My boyfriend tried to use my dying mother to teach me a lesson
Not My Responsibility
When my mom was dying of cancer, my boyfriend refused to pick up her pain medication from the pharmacy next to his gym because it wasn’t his responsibility. My boyfriend tried to use my dying mother to teach me a lesson, so I taught him one he’ll never forget.
We’d been together 3 years and living together for one when my mother’s cancer came back aggressive and untreatable. The doctors gave her 4 months, but she barely made it to three.
During those 3 months, I became a ghost of myself, juggling work and driving 40 minutes each way to the hospital every single day. I was drowning in medical forms and insurance calls and trying to make her comfortable while watching her fade away.
I never asked my boyfriend to help until one day when I needed him to pick up her prescription on his way home from work because my car had broken down. The pharmacy was literally next to his gym where he went every day without fail.
He looked up from his video game and said those four words that changed everything about how I saw him and our relationship and my entire future.
Not my responsibility.
You need to learn to be more independent.
My mother died 2 weeks later and he had the audacity to stand at her funeral acting like the supportive boyfriend while accepting condolences from my family. They had no idea he’d never once visited her or helped with anything.
That night, I made my decision sitting in our apartment while he played online with his friends, laughing like nothing had happened. If my problems weren’t his responsibility, then it was time for his to stop being mine.
I started small the next morning by not setting his alarm like I always did because getting to work on time wasn’t my responsibility. He woke up 2 hours late, frantically rushing around, asking why I didn’t wake him, and I just shrugged and continued drinking my coffee.
Then, I stopped making his breakfast and packing his lunch, which I’d done every single day since we moved in together, because feeding him wasn’t my responsibility. He grabbed fast food for a week before complaining that he was gaining weight and feeling sick from all the grease.
When he whined about his stomach hurting, I told him:
“Your health isn’t my responsibility.”
The laundry was next because cleaning his clothes definitely wasn’t my responsibility. He ran out of clean work shirts and had to wear the same one three days in a row until his co-workers started making comments about the smell.
Then I stopped scheduling his appointments and managing his calendar. This meant he missed his dentist appointment and got charged a no-show fee. He then missed his car registration renewal and got pulled over for expired tags.
He was furious about the ticket, but what could I say except that keeping track of his life wasn’t my responsibility. I stopped grocery shopping for anything he liked and only bought food for myself.
He’d stand in front of the empty fridge, confused about where all his protein shakes and meal prep containers went. I stopped cleaning his gaming area, which became a disgusting nest of empty energy drink cans and chip bags that started attracting ants.
I stopped reminding him about his mother’s birthday and his brother’s graduation and that important presentation he had been preparing for weeks. Each time he’d rage about how I knew these things were important, and I’d just calmly remind him that his family and his job weren’t my responsibility.
His friends started noticing the change because I stopped organizing our social life entirely. No more dinner parties. No more remembering his boys’ birthdays or booking those golf tee times he loved to brag about securing.
His social life crumbled within a month and his best friend actually asked if we were having problems because I seemed checked out. This almost made me laugh considering I’d been the only one checked in for 3 years.
His friend pulled me aside at a bar and said:
“You’re being really cold to him lately.”
And I replied:
“His feelings aren’t my responsibility.”
His work started suffering because I stopped proofreading his reports and presentations like I always had. His boss pulled him aside about the decline in quality and he came home stressed and confused about why everything was falling apart.
He tried to talk to me about being a team and supporting each other. And I reminded him that when I needed him to be supportive during the hardest time of my life, he told me it wasn’t his responsibility, so I was just following his lead.
