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The way she contextualises it is a bit odd, but the actual thing isn't that bad. It's just accommodating him, being aware of his particulars, and helping him over his issues. The gift of a single M&M is unusual, but giving your partner something nice isn't strange. People do similar things all the time in relationships, it's just not thought of as training.

Biggest issue is her framing it that way, because people might either get the wrong idea, or give the wrong idea. Saying she's training him like a dog gives the idea of a lead, like with an actual dog.

The biggest thing for me is that she's eroding his emotional sovereignty. She's taking covert actions to modulate and decide his mood for him.

Sometimes, when I'm feeling down, I just want to feel that and get through on my own. But she's deciding which of his moods isn't appropriate and is changing his behaviour. If this were out in the open, he would be able to accept or refuse her attempts to cheer him up or divert him. But he (presumably) doesn't even know it's happening. That's not cool.

It sounds fine because it's worded like she's helping him but she's still taking away his autonomy. Just bring it out in the open: "hey, I've noticed, when you're sad or stressed, peanut M&Ms cheer you up. Would you like me to keep some on-hand?" With that, you've alerted them to behaviours about themself and got their consent to "help" them.

If that's the timbre of their interactions, I've got no qualms. But setting the context as "I train abused dogs" brings the mental image to one step above "hiding medicine in a dog treat."

I mean this simply gets into the ethics of manipulation. Ultimately, it comes down to choosing happiness.

i remember this episode of Big Bang Theory

A man can only dream of having a girl who's so attentive and understanding. She'd make a good mom.

Most of us are so utterly self-consumed.

Insert "it should've been me" meme here.

This is literally how I want to be treated.

That's all fine, it's when she gets naked on the bed with a jar of peanut butter and a spatula that things start getting weird

My main issue with this is that the way we train dogs is that we train them to be dependant on us. So yeah, she's training him to come out of his shell, maybe, but if it works the same way a dog does he'll only be loyal and listen to her. Especially because anyone else he meets won't treat him like a dog and will expect him to behave like a person without the expectation of rewards which would probably make him more adverse to others

Of course, he's a human being too so it won't go down exactly like that. I'm just saying that from the very first premise the way we train dogs is by training them to be codependant

The problem is not the actions. The problem is your mentality. If you're trying to train a human being, that sounds pretty f****** terrible. On the other hand, if you're trying to support for and care for them, it doesn't sound terrible.

Based on the wording, it sounds like the former, but perhaps you're just trying to make your post dramatic for the internet and the actual situation is more like the latter. We don't know, but you do, so act accordingly.

Honestly if we treated each other as well as we treated dogs we'd already be in paradise.