fed up (bit long, sorry!)

[barmygirl]

so, this week, my DP was travelling south to see his DD - the only time he could see her for ages - a v good thing and he was looking forward to it lots. I was supposed to be going along too, because it's in a city that is cool to visit and we currently live in a tiny place with not much to do. It happened, too, that the day he was going to drive down was my birthday. That was all fine and it worked out that I wasn't working the next day so we would use the weekend to do nice things all together and that would be part of my birthday celebration too. We were all looking forward to it.

Problem is, the evening before my birthday, he was being really annoying and ranting belligerently at anything and everything and being generally provocative and I lost my patience and tried to get him to stop ranting. Not a row or anything, I was just telling him I was fed up with it. I didn't feel I'd done or said anything particularly bad and it wasn't meant to be horrid or nasty, I was just tired of his arrogant, superior attitude towards everyone else (how it seemed to me). He then went into a massive sulk and said I wasn't invited with him that weekend and didn't want me to go. He also said he'd not bought me a birthday card and then refused to speak to me or let me speak to him the rest of the evening.

The next day I left for work without really seeing him, and waited all day for a birthday text from him. Nothing. Went home. He came home. Didn't acknowledge me or the fact it was my birthday. He then said he'd been waiting all day for an apology from me for the previous night. I wasn't aware I was supposed to apologise as I didn't really think I'd done anything wrong! I said I'd felt hurt that he'd not texted happy birthday. He left. I went out to get myself something nice for my solo birthday tea. He texted saying if i really wanted to come I'd better be ready. But I was at the supermarket and hadn't packed or anything, and the text wasn't especially inviting and he was sulky and sullen and I didn't want to spend hours in a car like that and felt hugely unwanted. it was my birthday to boot!

He drove down south in the fog and nasty weather and didn't let me know he'd arrived safe and sound. No texts. The next morning I got one text saying he was going to see the film we were planning to go to together but he was going with another woman (along with his daughter and prob the other woman's kids)and how others were trying to set him up with this woman and she was rich and etc etc.

He then sent more texts but I couldn't bring myself to read them.

Am now feeling fed up and lonely and am not sure I've done anything wrong at all. Hate how he's made me feel rubbish over my birthday weekend and have tried to do nice things to cheer myself up, but am fed up as he's now having a great time with all his family and I'm not sure he's even told them that it was my birthday.

Am p'd off.

No one else to talk to so I'm afraid it's all come out here!! Sorry!

It sounds like he set you up to ruin your birthday, consciously or unconsciously. Does this sort of thing happen a lot around days that are supposed to be special?

He sounds a right childish asshole regarding the texts about this wonderful other woman. I think you should suggest he stays down there with her.

Thanks Kodachrome. Yes, New Year's Eve - similar sort of thing on all levels. I did actually think that he'd somehow done it to spoil my birthday - unconsciously, I think. He is like a petulant child quite often, but then blames me for all of it, whatever happens.

Am trying not to let it ruin my birthday and went out and did nice things today! Trouble is, I've not been here v long and have no friends to talk to or spend time with. My family is at the other end of the country, so I can't even pop over to see them.

Have treated myself to a nice tea and a few glasses of white wine to cheer myself up! I just had to vent a wee bit on here, so it's not going round and round in my head quite so much.

I have some red flags popping up.

How long have you been with him?

4 years. He's always been difficult but recently it's been getting better. It's just these less frequent 'flare-ups' that seem now to happen with long stretches of things being good. Things have been stressful recently due to financial probs and work stress, and so this weekend was supposed to be the 'big one' where we could have fun before completely economising until the summer. I feel like he's sabotaged it but only for me!

He sounds like a particularly nasty child. He did this on purpose and I can't see why other than his own immaturity and self-absorption.

The text messages that were supposed to make you feel jealous and shitty are a particularly low blow. No, in fact, deliberately ruining your birthday is worse. Christ, it's all mean and low. Do you have any ideas about why he does things like this?

Have things been better because you've changed your behaviour and avoided things you know will set him off?

It's absolutely true that he has sabotaged it for you, and you alone. He's fine, he's great - he's gone to see a film he knew you wanted to see, he's boasting about being out with another woman, he's effectively told you his family or friends think he should be with someone else, he's left you on your own on your birthday knowing you're without any support network to keep you company.

He's thoroughly punishing you for having the audacity to question his behaviour. He doesn't sound like a nice man. He sounds a bit like a narc.

Not sure really. He's v intelligent and is very very psychologically astute, but sometimes uses it in mean ways. He's sometimes done things to actually ruin things for himself, too. It's really weird. His upbringing was very much punctuated by big fights and etc from what I understand, so I think for him rowing is the norm, whereas for me it's the opposite, but I don't know why he has this need to spoil things and make people miserable. He has a fab relationship with his daughter and sometimes it's hard watching him be like that with her and therefore know he has that capability but is unable to apply it to close adult relationships. (if that makes sense? obviously I mean it's brilliant how he is with his daughter)

Aw barmy - that does all sound very mean and childish and I am sorry you are now stuck on your own for your birthday weekend. That sucks.

Could he have sabotaged it 'cause he really wanted the time just him and DD and those around her?

I wouldn't have minded it if it'd been a transparent thing. He has been desperate to see his daughter for ages and really misses her, and this was the only time he could go and see her, so of course I don't mind that. I just wish he'd maybe bought me a card, or made some kind of effort to do something with me first and then gone to see her if he wanted to see her alone. But he's never not wanted me there with him and his daughter before, we usually all have a great time together, so I don't really understand it to be honest.
i dunno.
I think he just wants to be in control of everything and really believed I'd jump in the car with him even after he'd ignored me etc, so I think it shocked him when I didn't, so now he's trying to get back at me for not doing what I was supposed to! (according to his rules) Trouble is, it's me that ends up with the rubbish birthday!

Can you zip off and go surprise some of your family/friends? Get on a bus or something?

Thanks, but sadly I can't. It's more of a plane trip to see my family! I really couldn't be living any further away! And I'm too skint to travel anywhere far.

Feel a bit better for having talked to you all on here, though. Just to get things down and realise I'm not being unreasonable!

I shall have another glass of wine and think happy thoughts!

Happy birthday.

Why don't you arrange a night out with friends for the evening he's due home?

TBH, if you don't find a massive bouquet on your doorstep in the morning with a sorry card attached, I'd be counting the days to telling him to sling his hook. He did it at new year, on your birthday; what's the next celebration? Be prepared for it then too.

Thanks Jux : )

i don't have any friends here, though, unfortunately, as I've not been here v long.

I think I'll just practice emotional detachment. But easier said than done, esp when he's a v charismatic person and who takes up a lot of space, IYSWIM.

I shall lower my expectations to 0 though

This just looks like a stupid competition to see who ignores the other the most, or who makes the other feel more hurt. Instead of lowering your expectations to 0, why don't you increase them to 100 by leaving that horrible man and looking for a better one?

He does sound like a narc-type. Taking up lots of space, all the attention, and expecting the world to revolve around him. You'd do much better to stop taking up space in his life and leg it out, rather than accepting zero from him and staying.

Why are you with him? He sounds nasty and entitled.

I hope you haven't got kids with him. I hope if you haven't got kids with him that you are using belt-and-braces contraception. I hope you dump him on his arse.

Agree with aurynne why lower your expectations to being treated like crap and ignored at best or deliberately hurt at worse?

Don'y you think you are worth and deserve much better treatment than this?

Please raise your expectations. You deserve a partner who thinks your birthday is important, who thinks you are important and acts accordingly.

In fact, unless you have anything invested in the house you're in and you have children, I'd say pack your bags and go.

His attitude to you seems to me to be one where you're there to see to his convenience, make his life easy by picking up the shit, but where he has to make no effort to reciprocate, and if by chance you make his life a little bit harder (asking him to stop ranting, for instance) then you are no longer fulfilling the role he has put you in and thinks n oohing of casting,you off.

Google narcissistic personality disorder.

Prepare to be shocked at how many boxes he ticks.

If you are, get away fast.

Thanks everyone. Charbon, I did google NPD and he does often seem to fit that.

Things basically went v wrong last night, too. He got back yesterday evening and had bought me a birthday card and some flowers, which was a lovely thing. He was very chatty and happy and gave me a big hug etc. Then we went to the pub for a drink. It was going OKish until he asked me, quite cheerily and genuinely, what I'd done this weekend. I sort of just looked at him. The reason this weekend away was supposed to be so good, was because where we currently live is a small place - v nice etc - but there is nothing to do at the weekends.It's the kind of place where you need lots of money to be able to do things (cinema is an expensive train ride away, the town here is a small market town with basically just a big supermarket and not a huge amount else). Neither of us particularly like living here because we both love theatre, cinema, going to cafes etc. So, anyway, I told him I'd been to the cinema. Then on saturday I had a coffee in the pub and read the paper. I like doing things by myself so am usually quite happy to do those kind of things, but not this weekend. He then smiled and said 'well, it sounds like you had a nice weekend'. I just though 'omg' in my head and felt v unhappy and unable really to speak. This then annoyed him and he said there was no point sitting there if i was going to be unhappy. He had a point, but it was difficult to feel really cheery at that moment.

We went home and he sulked some more and I said let's start again and start afresh this evening and be nice to each other etc. I tried to be chattier and etc, but he still was sulking.

The evening basically got worse and ended in a big row. To top it all off, he said that he'd booked me a surprise meal in our favourite restaurant (in the city he'd just been to) for my birthday and was going to get his parents to look after his DD and take me out and that I'd spoiled it all! First, he has never ever booked a meal in a restaurant, he's never surprised me with anything, he's never done anything for any of my birthdays before (I've organised and mostly paid for everything that we've done for my birthdays). And being taken out like that was something I'd have loved. But how would I know that he'd done that? If he'd done that, why not invite me properly on the trip instead of stropping off and not speaking to me?

In bed, he kept trying to touch me but I kept flinching because I was too upset and he then kept yelling how I was humiliating him and embarrassing him. I went and slept on the sofa but he kept coming to get me back and saying I shouldn't sleep there. Then once I was back in bed, he started arguing with me again. It was mad.

OMG - having looked at all the NPD stuff online, all of this recent behaviour does seem to fit. And I know if I told him any of that, he'd dismiss it and say it was all rubbish.

Am really fed up now and don't really know what to do.

This sounds just like my nutty ex right down to the expecting gratitude for stuff he "was going to do".

I doubt this is the first time he had behaved like this, in fact I would imagine you have known for a while something is not right and you are seeking some confirmation here.

He definitely sounds NPD, my ex is, amongst other things. No kids, not married, I would get the f*ck out if this pronto!

Do you need to be there? In a town where nothing happens except the offers at the supermarket, with a man who likes to say he was going to do something, an expensive train ride away from the things you enjoy?

How are you doing barmygirl?

What happens to threads like this? I sometimes worry for people - like this poster - then... well, nothing.

Did this girl post somewhere else? is she still in the land of the living? I hope the OP is ok now.

My guess is she's still being downtrodden by this pathetic, controlling twunt. OP if you're out there, if he's 'always been difficult' don't expect your next birthday to be any better.