My boyfriend 37m always comments to me on the appearance of women. Whether it’s someone on tv, the street, people we know, positive, negative etc. This has been a problem throughout our 3 year relationship. It especially bothers me when it’s about my friends or family.
It started with my best friend who he met and didn’t get along with. He would joke (to me) about her being overweight and unattractive. Like mean spirited shit. I’d tell him I found that to be disgusting behavior and cue him to stop doing that each time, which he will respond to in the moment but of course it happens again after time passes. He’s learned to make it less outright but the covert dig are almost more bothersome because it’s harder to call him out on what he won’t come out and say.
Then he met another one of my friends and remarked about how “plain” she looks. He also made some comment about how he thinks I’m “one of those attractive girls who is only friends with fat/ugly chicks because it makes me feel better about myself”. Ummm no—I love my friends for who they but I also happen to think they’re all ADORABLE.
And he met one more who is very attractive (and a few years younger) and started to refer to her as “the hot one” whenever she was brought up which made me feel a bit insecure. I told him I think it is immature and gross that he always feels the need to comment on women’s appearances unsolicited. He saw my point of view and agreed to change this behavior. I’ll admit it’s gotten better but only incrementally.
Currently I’m visiting my hometown—actually it’s a bit of a trial separation because I’ve been considering moving back since I’d like to settle down near my family and he doesn’t think he wants to, so that’s a whole other story. Anyways, I have a whole separate group of friends here whom he hasn’t met. I was on the phone with him saying how much delicious, naughty stuff I’m eating here and joked about coming home a bit more voluptuous. He asked if my friends here eat that way too. I basically replied “idk” cuz I don’t monitor other people’s diets. And he said “I bet they do, I saw those pictures” (about some photos posted on social media with this friend group last summer). I asked what he meant, and he said “they all have that same kind of look”. Again I asked what he was trying to imply and he knew where this was going and shut down the conversation. It’s obvious what he is trying to say is that my friends are chubby but since he didn’t flat out say that he’s going to find a way around it. Frankly I’m too tired to argue about it too so I let it end there for now.
I find it offensive on a few fronts. First off, selfishly, he judges other women’s appearances so much that I know he must be scrutinizing me too and making comparisons. Also, these girls he was commenting about tonight—aside from one who is a big girl and another who is slightly overweight—are very much so in the “average weight” range. I’m also “average” but on the thinner end of that spectrum. If I gain 10-15 lbs I’ll be the same size. And then, of course, there’s the fact that it just bugs me because they’re my friends and I think it’s not nice and I feel defensive of them.
I’ve always kind of felt the need to keep him at a distance from my friends, because I’m worried he might say something to hurt them. He never shares these comments with others in the instances where I have had him around but, still. So I see my friends have partners who are very involved with their own social circles and it makes me sad that I don’t have that because I feel I need to protect my friends from his insensitivity.
As I’m writing this it feels more and more like a lost cause. Is there any last ditch effort I can make to get him to realize what this is doing to us?
TLDR; boyfriend feels need to comment on appearance and makes disparaging remarks about my friends and it’s fucking annoying
Submitted October 29, 2020 at 10:06PM by fuzzycactilol https://ift.tt/2HNiV0y
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