I think it is more gentle when you actually use the OS, but OP says they don’t use it a lot. I basically don’t use Windows a lot for so many reasons, but in the odd occasion I need to use it, it’s like OP’s experience. There are so many updates and the thing insists on installing them, or you think it’s gonna be okay to install them --accostumed to pacman, apt or whatever. If you agree or click on Install updates as they recommend, there you go into the rabbit hole of Windows updates.