I’m divorced and my boyfriend is divorced. Both have DC and we don’t live together. We have known each other as friends for 5 years but been together romantically for 1 year. It is my 50th birthday next week. In August I booked an air bnb abroad for next weekend and invited and paid for members of my family, kids, friends and boyfriend to come and celebrate. At the time, I bought his plane tickets (easyJet) as they were cheap and he was away when I booked but he knew all the details.
we are nearing the day (next Saturday) and a group of us are exchanging messages in a WhatsApp group. Some of my friends have bought outfits for the nights out we have planned, so we are just having general chit chat about plans. Some of my friends and family live in different parts of the country so this will be the first time they will have met BF.
BF messaged me: “where are we off to again? “ I say, “you know, this is my 50th trip.” He said oh okay, can you send me the details again? I was quite surprised he didn’t remember. I send him the details and itinerary again. A few hours on he comes back and says “can we speak?” I call him and he says that he cannot do the last day (Monday) as he has a work meeting that is unavoidable and he can’t change and will have to fly back Sunday night. I had already booked his flight back on Monday and had given him the itinerary four months ago and multiple times since when he asked. I say I had told him about this since august and some friends and family were booking off Monday because like the rest of us, they also have work. He said “don’t get so upset I am coming to the majority of the weekend I just can’t square Monday.”
so because the flights are booked under my name I have to change them. It costs £250 to change them (original flight was £40.) When he sees the receipt he mentions that he will pay me back when he sees me for the trouble of changing.
on the group chat, those based in our local town are all talking about meeting up for a drink the night before we leave (which is my actual birthday.) my bf also lives in the local town. I ask him if he can also “pop in for one” on the day, or see me on the day, and he says that as he will be away for the whole weekend, it’s too much and he will see me at the airport on Saturday instead.
for some reason I got a bit upset at this and we started talking about it. His reasoning is that I have to just accept the time that he has available, that he is crazy about me, but he can’t invent free time, he is spending the whole weekend too - in some cases - meet my friends and family for the first time as my boyfriend “and that makes me nervous as it is.”
I can feel from all the conversations we are having that 1. this is not a big deal to him at all, 2. He didn’t even remember it was my 50th until the start of the group chat reminded him 3. Considering all this I think it’s very unlikely he will have got me a gift or a card or anything.
i don’t know if I am being a massive spoilt diva to expect my boyfriend to play some active part in my 50th celebration. There is a part of me that feels a little foolish for forking out so much money and him not taking it very seriously. And another part of me that really wants to save face in front of friends and family and so not start a big conversation about how I feel he doesn’t care and potentially fall out beforehand.
for context, we have a very good relationship normally. He remembers other things about me and had his 60th this year which I really wanted to make a big deal of but he didn’t. But for some reason he is feeling pressure around this.
what do you think?