Reddit Stories - I PRESENTED my PARTNER with a final DEMAND to ask for my hand

Episode Date: July 16, 2025

#redditstories #askreddit #aita #relationships #marriage #proposal #partnership #ultimatumSummary: I PRESENTED my PARTNER with a final DEMAND to ask for my hand, seeking commitment and clarity in our relationship. Their reaction will determine our future together.Tags: redditstories, askreddit, reddit, aita, tifu, relationships, marriage, proposal, partnership, ultimatum, commitment, clarity, future, love, communication, decision, emotions, boundaries, trust, support, growthBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/reddit-stories--6237355/support.

I hope you enjoy this story. I presented my partner with a final demand to ask for my hand in marriage, but he insists that I must become fluent in their native tongue and visit his family at their residence before he will contemplate tying the knot. My significant other and I are both young professionals in our late 20s who moved and together six months ago after graduating from professional school and relocating to a new city for work. We have been together for four years and have had no issues adjusting to living together. We are happy together, want the same things out of life, and take excellent care of each other. The issue is that I have known for a while that he is the person that I want to spend my life with, and I would like to settle down and hopefully start a

family soon. I have been in a serious relationship also lasted four years, before him, so I know what I'm looking for. On the other hand, my boyfriend is not in the same headspace as me about this for a few reasons. One, he was a late bloomer when it comes to relationships, and I was his first real girlfriend, and two, he has a hard time making decisions about everything, from his job to what pair of shoes to buy. When we discuss the future, I am very clear that I'm ready to settle down with him ASAP. He is also very clear that he loves me, he thinks we have a great thing, but he wants to take

more time to see where it goes. He also jokes around about how he hasn't banged enough chicks. We had some serious commitment discussions last year when we were deciding where to live after graduating, and I told him that I wasn't going to try to relocate to the same city as him unless we were engaged. He didn't propose, and I stuck to my guns. Despite very slim odds, we both coincidentally found jobs in the same city halfway across the country, so we moved there together and got an apartment together. Now I'm starting to get fed up and heard about this situation. It was causing a lot of stress for me, and it was the main point of contention in our relationship.

So in September 2017, I told him that when our lease is up in April 2018, I was going to move out unless we were engaged. He hasn't made a decision ever in his life without a deadline, so I figured this would help nudge him in the right direction. However, I'm starting to worry that he's not going to propose, mostly because he's telling me that he's not going to propose. Now I'm regretting this ultimatum, and I think maybe I was stupid for ruining a good thing by trying to rush things, but it's been four years. Also I worry that if he does propose, it will be forced and he'll always regret it. On the other hand, I gave him basically the same ultimatum last year during our job search, and he made it very clear that he'd rather end up in different cities, which knowing us would likely mean breaking up than get engaged. I'd like to think that I am

being rational and empowered here, but am I being stupid and desperate? If he doesn't propose by April, should I stick to my guns and move out, basically sacrificing this great relationship because it wasn't moving at my pace? I'm happy to answer any questions too. This situation is getting so stressful, and I appreciate anyone who takes the time to read this and give advice. Update 1, boyfriend knew and acknowledged the ultimatum, and I tried to use this as a springboard to have a serious conversation about where he sees the future going. We did have some sit-down talks that didn't really go anywhere, and he told me to stop bringing it up, so I stopped.

We carried on for a little while being our happy selves, without mentioning the ultimatum. Part of me hoped he had a proposal planned and would surprise me. Nope. Now, we are 10 days away from the 331 deadline, which I 100% planned to stick to, and he just told me that he wants me to visit his parents and their home in September, and after the visit he would then talk with them about our relationship

and consider proposing around December. Part of me is so insulted and angry by this idea. First of all, I have met his parents before and actually spent plenty of quality time with them. So far I like them, they like me. They live in a more isolated state that's hard to get to from where I live. Plain tickets are pretty expensive, would be a two-day drive. I have suggested that I visit them multiple times, and we've had plenty of opportunities to do so, but my boyfriend was against it for one reason or another. The saddest thing is that we both coordinated time off work last week. We knew about the vacation for months and had plenty of time to plan. He told me that he was going to visit his parents, and said that he was thinking about asking me to come with,

but kept it vague. I looked up fights, which were reasonable in price at the time, and tried to plan everything, but when I presented the information to B.F. He would say not now too busy and put off planning the trip. Then, less than three weeks before the vacations started, B.F. told me I needed to come to his family's home with him on this trip, and if that didn't happen, there was no way he would propose. By that time, all the flights I had been tracking had gone way up in price because the departure date was so close. It would have been financially very tight for me to pay for that flight, and honestly I think what he did was crappy, because he told me at the last minute what I had to do instead of planning in advance like I had tried to do. So I thought

it over and decided not to go with him. Now he is saying the reason he can't propose is because I haven't met his family in their home. Like I said, met his family a handful of time in the past, his family and my family have met each other, etc. He says that this needs to happen for his family to be okay with us getting married. If he had told me any time before the vacation was close and flight prices shot up, it would be fine. We had multiple vacations since I issued the ultimatum and we could have gone to visit his parents then. I feel like this whole thing was him setting me up for failure so that he could not propose and then blame it on me. Not sure if it's relevant, but he is Asian American and I am white, he was born in the U.S. I asked him if the

need for me to visit his parents' home before he proposes is an aspect of his culture, and he said maybe. I don't want to be culturally insensitive at all, so if anyone has knowledge about this, please share. Now that we're 10 days out and he's realizing I'm serious, he spends all our time together begging me not to go through with it. But he's not planning to propose. He says it doesn't make sense because he's telling me that he would propose in December, but he was willing to take the risk of losing me rather than proposed by April. I see where he's coming from in a way, if we do both want to get married, but I can't do this anymore. Also, I think he's an adult and find it insulting that he is blaming this whole thing on his parents not meeting me in their home.

They are asking him constantly what his plan is with me, they don't know about the ultimatum, and so I get the impression that they are just as curious about the future of our relationship as I am. I don't think they sat him down and told him I need to visit them before he can propose, but that's just a hunch. Any advice or comments on this situation would be appreciated. update two, I couldn't go through with the ultimatum. I was planning to move out, actually found a new apartment, and wrote the check for the deposit. But when push came to shove, I couldn't picture my life without my boyfriend. I decided that I loved him too much to leave him over the arbitrary deadline that I had created.

I also believe that he meant what he said about getting engaged in December. I felt I was being silly for leaving him after 4.5 years because I wouldn't wait another few months. As a compromise, he said we could get a cat, I had been wanting one but he'd been saying no, and he said he'd go to at least one family event with me this year. On March 31st, the day I was planning to move out, we got a cat together. My boyfriend and I spent time enjoying each other without really mentioning the ultimatum. We both needed to recover from the damage it did to our relationship. I got a therapist and started working on myself.

I picked up a new hobby, running, developed new friendships, and spent a lot of time working on my career and hanging out with my amazing new cat. I think focusing on myself slash my career slash my friendships took some of the pressure off of him. Also, multiple family events came and went, and my boyfriend had an excuse not to attend each one. I'm not sure it was that big of a deal anyway. By the end of the summer, we were doing great and it was like the ultimatum never happened.

He also complains about our cat constantly. As I promised him, I went to visit his parents and their home in September. As I mentioned in the previous post, he is Chinese-American, and I'm white, so I studied up on my basic Chinese and was able to speak slash understand a little when we were all together. It was a great trip, and I genuinely enjoyed his parents and had a lot of fun in his hometown. I left a few days before he did so that he'd have time to spend with them alone and speak with them about his plans for us in the future. I asked him a few times how that conversation went,

and he said that they are happy with us having a future together, but that getting engaged in December would be too fast. That seemed absolutely crazy to me, and again it seemed like he was projecting his own views onto his parents. He also told me I needed to learn Chinese before we got married. His parents speak perfect English but prefer Chinese when they are with family, so I started doing Rosetta Stone. Around November, I started getting antsy that my boyfriend was going to change his mind again.

He was starting to show his pattern of making excuses. For instance, one day he casually mentioned that he couldn't propose by December because he needed to save money. We share finances and money is not an issue for either of us. Another time, he freaked out that I have student loans, most people in my profession do, and I have a very secure job, good pay, and automatic loan payments, and demanded that he see a spreadsheet of my finances before he could consider having a future together. Luckily, I already have this spreadsheet, which I showed him, and he calmed down. In the meantime, my friends and family were starting to ask questions about the future wedding. Although they had the best intentions,

it was stressing me out because I was worried that after all this, there would be no wedding. I worked with my therapist on letting go of this stress, redirecting my family away from relationship questions. I also created a no-nagging rule in my mind I stopped dropping hints, mentioning wedding-slash-engagement, etc. with my boyfriend, didn't do it much anyway, as I had learned my lesson from the ultimatum. We spent Christmas together for the first time this year, and I really thought he would propose then. But he didn't, and I didn't bring it up or pout about it. He visited his family for new years and I was left in our city working, so it definitely didn't happened then. I accepted that he actually didn't follow through with what he said he would do,

despite me holding up my end of the deal. I was the perfect girlfriend that he asked me to be, and I tried to use this in an opportunity for growth, both individually and within the relationship, and still nothing changed. I was still on the momentum of not nagging him and trying to suppress all of my thoughts of wanting to marry him. It's now to the point that I equate my own thoughts of marrying him with shame and self-loathing, like they are bad thoughts that I shouldn't have. I realize I've been feeling so embarrassed with my own desires for my future, which is so sad. But a few things have happened in the past few weeks that have made me realize that this is all bullshit. First, one of my superiors at work offered me some great opportunities at my job

if I stay on board long term. However, my boyfriend wants to think about moving us out of the city we live in because we don't like it here, I am actually okay with it for the most part. He also has given a hard no to ever moving back to my home state, his reason, my family lives there and they annoy him. I started thinking, wow, this person is putting a lot of limits on my life for someone who still can't commit to me for the long term. Then, this weekend I went back to my home state for my best friend's baby shower. Also, I want to have kids, that's the main reason I am in any hurry to get married, biological clock is ticking. So yesterday, I was hanging out with my friend and her husband, helping them set up their nursery, and I had this aha. Moment where I realized

that it's okay for me to want to get married and have kids. There's no shame in having my own wants. And at this point, not only have my wants slash desires been shut down by my boyfriend, no marriage, we can't stay in the city where I have job opportunities. We also can't live in my home state where my entire family is, but I've internalized this sense of shame about expressing or feeling anything that conflicts with his desires. So I'm starting to form a plan to move on, because this dude is taking more from my life that he's adding to it. I'm hoping to get anyone's opinion slash advice slash support about where to go from here. Also, I am willing to hear all the I told you so from everyone who said I needed to leave this guy in March when I said I would.

I totally deserve it. Thanks for reading. Update 3. Wow, Thank you Reddit for the super thoughtful replies. I read each one, so far. I spoke with my boyfriend last night about all of this. I started by asking what his roadblocks are and where he sees the relationship going. He brought up the fact that it's moving too fast for his parents, and some issues that he has with the relationship. One, that we don't make decisions together. For example, the fact that I want to stay in our city for career opportunities.

despite him wanting to move next year. Also, sometimes I make plans to hang out with friends on weekends when he is free instead of us planning the weekends together. Two, he worries about the fact that I get a lot of Amazon packages and he doesn't know what I am buying. Showed him my Amazon history. It's mostly household supplies that we both use and occasional supplies for my hobby, but that's like $20 per month max. Also, this is all on my credit card, which I comfortably pay off each month, so I don't think I need to clear every purchase by him. And three. He also doesn't like that I'm chronically five minutes late to everything, that's true and my fault.

Also, since it came up a lot in the comments, I wanted to mention that he explicitly said that none of this has to do with cultural barriers or the fact that we're an interracial couple. However, after all this, he said he's not ready for marriage. I was pretty pissed and told him I wished he told me this a year ago so I could have moved on. He basically tried to keep me around for another year so that he would have more time to figure out if he was ready. So I told him the relationship is over, and he is appearing to be in disbelief. He's trying to be really nice now, probably to get me to change my mind, but I'm remaining

gently firm here. Next story, found my husband messaging a teenage girl on Instagram in panic during our road trip, but it turns out it was his secret daughter he never told me about. I am absolutely shaking right now. My husband and I have known three years and have gotten married six months ago. He is perfect in everything I could have asked for. These past years I thought I had been living the dream, but now everything has fallen apart. Two hours into our road trip my husband decided to take a stop at a gas station and get us some snacks.

I stayed inside the car and was waiting for him until I noticed he got a notification from Instagram. This surprised me because he was always adamant on never wanting to get Instagram. I opened up his phone and decided to check what it was. Upon opening it I found messages with a teenage girl. I only saw a couple of them but they consisted of, I love you I can't wait to see you again and him sliding on her story saying she looks beautiful. I clicked on her profile and it was obvious she was a teenager, somewhere around 14 to 16. The fact he was cheating on me didn't even register in my brain and it was more so the fact that he was texting these things to someone underage.

I did not have the chance to look further because he came back within ten minutes. I don't know what to do. I am terrified, betrayed, and disgusted. I am stuck with him for six more hours and he is noticing I am acting weird. I don't want to confront him on the road and I feel like these hours are driving me crazy. I need to vent and need some support or something. Edit, I want to thank everyone for the replies and support. I have been faking being sick just to get him off my back as to why I am not holding his hand or be

affectionate with him. I know I should go along with it and pretend for my sake, but I physically can't bring myself to. I am going to try to take a nap as we have about four hours left too. Truly taking everyone's advice to heart and thank you for everyone taking your time. I just need to rest my brain before I do something I regret. Thankfully, we are on a trip to see my parents, so after these hours I'm will truly feel safe. Update, first, I want to thank everyone for the support and advice they gave. Like I said in my previous post, I just fell asleep during the car ride and told him I felt sick. We were heading to my parents' house and I really wanted to be by them. However, within 45

minutes my husband woke me up and told me he found a nearby hotel for us to stay in. He said he was worried about me and wanted me to rest in a real bed, he also bought medicine for me. At this point I was freaking out because no, I was in an unfamiliar area and he was being extra clingy. Once we got in the room and we laid down, he kept cuddling me and giving me kisses. It made me feel sick and so I left to go to the bathroom. I stayed in the bathroom for about an hour. I scrolled through everyone's comments and kept pacing myself about what to do. I knew my husband was growing concerned because he kept checking on me. After I left the bathroom, he looked so worried and I just needed to let everything out.

I know the number one advice given was not to confront him, and I know it probably was a horrible move, but I couldn't take it. I told him I found his messages on Instagram. He immediately started apologizing and saying he wanted to tell me sooner but couldn't find the time. He was apologizing but not as intensely as what he could have done. So I confronted him about that and said what a lousy apology coming from a pedophile. He immediately went silent. It was probably silent for about six minutes when he broke it and asked what I was referring to. I told him and he looked so hurt.

He took a deep breath and explained everything. He said the person I looked through his messages with was his 15-year-old daughter, Sarah. He explained that she reached out to him a year ago on Facebook and ever since then was trying to connect with her. He said within six months he confirmed he was the father, met up with her bunch of times, and truly formed a strong connection with her. However, six months ago we got married and he didn't want to stress me out with that news, as well as his daughter not being ready to face others. He also explained that when he was 18 he had an on-and-off relationship with a Sarah's mom

when one day she just up and ghosted him forever. According to Sarah, her mom is also strict, which is why the message on Instagram to avoid her mom finding out right now. now. My mind was spiraling and I knew he knew that. He then placed his phone into my hand and let me scroll farther. Upon scrolling I found her referring to him as dad and she sent him a happy father's day a while back as well. He even said he would do another DNA test to prove it to me. I immediately felt guilty. I feel guilty that my immediate mind took innocent texts and turned them inappropriate. And I felt guilty that I saw my husband in that way.

I kept apologizing to him about the accusation. However, my husband just apologized and said he understood my point of view and told me it wasn't my fault. I kept trying to tell him I was sorry and he kept saying it was okay. I can see the look in his eyes though and I can see how hurt he really is. He said we should both just get some sleep and talk more later. To be honest, I can't fall asleep as I feel just disgusted with myself. About his whole secret daughter it doesn't bother me so. much. Maybe BC it's miles better than the alternative. But I understand the situation and

I'm happy for my husband because he wants kids desperately but we have decided to wait two years to grow our marriage. I feel as if right now I flushed everything down the drain and have no clue how to make things better. Edit, to answer some common questions or concerns, to the people who think my husband sucks for not telling me earlier, he acknowledged that it was wrong and through his apology I understand why he did it. I am slightly hurt, however if I put myself in his shoes revealing a secret daughter would be hard and difficult. I don't take it as he doesn't trust me more of it's a delicate situation to bring up. To the people who think I suck for invading my husband's privacy and making rash assumptions.

Yes, that is horrible of me and I take full accountability. My husband understand my point of view and doesn't blame me for rushing to conclusions. Although, he is hurt I could imagine him as that sort of person, long as. Long story short, we both empathize with each other's actions. Yes, we both are hurt, but understand why the course of events played out this way. Thank you to all the comments, and I quit kind of proof I can give LOL.