I had two ex-boyfriends.
My first was Mr “Patek P.”, an avid watch collector of all kinds of luxury watches. Although generous with his money and time, he is controlling and manipulative.
I remember my last conversation, as I sat him down to discuss our relationship woes, like how we should “focus on our journey, our present” and you know what he told me?
“Yes, you’re right, I need admire my current watch now and not think about the next watch I should get!”
What followed after was an ugly quarrel and nonetheless we broke up soon after. We had very different outlooks in life – i wanted to stay in Singapore indefinitely at the moment, but he wanted to work overseas and tried persuading me to change my job and get a new degree (he sponsoring) so I could join him where ever he is.
I have my reasons for staying in SG and I had enough of defending my position with him, so I’ll not do it again here.
Some of you here may think that I am “dumb” for not taking up his offer – but to think about it, it was actually more of a way to control me and isolate me from my friends and family by moving overseas.
Since the first one tried to control me with his wealth, I figure for the second guy I’ll go for someone who isn’t as wealthy, and the second criteria is that he makes me happy.
My second boyfriend is a chef. He bakes delicious cupcakes for me every time we met, and he took me out many places despite his limited means.
Sounds good right? Wrong. He was insecure and behaved like a stalker. He often ask me if I really wanted to go for a Masters, saying how he wants to take care of me and be a provider, and he wanted to get married soon and become a father.
It felt strange and I communicated my discomforts to him, like how I want to have my own career and savings. Additionally, whenever I tried cooking for myself – he would interject halfway and said I didn’t know how to cook.
When I made something for myself and it was too spicy, he would say something like “You are bad at cooking, so spicy, later you waste food!”.
When I went out by myself to watch a Disney movie, which he didn’t want to watch with me because it was “childish”, he actually look through my phone and book a movie ticket for himself but at the back.
When I caught him, he said he was scared that I was seeing the movie with someone else. The most ironical part was that he was actually cheating on me and had projected those emotions on me.
So what’s my conclusion of this story? Finding someone whom you’re attracted to, someone you’re compatible to and has no red flags is harder than it looks. Someone’s true character cannot be discerned from their surface. Being poor isn’t a badge of “holiness”, nor is being rich.