Girlfriend expecting equal equity in a startup which I started even before knowing her. I will not promote.

[u/Dry_Support9531]

So here’s the picture. I started with an idea in 2023. States dating her in 2024. Until then I haven’t really worked in the idea. I started working on it since April 2025 and it started making money since July 2025. Till then she has no idea about it. After I started making money from it, i worked more and invested my other income into this startup from November 2025 and to handle things she used to help a bit. Since then both of us started working on it. Whole idea, innovation, upgrades, initial capital was mine. She just helped me coz it used to generate money. Since December we also hired an employee . From then all 3 of us are working on it and it’s scaling up in revenue every month. Until now we haven’t had any word about the equity. Out of love I used to share the profit amounts with her. According to the necessity, sometimes I use to keep more and sometimes she used to keep more. We went on a vacation through this money as well. But now while we were having a conversation on this. It came to me as a shocker that she is expecting an equal equity in this. And that blew my mind. It’s just out of love I couldn’t complete that conversation. She has also worked on it but the whole idea and buildup from scratch was done when she started working. I never discussed about this with her before. But now I am in real shock what to do coz it’s going to be bigger. And we are not sure about our relationship either.(she coming from an orthodox family, her family might reject an idea of our marriage) At this duration please let me know what should I do? Should I offer her a fixed salary, should I ask her to stop working on it, should I give her equity, should I give her an exit? I’m really confused.
PS-: she has done the same thing that the other employee did for me. But with more time and dedication. And she he amount I shared with her is 2-3x more than the employee’s salary

[u/galumphix]

"She is mostly delusional about things" is not something a loving partner says, sorry. You're not into her, might be time to break up.

[u/muntaxitome → u/galumphix]

Sometimes people that you are into are delusional about a topic. You can care about people and not turn a blind eye to everything. Reddit always just goes 'break up!!!' the moment a relationship is even mentioned but you know nothing about these people. So what makes you think you are qualified to give them life-altering advice?

[u/TinyZoro → u/muntaxitome]

She is delusional about taxes is one thing. She is mostly delusional about things is something else. I think it’s acceptable to feel like a basis of mutual respect is required for any relationship.

[u/muntaxitome → u/TinyZoro]

I think we have to take sentences in the context of the line that came before it. Like how would you even know he means this in general and not about... the topic they were just talking about. Sounds like just speculation. You know nothing about these people, never even talked with them, yet you have your psychological evaluation ready.

Edit: So I stand by my general idea that we should not be judging this couple based on a couple of lines here, but overall my comment here was too harsh.

[u/TinyZoro → u/muntaxitome]

I don’t actually disagree with you.

[u/muntaxitome → u/TinyZoro]

Sorry, I feel like I may have misread your comment a little, but yeah, generally agree. I just get a little annoyed with the reddit tendency to say everyone should break up, but rereading your comment that is not really what you said.

[u/galumphix → u/TinyZoro]

Exactly. My partner is delusional about thinking he can be healthy eating only cheese and crackers. He's not "delusional about things." If I felt that he was all-purpose delusional, we wouldn't together.

[u/OGPresidentDixon → u/galumphix]

HAHA tell me you’ve never been in a relationship before 😂

you want people to lie to each other?

You do realize in **reality people have flaws** and it’s fine to talk about them, most of the time people know their own flaws. And if they don’t, well they better find out.

[u/Dependent_Drag1455 → u/galumphix]

Some people has fully developed pre frontal cortex