Hi Reddit! My (m31) boyfriend (m35) and I recently moved in together on our first year anniversary. It was supposed to be a happy occasion since we were both looking forward to it for a while. The situation went awry midway so I wanted to get a temperature check from you guys and see if I’m overreacting.
The day before the move-in date we had agreed to finish packing our individual place. I find out the morning of that he has not finished packing. In addition, we both agreed well in advance to take the day off – he tells me the morning of that he will have to leave for work midway as it’s a “client with 100s of thousands in commission potential” (he’s in real estate). His lack of preparedness was a little frustrating but I let him pack and handled my move on my own. I was pretty adamant about taking the day of and asked him to reschedule. He agreed over the phone that he would do so. A few hours later he comes to meet me in person after my move was complete. He got me some coffee and we were both in a chirpy mood again. Then he drops another bomb that he will be gone for work after all, and that I will have to handle the move into the new place myself. At that point it seems like he had already set the appointment so I couldn’t really say no. Thankfully the movers nowere quite helpful and did all the heavy lifting. I unpacked and reassembled most of our furniture. I can’t help but feel upset that he left me alone on our move-in day – something we had already planned well in advance. He was there for a total of 1 hour out of 6. I found out later on that the client was in town only for one day and absolutely wanted to meet the same day.
Am I overreacting for being upset? I feel like I can’t trust his decision making and communication skills in a long term partnership where I have to constantly clean up after him.
TLDR; boyfriend bailed on move in day for work which also happens to be our anniversary.
11 comments
You are moving in really fast and without knowing each other that well.
I think you are learning that he’ll put work above promises to you and will lie about them for quite awhile. That’s not great. It would be one thing if he was honest about it.
Not a realtor, but I have a couple of clients I couldn’t cancel on even if somebody died.
It’s okay to be upset, but I also understand that a huge potential commission is hard to just ignore. Sometimes you have to pivot to capitalize on an opportunity, and if you had movers hired to do the tougher stuff, I can see why he wanted to chase that commission. I would also be hurt, but the main thing I would want coming out of this, is to make sure the communication is better next time there’s something like this.
I’d say he’s a professional, he’s going to put work over you. Sadly you get what you get when you got a man that is like that. Sure he will be stable financially, but he might miss some dates. A good compromise would be getting him to take you on a nice vacation with that 100k commission bonus. It’ll make up for it!
Your frustration is valid. But it’s also probably going to be a occasional (if not regular) occurrence. This is the nature of his job. Ideally you would have already known this. It seems like something that would have arisen within the last year. Regardless though it’s something you know now. All sorts of occupations have erratic or inflexible schedules. If this becomes too much for you then you have to discuss it with him. Both of you will either need to compromise or reevaluate your relationship.
Yes you’re overreacting but you are justified in being upset (just maybe not this upset). He owes you an apology. You owe him some consideration You definitely deserve a nice night out for putting together all the furniture.
Well, what is the history? If he is usually a man who follows through, then I think you are wrong to be angry about doing a solo-job (the move) that was doable. That is what partners do they take up the slack. But…
If it is recurring theme, you need to work this out now.
What ‘repair’ has your SO done for doing this to you?
Sure work comes up – but why did was his communication around it so last minute?
Your not overreacting this a quite a common theme in toxic situations – moving in together is a good time for a loser to reveal themselves and set the tone for the rest of the relationship
The nature of some jobs is that a last minute issue like a client in town for a single day takes priority over personal plans. It’s annoying, but it happens, and unless it’s part of a pattern of disregarding your time for more frivolous reasons, I wouldn’t consider it a big deal.
That said, presumably he’s been managing his job for quite some time now on his own, and there’s no reason you have to rush in and handle things for him. You absolutely could have told him you weren’t going to be able to deal with his movers and let him problem solve that, or you could have done the minimum unpacking you needed for your own comfort and left the rest for him to do later as his contribution. Whatever he would have done before you lived together, he can still do.
Maybe, especially how fast you’ve moved in together, take this as a sign to take a big step back from any impulse to manage his life for him now that you live together.
Being a realtor is crazy. You basically have to be on demand. And you only make money when they buy or sell. So you’re really at their beck and call. What he did seems really rational based on how he makes his living. It’s probably time to get used to this as it’s his life. Maybe try looking up info about being a realtor? As if you wanted to go into the field? There are articles that explain it.
If you Start to Stand for This, You will always be Stooping to whatever Pooping he may throw your way. Nip it in the bud now or be forever “Cleaning up HIS poop.”
This situation is an important data point about your relationship that you have to consider. He has a job that will pretty regularly mess up plans. Sometimes those plans will be little things like a canceled movie night, and sometimes it means he’ll bail on your anniversary and leave you to manage a move by yourself.
Is that ok with you? If you want kids would you be ok with him canceling plans with them? Does he have concrete plans to transition to something more stable in a reasonable timeframe? Is this the first time this has happened?
I wouldn’t be ok with it. Some people would. You should talk to him about it and explain your worries about the precedent this could set. Maybe it’s genuinely a rare situation for him. But if it keeps happening going forward you should be prepared to think very hard about whether he can actually be a part of the kind of relationship you want.