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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Is this a huge thing...or am I being silly?

118 replies

ThunderInMyHeart · 09/09/2018 10:56

I appreciate my issue is tiny in comparison to other threads on this board, but it's been niggling me.

Last night I (31) was out with my boyfriend (30, dating a year, live together) and his friends for a friend's birthday celebration. Not a huge fan of this friendship group - they regularly go away for long weekends just to do drugs... BF has not been on the last few weekends (that have occurred whilst dating me) as he 'doesn't want to do drugs any more'. I hide the disdain for their lifestyles from the group. BF full well knows my thoughts.

BF has said for the last few months that he's going to look for a new job (we both are due to mortgage/house-buying reasons). I committed to the same thing and have been/am going through 4 different interviews processes; he, none. His CV hasn't even gone out. For context, I am already pulling double weight financially in that my salary is twice his.

He's childish when drunk i.e. says random unrelated sentences interrupting the other person talking. I feel like I have to paper/gloss over his bizarre interjections. Babysit him. It's embarrassing, but not that much of a biggie. But last night, him and the friends are jokingly flipping the bird at each other, just being fucking teenage. I’m just grinning and wishing I could go home…I’d had to go into the office that afternoon to work and on-top of the month of interviews I’ve been doing (with the aim of: buy house, get great mat package…being a grown-up), I just thought, ‘FFS. When is he going to grow up? He says he wants kids with me, buy a house etc, but, jesus. It feels like I’m the only one putting pen to paper…and he enjoys these shit-tastic nights out with these people’

Anyway, I’m chatting to one of his friends and enjoying the conversation, then I see my boyfriend at the bar talking to one of the girls in the group. He’s known her for maybe 4-5 years, but last saw her a year ago. They’re not best friends or even great friends. I see him wrap his arms around her waist, her arms over his shoulders, he’s lifting her up and bear-hugging. Her feet are dangling in the air and it’s full-body contact with her head in his neck. I was fuming, but had to restrain for the sake of not upsetting the party. When he came over to me, I said ‘that’s not cool what you did’…his reply: ‘oh you’re being ridiculous. She has a boyfriend’…as if her having a boyfriend makes a difference. What then pissed me off further was that he apologised to me, but then called me ridiculous for feeling how I did…so, in essence, a non-apology. He admitted that had a guy done that to me, he wouldn’t have liked it at all. In my book, that kind of a hug is 100% not appropriate.

I left the party about 15 minutes later. And part of me did think 'what else does he do when drunk? What else haven't I seen?' - as I said, he's immature when drunk...easily led. He is the classic example of a Bilbo Baggins 'I'm going on an adventure!' when he's drunk.

So, and I’m sorry this is so garbled, my questions are: i) would that hug have pissed you off? And ii) would you be concerned about his, in my eyes, immature lifestyle?

Other thoughts/answers obviously welcomed! Thank you.

OP posts:
RandomMess · 09/09/2018 11:39

The talking weird after drinking says to me he's also taken something drugs wise...

You're not compatible he'll likely end up a cocklodger whilst you do all the adult stuff!

ShrodingersSturdyPyjamas · 09/09/2018 11:41

I expect you were hoping that we would all say 'don't be silly'.

The only context I'd say that is don't be silly and buy a house with this man.

LotsToThinkOf · 09/09/2018 11:42

So apart from being poles apart in what you're ready for, you don't even sound compatible. He's all about being out with his friends and you feel that you have to tolerate them. If this was working you wouldn't really feel this way about his friends. I'm not saying you're in the wrong, you really aren't and their idea of fun doesn't sound like my idea of fun at all.

The part that concerns me is the first part of your OP, the part about him not wanting to do drugs anymore sounds a bit like he's saying he doesn't want to do drugs but he has to because that's what he and his friends do. Are you entirely sure he's stopped? Its not always obvious, I say this as someone who was in a relationship with a drug addict for many years before I actually realised (I'm not stupid, he seemed his normal self). It wasn't until the financial issues came to light that the whole sorry story came out.

I think you need to leave him, he's already not paying his way and unequal salaries only work when there's mutual respect, he doesn't sound like he respects you at all. This man child wont grow up, go and find someone worth your time.

TooMuchPenis · 09/09/2018 11:45

It's not the hug, it's the "he can get so shitfaced he doesn't speak properly" so he could really do just about anything couldn't he?

And it doesn't matter really if any of us think it's an issue. you do, and he even said he wouldn't like it, which does imply that he knows it wasn't appropriate.

He won't stop drinking, people like that don't. So when you've got your 2 year old and your 4 year old and you're staying up to babysit him and make sure he doesn't burn the house down while pissed and trying to make bacon at 2 am.

Or watching him get drunk in front of the friends you have only made because you've got kids the same age how will you feel?

TatianaLarina · 09/09/2018 11:49

You’re one of many grownup women trying to make something work with an immature twat.

Raise your expectations and keep looking, don’t waste any more time on this guy.

RainySeptember · 09/09/2018 11:49

"You're putting in £40K and he is putting in nothing."

Because he earns half what op does, but still has to pay 50% of household expenses.

And maybe he likes his job and doesn't really want another one.

I don't know. I've got two adult sons and if one of them said his gf had a whole long list of relationship conditions he had to fulfil I'd tell him to get out.

In fact if a woman posted here saying she was being made to change her job and being discouraged from important friendships, and being sneered at when drunk, and paying 50% of bills while earning a lot less, we'd all be saying 'red flags'.

HollowTalk · 09/09/2018 11:51

Come off it, @RainySeptember, this guy isn't worth arguing for!

AnyFucker · 09/09/2018 11:51

Do his friends do coke ? The weird interjections of conversations and grandiose hugging sound like he might have had a sniff.

You don't sound like you respect him much though so I don't really understand your position here.

KataraJean · 09/09/2018 11:52

Definitely don’t buy a house and have kids with this person.

I agree that bills should be split proportionately to your salaries if you are a couple, but I would question whether this person is the other half of the couple you should aspire to being in. You are saving what you have left over, his is going on drink and drugs. Your partner very much lives in the here and now, he may want children etc with you, but you will be the one to provide the security and stability.

Get a place you can afford on your own salary, and start looking for a man who has grown up. If you wait several years, then children will be out the window.

HollowTalk · 09/09/2018 11:52

discouraged from important friendships

What? Do you mean this one?

They’re not best friends or even great friends. I see him wrap his arms around her waist, her arms over his shoulders, he’s lifting her up and bear-hugging. Her feet are dangling in the air and it’s full-body contact with her head in his neck.

ThunderInMyHeart · 09/09/2018 11:53

He pays half the bills because it's the same amount he paid when he was flat-sharing with a friend. I was married and EXH definitely was a cocklodger and rinsed me of money, so, no, I'm not having it happen again. BF knows this.

I'm 100% he doesn't and hasn't taken drugs whilst with me.

Thank you for all your replies. Lots to think about.

OP posts:
ThunderInMyHeart · 09/09/2018 11:54

*whilst in a relationship with me

MN would also be telling a poster to protect her assets...and that's exactly what I'm doing with a 50:50 bill-split, not one based on equity.

OP posts:
Petalflowers · 09/09/2018 11:55

Maybe before you decide anything, you need to sit down and have a serious, grown-up conversation with him. Maybe force him into action. He has shown some signs of growing up, ie stopping/reducing drug taking, but maybe you see the next step sooner than he does. If you have only been together a year, it’s not that long to make huge lifelong decisions.

Badtasteflump · 09/09/2018 11:57

I would be leaving him for the first half of your post not the second

This with bells on. The hug may or may not be nothing, it doesn't matter.

What matters is that you have no ties to this man-child. Walk away while you can.

Rosemary46 · 09/09/2018 11:57

Well as long as he doesn’t take drugs with you , then that makes it ok, it won’t affect him at all.

Read Toomuchpenis post and ask yourself how you want you life to be a a few years.

Iwasjustabouttosaythat · 09/09/2018 11:58

How did you even meet? It sounds like you’re completely mismatched. It sounds like you’re settling because you want kids and a home so you want to change him. And fast.

Why would you be buying a house and having children with someone you barely know? It’s only been a year! You’re embarrassed by his attempts to make conversation with your friends, you don’t like his past and you don’t like his friends or how he interacts with them. Basically you want him to tow the line and become a different person. My suggestion would be that you actually find a different person who wants the same things as you and leave this guy alone. You will both disappoint each other horribly. Don’t get children involved in that.

RainySeptember · 09/09/2018 11:58

"What? Do you mean this one?"

No. More the entire friendship group :

"It's just this one group."

Inertia · 09/09/2018 12:00

It's not going to work out. He's about a decade behind you in terms of maturity.

If you're pissed off now when you're in pubs and have to put on a front to cover your annoyance with him being a dick when he's drunk, and you're worried about the drugs angle, just imagine how it's going to feel when those mates are coming back to your house to do drugs in your home while you're upstairs trying to settle a baby to sleep.

The hug might bother me depending on the circumstances, but the sheer bloody hypocrisy of him expecting you to accept behaviour from him that he wouldn't allow from you would make me livid.

This is who he is. You want children, consider very carefully whether you want to waste your fertile years waiting for him to stop playing at being a teenager.

Nanny0gg · 09/09/2018 12:04

MN would also be telling a poster to protect her assets...and that's exactly what I'm doing with a 50:50 bill-split, not one based on equity.

Protect assets yes - that's your 40k.

Splitting bills should be proportionate and it's financial abuse in a marriage when that doesn't happen and one partner is better off than the other.

TheVanguardSix · 09/09/2018 12:06

Didn't even have to get to the hug to wonder why you're even with this clown. Please take no offense from my comment. We've all had our clowns. But why court a cocklodger-in-waiting... with a drink problem?

Starlighter · 09/09/2018 12:06

The hug wouldn’t bother me. The rest of it would.

I couldn’t build my future with a man-child. You are so incompatible and at completely different stages in your life.

I suspect a lifetime of ‘niggles’ with this one. Not ready for a mortgage, not ready for marriage (can you imagine the stag do?!) not ready for a baby, not helping out... don’t do it!!!!

meowimacat · 09/09/2018 12:07

Do you know what? I had this and stayed. My ex was a liability when drunk, and once did something similar to the hug (dancing/grinding up to a girl friend on the dance floor) and I kicked off and he didn't get why I was upset. He was okay when sober, but drunk him was a liability. I stayed with him, he calmed down a bit and I thought we'd be ok. We had kids together. We then split because in reality even though he stopped that lifestyle he was still immature and we were both different and i ignored that. We did 50/50 bills too.

Your guy isn't going to stop seeing those friends, he isn't going to stop drinking. The more you get him to be how you want, the more you'll change him from the person he is and eventually he'll resent you for that/act out even more when drunk. Even if he sees them less he will still see them, there will be times (like stag do's) where you won't be invited and have to trust he's being good.

All I would say is this post screams that you are both different people, and you need someone a bit more mature and with their shit together. There is no way I would get a mortgage with someone when I have all the money for that. Just be warned. I stupidly got involved and had kids and everything, makes it a lot worse later down the line.

0ccamsRazor · 09/09/2018 12:09

How do you feel Op, when reading these replies?

What do you want to do about this situation?

Dieu · 09/09/2018 12:10

You don't sound at all compatible. Get out now while it's still straightforward to do so. And next time (I mean this kindly) wait a bit longer before moving in together. Good luck with everything.

ThunderInMyHeart · 09/09/2018 12:12

He knows my username and saw me typing on this thread and cane to talk to me. So, I can’t really detail on here my thoughts, Occam

It’s a pretty unanimous thread though

OP posts: