Hiya,
I just want to talk to some women about this. I was with a man, we broke it off, several months later I joined a dating website and was posting on here about a man I had met, and we met last week Friday and have been talking and seeing each other all week.
But there were red flags - he was always lecturing me, I felt he made things 'difficult' and a couple of things he had said bothered me. I knocked it on the head Friday, we were meant to be seeing each other that night. But he won me round and I did go to see him and we ended up having a really lovely time. I concluded that I had been intimidated by his career and his achievements, which are almost out of this world to me. And he is a great artist as well. On Friday night, he was showing me stuff that really impressed me. And he said he liked books and art and intellectual discussion.
So we then went up to London last night to birthday drinks for one of my girl friends and her friends, who are a group of mid 30s professionals who all have a bit about them and know how to behave. They were all very impressed by the man I brought, impeccably dressed, handsome. But when he started to open his mouth it all went wrong.
First off on the drive up there, he drove too fast and I was scared. And he eye balled a man who had pulled in front of us. I thought 'Oh no, your intuition was right, this man likes to be the boss.'
At several points in the evening I could see people baulking at what he said, and he was saying stuff about how he wasn't used to having to wait at the bar, he didn't usually go to these sorts of places where people jostled for space, he was going to be someone's boss and that's what they were paying him to do. I also caught him introducing himself to my friend's male friend, and he had told me that men compete with him because he is large stature, but the way he said hello to the man told me that he was the one who was competitive.
The later on, after midnight, we were now in a crowded salsa bar. I saw the other roll their eyes when our part of the group arrived. I was embarrassed. We went to the back and ordered some food, very informal. Strangers were coming and going, people they all knew, and to me that is great and I was chatting to them and inviting them to sit. But my friend said he asked the man who he thought he was. 'Um excuse me, we're all eating here!!'
Anyway I have a habit of not listening to this sort of intuitive feeling and I didn't want to make that mistake again. But I broke my cardinal rule of safety, about how to get home if you have to escape, and I was drunk and without my car. We had a fight after we left and I told him that he had set himself up as king pin, and I hadn't liked it, and so on. He said he would drive me home and not speed, and he didn't, people passed us all the way home and he drove very safely.
But when we got back to HIS place, not mine, he started shouting at me and doing this funny thing where he bent his knees and gesticulated wildly, going 'Was it a nice thing to do, yes! But no, YOU think I'm a dick! You think I did wrong!' and so on. I had my phone in my hand and thought to ring 999 and say quickly 'I'm in trouble, can you send a cab to XYZ.' I got my stuff and stood up and left, asked him to get me a cab, he calmed down seeing I was going to leave, I thought 'Jekyll and Hyde.'
In the end I lay down as tho to crash on the sofa and he made me tea and then he said I had to come to bed, so I did, but I put pjs on and slept immediately. This morning I wasn't in the mood at all for the inevitable lecture about why I was wrong and he was actually alright. Luckily he did drive me home and I looked out of the window and let him go on about how I turn things to poison and didn't try to say anything.
Sorry this is so long, I just have to get it off my chest.
I think he was controlling. And as for that behaviour with the strange shouting last night. He then got on the floor and prostrated himself to me, saying 'Look I'm keeping myself nice and low, you don't have to be frightened of me.'
All I was looking for was to find a normal man who can behave normally. Does anyone else think this behaviour is strange.