rSlash - r/Relationships Boyfriend Tried to Starve My Dog to Death

Episode Date: December 26, 2025

0:00 Intro 0:08 Dog treatment 4:36 Fiction 8:19 Book content 11:28 Family hostage Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to R-slash relationships, where O.P.'s boyfriend tries to starve her dog to death. Our next Reddit posts is from Unknown. I'm a 28-year-old woman, and I'm seriously considering divorcing my husband, who's 32, because of how he treated my dog and what came after it. My husband is never mean to my dog, but he's very much not a pet person. I knew about that going into the marriage. I was fine with him not interacting with my dog, or helping me with dog duties. I accepted that.

His only duty is to open the yard door to let my dog out to pee when I work 10-hour shifts. Even with this simple task, he complains that this is a lot of work for him and makes him stressed out. His reasoning is that having to let the dog out means that he has to constantly keep this at the back of his head. And it's one extra thing that he has to do on top of his busy work, which stresses him out. Anyways, he still did let the dog out to pee most of the time, and I kind of just accepted that. Yo, I gotta stop here. That's just such a stupid excuse. How does this guy feel about brushing his teeth? That's a chore that you've got to do twice a day. Does that stress him out having brushing his teeth in the back of his mind? What about peeing? That's something you've got to do, I don't even know, two, three, four, five times a day.

Does he get super stressed out about the imminent need to pee? This is the dumbest excuse I've ever heard. What about putting his clothes on? Oh my God, he has to do that every day too and then take them off when he goes to sleep. Man, what a dumbass. Recently, I had to travel out of country. because my mom needed surgery. The first week, I asked my friend to take care of my dog, but they were busy for the last two weeks, so I asked my husband to take care of him. He didn't complain and said okay, which I appreciate.

I got back from my trip and found out that my 17-pound dog lost five pounds under his care. That's one-third of his weight. The poor puppy is depressed that I'm gone, and God knows whether he's being fed twice a day, per my instructions. My dog always loses weight when I'm gone due to stress. But losing a third of your body weight in 13 days, so obviously I was very unhappy about that.

I was debating about whether I should have an argument with him because technically he did do me a favor by taking care of my dog. But he also did a really poor job. It also feels like this is weaponized incompetence. I just can't get over the fact that he's casually making jokes like, Oh, well, he's skinny now. At least he'll be easier to carry. Again, I'm okay with him not caring about my dog. As long as he doesn't hurt him, I'm already okay with that. All I wanted to do was have a conversation with him, telling him that he did not do a very good job taking care of my dog and that he should know better. He then started complaining about how taking care of a dog is extremely stressful for him, that he has to constantly think about whether the dog ate or peed for the whole day and it's stressing him out. I said that I already gave you the bare minimum instructions. All you have to do is feed it twice a day.

Make sure the water bowl isn't empty and let him out for the bathroom every few hours. He said these tasks are incredibly stressful. Why can't you understand? It's so much work. It's like a second part-time job. I have to constantly think about him all day. Did he pee?

Did I feed him? That's incredibly stressful. Obviously, anyone would not agree that these simple tasks are stressful, so I disagreed. He then started yelling at me. me, saying that I don't appreciate anything that he does, that I'm not being understanding about how stressful it is for him to take care of my dog for two weeks, that he's under so much stress

for the past two weeks, and I'm still complaining. The argument ended with him saying that he doesn't want to deal with this and told me to F off while yelling. Okay, so I came into this story expecting to be mad about the whole, you know, dog abuse thing, and I am, don't get me wrong, But I'm honestly more mad about this guy constantly whining about stress. What's so stressful about putting water into a water bowl once every, I don't know, two days? What's so stressful about opening the door to the backyard? How does this guy function? Does he have a job?

Does he drive on the road? Think about how stressful that is. He's either the world's biggest baby or, more likely, he's just lying and using that as an excuse because he's lazy and doesn't really care. about you or your dog. Both scenarios are worth breaking up over, in my opinion. Just think, O.P. If you had been gone for one additional week, you probably would have come home to a dead dog, which honestly sounds like the guy was hoping for. Our next Reddit post is from throwaway. My boyfriend, who's 31, is suddenly demanding that I, a 27-year-old woman, stop consuming fictional media at all. What do I even do? So this is honestly one of the weirder relationship

issues I've ever found myself in, and I feel like I'm losing my grip on what's normal here. My boyfriend and I originally bonded over our shared love of nonfiction. We both went through this big Tudorian history phase when we first met, like deep diving into documentaries and nerding out about Henry the 8th succession drama. I loved that about him. I still love that about him, and I never ever cared that he wasn't into the high fantasy books and shows that I adored. It's just never been a requirement for me that my partner shares every interest as me. When it came to watching things we would both enjoy, it would be stuff like The Bear, period dramas that were on a more accurate side, gritty crime scenes, docu-series, etc.

We'd usually have a good time with that, but things have really changed over the past couple of months. At first, it was just small stuff where he would gently decline when I asked if he wanted to watch some of the more reality-based shows we both used to enjoy. Then, he started making these little comments about how fiction is a waste of time, or how fantasy is just escapism for people who don't want to deal with real life. I brushed that off because everyone's entitled to their tastes. But as you can see from the title, it's become more than that. A couple of weeks ago, he started getting visibly annoyed if I put on one of my shows while he was in the room. I wasn't even asking him to watch it with me. It was just me watching something fictional and it was the same

with books. He literally scoffed when he saw me rereading one of my favorite fantasy novels and said, I don't understand how an adult can take that seriously. What happened last night is what encouraged me to make this post. I was curling up after work with a blanket in my book, and he told me that he can't respect the fact that I waste hours on make-believe when there's real knowledge out there. He said fiction is rotting my brain and that he doesn't want to date someone who lives in stories instead of the real world. I told him that's ridiculous. I have a stable job, friends, responsibilities. I'm not ignoring reality. I just like my stories. It's relaxing, it's fun, it doesn't hurt anyone. He doubled down and said if I cared about intellectual

growth, I'd stop reading and watching fictional media altogether and stick to nonfiction. I honestly thought that he was exaggerating at first, but he's dead serious. He says he doesn't want that stuff his home and that we needed to be on the same wavelength about what's worthy of our time. I told him no, absolutely not, that that's controlling and bizarre. He insists it's not controlling, but rather a standard for the kind of life he wants to build. I don't know if this is burnout, depression, some weird identity crisis, something he read online, or something else entirely. But it's making me feel uncomfortable, and honestly, I feel like disrespected and a bit angry. I don't know how to talk to him

anymore without him acting like I'm intentionally lowering my IQ by reading fantasy. Here's what I want to know. Why is he consuming nonfiction? Shouldn't he be reading scientific papers? Isn't that the best way to get intellectual growth and to obtain factual knowledge about the real world? What is this docu-series and gritty crime drama BS I'm hearing about? I don't know. This is just very weird. If this guy is really as smart as he seems to think he is, it wouldn't be difficult for him to understand why you like the things that you like. I don't really think this is about fiction. I think

it's just about control. Our next Reddit post is from Throwaway Mental Gymnist. I'm a 24-year-old woman, and I've been writing my book trilogy for years since I was 16. The book is how I met my boyfriend John, who's also 24. We met at some writing class three years ago and hit it off. John went to university for journalism and creative writing, but isn't working in either field. I never intended to make money from my works, but I do. It's not my main profession, though. Here's where things get weird. I asked John if he could read certain chapters and give notes on things to change or adapt. My usual beta reader was unavailable. Without giving too much away, the main character of my book gets kidnapped and experimented on. It was written to be

grotesque and horrifying. And I told John about this before he started reading. He said he'd be fine. Well, I find out that he made a call to the local police department because the description sounded too real. And there was non-consensual stuff in the chapter. To be clear, not sexual assault. The experimentation was not consented to by the main character. He didn't tell me he made the call. I found out because an officer came to my door the next morning for a welfare check. I was humiliated. I explained everything immediately and they checked the house, saw nothing, and eventually apologized for the confusion. When I confronted John, he apologized and tried to say the story got in his head. He said that it was a mistake and that I should understand how

someone could get worried given the content. He wants me to just drop it. I'm so effing embarrassed and honestly really creeped out. My writing is dark, but I've been publishing for years and he's read my material before, this was honestly not even the darkest, most effed up thing that I've written. I don't know if this is something we can work through, or if this is a sign of a deeper issue. I genuinely can't imagine why he'd call the cops if he was so disturbed, but also stay at my place and be all lovey, cuddly. Could this be an honest-to-god mistake? How do we move forward? What I want to know is, what did he expect the cops to do? Seize your laptop? Arrest you? Put you in an insane asylum?

Like, what's the cop going to accomplish? Hello, man, we've got a report that you're writing bad stuff about character. That's just half a fiction. Most fiction, someone dies or gets murdered or, you know, people get blown up. A lot of people are thinking that O.P.'s boyfriend did this to sabotage her career because he was jealous. But I don't know if that's right, because again, what's the cop going to do? Wouldn't actual sabotaging be like, you know, logging into her car? computer and deleting the content or secretly writing negative reviews on her good

reads accounts or whatever. Very, very weird. I think I'd have to break up with them. Not because this behavior is horrifying, but just, it's so bizarre, how could you ever trust his judgment to behave in a normal, acceptable human way ever again? This comment, may this man never discover AO3. Our next Reddit post is from Just Pro Wessing. I'm a 28 year old woman and I'm being held hostage at my parents' place and I don't know what to do. I'm an Indian and I'm so exhausted of fighting. Three years ago, I made a post about how my family stopped talking to me because I didn't travel back to my home country to get my surgery done. Well, things never really got better. I started talking to them maybe a year after my surgery when they reached out and it wasn't great. All we did was

And any cordial conversations were conversations of no value. Last year, they showed up to Australia out of the blue, and I didn't handle that well. My partner and I met them, but suffice to say, they weren't very happy. Coming back to today, I came to visit them in India, with my partner staying with us for a week and then two weeks without him. I was keen to work on the relationship because I do want to get married and have the option to have potential kids, and I can't really or don't want to do that without my parents involved in my life. I'm dating an Australian guy who's 28, who I've been in a relationship with for over five years. My parents made an excuse so my boyfriend couldn't stay in the house with us,

but we met up for lunch the day my partner was leaving. Ever since I started staying with them, my parents have been saying that I should extend my trip. I've made it very clear about how I can't, and I've had multiple fights with them over this. One of them were my dad started talking about how I'm essentially filth, and I live in filth, and he can't believe that he's been loving filth,

this entire time. They've been taking me around to relatives places and they didn't let me leave the day that I had my return ticket. I've cried so much talking to them, but apparently this was always the plan. They said I'm not allowed to leave anymore because apparently I've become a very negative person and they're worried about me. They've said that the Australian chapter of my life is closed and I'm staying here from now on. I'm so scared. I really don't know how to deal with this situation, and I'm looking for advice from anyone at all. I want to leave, but I'm worried they're going to stand guard at the door from now on and won't let me walk out. My brother is physically bigger and stronger than me, and he's not on my side either. Then OP posted an update. In short, I ended up

running away from home. I'm still contemplating if the decision I took was too extreme for the situation, but I think I'll go crazy if I go down that rabbit hole. A couple of friends of mine had a friend in a town three hours away, so my boyfriend and my friends planned my getaway. I was constantly surrounded by my relatives and parents to plan things, but for everyone reading this, I'm of sound mind, and my decision to do this was mine alone. I snuck out the night that we came back home from my relatives on the pretext of going for a walk, but I know they'd probably have found out not too long after I left. My friend was waiting in his car close to my place, and he drove me to the airport. It was perfect, because booking a cab would have had issues with timing.

I didn't know when would be a good time to sneak out, so having a friend around gave me the flexibility to sneak out at my own convenience. The priority was getting out of the country as soon as possible without even knowing what the best way was to get to Australia. I could only do this because of the immense support from my friends back home who spent a lot of time planning the routes and booking the flights for me so as to not arouse any suspicions from my family and very little time for them to act.

I've had messages from my family and a few calls, so all I've done is message them that it was my decision to leave and list a couple of points on why, and that I'd be keen to work on the relationship if they can try to come around to my life choices. Really, O.P., you still want to have a relationship with these people who imprisoned you? Why? Sounds to me like all you're doing is setting yourself up to get kidnapped again, except next time they'll probably learn from their mistakes. That was our slash relationships, and if you like this content, be sure to follow my podcast

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