His mom’s been through hell, and all he does is whine.

She finally told her boyfriend to grow a spine and set his kid straight. But was that too much?

Read on for the story.

AITAH for telling my boyfriend to “man up” and parent his ungrateful son?

So I (35 F) have been dating my boyfriend (40M) for a while now.

He has a 19-year-old son from a previous marriage.

I’ll be honest the kid rubs me the wrong way most of the time. He comes across as selfish, entitled, and really ungrateful, especially when it comes to his mom.

Woof.

Here’s some context: My boyfriend and his ex divorced when the boy was 8. The mom became the primary parent.

My boyfriend provided financially, but he’s the first to admit he wasn’t fully present.

From what I’ve heard, his ex was a bit of a “helicopter mom,” maybe strict, but nothing truly extreme or abusive just kind of typical overbearing parenting.

Understandable.

The son has told us that after the divorce, his mom worked a lot, and he spent most of his time with his grandpa.

She’s a teacher who also does Uber Eats, DoorDash, Spark, etc. to support her lifestyle she likes nice things, vacations, etc.

But she’s always made sure her son had the best. He’s been well taken care of his whole life.

Recently, though, things got really rough for her. In just over a month, she lost her mother, lost her husband, and had to undergo a hysterectomy. It’s been a brutal time for her.

Oof.

Despite this, every time we see the son, he’s complaining about her about how she’s not cleaning enough, how depressed she seems, how he and his girlfriend have had to help clean her house (three times, mind you), and how he “doesn’t want to deal with it anymore.”

At dinner a month ago, I finally snapped and told him flat-out that he was being incredibly ungrateful.

I reminded him that this woman raised him, took care of him when he was sick, and took him on vacations. I told him that now he needs to be there for her and help lift her back up.

Amen.

It got kind of tense, but nothing too dramatic.

Fast forward to now we’re about to have another dinner with him this coming Friday, and I told my boyfriend he needs to step up and talk to his son.

I said he needs to tell him to stop whining and show some damn compassion for his mother.

My boyfriend’s response? “I don’t want to say anything that will upset him. I don’t know the whole story. What if he snaps back?”

Uhhhh…

I got really frustrated and told him he needed to man the **** up and be a father. I said, “You have no problem confronting me when you think I’m out of line, but you won’t say anything to your kid? Be a **** parent already.”

Later that night, my boyfriend told me he felt anxious and asked me for a hug. I did hug him, and yeah, I felt bad.

Maybe I came in too hot, but I still don’t think I was wrong in what I said.

So, AITAH for how I handled this?

He got mad, she got frustrated, and now everyone’s tiptoeing around dinner. Ugh.

Reddit is all pretty much on his side.

This person says “man up” is the perfect way to describe it.

This person is just glad he isn’t playing favorites.

And this person says this is breakup worthy.

Parenting isn’t optional…even when it’s uncomfortable.

That comes with the territory.

If you liked this post, you might want to read this story about a teacher who taught the school’s administration a lesson after they made a sick kid take a final exam.