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'AITH for not helping my husband anymore?' UPDATED

'AITH for not helping my husband anymore?' UPDATED

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"AITH for not helping my husband anymore?"

throwaway-faraway70

My husband and I have lived like roommates for our whole 25-year marriage. He’s a bad roommate. For 25 years, I have done everything — cooking, housework, shopping, yard work, household repairs, paying the bills, etc. — literally everything. He has never done anything to help.

He then developed macular degeneration. So, for the last couple of years, I have to either take him where he needs to go, or I have to run errands for him to get what he needs, among other things.

He is a compulsive gambler who put us into bankruptcy last year with over $250,000 in gambling debt. We filed Chapter 13, so we have a sizable payment to make every month. We prorated the payment because I didn’t want to pay his gambling debt.

He is a master manipulator, and he talked me into paying $500 a month of his portion because he said he wouldn’t be left with any money if he paid his full amount without my help. He continues to gamble. He takes his magnifying glass, calls Uber and spends the whole day at the casino.

In July, I went to visit my granddaughter and was gone for 10 days. When I came home, I couldn’t find my big salad bowl. I eventually found it on the dining room table. It still had a small amount of salad in it. The salad was rotten, stunk, and had stained my salad bowl.

I confronted my husband and asked him if he had moved my salad bowl. He replied arrogantly, “Yes, I did.” I asked him why he didn’t rinse it out first. He said angrily, “Because I’m NOT your maid!". That was the last straw for me. I honestly just lost it. I said, "You know what, I'm not your chauffeur and I not your bank."

I told him I was done helping him. If he couldn’t take 30 seconds to rinse out a salad bowl, I wasn’t going to take any more of my time helping him. I told him if he could take Uber to the casino, he could take Uber everywhere else he needed to go.

I have kept my word. I don’t do anything for him anymore. I make him pay for household things he never paid for before. I don’t cook for him. I don’t run errands for him. He claims he doesn’t have money, but he still goes to the casino. He still doesn’t do any housework. He still doesn’t do yard work. Am I an AH for refusing to help him anymore?

Here were the top rated comments from readers:

sffood

LEAVE, for crying out loud! Clearly you have funds to do it, you have opportunity and nothing is more obvious than the fact that you have zero reason to stay. Why don’t you leave? It’s been 25 years. How much longer do you need to prove what? What are you doing??? NTA, but woman, what has to happen for you to choose YOU?

MastodonDangerobf

YTA to yourself for staying with this loser who is ruining you financially.

Slowpye

YTA. Simply for putting up with this lazy addict and allowing yourself to be used like this. I wish you find something/someone better.

MmeGenevieve

NTA. I'd legally separate and roll that 13 into a 7.

Repuleak2896

You don’t want him to get half of everything but at least you get to keep half. What happens when you have to sell the house to pay his gambling debt? What happens when he has gambled away everything?

ski-mon-ster

ESH seriously, this story must be highly exaggerated cause why would you be married at all to this POS? You are an AH to yourself to ruin your life doing this. So of course you are not the AH for not helping anymore but you are for not figuring out how to RUN FAST!

The OP responded here:

throwaway-faraway70

I promise you, it is not highly exaggerated. It is not exaggerated at all. In fact, there is so much more to this story than I have stated. Trust me when I say I have beaten myself up many times for (1) marrying him in the first place and (2) not leaving him when it would have been a lot easier to do so.

If I divorce him, I lose half of everything I own — things that he hasn’t contributed a dime toward — including my house that I owned before we met. I would likely have to pay him spousal support. I am not willing to do that. Every penny he would get would go to a casino, and I won’t give him that satisfaction.

Please know, however, that I am happy. I go where I want to go and do what I want to do. I travel by myself frequently. Happiness is a choice, and I choose to be happy. I do the things that make me happy. My happiness is self-generated, so he can’t take that away from me. I view him as nothing more than a bad roommate.

I don’t have any feelings for him anymore, so he can’t affect my emotional state. I stay because I absolutely refuse to let him have so much that he did nothing to earn. I will never remarry, so there’s no downside to me not getting a divorce.

Divorce is not an option I am considering at this point. That could change in the future, but for now, I am not going to divorce him and give him access to so much more than he has access to now.

Update from OP in the comments:

I am happy. I asked a question about whether or not I’m an a^%$#le because I refuse to help a man who is, for all intents and purposes, a handicapped man. He can’t see well enough to take care of himself completely.

You’re right. I let him get away with way too much over the past 25 years. He is narcissistic, manipulative, and, for a long time, intimidating. I was afraid of him for many years. That stopped when I realized he is a coward.

Yes, I have talked to an attorney. My options are not good. He came into this marriage with nothing. He has paid almost nothing for anything in the house. If I divorce him, he would walk away with half of everything I own, including my house which I owned before we met.

I refuse to give him that satisfaction. He would have nothing without me. I WIL NOT reward him for his bad behavior by giving him half of everything I own.

I am not b%$#^ing about anything. I simply stated facts about why I refuse to help him and asked if I’m being an asshole for not helping him considering that he can’t completely take care of himself. If I had just said “Am I an asshole for not helping my nearly blind husband get his medicine from the pharmacy,” that wouldn’t have give you enough information.

You can’t see this tiny little pixel of my life and think you see the whole picture. Don’t be so quick to judge a situation you don’t completely understand.

As to the question of my happiness, that’s simple. He doesn’t give me my happiness. I make it myself. Happiness is a choice, and I choose to be happy. Because he doesn’t give it to me, he can’t possibly take it away.

Sources: Reddit
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