I was friends with A(24M) for over a year. We realized we liked each other so we started going out together. During that time we both purchased some trekking and road trip gear since we were planning a trip during Christmas. It included two back bags, a tent, sleeping bags, flasks, portable chargers, etc. We purchased it on Credit, for 6 months EMI. We were paying alternate months. After this, he formally asked me out and we started dating.
A month later, he broke up with me. blamed it on me. He said I was too emotionally demanding and clingy, suffocating him. (We met only once a week, and would have a 10 min call daily before going to sleep). After the breakup, he blocked me everywhere and cut off contacts. There was no way I could contact him, still, I kept going over to his place to talk about the breakup, but he gave me the cold shoulder. Later through his roommate, I found he dated me just for social status and as an act of revenge with his batchmate K(26) (who turns out to be my older ex).
Until now out of six months of the payment, I had paid for two months. After the breakup, I forgot about it, and he also never contacted me, so I guess he made the rest payments.
Around 5 months after no contact at all and our breakup, he called me asking me to send over all the t-shirts and hoodies of his that he gave to me while we were dating. He had relocated to a new city. I was out of town as well, so I couldn’t courier those tees to him, and in turn, he got very angry and yelled at me. Still later I parceled all his clothes that I had with me to him. This was somewhere around my birthday. After receiving all his clothes, he again blocked me and we didn’t speak.
A month after this, he sent me the remaining trekking gear he had with him and said I could keep it as a birthday gift. Fast forward 8 months later (November 2023), one morning, around 5.30 am, he called me asking me for the remaining months’ EMI payment for the trekking gear. I was a bit taken aback, but he said since I am using those and it’s with me, I should pay the rest amount. I mentioned that I thought it was a birthday gift and he said, he didn’t have space in his house so just gave it to me to dispose of the items. It wasn’t meant to be a birthday gift. Now he needs the money.
A doesn’t know, but my elderly father had a stroke, and his right side was paralyzed a few weeks ago. He is still hospitalized. I had to leave my full-time job and stay with my family to take care of his health and exhausted all my savings. When he asked me for the money, initially I wanted to debate with him, but then didn’t have the energy so said I would repay once I received some pending payment from some freelance clients.
For the last two weeks, he has been pestering me regularly for the payment. I thought of selling off the trekking items, to pay him back, but it is at my residence, across the country. I am in my native with my family. I am not going back anytime soon. I am not at all in a financial condition to pay the whole amount to him right away. He also asked me to repay the various expenses he did for me , when we were friends or dating, like a few times he paid my doctor’s fees or my medical bills. He wants me to pay them too.
I am trying to keep my calm, but his behavior is triggering me. He keeps sending messages like, “If you have any shame left in you or any dignity please pay back my money” / “I really admire how good a player you are”/ “You are such a gold digger, Kudos to that” / “I am not asking for the 9 USD processing fees or the interest charge, since it’s not much, I am just asking the cost of the items. Can’t you even give that?” / “I am not saying a word extra where someone else would have already said a lot, Can’t you see how understanding I am of your situation?” / “You have been using these items for free for the past few months, and now that I ask you for the money, you are being such a miser” . He used a few more colloquial slangs, and terms which are very disrespectful, and mean like a shameless, honorless person who feeds off others, and manipulates them.
Moreover I still have resentment and grude against him, which recently surfaced. anger for the whole breakup, lying, betrayal thing, and that he just wanted to avenge K(my former ex) and so became my friend and courted me. Once everyone knew he was my bf and we were dating, he broke up blaming it on me.
What do I do in this situation?
6 comments
Do you have where he said it was a gift in writing?
Honestly, this guy sounds like he has control issues and is just trying to find a way to control you. I’d just block him if I were you and stop responding to him or if you have to be on good terms, tell him you’re on a tight budget and can’t afford to ship it back, but you’ll leave it somewhere for him to pick up if he wants. I’d personally just give it back if someone demanded like that, I hate the feeling of people acting like you owe them something
If you really want to be fair, tell him to wait until you have a chance to sell the gear, then you’ll forward him his share of the proceeds. If it truly mattered to him though, he should have figured this out with you when the relationship ended.
But truly, unless you had some kind of formal signed agreement, you don’t owe him *anything*, and by your account, he seems like a giant, petty dick hell-bent on manipulating your emotions to squeeze as many pennies out of you as he can. I personally suggest blocking him and removing any means of him being able to contact you.
You write that he wants the money not the items but that’s not for him to decide. He can’t request the form of payment, only the purchase or the value of it. Plus you paid for a part of it.
Let’s say the items were 600, you paid 200 (just for easy math, replace it with the real value), so you can write something along those lines:
“Dear Ex, I’m quite disappointed by your behavior. Last we spoke about them you sent them to me unprompted and claimed that I should keep them as a birthday present. Now, over 1 year later, you pester me relentlessly for the money. This came very sudden and I am appalled by your behavior. However, I have decided that I will not hold you to your statement that I should keep them and will graciously go back to my initial plan to divide them fairly. Since I have paid 200 and you have paid 400, I will post you 2/3 of the items. If you have any specific wishes which ones you’d like to receive let me know and I’m sure we’ll find an amicable solution on how to divide them. Please note that I am currently in country X and won’t be able to post them until I return, most likely by date Y. If this is not an acceptable solution to you, the alternative options are A) You send me my share (200) and I send you all the items or B) I resell all of them and we share the outcome fairly (2/3 to you, 1/3 to me). However, I will not refund you the full 400 as I never ask to keep them nor did I want to, you just dumped them with me and made me believe they were a gift. A payment was never agreed upon. Please let me know which option you prefer.”
Hold your ground OP. Don’t let him pester you for more money than his fair share.
He has already shown you the proper response, block him and ghost him. IMHO
I mean he blocked you and cut off contact so just do the same and don’t pay him.