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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

Original poster

Girlfriend being very unreasonable

81 replies

Lostfound21 · 02/08/2021 13:10

Hi,

On Saturday night I went for a drink in my town since Feb 2020. I met one friend who was home for the weekend and two friends who live in the town who I hadn't had a drink with in 18 months. Since Covid started this was the third time I had met some of my male friends without my girlfriend. I said she was welcome to come in Saturday but she said no and so I went in met my friends had a few drinks and waked home (we live separately). I had also told my girlfriend I was going to bring her into town for dinner and drinks the following night also.

All hell broke loose and she sent me messages giving out about me wanting to be one of the lads and that most men grow put of it by their 30s.and no woman would put up with it. I'm 46:and she is 37. It's the third time I've met my friends in 18 months and even before covid I only met them 3/4 times a year and I always ask my girlfriend if she wants to join us
She meets her friends for dinner and drinks occasionally and always tells me it's girls only and I'm not invited. It's not like we never do anything. In the last 2 months we have been on a week's holiday in a costal resort, been to Vienna for a weekend, been for dinner and drinks in a town nearby and had an extended sunday lunch with drinks in a gastro pub in her village and were going for dinner in my town last night before all hell broke loose.

I don't think I've done anything wrong but she is tearing strips off me since for meeting my friends

OP posts:
Hopingforabagofbuttons · 03/08/2021 06:24

This behaviour is so controlling and manipulative. You hardly ever go out by the sounds of it and when you do it doesn’t exactly sound like a night of wild excess. What does she want you to grow out of? Meeting up with your friends occasionally, not wanting to spend every waking moment hand in hand with her ?
The relationship sounds controlling and claustrophobic, I’d feel like I was being slowly suffocated.
This isn’t healthy behaviour at all I’d tell her you are going to continue to see your friends as and when you please, and if she’s going to continue with her unpleasant controlling behaviour then you will have to seriously reconsider your relationship as it’s not working for you. If she continues you know what you need to do.

MyOtherProfile · 03/08/2021 07:20

I'd want to ask her why she thinks it's ok for her to go out with her girl friends but not for you to go out with the guys.

Lots of my friends, including myself, wish our middle aged husbands would go out a bit more to the pub!

AhNowTed · 03/08/2021 07:37

OP you're doing a lot of over-explaining about your quiet nights out with the lads.

I hope to god your not justifying yourself like that to her.

You're fully entitled to go out and shouldn't need to pussy foot around her.

She's ridiculous and controlling, and you're sleep walking into giving her that control.

Stop it now!

Original poster
Lostfound21 · 03/08/2021 09:07

Hi all, I sent her a message saying that i don't deserve the hassle I've got about meeting my friend Saturday and that she is entitled to disagree but that living like this is not for me. Will see what comes back

OP posts:
MuseumGardens · 03/08/2021 09:22

She's not suitable girlfriend material. I'd end it if I were you. If she comes back to you all sweet and apologetic as she senses you might be thinking of ending it are you going to continue the relationship? I'd cut my losses if I were you. There's better people out there

bathsh3ba · 03/08/2021 10:23

I tend to be insecure in relationships and might be anxious about a partner being out like this, but I would do my very best not to show it, and if it slipped out, I'd immediately apologise. Her behaviour just sounds controlling, rather than rooted in insecurity, to my eyes.

I and my boyfriend are similar ages (I'm 39, he's 47). He doesn't go out much but it's perfectly normal to do so at our ages - she is talking rubbish!

Ruby0707 · 03/08/2021 13:20

@Lostfound21

Hi all, I sent her a message saying that i don't deserve the hassle I've got about meeting my friend Saturday and that she is entitled to disagree but that living like this is not for me. Will see what comes back
Good for you!
Umberellatheweatha · 03/08/2021 13:22

I wouldn't let it become a conversation. Just tell her you are done and have done with it. Don't sit about waiting for her to dictate how things move forwards (or don't). 'This doesn't work for me anymore so lets call it a day. Let me know when suits to have a friend collect my things/I'll drop your stuff off with your parents'. Done.

Lotsalotsagiggles · 03/08/2021 13:33

We're late thirties and I encourage my husband to go out with mates

I got out of and have a little one so ensure there is cover at these times

Men need to talk like women do, but they don't as much as text but they in the pub. If all this mental health stuff in the world should tell you it's that men need man time too? To open up, discuss things but also to support their friends who maybe need to offload or who are lonely and spend a lot of time alone

No one grows our of going to the pub? Why couldn't you have a drink now and again with your mates when 50 and 60? It's socialising, they see your friends and you should be have to apologise or feel like you can't

Every Friday and Saturday yes.... maybe I reasonable but this totally isn't!!

billy1966 · 03/08/2021 13:53

Good for you.

Why would you want such unnecessary stress and hassle in your life from someone you are dating?

When/where/for how long you see friends when you are not with her is 100% none of her business.

Most people of either sex would not entertain this for even a minute.

LtDansleg · 03/08/2021 14:05

So she’s jealous, controlling and a bit abusive. This is a ridiculous reaction to your partner meeting his mates for a drink. I agree with the pp who said you sound like you’re having to try and justify spending time with your friends. Please don’t move in with this woman, she’ll make your life a living hell.

LtDansleg · 04/08/2021 20:10

What was her response to you?

Purplegrape23 · 04/08/2021 20:16

@Lostfound21 gosh she sounds awful, poor you. You don’t deserve it especially as you seem to make time for your relationship.

You’re in your late 40s, so you really want to be doing this even in your 50s? She’ll only get more controlling as time goes on.

Eddielzzard · 04/08/2021 20:17

Well done. Of course she's unreasonable. First it's your friends, next your family

Shellfishblastard · 04/08/2021 20:33

I love spending time with my friends - I have children and a lovely DH who are my priority but spending time with my friends is important to me. My DH would never complain about this and I would never prevent him from meeting up with friends either.

Original poster
Lostfound21 · 04/08/2021 21:07

@LtDansleg

What was her response to you?
She accused me of gaslighting and trying to manipulate her. Needless to say it's over. She was always a bit controlling and demanding and I tippy toed around it for a long time but she has got way worse in the last few months basically telling me to move in and its off and that I should step up and be a father to her 11 and 14 year old (from a deadbeat dad) and that its a mans job to provide and lots of other stuff. Last weekend was just the icing on the cake.
OP posts:
66babe · 04/08/2021 21:21

Good ... go plan a fab weekend doing exactly what you like with who you like
Celebrate... the witch is gone 🎉

Original poster
Lostfound21 · 04/08/2021 22:11

@66babe

Good ... go plan a fab weekend doing exactly what you like with who you like Celebrate... the witch is gone 🎉
I am a bit upset over it but I also feel kind of happy. Very strange
OP posts:
66babe · 04/08/2021 22:29

That's natural , you will feel sad that the time and energy you invested in a relationship has now ended
But better days are coming , someone will treat you as an equal one day then you will see how lucky you are to be free from this one
You'll be fine ❤️

billy1966 · 04/08/2021 22:46

Well done, you have dodged a real bullet.

Take a while to process honestly what she was like, and why you accepted it, before you dive right in again.

You sound like a nice man, no doubt you will meet someone nice too.

ElizabethChin · 05/08/2021 14:46

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LtDansleg · 05/08/2021 15:10

@ElizabethChin

Hey Lostfound21, this behavior certainly seems unreasonable, but you have to understand where she is coming from. Most likely she cares about you so much that she doesn’t want to share you with anyone, including your friends. Do you know how to tell that your girl hates you? It’s simple: she doesn’t answer your calls, doesn’t care where you are, what you’re doing, and so on. Do you know how to tell if she cares about you? She pulls off tricks like this one, gets jealous, and, of course, becomes unreasonable. You should definitely understand that she is motivated by love. Let me recommend you this article calmerry.com/blog/relations/think-your-girlfriend-hates-you-learn-the-reasons-why, where you can find more information on this matter. In the meantime, try to discuss with her why she feels that way. I wish you all the best!
That’s the biggest load of bollocks I’ve ever come across on here, and that’s saying something! It doesn’t matter how much you care about them, it should NEVER manifest itself into jealousy , possessiveness and abuse! Abuse is abuse pure and simple, it’s not ‘oh they love you so much that you’re literally never allowed to spend any time with anyone else, ever’. I love my oh so much I’d die for him, he’s still allowed to see his friends 🙄
LtDansleg · 05/08/2021 15:13

Going by your update op, so not only are you not allowed to see your friends, she also wants you to play dad to her teenage/teen daughters and provide for you all. What a pisstaker 😂 she doesn’t want a partner. She wants a slave/skivvy/workhorse.

ZestyMaximus · 05/08/2021 16:34

Um, Elizabeth? What the hell horseshit did you just post?! That's one huge load of victim blaming crap.

Do you also think that it's super romantic and shows love for someone when people kill their exes and children because they can't bear the though of anyone else 'having them'? After all, it's only because they love them soooo very much they can't bear to be without them or think of them having a life (literally!) without them right? Poor murdering, abusive lambs.

Perhaps the partners of those who get beaten to a pulp after having the audacity to have a life outside of the relationship, are only showing strong, loving tendencies? Those lucky people hiding their battered faces from friends and phoning into work sick again so no one sees.

Or maybe those who tell their partners that they will kill them /someone they love if they ever leave them are acting out of pure love? What a beautiful thing to behold! We should all be so lucky eh?

The examples I give above are extreme, I'll grant you. But the behaviour you're excusing and labelling as love is how all of the above examples tend to start out. Coercion, possessiveness, jealousy, demands and threats are not traits of love. They're abuse.

Seriously, stop. This is exceptionally harmful.

TheFoundations · 05/08/2021 16:52

@ElizabethChin

So, if somebody treats you badly, then assume it's love?

Can you see no other ways in which a person could display their positive emotions? Healthy ways?

The article you recommend is very poorly written.

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