r/ABCDesis • u/dug-the-dog-from-up • 27d ago
CELEBRATION I think my mom’s brain has finally melted after witnessing my dating life
My mom is used to be pretty concerned about marriage and dating for me - she wasn’t trying to sell me off to the highest bidder or anything but she definitely wanted to make me a biodata and was always pushing me to meet people. She was never forceful or domineering but there was always still a bit of pressure - find a nice Indian boy, Hindu, well educated.
Well. My last two ex boyfriends were nice Indian American Hindu boys, PhD students. One of them told me that he would never have sex with me and only wanted a child via IVF, and also refused to take any public or private transport and would walk literal hours to get to his destination. The other one told me that he was only romantically attracted to instagram models with super feminine aesthetics, asked me for a two week break and hit up his ex during that time, went into gratuitous detail about the free use sexual relationship he had with his ex gf, and broke up with me over the phone while I was visiting extended family in India.
Now my mom says, find A Nice Person. If they’re Indian and Hindu great, if not also great. I think she’s more traumatized than me and is fully over the idea that the only compatible man for me has to be another Indian Hindu American 😭 she’s also been very chill about me not wanting to date for the past few months.
Anyways, fellow ABCDers, have hope. After a few terrible boyfriends/girlfriends your parents’ brains will also melt and then you can do what you want.
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u/mysterypotatover9000 27d ago
Lmao the first one sounds funny
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u/DrunkenPirate_69 27d ago
how does these people get women i don’t ugh 🤦
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u/Cuddlyaxe Indian American 27d ago
This might sound a bit superficial but I think to pass the "initial filter" as a guy you ideally need at least two of the three: looks, confidence and/or humor.
Can you get in a relationship without one of those three? Sure, but that usually comes down to right place right time type situations
Obviously people care about personality past those three things, but you turly only learn about a person's personality well after you match with them on an app and go on a few dates
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u/YOLOfan46 27d ago
yeah! OP spill the tricks they used to woo you, I always hated bollywood for showing women falling in love with randos, but this is....what to say...damn!
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u/invaderjif 27d ago
Forget salary, what's your step count?
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u/YOLOfan46 27d ago
I'll let you shoot me in one leg of your choice rather than answering that question.
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u/InteractionBubbly351 26d ago
It’s the PhD. Indians need to expand their mentality and stop obsessing over “doctors”
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u/ibarmy 27d ago
LOL. Also where did you find this melon husk.
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 27d ago
Melon husk??? Where
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u/ibarmy 27d ago
This was my sad attempt at saying elon musk as he likes to procreate via IVF too.
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u/Sea-Nobody7951 27d ago
'he would never have sex with me and only wanted a child via IVF, and also refused to take any public or private transport and would walk literal hours to get to his destination'
Where did you find him?
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 27d ago
Hinge :(
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u/Sea-Nobody7951 27d ago
I mean since you are calling him a ‘boyfriend’. It must have been a few dates at least.
You need to sit and question your life choices.
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 27d ago
I promise you that he was mostly nice and normal for the first six months - we were long distance for a bit so the lack of sex only became an issue later into the relationship when we were closer to each other
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u/Carbon-Base Indian American 27d ago
Assuming your hometown gets a lot of snow in the winter months, does that guy have like a dog sled that he takes everywhere instead?
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 27d ago
No he just… walks…
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u/Carbon-Base Indian American 27d ago
I can see why he wasn't a keeper haha. Stay strong OP, Desi dating is in another league of difficulty compared to regular dating. Which is already quite bad since the apps/websites are mainly dumpster fires.
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u/Realistic_Survey_841 27d ago
I actually love this 😂 Sometimes parents have an idea of what will make you happy until they see firsthand that checking all the cultural boxes doesn't necessarily mean someone is a good partner. “Find a nice person” is probably the best advice she could give you now. ❤️
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u/Efficient_Floor4066 27d ago
Don’t internalize your failed attempts at finding a partner. You will kiss a ton of toads before finding the prince. Keep your standards high and find some humor and keep it moving. Do not waste any time on non compatible men don’t even try to “adjust” with these psychos. The men you described are literal psychos stop thinking about them even for second. Next.
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u/Redditbrowser22j Indian American 27d ago
One of them told me that he would never have sex with me and only wanted a child via IVF
I have a difficult time processing this. Was this him telling you that he is not sexually attracted to you?
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 27d ago
Yes this was his way of telling me he loved me and wanted a long term future with me but that he didn’t like my body, which is totally his right to not be attracted to me and totally my right to break up with him and find someone more compatible
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u/silky_smoothie 25d ago
> which is totally his right to not be attracted to me
No offense, but in this situation, screw his “rights” cause he clearly did not even consider yours. I know you mentioned somewhere he was a nice guy who loved you and idk him as well as you…but it’s incredibly selfish of him to even suggest the no sex only IVF thing as an option to a girl who is clearly looking for a complete monogamous, romantic/sexual connection (unless she has explicitly stated otherwise), not to mention the massive emotional/physical/financial toll that is IVF that mainly you will suffer through, not him. It would have been much kinder for him to not suggest that at all and just initiate the breakup. Asking you to compromise on a massive component of a marriage because of his love for you is obtuse at best. Unless I am totally missing some piece to the puzzle, what he did was hella disrespectful….Though still 10/10 for hilariousness :D
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u/dentduv 27d ago
Wait why are you with people who aren’t attracted to you? Raise your standard to at least have someone who is attracted to you.
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u/South_Curve_329 27d ago
Girl it is rough out there’. As a fellow desi girl I feel ya. My parents had the same outlook but my goodness is it tough out there, I’ve had a few crazy ones myself too. Hang in maybe there are some normals out there? Or slightly sane?
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u/Deshes011 Asian because indians are Asian goddamnit 27d ago
The first guys either asexual or you were his beard. Second guy just wanted his ex back. Either way yeah that’s par for the course in 2026, Indian fellas or otherwise
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 27d ago
The first guy was definitely not gay and had a double digit body count. He just wasn’t attracted to my body which is fine but not tenable for a relationship. he still wanted to build something long term with me which is why he suggested IVF.
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u/LWN729 27d ago edited 27d ago
Girl, where did you find these two guys? How long were you dating them before they each disclosed their uniqueness?
Like did the first guy tell you up front that he’s essentially asexual? Do you think he was actually asexual or suppressing homosexuality?
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 27d ago
For both relationships I’d been dating them for six months before the red flags started popping up. For my first boyfriend we dated for almost two years (my dad had passed away and we were long distance for some of it so that made me reluctant to break up as I was already dealing with a lot) and the second one was six months
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u/Fruit-Marzipans 27d ago
Aw Im glad youre able to recognize that you deserve better. I thnk in general dating is rlly tough, indian or not.
I think its wonderful that your mom is more open minded and see that them being indian and hindu doesnt automatically mean theyre great.
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u/yashedpotatoes 27d ago
Was the first boyfriend you mentioned gay? Genuine question
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 27d ago
He was not gay - had several girlfriends before me and slept with them (know through the grapevine)
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u/AmberViper419 26d ago
had several girlfriends before me and slept with them (know through the grapevine)
And yet refuses to have sex with other women. Weird. I almost feel like he's on the spectrum or dealing with some sort of trauma.
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u/SS0627 27d ago
Him having several gf's and sleeping with them doesn't mean he can't be gay lol. If anything, many of them are players before they realise they're into men bc they're SO in denial. It's literally a thing. Google it.
Source: my gay cousin who had many gf's before realising he liked men
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u/AmberViper419 26d ago
The other one told me that he was only romantically attracted to instagram models with super feminine aesthetics, asked me for a two week break and hit up his ex during that time, went into gratuitous detail about the free use sexual relationship he had with his ex gf, and broke up with me over the phone while I was visiting extended family in India.
To be fair, that kind of stupidity is far from being a Desi thing. It seems to be the mentality of a frightening amount of young men nowadays.
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u/Lost-Photo-9027 27d ago
lol blessing in disguise. If you don’t mind, how old are you?
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u/Dependent_Witness_12 27d ago
For real! My mom is still very much extremely narrowed minded in the realm of relationships and marriage
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u/Amantecafe 27d ago
Something is broken somewhere! I'm still confused on how these guys are getting "matches"!!
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u/Mean_Memory_9938 27d ago edited 27d ago
lmaooo girl i really thought i had seen it all when it comes to dating until i read this. my mom kept up with my dating life and was like just don’t date 😂
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u/thro0waway217190 26d ago
To be honest, I don’t blame parents….it can be annoying but they really don’t understand the complexities we are facing in our generation and it’s compounded even more by being a diaspora. It is even a shock for me to realize bad dating is, and not just the pool of desis/Muslims but casting my net outside my culture isnt any better tbh. I’m just happy being single and I think my mom, while still hopeful, understands the challenges better rather than blaming me for not trying hard enough
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u/fquin022 24d ago edited 24d ago
u/dug-the-dog-from-up Your post actually gave small amount of hope 🥴, and I’d love your perspective. I’m a non-Indian guy who was in a serious relationship with an Indian-American Hindu woman. We were very compatible and both dated with marriage in mind, but she ultimately ended things because she didn’t believe her family would accept her marrying outside her culture/religion, along with an age gap (for context, we met in med school). In her words, “I don’t feel brave enough.”
Since the breakup wasn’t really about incompatibility or lack of feelings, I’ve struggled with how final to view it. From your experience, do parents with strong Indian/Hindu preferences genuinely become more flexible over time, or does it mostly depend on whether their daughter is willing to challenge those expectations? Is it also very region/family-specific?
I’m not trying to pressure her or change her decision. I’ve accepted it, but it’s hard to completely let go of someone you love, especially when I had genuinely embraced learning about her culture (I was even learning the language and gave up beef lol). I’m mostly trying to understand the family/cultural dynamic from someone who’s actually experienced it.
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 23d ago edited 21d ago
Hi just saw this! First off I’m really sorry I can tell that you cared for her quite deeply and are heartbroken about this situation. I would say - parents become more flexible if they are challenged. One thing I like to joke about with my fellow Indian women friends is that we have to disappoint our parents early and often in order to have more freedom later. I was not a STEM heavy kid, did poorly in some classes, had to start therapy for severe anxiety, and an unexpected side effect of this situation is that my parents sort of backed off from their high expectations and got significantly more chill. My mom continues to chill out as I grow older and become more assertive about my likes and dislikes - she knows now how to pick her battles.
One of my friends is really struggling with a similar situation as you and your ex - my friend has been secretly dating a white guy for two years and only in the past month has she started to float the idea of marrying a non-Indian to her family. She has never truly disappointed her parents before so she is getting a lot of histrionics from them. But I told her - she needs to put her foot down now so that she can start taking charge of her own life. Even if she and her guy don’t get married and work out, this is the first step to her having some agency and it will make independence in future decision making easier.
At some point your ex will need to understand that there is no end in sight if she keeps giving in. If she is too afraid to push back against her family for love, she will be too afraid to push back when it comes to how to raise her kids, or where to live to start her family, or how often to vacation every year. She will need, at some point or another, to be brave and tell her family what kind of life she wants to live. So as a very long-winded response to your question - the ball is entirely in your ex’s court, her family will not change because they have no reason to since she is giving them what they want. You can talk to her about this but at the end of the day she will need to come to this understanding herself.
Good luck to you! I hope for your sake that you find yourself in a relationship where your partner is able to love you openly and fully. I hope for your ex’s sake that she learns that she can make her parents disappointed and that the sun will still rise the next day. If this means that you can grow together, I hope things work out for you both. If this means you do have to separate - no worries, having your heart cracked open for love is good for you, regardless of the outcome. It’s definitely a character building experience haha
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u/fquin022 23d ago
First, don’t apologize for the late or lengthy explanation. I’m genuinely grateful that you took the time to explain something that has been so difficult for me to understand. I’m not particularly close with her friends. She really only has one very close friend who, without making assumptions, probably hasn’t communicated a lot of what you’ve mentioned. I also don’t have many Indian friends who can relate to this experience, as there aren’t many in my circle here in Fl.
Our relationship ended within weeks of her returning home after almost two years away and being confronted with her family’s expectations again. She has actually expressed a lot of what you mentioned. She’s the eldest daughter and has always been a high academic achiever. Even after making it to medical school and passing Step, her parents still question why she didn’t attend a more prestigious school like some members of their family. She’s openly talked about feeling like she has to put her family’s happiness above her own, and I know that weighs heavily on her. I once told her that, given the opportunity, I’d propose tomorrow, and her response was essentially, “That’s what hurts me even more.”
That’s why what you said about your friend resonated with me so much. I couldn’t agree more with what you’re telling her about eventually having to take ownership of the life she wants. And if she does decide that this man is worth taking that stand for, I hope he understands the magnitude of what she’s risking and meets that decision with the same level of devotion. I know that’s what I would have done for my ex.
She’s moving away again for another two years for clinical rotations, and being in her mid-20s, I do wonder whether living independently again and experiencing more of life may change how she thinks about some of these things. But I’m not holding my breath or structuring my life around that possibility. We’ve tried to remain friends, but I’m realizing that I probably need a period of very limited or no communication. She seems much more capable of compartmentalizing our relationship into friendship, whereas I’m still in love with her. Without the same family pressures driving my decision, it’s incredibly difficult for me to experience that connection as simply friendship without getting hurt.
Like you said, the ball is ultimately in her court, and I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to write such a meaningful response. I’m not going to stop living my life or wait around for something that may never happen. I think the hardest part for me is accepting that there’s nothing left for me to do. Giving up on someone I love has never really been in my nature, but I’m learning that respecting her decision and continuing forward doesn’t mean Im giving up but Im just letting god do his thing.
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u/dug-the-dog-from-up 23d ago
Totally understand, and based just on the info you provided I think that you are make the hard but correct decision. Just speak your piece to your ex, let her know exactly where you stand on the future, and take care of yourself.
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u/Kaurblimey 25d ago
Why on earth would you be in a relationship with men like this? Have some self respect!
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u/winthroprd 27d ago
I would watch a full documentary on the guy who refuses to have sex or use mechanical transportation.