When you first meet this man, he bowls you over with just how impressive he is.
The perfect amalgamation of brains and brawn, he wants the white picket fence and the two kids, to chop firewood and fix the tap when it’s leaking.
Like a Ken doll made up of all the qualities you’re looking for in a man, he’s inherently masculine, but wants to respect you. Take care of you.
He says he doesn’t want you to make the same mistakes you’ve made with men before. He knows what’s best for you before you know yourself.
He’s not going anywhere, he says. You won’t scare him away.
Watching how Charlie Newling interacted with Ali Oetjen on last night’s episode of The Bachelorette, I recognised the type of man I unfortunately know all too well.
“This is a girl who’s fallen for [things] before in the past, and in my mind she’s falling for it again,” the 31-year-old builder told the camera before sitting her down to tell her she was being blinded by the other men in the house.
“That hurts me, I care about her a lot. She needs to be protected. It needs to come from me.” (Watch the moment below, post continues after video…)
It felt uncomfortably familiar because, Ali, I’ve been there before. I’ve sat where you were sitting, with a ‘Charlie’ telling me I was wrong and he was right.
Telling me that I’m making mistakes and that I can’t trust my feelings, that he knows what’s best for me, and if only I would do what he says, everything would be better.
