'I am planning to leave my financially dependent partner when he's away for a week.' UPDATED

"I (29F) am planning to leave my completely financially dependent and toxic partner (34M). How do I warn him that he needs to get it together?"

My partner and I moved out of our home state 4 years ago when I got a job. He has not had a job since, and I struggle significantly to get all of the bills paid. He spends a hundred or more dollars a week on Mary Jane which makes it more difficult, and I have to pay for everything.

He complains about my cooking, but doesn’t cook either so we have to eat out often. He gets in very foul moods where he slams things, yells, calls me names, etc.

At the beginning of April I told him I don’t want to be with him anymore. I also told him if he reacted aggressively to my feelings, I would plan to leave him without warning. He reacted aggressively, by slamming things, and then I decided to work outside of the apartment because he was being so loud and I work from home.

He found the cubicle where I was working in our building, barged in, got in my face and called me a whore among other things. When I made the comments in April, I promised myself that I would leave.

I believe that part of the reason he reacts so negatively to me saying these things is it means he will lose access to housing, food, a car, etc. He doesn’t talk to his family. He does have one close friend whose family he can maybe stay with although I’m not sure.

My partner will be out of town for a week or less this summer, and I plan to pack up and leave then. I don’t know how to go about this, and what I should say (if anything) given his previous reactions. My therapist connected me with a DV org, who is going to help my break my lease. I don’t know how to go about telling him he needs to start taking action to support himself, given his reaction in the past.

He will not know where I am going, however he does know where my mom lives and that kind of freaks me out.

Edit: I didn’t expect this to blow up as much as it did. I will be leaving in July and will update this post. I plan to look at it whenever I start doubting myself. Thank you to everyone who gave such helpful responses. Also things are generally amicable as long as I don’t bring up breaking up.

He can be cruel if I’m loud in the mornings and wake him up, but as of now we are getting along okay since he doesn’t know my plans. I’ve even been asking if he needs help paying for his trip and he does not suspect anything

This is what people had to say to OP:

[deleted] said:

Do NOT tell him. You are not responsible for him. Take your important documents and anything you want to keep, don’t let him see you packing, GTFO when he’s not around to stop you. Full no contact, and make sure the people around you won’t tell him where you are either. The reason he’s got no support network is that he’s not a good person, and that’s not on you.

JosieJOK said:

Do not warn him, just leave. You've already told him that you'd leave without warning him if he reacted aggressively, and he then reacted aggressively. That was his warning; you owe him nothing further. Just get out as safely as you can. What he does from then on is no longer your concern.

cryrabanks said:

You don’t tell him. He could try to hurt you. You get the heck out of dodge and don’t turn back and block him on everything

FunnyEfficient1108 said:

Warn him for what? He’s a grown man. Girl pack your things and go live your life.

Two months later, OP shared this update:

I’ve been posting here about my ex. He went through a period where he was incredibly cruel and awful to me, and then became decent but never great. My dad also has a terminal illness, and I had mentioned I wanted to move back to my home town to spend time with my dad during his remaining months.

My ex told me I was moving to my hometown to be with other men, and it wasn’t about my dad. My ex randomly got a fairly decent job in our home state as well, and I gave him enough money that he could get an apartment. While I don’t love that I had to do that, I knew that if I refused to help him pay his apartment deposit his mistreatment would escalate and he may end up harassing my family as well.

I went no contact with him earlier this week. He is now living about 90 minutes away from where I am (he has no idea where I’m staying). Even though I know there is a long road to healing ahead of me, I can’t believe I actually did it. I haven’t even felt sad yet? Will it ever come or did I already lose my love for him after his treatment of me?

He of course begged for me back and sent many unhinged voice messages about how he’s changed and he knows how awful he was to me and he won’t be that way anymore. I didn’t even feel sad about it… some of them freaked me out, and the others were just funny because he truly believed he had healed his own trauma in 3 days.

I still can’t believe I successfully left when I felt so trapped a few months ago at time I considered self harm. Wishing everyone here healing and peace. I am in my own apartment, no contact with my ex, and working on healing. The universe was on my side and my ex ended up getting a decently paying job, and last I heard he has his own place.

When I informed him of my desire to split, he was really upset, and tried to convince me he knew of all his wrongdoings and had changed his ways after 3 days at his new job because he no longer had to stress out about money. He is blocked now. And I am feeling hopeful about whatever the future looks like.