How much importance do you give to your "type"?

[stuckstucknamechangestuck]

Currently in a great relationship - we get on brilliantly, good chemistry, good communication and in many ways a much better fit for each other than our exes (we're both divorced from previously emotionally abusive partners). She's kind, funny, caring and the sex is great!

There's just one tiny thing that's causing me anxiety: she has a particular "type" that gets her going - basically strong, broad-shouldered and chested. Not "alpha" or aggressive in attitude, but still able to be quite rough with her in bed, pick her up, toss her around, etc.

This is not me.

Don't get me wrong, I do keep fit and am quite strong for my build, so can manage a bit of "manhandling" (as it were). But I'm never going to be the Rugby-build/wrestler/lumberjack kind of guy she fantasises about. I'm lean and wiry and a geek. I'm David Tennant, not The Rock.

She tells me she's happy with me as I am, however I see people on this thread put so much stock in having a "type". So the fact I'm not hers, I worry it might become more of a thing once the initial honeymoon period wears off. She could definitely find a guy who maybe had my good personality qualities but matched this physical "type" better if she tried, I'm sure. I worry that, although our sex life is good and varied, she's actually achieving orgasm by closing her eyes and picturing someone more like her "type" doing it with her. Previous partners have always kind-of been into what I'm like. This is the first time I've been with someone where its almost as if they're with me despite my physical "type" rather than, at least in part, because of it. And yet, we both say its possibly the best relationship either of us have had.

Do you think I've reason to be anxious?

You are massively overthinking this. If you listed my celebrity crushes they are all quite wirey in build, and my DP is quite broad shouldered and muscular from his job. I adore him, he’s amazing and I wouldn’t change anything about him at all.

Don’t let it ruin a great thing for you.

You genuinely feel that what you’ve described here and what you said in the OP amount to the same thing?

Honestly, this is 100% a ‘you’ issue.

It was wrong of her to say that to you, if the sexes were reversed, I would have told you he was using pick up artist techniques on you. These are phrases designed to arouse insecurity in you and to seek his approval. I have no doubt some women do this, too. It may have been just a slip, but to then later follow that up with lstronger than you look” is a backhanded compliment. Totally textbook negging.

Negging is an act of emotional manipulation whereby a person makes a deliberate backhanded compliment or otherwise flirtatious remark to another person to undermine their confidence and increase their need of the manipulator's approval. The term was coined and prescribed by pickup artists

@PetalParty I really do want avoid overthinking it. However it’s true she has self-confessed body image issues of her own from a close family member doing exactly what you describe to her at a young age. And literally the day before, I’d remarked how I’d struggled with a certain era’s fashion because it suited broad-shouldered men much more than another era’s (conversely skinny jeans suited me fine!) So, yes, she knew it was something I already had a bit of an issue with.

She also told me in earlier days she knew I was interested in a relationship with her but she was only casually interested (she’s since retracted this saying she only said it because she didn’t want to appear clingy); that she was going on a “singles night” with her friends; that she fancied her ex at first sight more than me; that she wasn’t sure if she actually liked me or just had a “low bar” from previous relationships, etc, etc.

I’ve put it all down to her perhaps not clocking how each of this could induce anxiety, especially in the very early days of us being exclusive. It’s just not the sort of thing I feel you should make a point of saying when you’re still finding your way with each other.

Oh! You poor thing. Of course you are feeling this way if she has hit your sensitivities unerringly, because you’d mentioned it. And as someone who has experienced this herself, she should no better. I can’t see my way to giving her the benefit of the doubt at the moment.

There are some women with dark triad tendencies, they just express it differently than men. For example, in the psychological warfare you’ve just experienced. She is seeking power over you with these manoeuvres, or she just enjoys inflicting hurt.

If you were my son, I would tell you to run. Don’t think twice, don’t look back, just get out of there. You can be with someone who lifts you up rather than puts you down. She’s shown you who she is, believe her.

All seems a bit off to me.
and I’ve always hated the ‘this is the best relationship blah blah blah type bollocks as usually means this is the best relationship I’m in now and I’m telling you what you want to hear.

you just have to go with your gut but you are possibly being over sensitive

I think a lot of people have a type. But the moment you speak to someone that can change. Positively or negatively depending on the person. You really need to have this conversation with your partner and tell her you can’t be that person. If you haven’t already. If she truly cares she will want you to be yourself.