Mistakenly called the cops on my 27F boyfriend 29M when he had planned a surprise proposal. Now things between us are strained. Am I able to fix this?

A Reddit user shared their frustration after mistakenly calling the cops on their boyfriend during what turned out to be a surprise proposal. After arriving home to find their house dark and their boyfriend unresponsive, the user called emergency services, only to discover the proposal setup, which was ruined.

Despite apologizing, the boyfriend now believes the user intentionally sabotaged the proposal because they don’t want to marry him. The situation has caused strain in their relationship, and the user is unsure how to move forward. To find out more and how others have reacted, read the full story below.

‘ Mistakenly called the cops on my 27F boyfriend 29M when he had planned a surprise proposal. Now things between us are strained. Am I able to fix this ?’

We have been together for seven years. We moved in together after two weeks, adopted a dog and a couple of cats, opened a joint bank account, met each others families, merged our friends into one tribe. It has been seven really good years. I’m happy.

I am not one of those people that need to be married. I don’t need a ring, a ceremony, a piece of paper, to commit my life to the one person I love beyond all others. I am his wholly and completely. That isn’t to say I’m against marriage, because I’m not. But getting a ring on my finger is not a priority for me.

When I have thought about it I imagine a small wedding with our parents, maybe our siblings, and the officiant. Barefoot on the beach. No fuss, nothing elaborate, something simple that we could throw together ourselves. Then off to a place we could relax, eat and drink without the formalities.

If I had a dream wedding, it would be that or something similar. Back in July my boyfriend was acting cagey. I knew he was up to something and trying to hide it. He is no good at trying to keep something under wraps.

He’s one of those people that, even though they don’t say anything, act like they have a secret. I wasn’t worried about his secret because I knew he would tell me eventually. I was thinking he was going to surprise me with a weekend getaway because I had been working long hours for a couple of months and that’s the kind of thing he does.

One night I arrived home from work and his car wasn’t in the drive, the house was dark, and the front door wide open. I sat in the street watching the house for a couple of minutes. There was no movement, no lights in the windows, nothing. I called my boyfriend four times, no answer. That wasn’t like him.

One missed call? Sure. Four missed calls? No. So I called the cops. I was still on the phone with emergency services when they arrived. They came over to me, I gave them a run down on what I knew, which was nothing, and they went into the house.

A few minutes later one of them came out and asked me to go in with them. They lead me through the house to the back patio. I had flipped the lights on as I entered and saw that a trail of rose petals took us right out the back.

Where my boyfriend, wearing a tux and handcuffs, was sitting at our patio table that was set beautifully for dinner. It goes without saying that the surprise proposal was ruined. It has been about seven weeks since. Things are not good between us. It was a simple misunderstanding on my part.

My boyfriend thinks I called the cops because I knew he was going to propose. He thinks that I don’t want to marry him but instead of saying that, I found a way to make sure I wouldn’t have to. We have discussed us getting married exactly once and that was in our first year of being together.

I remember the conversation word for word because it was only a handful words.. Him – would you wear my ring?. Me – yeah. Him – when?. Me – surprise me
That was the extent of our discussion about marriage.

I don’t know how I was suppose to know he was going to ask five weeks ago from a half assed conversation from some six years ago. I know I hurt him and I’ve apologised for doing so. He refuses to see how it came about that I called the cops.

He went to his parents that night because he was upset, then came home an hour later because they thought it was hilarious. Everyone he tells thinks it’s funny. He is the one telling people. Before this post I had not said anything to anyone because I know it upsets him.

I don’t know what else to do. He doesn’t believe me that it was a huge misunderstanding. Am I missing something? Did I break trust or harm him in some way that I’m just not getting? How do I approach this so I can fix it? At this point I’m thinking of proposing to him so we can move on from this.

Here’s how people reacted to the post:

HatsAndTopcoats −  Why in the world did he leave the front door open?

[Reddit User] −  Honestly, I think it’s a hilarious story and if I was the bf I would be laughing about it

avast2006 −  Your boyfriend meant well, but “empty driveway, dark house, front door hanging wide open” means exactly what you thought when you saw it, to anyone with a shred of common sense and a drive towards self-preservation. He got it almost right, and then ruined it with the dumb front door.

You would have been a fool to walk into that, and you did exactly right by involving the police. And now he is being unfair to you by refusing to acknowledge he did something spectacularly idiotic. At this point it has gone beyond dumb and has progressed to emotional abuse. You did nothing wrong.

He hangs out on the idea that “everyone he tells thinks it’s funny” without realizing that the reason it’s funny is because he did something embarrassingly stupid, and he’s the one who ended up in handcuffs at his own proposal because of it.

My advice is to get a disinterested third party to yell some sense into him, because he’s damaging his relationship with his pouting over something that is entirely his fault.

Datonecatladyukno −  I’m sorry but this I A GREAT STORY. How is it ruined it even better, not boring at all 10/10

Trouble_in_Mind −  Ngl, I was kinda prepared to read something silly…but what the heck! Have you tried reversing the example? “What if you came home, it was dark out, the front door is wide open with seemingly nobody at home, and you couldn’t get ahold of me?

Wouldn’t you be worried there was a home i**asion? THAT is what I thought happened.” The fact that he’s so upset about this / blaming you is VERY weird.

JellicoAlpha_3_1 −  Honestly, just wait until you get more responses to this post and send him the link. Leaving the door open and the lights off was incredibly stupid. I’m a grown ass man and I would have called the police too. What he did was idiotic and now he is pouting about it

OP’s soon to be fiance…if you read my post…stop being a baby. You had good intentions, but you screwed up the execution. It happens. This woman desperately wants to be with you. Stop f**king up a good thing, pull your head out of your b**t, and propose.No big to do’s, no drones taking 360 videos.

Take her somewhere special to the both of you, get down on one knee, tell her how much you love her, and put the ring on her dang finger already

woman_thorned −  This is super fake lmao.

heavy-hands −  Your boyfriend thinks you called the cops *because you knew he was going to propose* and not for his painfully stupid and poorly thought out proposal that made you think your home had been burglarized?

Jesus Christ. Maybe it’s worth abandoning this relationship if his head is so far up his own ass he can’t see what the actual issue is here.

DplusLplusKplusM −  You have to consider two things here- The first being that this guy doesn’t know you very well if he truly thought one of these staged, made-for-social-media surprise proposals would be something you wanted.

The second is that if he can’t see why you’d be completely freaked out to come home and find the door hanging open and him missing then his grasp on reality isn’t great. Maybe take some more to time to actually get to know each other.