Boyfriend is driving me mad!

[Booboo1020]

Name changed as some of my friends use this site and know my username.

Just need to rant really.

My boyfriend and I have been together 2 years and are moving in together in October. At the moment we only get to see each other 3 evenings per week. He has lots of good qualities and I do really love him.
HOWEVER, he can be extremely irritating at times and it’s starting to really make me pissed off.

For example - last night I was exhausted after a very stressful week at work and I also had bad period cramps and was just wanting to cuddle up and relax with him. I put some music on and he starts singing along loudly in a silly voice. This is funny for about 5 minutes but soon became really irritating when he wouldn’t stop for ages and I had to tell him to ssh. I then try and cuddle in and kiss him and he starts pulling really ugly faces to try and make me laugh. Again, funny for 5 mins but when he wouldn’t stop I had to tell him (in a jokey way) to stop being so annoying. When I was trying to kiss him he was doing things like prodding me, pretending there’s a spider on me, tickling me, licking my face, putting on silly accents, or just kissing me in an OTT way. I can’t have any sort of normal conversation with him when he’s being like this either as i’ll Just get daft responses to whatever I’m saying. He was clearly finding it all highly amusing so I just rolled over and said I was going to sleep and turned the light off (all of this had been going on for over two hours now).
This happens fairly regularly and it really annoys me as we hardly get anytime together and I feel like it just wastes our time when we could be having a nice, relaxing evening.
Other times it can be really great and we have an amazing sex life and get on very well. But at the moment it feels like 50% of our time is spent with him acting ridiculous (he’s a 34 year old man!)
It’s funny to be silly together sometimes but not for the whole evening when we haven’t seen each other for a few days and I’m exhausted and not feeling well.
I’ve spoken about it to him before and he always apologises and says he’ll not do it as much. A week or so later he’s back to doing it though and it’s driving me mad. It’s making me start to dread seeing him after work when I’m tired, and I’m now having doubts that I could cope with living with him.
Sometimes when he arrives at my house, the first thing he’ll do is start prodding and tickling me and it will instantly put me in a bad mood.
Maybe we just aren’t as compatible as we first seemed.
Would this annoy you too or am I being a bit harsh? I told him this morning in a very direct way that it’s pushing me away and he apologised again but no doubt he’ll be back to doing it by next week

Buy him a colouring book and some pens. When he start irritating you tell him to buggar off to the colouring table. Go have a long bath...
Would drive me nuts.

Or ltb.

What do you get out of this relationship now, what is in this for you?.

I would cancel the whole ideal of moving in with him.

On a wider level should you and he be together at all now?. He does this because he can. Prodding and tickling you like he is doing is not acceptable and you've talked to him about this too. He continues to do this even after you've spoken to him. Does he act similarly around other people with accompanying sing song voices and dodgy accents?. My guess is that he does not.

He's not respecting your boundaries, and disregarding your feelings. I wouldn't move in with someone like this - or even want to be with them.

@atilla i’d Say about 50% of the time he doesn’t act like this at all around me and we have great chat together and he’s very intelligent, affectionate, loving etc.
But when he’s in a silly mood then it’s just relentless and he will.not.stop!

Maybe we just aren’t as compatible as we first seemed.

I think this is it...2 years is the timeline of when the reality of the relationship hits.
If you are posting about it then its a big problem, he seems unable to handle your emotional needs so reacts with "silliness". Or he may not want to offer you what you need i.e normal affection, sympathy etc.

At 34 this will be him as not likely to change.What was his childhood like?

You are out growing him

This sounds familiar. Have you posted about this before?

He is telling you who he is.

He doesn't respect your feelings now and that is not going to change.

Feel relieved that you know now before your tied to a home with him.

If you don't want to break up tell him that you need more time before you move in together.

@lifebegins think he had quite a difficult childhood as his dad was physically aggressive with him. He’s been in 3 long term relationships before me and all of them ended it with him (not the other way round) so I’m assuming he’s like this in every relationship.

@Harriett no I’ve never posted about this before

Well he sounds like a total irritant and I couldn't be doing with it.

I think you are going to end up very irritated living together. And its going to be frustrating beyond belief if he deflects everything serious into being silly (if thas what he is doing). He may not be doing that, but if he is then you'll be posting here in a years time asking how you can discuss X without him making a joke of it.
And you'll inevitably end up feeling like the adult who is telling him off, making you feel mean and guilty.

Agree, you are outgrowing him already. I would have a serious conversation about how the relentless sillyness is making you feel and if it doesn’t stop... just don’t move together.

I did... the stupid sillyness was just a sign of worse things to come. The sillyness stopped thankfully in no time, but he was not able to “read” body language, empathise or be sympathetic to other people’s feelings. I seemed to spend those 10 years always excusing his behaviour with one person or another... very draining.

Run while you can.

He is repeating what he already knows; his childhood and now you are on the receiving end of that. These women ended their relationship with him for likely the same behaviours as you are now describing. He really does not respect you at all.

If he is annoying now, what do you think it will be like when you are living together 24/7?

Don't.

I can't help thinking it's a deep-seated psychological device to push you/his partner away.

That could take some serious excavations in therapy to sort out - or perhaps just plain couples counselling. Would you both be up for that?

Couldn't be dealing with that! He'd have to go.

That 50% of the time is him being himself and the other 50% is toning it down for you because you’re constantly nagging him.

You need to accept him as he is and stop trying to fix him. There’s nothing wrong with him wanting to be silly. It’s just not compatible with your personality. It will be with someone else’s though.

As to him not being interested in your advances and you keeping at him and throwing a strop when he didnt return them... maybe stop annoying him? He didn’t want to kiss and cuddle on the sofa.

I agree with everyone else, it sounds exhausting. Not being annoying and childish 50% of the tone isn’t enough for you. It wouldn’t be for me.

He won’t change. For some reason, this is just how he behaves, it’s kike he’s testing you and putting you in the position of a parent. I’ve got a friend who’s boyfriend is in his mid 40s who’s like this. Not tickling and prodding but incessant joking, play fighting, endless silliness. It’s tiring to be around for an evening and he’s a nice man who can also be thoughtful and interesting but it’s like he’s afraid to be too much like that because then he’ll realise he’s actually an adult so mid conversation he’ll suddenly start arsing around and being a prat and ruins it. For now, she tends to roll her eyes and laugh awkwardly but it’s wearing me down and I can see her starting to get properly pissed off down the line that he won’t fucking grow up, listen, be serious for more than 10 minutes at a time. She wants babies and if it happens she’ll end up with him an extra child to look after and she’ll have seen it coming!

Please don’t move in together.

It sounds like a simple case of incompatibility. No one at fault.

It sounds like he can't deal with the raw vulnerability of intimacy. Whether he knows it or not - and he probably doesn't to an extent - he's engineering the situation so that you push him away, which is what a part of him wants. I'd call it a day, because it won't get any better.

He is too old for this behaviour. Sounds immature and juvenile.
I do love a funny man but when he takes to the point of upsetting you it's not funny anymore.
Have a make or break talk and see if you can get to the bottom of why he doesn't quit when asked.
It would drive me nuts. I don't even expect that from my 12 year old.

I think he’s picking up on you being ‘tired’, and his silly behaviour is his anxious way of trying to improve your mood.

I could not handle this at all. Me and my dp are sometime playful with each other, but it would be exhausting with what you're having to deal with. I don't think you could handle living with him if you can't handle it just now.

@thestoic I was tired but I was in a perfectly upbeat mood as I usually am with him. I only started to get into a bit of a grump after a few hours had passed of him acting the way he was