She told me her income is hers and mine is 'ours.' I'm still trying to understand the logic.

I've been having a hard time dating, and honestly, it's reached a point where I've started questioning whether I even want a romantic relationship at all. A little about me: I'm 26, based in Iran, currently finishing law school while working as an executive manager at a respected law firm. I started working young, and by most measures I'd call myself successful for my age. I take responsibility seriously — professionally and personally — and I've never had a problem carrying weight when it's needed. Before I get into it, I want to admit something. Writing this wasn't easy. I think most men find it difficult to talk openly about rejection, about the moments that stung, about fear or sadness or feeling like you weren't enough. We're not really given the vocabulary for it growing up. But I decided this was worth doing anyway — partly because I think the question underneath it matters, and partly because I wanted to understand myself better by putting it into words. Here's the pattern I keep running into. At some point, almost every conversation I have with a woman here eventually turns to relationships, marriage, and how responsibility gets divided. When I say I'm independent and that I'd want a partner who's independent and capable too — someone I can genuinely build a life with, not just be provided for by — I've had women tell me, sometimes directly, sometimes not, that they don't see themselves as responsible for building or financially supporting a shared life. The unspoken expectation seems to be: the man provides. He's financially responsible, protective, always has an answer, always knows what to do, where to go, what to decide. He carries the relationship. Two conversations stayed with me. On one date, with a 32-year-old lawyer, this exact topic came up. She told me, plainly: "My income is mine. Your income is ours. Don't count on me for the financial side of a shared life." I asked why I should agree to that. She said she didn't want the stress of financial responsibility. So I asked her directly — did she expect me to carry all of that stress while she carried none of it? She said, half-joking, that apparently that's what a "powerful man" does, and that I was "acting like a princess." Later in the same conversation, she told me, without much hesitation, that men who want shared responsibility are a turn-off for her. Another time, I was on a date with a 28-year-old brand manager at a pharmaceutical company. Same underlying theme, but with a twist. She told me she wanted her partner to be more professionally accomplished than she was. When I asked what she meant, she said: "You're a COO right now. I'd want my partner to be a CEO." What struck me was that, on paper, my position was already more senior than hers. I found myself wondering — what exactly is she looking for that she doesn't already have in herself? I could list more stories, but I don't want this to turn into a highlight reel of bad dates. That's not the point. At first, I assumed I was simply meeting the wrong people. So I widened the search — dated women my age, then older. The pattern kept resurfacing in different forms. Eventually I started wondering if this is more structural than I'd assumed. Maybe a lot of women genuinely aren't looking for an equal partner in the way I picture one. Maybe what's wanted is a man who leads and carries most of the weight — and maybe, paradoxically, a man who explicitly asks for shared responsibility becomes less desirable for it. Here's the strange part: I am capable of being the sole provider. I've done exactly that for my own family when it was needed, and I'd do it again without resentment. But if I'm choosing who to build my own family with, I don't understand why I'd knowingly walk into a relationship where I end up more alone under the full weight of everything. For a while, I turned the question on myself. Maybe men, stripped of the provider role, simply aren't as lovable. Maybe we're conditioned to be valued for what we produce and protect — and the moment we stop performing that, we become less wanted as partners. And then a darker thought followed it: who actually shows up for a man when he's sad? When he's facing something alone? When he's scared, or tired, or just wants someone to help carry the weight instead of carrying it all himself? Sometimes it feels like men are valued mainly for output — for what we provide — rather than for who we are underneath that. I know that conclusion is probably too broad to be the whole truth, and I'm not trying to turn this into "men vs. women." I don't think every woman I've met reflects some universal rule. I suspect there's a better explanation than the one I've landed on — and that's genuinely what I'm here to ask about. Maybe I'm misreading the situation. Maybe I've been noticing certain things while missing others entirely. Maybe the culture around relationships here is shifting, and I've just kept running into a particular type of person along the way. So I'm asking, honestly: how do you see the question of responsibility between men and women in a relationship today? Do traditional roles still hold up? Should responsibility generally be shared — even if not perfectly 50/50? Or is there something in all this I'm still missing? And if you don't have a theory, that's fine too. I'd be just as interested in hearing how this lands for you. submitted by /u/Omidteimoori [link] [comments]