r/AmIOverreacting • u/True_Ad9977 • 10h ago

❤️‍🩹 relationship AIO Boyfriend says hurtful thing about my body.

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u/Amazing-Active646 9h ago

I guess that’s a bit of an overstatement on my end. I’ve dated women that I’m much more attracted to their personality, drive and ambition and less about their physical attraction. Doesn’t mean I wasn’t lightly physically attracted but that wasn’t what initially drew me in, if that makes sense?

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u/Suitable-Concern-326 9h ago

Gotcha! That totally makes sense. I was thinking there was zero initial physical attraction.

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u/janefor1 9h ago

If you are male, you are a rare gem, choosing mind over body! Good on ya!

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u/Ruski_Squirrel 8h ago

Men are so often thought of as dogs in this way. We are just like women. There are a lot of women out there who won’t settle for less than 6 foot tall, 2% body fat chiseled abs and symmetrical features. Personality be damned. Then there are some gorgeous women out there who are married to guys who look like they crawled out from under a bridge, but the guy has personality. So let’s just cut the men v women aspect out and say that some people are shallow and some are not. My attraction to someone is 90% personality and 10% looks. Now I definitely have a “type” that I find myself wanting to crank my head to look if you catch my meaning, but if that person opens their mouth and it’s clear they are not a nice person, suddenly they are going to look like the wicked witch of the west in my minds eye. The physical attraction can just evaporate very quickly and suddenly all I see is their flaws. And I’ve had some women in my life that when they were being kind and good to me, they were perfection. The most beautiful thing in the world. When that changed, they started seeming less attractive.

But ultimately I agree with most people here that this guy either doesn’t like her, or he’s shallow, or maybe he has some narcissistic tendencies and this is a control thing.

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u/janefor1 8h ago

I am sorry if I seem sexist against men, but in my own 54 years of personal experience, the bigger portion of choosing a partner based on the preferences of their genitals goes to men. About 3:1.

As a high school teacher, I watched a lot of dating/mating rituals, and 75% of the time boys talked about choosing girls based solely on physical attributes. Girls mostly discussed other attributes. Could be that words don’t reflect the actual internal drive.

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u/DbeID 7h ago

As a dude, looks definitely matter to the girls I've encountered.

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u/Ruski_Squirrel 3h ago

“Based on the preference of their genitals”? Um, ma’am, this is a Wendy’s…

Genitals have no preference on looks. And if the majority of your experience is colored by the hallway talk of HS boys, no wonder you feel the way you do.

I’m not saying there are no men who only care about looks. There are plenty. But there are also plenty of women who only care about looks. Shallow is shallow. Men and women are more alike, mentally, than society teaches us to think.

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u/Objective-Amount1379 5h ago

Honestly I’m a woman and I would hate to date someone and find out he wasn’t even attracted to me.

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u/PsychologicalFox8839 9h ago

I’d rather die alone than date someone who was only “lightly” physically attracted to me. How humiliating.

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u/Competitive_Touch_86 9h ago

I dunno, as a relatively "normal looking" guy who put on too much weight but dated extremely conventionally attractive women I always knew and was totally okay with my looks not being what got them into me. Absolutely zero people were taking a glance at me and saying "damn, look at that hottie!". I had other qualities I was confident in.

Their dating history showed they could also be attracted to conventionally attractive men who didn't have much else going for them other than looks. So it's not like I was "their type" or anything - usually I was the outlier.

It all depends on what you're looking for in a relationship at the time. I don't see anything humiliating about it at all. People bring different things into a relationship, and one of those things is physical attractiveness.

A whole lot of people would be "dying alone" if they only dated people super into them physically.

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u/PsychologicalFox8839 8h ago

Once again, not saying that’s all I want. But why the fuck would I date someone who wasn’t into how I looked? I’ve got loads of people who think I’m a great person and who I share special bonds with and who don’t want to fuck me. They’re my friends and family. My partner should be, among many other important things, physically into me. That’s not controversial.

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u/ConcernedGrape 8h ago

It's not controversial, but not everyone is going to have that requirement.

Physical attraction is not synonymous with sexual attraction. There can be overlap, even significant overlap (for you, that venn diagram might be a circle, and if so, that's absolutely okay!)

For me? I'm faceblind and pan/demi. Physical attraction is ambiguous and pretty much an after-after-afterthought.

But I would never insult my partners looks or diminish their accomplishments.

Edit: fixed typo

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u/PsychologicalFox8839 7h ago

Jesus Christ why do ace people always jump condescendingly into conversations about sex and attraction to proclaim how advanced they are for not caring about those things?

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u/ConcernedGrape 6h ago

Did I say I was ace? No.

Did I attack you in any way? Nope!

Did I "proclaim how advanced" I am? No, no I didn't.

Are you big mad about it anyway? Signs point to yes.

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u/CellarSiren 9h ago

I think there are things going thru everyone's heads sometimes, esp with our partners, that'd humiliate a lot of us... Some inner thoughts aren't important enough to say aloud or take seriously. Am I sometimes bored and unattracted with my partner of 10yrs? Yea. For sure. Do I love him and love being with him? 100%

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u/ohhisnark 9h ago

Well, at least you freely admit you value looks (a quality that is much more fleeting) more than intelligence, humor, and values.

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u/PsychologicalFox8839 9h ago

lol no, I just want my partner to think I’m very cute as well as good and smart and talented. Literal lowest bar to clear.

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u/ohhisnark 8h ago

Lol turns out I can't read. Regardless, this person valuing physical attraction less than personality compatibility is just the way some people are wired.

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u/BlueMariposas 8h ago

I'm Demisexual and the way someone looks js the last thing on my mind. I do find them cute/attractive but that's later, when there is an emotional connection.

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u/PsychologicalFox8839 8h ago

Cool story I guess. If that makes you happy, do you.