Is it petty to be turned off by too much affection from your spouse?
I ask this because I ran across a woman on Reddit who talked about her boyfriend’s habit of showering her with affection. They’ve been together for six months and already she wants out.
It started out normal. He would buy me flowers, send me cute goodnight texts, etc. But now, I just can’t handle it. He will leave me post it notes in the most random places with the cheesiest notes ever. Today’s said “I hope I make you as happy as you make me,” which is cute for some, but I am NOT a “cute” type of girl, I’m really not into that stuff. His notes are pretty much the same every time, sometimes saying things like “you are the best thing to happen to me” and “I don’t know what I would do without you”. Some people might like this, but it’s coming off as super clingy and NOT cute.
Next, whenever I spend the night, he basically wants to “cuddle all night,” aka hold me in a death grip. He insists on literally holding me throughout the night, now to the point where I can’t sleep well. He always has to touch me… Like in public he will hold my hand or constantly have his arm around me. I am NOT a PDA person either. Again, it just seems super clingy. He will try to kiss me every chance he gets, and when I deny him or tell him to stop, he will start to suggest that I must be doing something with a different guy because I don’t want his attention. He just acts so childish. So annoying.
It’s funny. I feel like a majority of the stories I hear about, from reading online and from friends (and from my own past relationships), deal with men who don’t show enough affection and won’t go out of their way for their girlfriends. But a man who shows too much is an interesting anomaly. And I’m sure it’s reason enough to make some of you think, ‘What a b—h!’ Who doesn’t love an affectionate man?
But the truth is, just because you’re a woman doesn’t mean you’re automatically the emotional stereotype who craves affection and affirmation at all times. In this woman’s case, I think the issue is a lack of compatibility. He wants to come off as her number one fan at all times (which is adorable), and she just wants a healthy relationship that doesn’t feel forced and overwhelming. There are only two options: She can tell him how his affections are a bit smothering and how they’re having an effect on the way she feels about being with him. She could let him know that he should be secure in their relationship (clearly he’s insecure based on his light cheating allegations) and reassure him so he doesn’t feel like he needs to put on a rom-com show every time they’re together. People can be very much in love without packing on heavy PDA.
The other option is to bolt. What I’ve found is that when one person is too affectionate and sweet, the other person can become bothered enough by all of the lovey-dovey behavior to the point where they begin to mistreat the other party. Maybe they’re hoping it will get the person to back the hell up, or maybe they think they are going to be able to push that person enough so they will be the one to initiate a breakup. Whatever the case, it shouldn’t have to come to that.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being someone who likes things chill in a relationship. Again, people don’t have to be on top of one another at all times to be happy. But I do think there is something wrong with not voicing concerns about someone’s actions and letting things get to a place where you can’t even enjoy spending time with them because of it. That’s not fair. If they are willing and able to turn up when it comes to their affections, they should be willing and able to tone it down if they’re as crazy in love as they pretend to be…
But as always, that’s just my opinion. What do you say? Is it petty to be turned off by an overly affection boyfriend?
