I am also sorry for your continuing frustration with your BF. I agree with Chrome on why BF reacts as he does. I think it is his mother’s voice he hears when you praise him for doing a good job and it is his anger toward her that he is really expressing.
That’s one of the issues kids have growing up under a narcissistic parent, isn’t it? On one hand there is all the control that the kid has to live under, the negative control about how s/he can’t do anything right or at least not to the satisfaction of the parent. But for the positive things that happen, like the kid achieving some recognition, prize or something, the parent wants to step in and take credit for that too! The kid has absolutely no way to win. If s/he screws up, s/he gets yelled at and blamed. If s/he does good, then s/he is not allowed to take credit for it. Lose-lose.
Maybe your BF was hearing some of those voices from his past? He did good, he went to the meeting, but he did not really do it all by himself, or at least he might think that way. He needed you to push him out there. Once you did (and I think you did the right thing to push him to go), he immediately sees you own the bragging rights to it. So he felt like you were stealing his accomplishment. Just the catch 22 type of situation you would think a damaged adult child would create for himself.
