'AITA for how I reacted to my BF locking me out of our bedroom at night to try and 'help' me?'

"Did I overreact to my BF trying to 'help' me?"

So this happened last night and I’m still not sure how to feel about it. My boyfriend (22m) and I (22f) have been together for 6 years and living together for 1 year. I have always had a weird thing with leaving my bedroom at night.

When I was younger I would refuse to leave my bedroom for any reason at night due to the high amounts of paranoia and anxiety I would get when I tried mostly due to an over active imagination. My boyfriend knows this and though I have gotten much better as I have grown up every once in a while I still have to take moment to myself before I can walk out.

Last night my boyfriend I were lounging in bed after a long day of movie marathons, I had been drinking tons of water and soda all day and had been having to pee super often.

As I was lying in bed I realized I had to pee once again. As I went to leave the room and saw the dark hallway (the light switch is at the beginning of the hall and not by the bedroom) I froze. I started to panic as my mind went crazy. I stood there looking into the hall and wringing my hands together to try and calm myself down enough to run to the bathroom and then eventually back.

My boyfriend sighed as I was standing there and said “there is nothing there just go so we can go to bed”. I looked at him but did not move from my spot. He got up to stand by the door and said he would wait for me if it would make me feel better. I felt a lot of relief from that so I stepped into the hall.

Once in the hall he shut the bedroom door and locked it. I started panicking, crying, and pushing the door to try to get out of the darkness. I begged for him to open the door and he said he wouldn’t until I went pee.

I begged more but he wouldn’t budge so I ran to the bathroom did my business and by the time I was done the bed room door was open again. I ran back into the room and quickly got into bed to calm all the way down. My boyfriend turned to me and said “see you are fine, nothing happened so know you won’t worry about it."

I told him that I didn’t like what he did and that it didn’t help me the way he thought it did. He just let out another sigh, told me I was overreacting and rolled over to go to sleep. Am I over reacting? I know he genuinely wanted to help but it made me feel awful.

What do you think? AITA? This is what commenters had to say:

Zealousideal_Bag2493 said:

I’m going to offer you a way to help him understand why what he did isn’t helpful. A paranoid fear isn’t reasonable. If it were, you would reason yourself out of it. He may have thought he was going to show you that you had nothing to fear, but what he really showed you is that you can’t trust him.

Now, when you’re battling your fear, you ALSO have to worry that he will take away your safety. He didn’t help you; he made the burden larger. He needs to be a person you associate with safety, not fear. Ask him what he wants to be for you. I’m sorry that happened to you. You’ve done great in being able to get that fear down over the years. NTA.

Outrageous_Smile_996 said:

What he wanted to do is an exposition technic (flooding), it doesn't work if the person is not willing to be involved in it, it needs your consent bc it could have the opposite effect. Your bf is TAH.

rockshow12 said:

I was good with everything until he shut and locked the door. What did he think would happen? That you would be like gee... everything is great out here? That is cruel beyond words. I get you guys have been together for years but that is the most immature/selfish thing he could have done.

PennyPirateShip said:

I don't know if you overreacted or not but I know this would be too much for me personally and I couldn't love someone the same after this.

0512052000 said:

That's awful. Even reading this gave me anxiety. I'm 38 and I'm still afraid of the dark. Might seem childish but it's an awful fear. He's an idiot.

She later shared this edit to her post with more info.:

Therapy? I am on a waitlist to see a therapist, I have been for about 7 months so I can help manage my anxiety. My first sessions is supposed to happen Mid August. To why I didn’t get therapy sooner, as a kid my family didn’t “believe” in therapy so it wasn’t an option while I was living with them. But after I turned 19 I started looking for therapists that weren’t booked up to a year and half out.

While I was in college I got to see the therapist there and he suggest the trying to calm my self down before going out into the hall and to remind myself that there is nothing which is what I was trying to do. He also suggest not to get a night light because I would be to reliant on it. I see how from the comments that it would be best for me to get one.

Turn on the Light? That would be running down to the end of the hall instead of just to the bathroom as there is no light switch by the bedroom door. We don’t have a ceiling light in our room so we use lamps and they kinda suck so it really doesn’t lighten up the hallway at all. I am slowly realizing that the way our apartment is set up is quite weird but it’s what we have.

Thank you for all the comments. I understand how childish it is and I agree that I need to take a good portion of accountability for not getting more help sooner. Also I do know it’s irrational and I’m deeply ashamed of it and do not to ask him for help because it’s not his problem to fix.

I am going to talk to him once we both return from work so he can let out any frustrations or feelings towards whats going on and so I can do my best to explain to him why I was upset. I will be investing in a night light and as for the therapy, once august hits this will hope fully be one of the first things I can work on. Again thank you all.