The acrid smell of burnt pasta sauce still lingered in my memory, a fitting scent for the smoldering ruins of my relationship. My boyfriend’s furious texts, demanding I clean his ruined rug, only fueled my righteous indignation. His “TikTok trend” excuse felt like a slap in the face, a dismissal of my feelings and my very real pain. I had stood my ground, defending my dignity against what I saw as a blatant disrespect, but the lingering silence after our heated exchange made me wonder if this “dumb fucking TikTok joke” had truly spelled the end. Was I the asshole for letting it escalate this far?
The silence from his end had become absolute. No more furious texts, no more angry calls. The “TikTok trend” defense had finally run its course, and with it, perhaps, our relationship. I felt a strange mix of vindication and profound sadness. I still firmly believed I wasn’t the asshole for reacting to being called a “bitch,” especially given my past trauma. But the abrupt, messy end to a two-year relationship over something so seemingly trivial left a hollow ache. I found myself replaying our last exchange, wondering if there was anything I could have done differently, or if this really was just a symptom of a deeper, unacknowledged issue.
A few weeks passed. I was trying to move on, but the lingering question of “why” gnawed at me. Why had he doubled down on such a flimsy excuse? Why couldn’t he grasp the severity of his words?
Then, I ran into his younger sister, Chloe, at a mutual friend’s birthday party. Chloe and I had always gotten along well, and she looked genuinely upset to see me.
“Hey,” she said quietly, pulling me aside. “Can we talk for a sec? About Liam.” Liam was my ex-boyfriend.
I nodded, my heart sinking. I braced myself for another lecture about overreacting.
“Look,” she began, her voice hesitant, “I know Liam was a huge asshole. No excuse for what he said. But… there’s something you need to understand about him, something he’d never tell you.”
She took a deep breath. “When Liam was about 10, our dad left. Just… packed his bags and disappeared. No warning, no explanation. It was devastating for all of us, but especially for Liam. He adored Dad. And Dad was a big, boisterous guy, always joking, always using nicknames. Sometimes, he’d even call Mom ‘bitch’ in a ‘joking’ way, like he thought it was funny. Mom hated it, but she always just brushed it off. Never said anything, never reacted. She just… internalized it.”
My mind flashed back to my own past, the abusive relationships. The word “bitch.”
“After Dad left,” Chloe continued, her eyes distant, “Mom completely shut down. She became withdrawn, depressed. Liam, as the oldest boy, saw it as his job to ‘cheer her up,’ to ‘make her laugh’ like Dad used to. He started mimicking Dad’s humor, Dad’s mannerisms, including the ‘joking’ insults. He’d call her ‘bitch’ sometimes, trying to get a reaction, a laugh, anything to bring back the lightness he remembered. And Mom… she’d just smile weakly, or sometimes even force a laugh. Because she thought that’s what Dad liked, and that’s how she got his attention before he left.”
Chloe’s voice dropped. “Liam, he somehow absorbed this twisted idea that using that word, or other demeaning ‘jokes,’ was a way to connect, to be ‘funny’ like Dad, to get attention and affection from women. He thought it was a sign of intimacy, of being ‘comfortable’ with someone. He never learned that it was actually hurtful because no one ever truly shut him down, not even Mom, because she was too broken to confront him. So when you finally reacted, when you literally dropped the sauce… it didn’t compute for him. He genuinely thought he was just being ‘funny’ and ‘joking’ like his dad. He was mirroring a deeply flawed, unacknowledged pattern from his childhood, trying to connect with you in the only way he knew how, even though it was deeply toxic.”
She looked at me, her eyes filled with a profound sadness. “He saw your reaction as a rejection of him, not just his words, because in his mind, those words were intertwined with his attempts to be ‘loved’ and ‘funny’ like his father. The ‘TikTok trend’ was a flimsy excuse because he couldn’t articulate the real reason, couldn’t admit the profound, unconscious wound that drove him to use such demeaning language. He was just repeating a learned behavior, trying to find love in a way that had been modeled for him, even if it meant destroying the very relationships he craved.”
The harsh light of morning broke over the murky waters of my anger. The “dumb fucking TikTok joke” wasn’t a joke at all. It was a desperate, unacknowledged echo of a fractured childhood, a son unconsciously replaying his absent father’s toxic humor in a misguided attempt to forge intimacy. My ex-boyfriend wasn’t just a disrespectful jerk; he was a man trapped in a learned pattern, desperately seeking connection through the very words that pushed people away. The AITA question, once a clear binary of right and wrong, dissolved into a profound, aching understanding of the unseen burdens people carry, and how the echoes of childhood trauma can tragically dictate their adult actions, even at the cost of cherished relationships.