Submitted by kabuto_mushi t3_y66z6y in relationship_advice
This is a hell of a situation and I don't know what the fuck to do.
This happened last night. We were at a local festival, a Renaissance Faire. We'd had a really awesome day. My girlfriend of 10 months was with me, and we had dressed up and had a lot of really nice romantic moments. She'd had like 3 or so meade drinks (I was toast after only 1) but was now acting normal again. We left at the very end of the night, around 7pm.
We were leaving in my car, her in the driver's seat and me in the passenger's. We were driving across a mostly empty field in the dark, toward a line of other people leaving in cars and several police vehicles, on a little dirt/grass path. Suddenly a group of 5-6 guys walked out of the festival and across the path about 40 feet in front of the car. I looked down at my phone for a moment, but didn't feel the car stop as it should have to let them pass. They were kind of lingered in the path, saying a long goodbye, exchanging hugs, right in front of us. Had I been driving I would have just stopped and waited for them to pass, and then continued on to the line of cars leaving.
This is when shit hit the fan. I looked up and my girlfriend had driven right up to them. Closer and closer until the front bumper was no more than a foot away. She then LAYED on the horn, shocking two of them and making the other few that had already passed turn around in confusion. The guy she was directly in front of made a sarcastic gesture (like a "good job idiot" sort of motion). Most of them just looked like they wanted to keep walking. One of them I think came around to the driver's side and made a "what the fuck man" sort of pose.
My girlfriend then ROLLED DOWN THE WINDOW and started saying shit to them. "Nice just stand in the fucking road, huh?" Stuff like that. As if they'd been in the middle of a highway. Ours was the only car left. The guy on front put his hands on the hood, and she pushed the accelerator a bit, like reved the engine, and he freaked out. She did almost hit him or like, push him with the car? He walked around to the driver's side and (I didn't see this) grabbed her glasses off her face that was out the window and threw them straight down onto the ground. At this point honestly I felt like my girlfriend was still totally in the wrong, because you yeild to pedestrians always, though that guy should not have grabbed her glasses or touched her face.
She instantly opens the car door, engine still running and starts getting in this guy's face. Yelling, screaming, trying to start a fight. I was shocked and scared, but I knew I had to get out and do something. De-escalate. I wanted to get her away from these men now ready to possibly strike her or hit her because she was trying to fight. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a police car peel away from their group that was shuttling out cars and start heading in our direction.
In a split second decision, I decided I needed to remove her from the scene as fast as possible. I'm a bigger guy, but I can't take 5-6 young dudes if it comes to it. And I know yelling back at them would start that. Fists would come out. So, with the best and calmest energy I could muster, I walked toward her in an effort to pull her away, put her into the passenger's side, and just stop a physical altercation. Most of the guys were actually calm, and one said like "hey man, I don't want to touch her, can you please take care of her". I nodded and moved between my girlfriend and the guy who had thrown her glasses, facing her.
I looked her in the eyes as best I could. I called her name over and over and over louder and louder and louder hoping she'd hear me and stop trying to push past me and get back in these guys business. But she just kept coming. So I used my biggest and toughest yell. "HANNAH FUCKING STOP GET INTO THE FUCKING CAR NOW". She finally dropped and just. Stood there like I'd yelled at a child. Pouting almost. I cant stop seeing the look in her eyes, like I'd just completely failed her. I said again, get in the car, please.
Then, of course, one of the guys, maybe the leader one, said something like "yeah, walk away bitch". And she FLEW AT THEM AGAIN under my arms. I was still reeling, because I'd never seen her act like this. She then in a flash stormed away from them, jumped back into the driver's seat of my car, and PEELED OUT IN A SHARP TURN IN THEIR DIRECTION. Honestly, I don't know if she really would have hit them, but watching her turn toward their group as if to drive through them all was the scariest thing I'd seen in my whole life. My throat still hurts from screaming.
She hit the breaks, got out, and jumped the nearby fence and sat in the grass crying. The guys left the scene quickly (I imagine terrified they were almost all hit by my car) and the police finally showed up. I tried to smooth talk the police guy ("hey, yeah it was just a disagreement, no one was hurt, yes she has a ride, we're okay") to get him to leave. Some kind lady passers-by stopped to help my girlfriend, because she was just sitting in the grass crying in the dark. I heard them ask her if I was hurting her, etc. I appreciated them so much.
I drove us home for an hour and a half with no words, just her sobbing. She'd said "you didn't do anything" over and over through her tears. When we got home we had a very painful conversation. She told me that guy had grabbed her glasses and she believed I should have done something to them. I asked if she'd wanted me to start a physical fight with them, basically come out swinging, and she said in the moment yes, but I should have just yelled at them to stop or leave her alone, and been on her side. I should have trusted her? In my mind I was screaming "You were the one trying to fight them?? They were just trying to go home, not fight you, you completely antagonize them from start to finish!". Confusingly, she also said I'd pushed her against the car twice, when all I remember was trying to hold her back, to get her into the passenger's seat, to snap her out of that rage. She said she felt like she was all alone because I didn't, and I said that so did I, because you became someone else I in that moment and I didn't have any idea why you'd do those things. I honestly just left it at that and went to bed.
I know it's against the rules to ask for a moral judgement here, but I don't think I was in the wrong. I did my best to de-escalate what could have been an awful fist fight and even a trip to jail overnight if the police had decided it. Now, I don't even know what to do? I'm wondering if it had something to do with the alcohol my girlfriend had during the day... she is a recovered alcoholic who recently ended a year of sobriety. I'm honestly thinking of ending the relationship? Because I don't feel like I can't trust her after last night. From what I saw and felt and remember, my girlfriend basically couldn't wait an extra 20 seconds to let a group of people pass and basically antagonized a fight, that I was expected to finish. I don't even know to think.
TL;DR: My girlfriend tried to fight a group of 6 dudes leaving a festival at night, and I think expected me to have her back. But I didn't. It never needed to happen, and started just because of her impatience and rage. I don't know what to do. Help?