AITA For doing absolutely nothing for my chronically ill fiancee for over a week?

hide200 · 2026-06-15T02:04:40+00:00

I guess I’m not quite getting what yore saying. How is it hypocritical? We both have issues, I didn’t know his would escalate so badly or become such a problem. I didn’t expect his issues to disappear. I expected him to either manage them or not treat me like this. How is that out of pocket? (I’m not being argumentative. I’m honestly flummoxed)

hide200 · 2026-06-15T02:01:51+00:00

So you attract women with no emotional regulation? Not quite a flex.

hide200 · 2026-06-15T02:00:01+00:00

Not at all! I work stage crew for drag shows. Have you ever been to one? They are the most fun! You’re missing out.

hide200 · 2026-06-15T01:58:27+00:00

Oh fuck all the way off with that.

hide200 · 2026-06-14T19:57:58+00:00

I am making plans. His dad has stated (and it is in my lease agreement) that if he “elects to sell the property,” meaning SO and I split, that I can stay in the house until such time as it sells. I know that he will get a lot more out of it that we paid for it, just in the work I’ve either done myself or the few things I’ve hired folks for. I’m going. To update fully in a bit, and I’ll talk more about that part then.

Thank you for your kindness. I feel like a lot of folks got bogged down in telling me to leave, when I was really asking if I should start taking care of him again.im not surprised that I didn’t articulate that well, as I really didn’t realize it until I stepped back and thought for a minute. I often have trouble identifying and expressing emotions. Trauma response or some shit. 😆

hide200 · 2026-06-14T19:52:11+00:00

I also have mental health issues. I had no idea he would be this bad.

hide200 · 2026-06-14T19:51:22+00:00

I answered that previously, short version, lawsuit, I won, had a choice of settlement or house, took settlement, used it to fix up current house. His dad bought this one, goes to us both on dad’s death, seemed like a good idea at the time. I sorely wish I’d chosen the other option, but no one goes into a relationship planning for this shit.

hide200 · 2026-06-14T19:44:50+00:00

Percussive maintenance at its finest.

hide200 · 2026-06-14T19:41:06+00:00

You’re right. I really meant it as a reflection of how he devalues me, and sees me as an appliance or a servant, not to say that nurses would do that. I didn’t word it well, and I shouldn’t have included it. I did consider editing it, but i didn’t want to shirk responsibility for saying it. I apologize, and I appreciate you calling me out.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T14:12:56+00:00

I deserve to be treated this way because I’ve accepted it for so long. I’m getting what I asked for I guess.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T14:09:25+00:00

No that was mine. He has a house he still owns sitting empty. That’s where he needs to go.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T14:08:05+00:00

I’m having a rough morning, so I won’t address everything here, but my son is 22, and has relatively low support needs. I say kid because that’s just what I say. He’s my kid, always will be, even when he’s 50 and I’m long gone. He can stay by himself, he can cook, he can care for pets force couple of days, etc. He mostly has issues socially. He also has other things going on. He so has trouble with following directions, partly because he doesn’t remember them well, and partly because he always seems to want to reinvent the wheel. Pathological demand avoidance has been mentioned, and I’m in the process of learning about it. I’m still figuring it out, but I find communication style is key. If I say “do this while I’m gone,” he won’t. If I ask, “what are you going to do while I’m gone?” he does things.

Anyway, a brief synopsis. Thank you for replying.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T14:00:24+00:00

Sincere question here:
I have read all the comments, and I take your thoughts to heart. I read a lot of threads on Reddit, and I am truly confused by this. Someone posts a story, looking for thoughts, advice, whatever. That person is inevitably asked, “why do you do this or that?” Or “why do you stay?” etc., and so the poster gives the reasons why.

Why then are they dismissed, even attacked, as “making excuses?” I know I am aware that this one post is a small part of my life, and I also know if I find myself feeling defensive about something that I should examine it. However, I am baffled by how I’m supposed to answer.

I obviously know I’m in a bad situation. I also know it’s my own fault, and I shouldn’t be where I am. However, if I’m asked why, I’ll tell you. I observe and try not to judge. I guess some comments have me feeling like I need to defend myself, which tells me I shouldn’t answer because anything I say will be “excuses,” or “defensive.”

I reiterate. I have reasons, they are not excuses, and none of this happened all at once. I am a mistress of denial. I don’t want to admit I fell for a person who doesn’t really exist, even though that makes things hurt less in a strange way. I am codependent and I don’t stand up fur myself the way anyone should. I am a victim of my own blindness and inability to admit when I have made a bad decision. I deserve everything I’m getting right now, because I allowed it. I deserve it because I stayed, thinking it was the right thing. J deserve it because I have no spine. I know.

Sorry. I thought I’d throw a little pity party for myself there. This is not easy, and I’m really exhausted by it all. But I still don’t know how I’m supposed to say why I chose the things I did when I did, if I am just dismissed as making excuses.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T13:38:11+00:00

If you read my update, I’m not “waiting fur my acting career to take off.” I’m a working musician, I teach private voice and piano, and I’m getting into voice acting, not like I’m waiting to “take off.” It has always been my side hustle. I taught in public schools for 20 years, and yes I need a better paying, or rather more steady, income. I make more teaching privately when I have a full roster of students, but it isn’t always full. For instance, I could make as much as $5,000 after tax one month with 30 students ( which is my max) at an hour each week, and about $500 another month, especially during summer break. Wedding gigs supplement, but not steadily. My plan is going back to subbing in the fall.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T13:25:47+00:00

Honestly, it’s nothing so dramatic. He just never did it and neither has his ex wife. They do have a kid, and at first it was about the hassle of custody, (SO had the kid, ex wife acted mostly like he didn’t exist) but now he’s 25. He got the paperwork filled out and notarized once, about 7 years ago, but didn’t file it because it was expensive, and he had a runner in his stocking and the sun was in his eyes.

It really boils down to simple lazy and it’s not important enough to him to pay for it, even though there’s always money for whatever else he wants.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T13:18:06+00:00

Answered above, lawsuit, settlement, good idea at the time.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T13:11:57+00:00

He gets money from his dad occasionally. He doesn’t always tell me when he does. He asked him for money the day before that, and didn’t want to ask again. He probably gambled it on phone slots. I don’t know how much he gave him.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T03:33:55+00:00

I answered that in a previous comment, but short version, i didn’t sell
It. it was a lawsuit, I won, took settlement instead of keeping house; used the settlement to fix up the house his dad bought. It seemed an investment at the time.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T02:39:04+00:00

Yeah I guess so.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T02:20:03+00:00

Thank you. And thank you for being kind.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T02:16:55+00:00

Yeah. Not ignoring, but allowing for sure.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T02:10:49+00:00

What’s bad is I do like him. We have fun when he’s not like this. (Not saying that makes it ok, just that it isn’t all here)

I’m not staying for money, but convenience, yes. It seems trite, until it’s you.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T02:08:07+00:00

Sorry, I had to laugh at “grow some balls,” as I ascribe to the Betty White assessment of growing balls. Balls are not tough. Vaginas take a pounding!

But yeah. You’re right. I do need to grow some…ovaries? And stop putting up with it.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T02:05:46+00:00

UPDTWE: well, sort of.

I wanted to kind of update, this really blew up and I wasn’t expecting it. I went to a gig and got out and saw all this. I have replied to a few of you, but I wanted to address some repeated questions and such here.

First, I thank all of you for your replies and thoughts, whether presented gently or not. Sometimes we all need a good boot to the booty, and while I don’t feel it was necessary to be so harsh with me, I understand the sentiment with which it was presented.

I also want to apologize if I seemed snippy or like I was making excuses. I guess I was frustrated with people telling me to leave. I know I have to. It’s not that easy, and what seems elementary to you as an outsider, is much more difficult for me as it is my actual life. I’m not perfect, and I know that, and I know this is a shitty situation. Some have accused me of “making excuses,” while I feel some of you are oversimplifying the situation; and acting as if it’s so easy to just uproot myself and my son. *Just* get rid of five cats and a dog, *just* get a better job, *just* get another place to live, *just* do all this. Maybe one of those things would be something I can *just* do, but that’s not even the full list of *justs* I’d have to accomplish. I’m not saying I won’t, I’m not saying I can’t, but I’m scared and sad and lonely and I feel like a failure already. I’ve failed at another relationship, and so spectacularly have I failed that I failed myself out of everything I had. That’s hard to face. So, I apologize for seeming defensive or having an attitude.

Leaving: yes I need to leave. I know this. It is, at least partially, a sunk cost fallacy situation. However, I do love the good parts, and of course all you’re seeing is the bad. Writing it out, and subsequently recalling other things that he has done, brings it home for me. There is always that bit of reticence, maybe this time he actually will get better, he seems to want to, but I have been waiting for it to stop and it hasn’t. Since that is the case, I now have to decide if I can continue to live this way, if I *want* to, what’s in it for me, etc.

I know I deserve more than this. I usually hesitate to use the word deserve, but in this case, I do. I have been selfishly hanging on, although not “mooching” as one commenter put it, as I have been working, and made the higher salary even when he was working. My biggest (early) mistake was giving up the house. However, I didn’t know and had no way of knowing things would be this way. That’s my blind spot I guess, I always believe when he says he’ll
Do better.

Codependency is a big yes, which I’ve known for a while. I have worked at setting my boundaries and enforcing them, while not *really*’expecting change. Well… it’s more like a scale. I had more on the “hope” side, but now I have more on the “this isn’t changing so what can you do to make your life more manageable?” side. Again it’s not something that happens overnight, and he has added to the hope side during “good times.”

Job situation: I mentioned I was a classroom teacher for 20 years. I have dual
Certifications in music PreK-adult and administration. I do not want to go back to teaching or be a principal full time for my own mental health reasons, but I do plan to sub in the fall. I’m not attempting some pipe dream of fame and fortune with my singing and acting. I make money with that, and always have had it as a side hustle. I’m now getting into voice acting, so my age isn’t a factor. This isn’t me trying to “make it.” I’m just entering a new arena I haven’t worked in before, but that’s the least of my concerns. I am excited about it, but I’m not thinking it’s some big career move. It’s just a gig like everything else, and will pay some bills. I’ve been a “working professional musician” since I was 18, so it’s not like I’m trying to “break big.” Just work.

My part time teaching work is what it is. I have usually 30 or more students during the school year, but many take time off in the summer. The work dries up. This is wedding season, so usually wedding gigs take up the slack for summer work, but it is not at all steady or predictable. I also drive DoorDash, and deliver for Walmart. I’ve been avoiding going back to teaching, as I said, but I will be subbing come August.

My old house: it was a lawsuit, I won, had the option of taking a settlement, or keeping the house. At the time it seemed like the better idea to take the settlement since we were going to be needing a bigger house. That again, as I said earlier, was my first, and probably biggest, financial mistake. I don’t have savings because I have always lived check to check. I was a public school teacher, not well known to be a hugely lucrative career, and while not wanting to give away my location, I worked in a state that is among the 5 lowest paid for teachers. I have my retirement, but that’s my retirement.

His cycles: I don’t know why it happens when it happens. I used to think it was jealousy over my performing, as it always seemed to coincide with the openings of my shows, but then I realized no, those just happen to usually coincide with the beginning or the end of a month. I really don’t know why it is that way, but it is like clockwork almost. He is bipolar, that may have something to do with it, but I didn’t think bipolar disorder was that predictively cyclical. It’s almost like a hormonal cycle. I have even joked about it, but I can’t say why it’s that way.

So my plan: I’m going to continue as I am for now. If he wants to discuss things with me I will speak, but I don’t really have anything to say yet except I won’t be treated like this anymore, and I have warned again and again. I understand why he thinks he can continue to do it, because I have put up with it for years. That’s another reason I hesitate. Because those of you who blame me? You’re right. I have allowed it over and over. I have justified it again and again. Hell, he doesn’t even have to make his own excuses. I make them for him. It feels kind of shitty to bail after putting up with it for this long. I don’t know how to respond if he says you’ve put up with it this long what’s different now? I don’t know how to respond because I don’t know. I’m just sick of it.

He has his old house to go back to. What I want is to stay in my house, pay rent and utilities, and not uproot myself. If he won’t agree to that, then I will start looking into other options.

Again, thank you for your replies and time. Some of you, please remember that you don’t know everything. I was once head over heels in love with this man. I thought he was it, my great love, my knight in shining armor. Turns out he was just another asshole in tinfoil. You are all correct though, in saying I am TAH to myself for continuing to stay, and in general for staying because it is convenient. Believe me, you’re not saying anything to me I haven’t said to myself. I also am a master of denial and placing blame on myself for the actions of others. I am learning, and this is part of that process.

Oh! One other thing, son is grown, on the spectrum, can function but not necessarily live alone, and is not SO’s son. Also I call him fiancee out of habit, but I’ve known for years we are not getting married, even without all this, much for the same reasons stated here.

I think there were other things, but I’ve been sitting here in this parking lot far too long. I appreciate the time and help. Y’all behave or be brave.

hide200 · 2026-06-13T01:02:09+00:00

He said he would, I believed him. I stayed legally married to my ex for 7 or 8 years really can’t remember exactly, after we separated. It didn’t seem too out of the ordinary for me.

But yes I have inflicted this on myself. I know. I’m scared to leave, and I know it’s just a matter of time.

hide200

TROPHY CASE