Before my boyfriend Sam and I moved in together, we had separate apartments. He had a really crappy apartment, that he shared with 3 other guys. It was about as messy as you'd expect a house with 4 young guys to be. And I had a really nice apartment, that I shared with a roommate, Mel.
I have to credit my old roommate Mel with all the nice furniture and interior design stuff, that's not my forte. I kept stuff clean and nice but she'd done most of the decoration and all the little homely touches. She was a lot more well off than me and she'd impulse buy things for the apartment like a huge TV, paintings, appliances, furniture, rugs, cutesy towels and other cute little things, etc. I'd always offer to split the cost of furniture and kitchen things, but she'd always just go buy stuff on impulse and tell me to not worry about the cost. I did my part as a roommate by being more of the "handyman" who would put together furniture, fix stuff that broke because our landlord wasn't good about doing maintenance, repair appliances, help her if she was having computer trouble, and stuff.
Before we lived together, Sam and I would go over each other's places fairly often, he liked my place better than his own but we tried to make it equal to be fair to Mel.
So, when Sam and I moved in together, I didn't have much furniture or appliances to bring. I brought my bed, and some dishes and pots and pans my parents gave me second hand that have seen prettier days. And my clothes, and the stuff I need for my sports. But nothing really stylish or decorative. Sam brought more furniture and small kitchen appliances but nothing too nice, just some stuff from his old apartment. I was really happy with our apartment once we'd moved our stuff in. It was comfortable and it was in a nice building that lets in lots of sunlight. I've lived a lot of really crappy places, my family's house is a "chain smokers with 5 cats and loads of broken stuff lying around" kinda place so I have a low bar maybe. I'm happy if my place is clean and comfortable. And this place was really clean and well taken care of, and our furniture was cozy and comfortable.
In the first couple weeks we were living together, Sam kept asking me stuff like that "where's the hand blender? Why didn't you bring that coffee table? Didn't you have more chairs? What happened to all those rugs?" And I kept saying "That stuff was Mel's." It seemed like he thought way more of the stuff in my old apartment was mine, than what really was. I didn't think that was a big deal though.
He talked about wanting more chairs for the living room, a TV some stuff to decorate the apartment, and I told him to let me know when he wanted to go shopping and we could pick out some things together. We went to a home goods store a week ago and didn't find a lot of stuff he liked. I was pretty much fine with anything that was reasonably priced, but he was pickier.
He said to me last weekend that the apartment wasn't what I expected, he didn't expect me to bring so little. Nothing to decorate at all, not really caring what we bought for the apartment. I asked why he'd expected something else and what he'd expected. He had expected something more like the place I shared with Mel, something "like a home instead of like a college dorm. Something with care put into it, like all the care you put into making your old place nice." I said that was all Mel's doing, that isn't really a skill of mine. I don't really have the eye for design that she does, or the money for that matter, so the "picture perfect furniture catalogue home" wasn't really my style.
I asked him why he didn't pick some things out online, if he had a style in mind that he couldn't find in the store. And he said he wasn't good at picking stuff out to go well together. I said "yeah I'm not either." I'm really utilitarian when I buy things for my home, I don't think about looks as much as usefulness, comfort, and price.
I thought that stuff wasn't too big of a deal, even then. But he keeps making little comments about how our place doesn't feel like a home, how it's not a place he'd be proud to have people over. I keep saying that I feel happy and at home but if he knows what he wants to change, to go ahead and do some shopping. But from the way he hadn't put in an effort and he just keeps complaining, I'm feeling as if he expects ME to become more of the homemaker. Maybe because my old apartment was so nice and he had high expectations? Maybe it's a little sexist,i sure feel like it is. IDK.
I snapped at him recently when he complained about not having a well equipped kitchen like my old place, telling him that if he liked Mel's kitchen so much he could go live with her. It was petty but I'm just sick of being compared.
How do I get him to stop, and get him to understand why I'm so annoyed?
TLDR ... My boyfriend and i moved in together. He seems disappointed I'm not more of a homemaker.
Submitted January 29, 2019 at 10:13AM by doornaols http://bit.ly/2Wq3nCM
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