Is he jerking my chain or is it me?

[Moreshoesthanimeldamarcos]

Have name-changed for this.

Basically I've been seeing a guy for 7 months. I'm divorced and he's properly separated (I know this to be true). He is the first bloke I've been out with since my divorce a year ago. He'd been dating for a while and started sooner than me. We're the same age with grown DC's and live about an hour apart.
So. In the beginning it was exciting and romantic and he treated me like I was the best thing ever. Charming, generous and so on, bowled me over in fact, even though I doubted anyone can be THAT great. He fell in love quite quickly, I followed soon after and he's been spending time with me doing all kinds of stuff so I haven't been a booty call in any (obvious) way.

I have lots of RL mates and a good career, I'm independent financially and I love to go out and socialise. He is currently out of work and self employed, it bothers him, and he doesn't have friends because he wanted to be a family man. He comes along with me when I go out but it's most often me who suggests what we do and tbh if I didnt' do that I think we'd spend all weekend indoors.

I feel like I've taken most of the responsibility for the relationship. He never makes plans ahead of time (and i'm talking days, literally) but he always likes to know where I am and what I'm doing. Despite what he says about being committed to me and a future together his calls and texts have simply tailed off in the last few days and I've got to the point where I'm pissed off with making the first move and asking if he's coming down even though he'll probably say yes. I often feel like I'm being controlled even though I can't quite put my finger on how, but I do feel that way. He's also told me he hates arguments which kind of paralyses my wish to assert myself because he isn't actually doing anything WRONG as such.

What do you wise women (and men, if there are any here who aren't watching football) think?

You've gone off at a bit of a tangent, OP. Whilst I think if you have been 'dumped' you've had a lucky escape, it's equally possible this is what he wants you to think, to keep you drawn into his mind game.

I would make things crystal clear with him so you know in your own mind it has ended; at the moment control of the relationship is still with him - because you are allowing it to be so.

x posted with you Chandon. Interesting take, but the only way to do that is to make contact with him. I know him quite well and my guess is he's going to sit this out until I give in and of course I've given him every reason to be angry with me because I didn't tell him how i was feeling and I've not contacted him today.

Thing is, i began to hear myself asking for more and more reassurance from him that he loves me, really intends to live together etc?and when I did challenge him his response was off.

Believe me i am an educated and well experienced woman. But this is all new to me.

I've given him every reason to be angry with me because I didn't tell him how i was feeling and I've not contacted him today.

Er .. WTF?

This is the bit where I think your tangent starts: when I did challenge him his response was off.

So you'd had a conversation with him? And now he is withholding contact ...

It's the wine tribpot.

But i didn't think of it like that. That's so insightful. HE doesn't like to feel he's being controlled!

Right.

when i've made a serious challenge like 'how can you have known you loved me after only two weeks' ( a few weeks ago) or him telling me to stop it when I was angry when he said he'd gone off me but still likes my hair and bum (the other day).

Oh there's loads. But after last night when I said I was going out with friends after he hadn't been in contact all day (in the context of ever decreasing contact from him) there's been nothing.

Well done for writing these things down and asking for opinions. (non-patronising well done by the way!)

IME the things that you feel you can't tell your rl friends are usually red/somethimes amber flags.

OK maybe my original post should have read:

Does this make my bloke a dodgy, bad person?

Telling me on the first date it was his wedding anniversary (although he's so over it)

Denying he's racist after telling the worst racist joke I've ever heard and me being visibly shocked.

Being homophobic/sexist etc

Getting into my life but i can't get into his because his DC's don't accept the marriage is over.

Feast or famine finances (currently famine)

Hugely charming and complimentary, I'm the one, he's made his commitment to me.

Why am i even asking? I know don't I?

It makes him a complete and utter fuckwit, and I would be very skeptical about exactly how over his marriage really is

I don't think you need to tell us that there are many undesirable things about this man, why would you want to be with a man who is sexist, homophobic, racist (it's what you do that counts), has 'traditional' views on women, slags other women off, do I need to go on? And that's without starting on why he has no friends and hasn't introduced you to any people who know him.

Honestly, after seven months, this is awful.

Being single, going to bed without this headfuck every night, has to be better.

Mumsy actually he introduced me to his brother and family some months ago and then admitted he'd known that his stbx would find out about me that way. Since then I haven't had an invitation to meet any other family.

Can i just say again that this reads so badly about me and my ability to discern the good from the bad - but i've been out of the dating game for a VERY long time!!!

Could you do something for me, please OP? Bolt your doors now. I'd feel a lot happier if I thought he couldn't get in tonight.

He knows you come on this site, does he?

It is very, very difficult, OP, to spot these red flags when they're in your own life. I think all of us have experience of that in one way or another (I had a boyfriend at uni who announced I had been unfaithful but that he forgave me - why I didn't just laugh in his face and tell him to go fuck himself I have no idea). There are some absolutely classic signs in your story (feast and famine, overwhelming emotion at the start, absolutely appalling behaviour smoothly manipulated into you over-reacting to a joke, constant denigration of other women designed to put you in your place / remind you of what will displease him). And that's before we start on the sneaking up on you, the you not being allowed to be on Skype unless he knows what you're doing, him wanting to know where you are all the time, your genuine concern that he might catch you on MN tonight.

It's like catching a fish. If they just threw the hook straight at you you'd run away (well, swim away I suppose) in fear. So they bait it. And you take a nibble, and then little by little they reel you in. Put all in one place it seems pretty obvious the guy is very bad news. But you didn't put it all in one place until now - and fortunately it's not too late to swim off the hook for good.

Tribpot is spot on OP - if it was as obvious as some people like to think then no-one would ever end up hurt, scared and trapped in an abusive relationship. His behaviour says nothing about you - your doubts and realisation speak volumes - you can get out before it's too late ad you were aware enough and think enough of yourself to do it.

7 months is not a lot in the grand scheme of things. Is it a hard and hurtful realisation? Yes but so, so, so, so, much better for you in the long run.

I wouldn't go near him with a 10 foot pole from the top of an elephant. I would make sure he has no means of access to my house as he seems the type to get broody and vindictive because you slighted him while having the bloody cheek to be a woman. You're bloody lucky you're totty...

Onwards and upwards to somebody that deserves you.

He's gone off you but he still likes your bum and your hair? How fucking disrespectful

Listen, OP, I have had one of these. It wasn't a long term thing, 4/5 months altogether, but I was like you, strong, confident, feisty. And you know what, he almost turned me into someone rocking in a corner.

I posted here at the time, and the women here helped me to get rid of the cunt. Something someone said on my thread (I think it was Anyfucker) that these men like the strong confident ones, because they're that bit harder to crack, it's a better challenge.

I would strongly recommend that you get rid of him. He'll get the shock of his life, mind, but I honestly think, just based on what you've written here, that you are endangering your emotional health.

Well now I'm thinking a lot more realistically i know he's not going to come to my house. I am safe, I know i am tonight, and i will change the locks tomorrow. if he's going to do anything tonight he's going to be sitting at home on a dating site but he won't come here. I know that.

That's the whole point of my starting this thread tribpot. I simply don't know where my stuff ends and his begins. I really don't. But whatever. He isn't for me - I fell for all the stuff which mn says we shouldn't

Moreshoes I would like to say well done for spotting this crap just 7 months in, while you are still dating. How many of us have ignored our feelings for longer than that? I know I have in the past.

You might be new to dating but you just proved two things with this post - you have good instincts and you are able to listen to them.

You'll find a good 'un in the end.

Alright then, I get rid and what do I say? I've been to the baggage reclaim site and i know it's no good listing all the things i think is wrong.

And I still think i could be wrong. but that's what is so addictive about this isn't it? (plus i've had more wine )

agree with pew and to add--you have good instincts, you are able to listen to them,........ you are able to share them, ask for support/advice and act upon them...

Say you just don't think it's working. The spark isn't there for you. All that old shit. He doesn't need it all spelling out, just make it sharp and clean.

He won't make it easy for you though. Men like this won't believe the cheek of you.

my DS thinks this guy is genuine (he has never had a proper relationship yet though - even as an adult).
my DD likes him even as she doesn't like the way he monopolises me sometimes and she feels stressed about his 'humour' at times (oh god).

This reads badly. I know it does. he has never been nasty to any of my DS's in fact he has told them 'get used to me, i'm not going anywhere' - yet where is he, why hasn't he even made an effort to see if there's anything wrong? i wonder if it's me with the problem and not him even if he's not mr perfect.

what you say is right. it was horrible and disrespectful to say that, even as a joke. it really hurt. and I'm angry about that. i should be too.

He said he wasn't going anywhere and they should get used to him?

Stop thinking you are the problem, will you?

I had had an argument with mine one day about sex. He said I was too much and that he had better things to do than to be feeling me up all day. It escalated into this dreadful row where he said some horrible things.

We sort of made up and I said I was going to have a bath - he said 'make sure you have a good wash - I might want to go in there later '

I was so hurt and angry. That's when I started to question the relationship, and it just went from bad to worse. When I finished it, he was dreadful, manipulative and horrible. I had to change my number and threaten him with the police.

he has never been nasty to any of my DS's in fact he has told them 'get used to me, i'm not going anywhere'

Read that back to yourself objectively, OP. It sounds horrible!

why hasn't he even made an effort to see if there's anything wrong?

Because he's punishing you for saying you're going out with friends. Because he's punishing you for questioning how he could have been in love with you inside of two weeks. Because he wants you wondering why he isn't calling, it keeps you on the hook, it keeps you wondering if it's your fault.

Keep being angry, I think you may find there is quite a lot you've bottled up or put down to a misunderstanding or to an overreaction.

i will not see myself as the problem. but this is hurting nonetheless. it was lovely to begin with and it helped me get over the awful betrayal of my now ex h.

I am horrified at your post serendipitous as I am at the red flag thread. I have never been hit or abused in the way some of the posters describe so i feel a bit of a wuss but I KNOW THIS IS NOT RIGHT.

tribpot yes. that's how it feels. to 'love' someone genuinely is not to punish them. i think i am punishing him for all i have described and he is punishing me too.

i have bottled up a lot and it feels like it wants to come out. but it wasn't all him, i know i have played my own part.

That's why I'm posting on this thread love - it's subtle, so subtle.... You barely notice it until you get a moment of clarity, and then some of that stuff is blindingly obvious. It's insidious.

Mine was nice to my kids too. One night, my ds had cut his head open on a glass-topped coffee table and I had to take him to A&E - and I didn't even get a phone call all night asking how he was. He didn't even ask after him the next day. That was my moment of clarity, I genuinely realised that actually, he just didn't really give a fuck.