A lakeside weekend away is supposed to be all about relaxing… and ideally not about revealing how little your partner is willing to look out for you.
In a Reddit post on r/AmIOverreacting, a 27-year-old woman shared that she went to a lake house with her 29-year-old boyfriend and about 15 of his friends. After a long day of boating and drinking, she crashed for a nap around 4 PM and didn’t wake up until about 7 PM.
By then, all the burgers for dinner had already been grilled and eaten. Because it was the last night at the house, there was nothing left in the kitchen except a few single-serving bags of chips.
“I was upset with everyone, but mostly with my boyfriend,” she wrote, explaining that if the roles were reversed, she would have either saved him some food or made sure he knew it was time to eat. Her boyfriend, meanwhile, insisted that because he wasn’t the one grilling, it wasn’t his responsibility — and that with a big group, the vibe was “every man for himself.”
His friends’ reactions ranged from “sheepish” to a casual “you snooze you lose,” according to the poster. She, on the other hand, said she was “honestly livid” and couldn’t imagine not looking out for a partner in such a simple way.
Reddit overwhelmingly took her side — and many commenters said the missing burger was really just a symptom of something much bigger.
One person pointed out that if it truly was “every man for himself,” the bare minimum would have been to wake her up: “Why didn’t he just shake her shoulder lightly and let her know it was time to eat? What an ass.” Another commenter said they’d save food even for “the person I liked the least,” calling it “basic human courtesy.”
Others zoomed out to what this behavior might predict for the future. “It’s moments like these that give you a glimpse into the future with someone. Don’t ignore that,” one top comment warned, adding that if you ever go through something like postpartum, illness or disability, you want the kind of partner who’s already thinking ahead about your needs — not just grabbing theirs and moving on.
The original poster admitted that the perspective hit hard. “I’m not sure I want kids, but what if I get sick or disabled or something,” she replied.
Multiple commenters shared stories of spouses who made plates for them at parties, insisted on going hungry rather than leaving them without food, or literally fed them bite by bite during postpartum recovery. “Being someone’s partner means you get to take care of them and make sure their needs are met,” one person wrote. “If someone isn’t offering their consistent concern and care, I’m not offering myself to them.”
And while some people were willing to chalk the burger incident itself up to drunken chaos and distraction, many said the boyfriend’s reaction afterward — doubling down on “every man for himself” instead of apologizing — was the real red flag.
As one commenter put it: “He is showing you exactly who he is — for your own sake, please believe him.”