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The original was posted on /r/bestofredditorupdates by /u/Direct-Caterpillar77 on 2023-11-28 06:02:45.

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I am not The OOP, OOP is u/ThrowRAs7

I (26m) humiliated and shattered my gf’s (25f) confidence

Originally posted to r/relationship_advice

TRIGGER WARNING: emotional abuse and manipulation, verbal abuse, misogyny, assault, abuse

Original Post  March 25, 2023

My gf (25f)  and I (26m) moved in together last year. We live in a fairly safe neighborhood, but during the night there are some sketchy drunk men hanging around who also scare me quite honestly. My gf however wasn’t really scared to walk alone at night and would say that she’s just as strong as those men and can take care of herself. My gf is 5’10" and works out 2 times a week. She’s indeed very strong compared to most women, but she was obviously delusional to think that her strength was comparable to that of an average man. She would even go as far as saying that if someone should be worried for walking alone at night then it should be me as I’m a scrawny 5’9" man. I thought this was one of the situations where it would be better to just shut up than being correct, so I mostly stopped showing my concerns to her.

Yesterday she went out with some of her friends and called me at 1am that she’ll come alone via public transportation (she doesn’t have a license). I told her that it’s dangerous and I should come pick her up, but she insisted on coming by herself. I couldn’t sleep till she came home an hour later. She was so angry at me for not trusting her that she can take care of herself. That was when I decided to demonstrate her the disparity between the strength of men and women. She thought I was joking at first but when she realized that I was dead serious, she happily took the opportunity to prove how wrong I was. I basically told her to ground me as hard as she can, and then I quickly got out of her grip and grounded her for several minutes till she surrendered. She cried a lot throughout this whole time and I could also see the fear in her eyes, even though she knew very well that I would never hurt her. I humiliated her. I slept on the couch that night. She didn’t want to talk about it in the morning and said that she’s fine, but she’s still obviously very upset about it. I feel horrible that I’ve shattered her confidence like that, and I don’t think she will ever feel safe walking alone at night again. I’m probably a really horrible person for doing that and I wish I could had just trusted her more to take care of herself. I know this relationship is probably over, but is there anything I could do to make up for it?

tl;dr: I demonstrated to my gf the disparity between the strength of men and women trying teach her a lesson. I humiliated and shattered her confidence in the process and feel terrible for what I did. Can I do something to make up for it?

EDIT: I can’t possibly answer all of your comments. What I did was an assault, I admit it. I can’t express how sorry I am for doing that. I thought I was doing the right thing, but instead I assaulted her by trying to prevent exactly that. Don’t learn from me, but please keep yourself safe out there, if not for you, then for the ones who love you.

TOP COMMENTS

doomer_irl

“My girlfriend thought she was tough enough to defend herself so I assaulted her”

You didn’t shatter her confidence, buddy, you engaged in domestic violence.

rotatingruhnama

The fuck did I just read.

You harmed and terrified your girlfriend to win an argument?

ProtopetPhantom

The problem is you proved your point and then took it too far… you shouldn’t have made her cry in fact you only needed to show her she couldn’t hold you down. You need some self reflection

Update  June 11, 2023

It’s been two and a half months since my original post, and I thought it’d be appropriate to give you an update after some recent events. I actually already tried to do an update a few days later, but I was such a wreak mentally and deleted it shortly after.

So I’ll get straight to the point, she broke up with me the next day over the phone. She wanted me to admit that I enjoyed seeing her cry, but I kept defending myself till she gave up. But deep down I knew that she was right. I’m not ashamed to say now that I was a bit aroused by overpowering her so easily and seeing her cry. I know how horrible it sounds, and I’m definitely not proud of it, but I think that acknowledging my flaws and being open about them is the first step in overcoming them. The next few days after the break up were probably some of the worst days in my life. I thought that I’ve lost everything, including my self respect. I decided to go to therapy and take a break from dating for the foreseeable future. Luckily, I also had the support of my family and close friends, even if they didn’t fully agree with my actions.

For those of you who say that she needed a reality check, I have to disagree with you on this one. Yes, she overestimated her strength, but she’s not dumb enough to actually engage in a fight with a stranger, let alone a drunk man. Being cautious has nothing to do with strength, and now I believe that she was also right to get a bit mad at me for having little to no faith in her. Trying to demonstrate how much stronger I was at 2am was just plain stupid though.

I haven’t heard from my ex till she gave me a call two days ago. We barely talked about the incident though, it was mostly just catching up and making peace with each other. She’s doing pretty great actually. She’s about to graduate with her masters and already has a job lined up. She started dating a new guy last month, and I can tell by the way she talked that she’s very into him. She signed up for a swing class (which is something that she wanted to do for the longest time but didn’t do it because of me), which is also where she met her new bf. What she didn’t do however is to sign up for a self defense class, which honestly I kind of expected. Overall I was glad to hear how happy she sounded. I’m also doing pretty good myself, although I’m still on my break from dating and I don’t see myself getting into another relationship for at least a year.

Last month I also got to experience how my ex felt when I was overly worried for her safety. I went with my family to a trip in Naples, and while we had our apartment in a fairly safe part of the city, it was just a few blocks away from some sketchy alleys during the night. So when I craved for a good pizza (in a specific place) during one of the nights there, my mom got very vocal about not wanting me to go to that place because of how sketchy some of the alleys on the way there looked like. I tried to convince her that she has nothing to worry about but to no avail, and then it dawned on me that this is probably how my ex felt when I expressed my concerns to her. Eventually, I decided to go to that place the next day during daytime instead. Was definitely worth it though.

I’m genuinely happy with how things went for both of us, although I still miss her sometimes, and hearing her voice again just made me miss her even more. But I know that it’d probably be better for us to just move on with our lives separately. I also plan to continue with my therapy sessions, even though I feel completely fine by now. The reason is very simple, it’s just to have someone that I can talk to without feeling judged. Reddit isn’t really the best place for that as you could probably tell from my original post, but I still want to thank everyone who commented and gave their opinion.

TOP COMMENTS

Comfortable-Yam-5561

“I was a bit aroused by overpowering her so easily and seeing her cry.”

That’s a hectic statement to make my dude. I’m at a loss of words… Definitely seeing a therapist for those type of dark thoughts is a good idea.

Emerdaldgyal

Very glad she broke up with you. You are 26 years old and you took your gf to the ground……… I would have sent my uncles after you after that shit tbh. The fact that you admit you were aroused by that…….  This is why we say all men. Women will never be safe with men like you in the world.

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