Marriage comes with plenty of compromises, but feeding a picky eater for nearly two decades tests even the most patient among us.

A woman who’d spent 17 years managing the household budget and cooking every meal found herself endlessly frustrated by her husband’s contradictory food habits, loving a dish one week and snubbing it the next, all while requesting the same three foods on repeat.

What really pushed her over the edge wasn’t the pickiness itself; it was watching him happily eat a frozen pot pie while turning his nose up at actual leftovers.

Now she’s considering handing him half the grocery budget in cash and letting him fend for himself entirely.

Keep reading for the full story.

AITA for telling my husband I’m not cooking for him anymore.

I (41F) have been married to my husband (41M) for 17 years. He is the pickiest, not picky eater, ever.

She explains that she’s always been left in charge of all the cooking.

I have been the primary with regard to finances and as the cook for most of our marriage. I keep a weekly budget on groceries and build a dinner meal plan based on sales.

Her husband preferred to keep a very consistent schedule for dinners.

For a long time, I would ask my husband what his requests were and it was always the same: steak, bacon, pizza.

To her, this didn’t amount to a satisfactory meal.

Sometimes it was in the budget, sometimes it wasn’t, but the larger problem was, what are we doing with these if I bring them home?

Are you going to cook up a whole package of bacon and call it dinner?

Her husband is getting on her nerves for a few other reasons too.

The other issues include: when I make something, he likes it the first time, but not the second time, with little feedback as to why.

When I try to serve leftovers in any capacity (there are a few things that are okay, but most is not, but giving him a frozen pot pie or meal is okay even though it’s basically frozen leftovers?) he snubs his nose. I can’t stand food waste, so this drives me crazy.

Now she’s trying to figure out how to bring about some much-needed change.

So, WIBTA if I take half our weekly budget, hand it to him in cash and say “Figure it out”? I’m done trying to navigate it. Cooking and feeding is one of my love languages (yes he knows that) but I’m over catering to him. Can an actual grown man figure it out?

AITA?

It sounds like it’s time for her husband to start pulling more weight around the house.

What did Reddit have to say?

It’s clear some people feel enabled to keep behaving poorly.

Her grown husband needs to start learning how to feed himself.

Meal planning can be a real relationship tester for some people.

Her husband needs to learn one way or another.

This isn’t really about picky eating anymore; it’s about years of unpaid emotional labor going completely unacknowledged.

Loving a dish once and rejecting it the next time, without explanation, puts the entire burden of guessing correctly on someone else’s shoulders.

After 17 years of trying to make it work, stepping back is long overdue.

Would it really hurt this guy to learn some independence?