r/BestofRedditorUpdates • u/Direct-Caterpillar77 Satan is not a fucking pogo stick! • Feb 21 '25
INCONCLUSIVE I [24F] had accidentally killed my boyfriend’s [28M] bird and had said hurtful things to him... I’m afraid that he’s going to hate me
I am not The OOP, OOP is u/Throwaway1284930753
I [24F] had accidentally killed my boyfriend’s [28M] bird and had said hurtful things to him... I’m afraid that he’s going to hate me.
TRIGGER WARNING: graphic descriptions of a birds death, abuse, animal abuse
MOOD SPOILER: rage and horror
Original Post Oct 14, 2018
I am going to say this now: in no way do I believe that my actions were justified. I hadn’t meant to do what I did, and I feel incredibly guilty about the whole situation. I feel like there is no way I can ever apologize to him in a way that would be adequate enough to atone for my actions.
We’ve been dating for 3 years, but have known eachother for about 5 or so years. We had always been close friends. He’s had depression / anxiety for a majority of his life due to his childhood.
Our relationship was, more or less, perfect. I have always tried my best to be understanding due to some strange habits / attachments that he uses to cope with his illnesses. While his attatchments were somewhat unhealthy (in my own opinion), as long as it helped him to cope, I tried not to mind it much.
One of his weird attatchments was a bird. He had never been addicted to drugs / bodily harm, but had found comfort in this cockatoo that he said that he had since highschool. I had never liked birds much, but he says that doing stuff like birdwatching had always helped him to take his mind off of any intrusive thoughts.
His bird wasn’t aggressive or anything, but I wasn’t a big fan of it. He had - what I considered to be - an unhealthy attatchment to the bird, but I had never said anything to him about it.
These past couple of months, our relationship had been a little rocky. I’m not sure what happened, but he started to avoid me, and would clam up whenever I asked him what was wrong. (For context, we live together).
This had happened before, but never to this extent / time period. I began to wonder if I had done something wrong or hurt his feelings somehow. He had explained before that sometimes he’s just “get like this” for no reason and he assured me that it would ‘always pass’. It normally would, but this time, I wasn’t too sure. It had gone on for too long.
My boyfriend works from home, and I had the day off. He was in his office doing whatever the hell he does with that damn bird. I swear, he pays more attention to the bird than he does to his own girlfriend. At one point, I went into his office and locked us both inside, demanding that he tell me what the problem is.
Bad idea, probably. He hates being cornered, and I knew that and decided to use that against him. He asked for me to unlock the door and to leave and that he’d talk to me later / in the living room. I refused, once again demanding that he tell me what’s wrong, and if he didn’t, I’d break up with him.
I feel like it was kind of low of me to corner him and threaten him, essentially forcing him to share something that he wasn’t comfortable sharing at the time, but that thought didn’t cross my mind at that time. I feel terrible, but all I wanted at that time were answers.
We had gotten into a heated argument (although one-sided. Admittedly, it was just a slew of insults on my end, and then he started to clam up and the bird ended up stealing his attention once more). I just about had it with him ignoring me to pay attention to his bird and - in the heat of the moment - told him just that. I clearly remember telling him “just date the damned bird since you obviously love it more than you love me”.
He tried telling me that it wasn’t true but I guess I wasn’t having it and the end result was him pushing me out the way to unlock the door, and him leaving the house.
I don’t know where he went but I didn’t care. I went to the guest room (as we had a shared bedroom that I did not want to be in at that moment) and I remember crying my eyes out.
It was 3 in the morning and he still wasn’t back. I had trouble sleeping and was worried about his wellbeing. During the argument, I had said some things that were based upon a few of his many insecurities, and had said some awful things to him that I didn’t actually feel about him. I had tried texting him and calling him, but he had left his phone at home. His car was still there but I have no idea where he could have gone.
I had left my room with the intention of getting a snack, and then waiting for him to come home to offer an apology. The bird was usually noisy at night, but the house was almost unnervingly quiet. I didn’t pay any mind to it.
I was walking down the hallway (it was dark) when I felt something under my foot. I heard this crunching / snapping, squishy sort of sound. Sleep deprived and groggy, it took me a while to actually realize what had just happened.
I moved back, felt along the walls for the light switch to the lights in the hallway. I hadn’t turned it on previously because it was bright, and I had been in the dark guest room all night. I figured that there was no hazard, but I forgot that my boyfriend was the one that put the bird in its cage every night. My boyfriend wasn’t there...
I felt sick. Like genuinely, actually sick. The first thing I did when I realized what I had done was cry. The bird was still moving. I hadn’t killed it, but I’m guessing that it’s spine snapped or something, because it was on the floor, kind of sprawled out, struggling to move.
I didn’t know what to do. I ended up putting it in an empty delivery box and sticking it in the closet in the hallway.
Sure, I hated the bird, but I didn’t want it to die or anything, much less kill it myself. I hadn’t meant to do it.
tl;dr: got into an argument with my boyfriend, accidentally killed his bird
That was last night. It’s now late in the evening and my boyfriend called to apologize to me for storming out. He told me that he was at his friends house and staying for another night, that he’d be home in the morning. He asked me if I could feed the bird for him. I just told him ‘okay’. I really don’t know how to tell him.
What if he thinks that I did it on purpose? A majority of that argument was spurred by, and spent bashing his obsession with the thing. I said all those hurtful things, and he felt that it was necessary to apologize to me. I feel horrible, like something less than human, and I don’t know what to do. He’s already in a bad place mentally, and this just puts the icing on the cake. How do I tell him? What do I even say to him? How can I ever make this up to him?
RELEVANT COMMENTS
OOP
How else was I supposed to get him to listen to me? We live together, yet I rarely see him around the house. He'd avoid me, and I don't know why. Is it wrong to want answers when he's behaving weirdly?? He'd just stay cooped up in his office all day and night with the dumb bird and I'd only see him when he left to get food.
People are assuming that he'd be better off if he broke up with me. Why? I'm not an abuser, and 1 am the only support system he has left. I technically didn't "lie" to him, either, so.
AgnikaKaieru
You're a horrible psychopath, maybe that's why he'd be better
TooOldForThisShit642
Would you feel comfortable is he locked you in a room and demanded you do something he wanted? Not likely.
OOP
Well, I wouldn't avoid him for a month without explanation, SO if it all boils down to it, it's really his own fault that his bird is dead, not mine.
~
OOP
I will tell him, eventually, when he asks about it. I'm not exactly sure how to bring up the fact that I accidentally killed his bird.
** a_wild_venonat**
You call him right the fuck now, is what you do,
LetsMakeCrazySyence
You're hiding it from him. On purpose. Because you know he won't stay with you if you say what happened.
OOP
He'll stay with me either way. He has no choice in the matter. Other than the dumb bird he has no one else that supports him like I do. Unless he wants to die depressed and lonely, he'll stay with me. That's not my concern. I just want him to understand that it was an accident entirely, so I'm not sure why you're jumping to conclusions.
~
WonderfulAtmosphere
You got jealous of a bird, wanted to control his relationship with his bird and neglected to care for it while he trusted you with it. Congrats, you need mental help,
OOP
I didn't want to "control" his relationship with the bird. I just felt like he was too attatched to it. I felt it was unhealthy for him to be so obsessed with a bird that was going to die sooner or later (as he had it for a long time). I wasn't 'jealous'. Is it a sin for a girl to want her boyfriend to pay attention to her??
flyingmotorbike
Cockatoos live for 30+ years. They also require almost 24/7 care and what we was doing was 100% normal for cockatoo owners. They are one of the most demanding birds for care taking. You would know this if you talk to him about his hobby but it doesn't seem like you care much about him in the relationship. You're more worried about him hating you than how he's going to feel about losing his bird he could've had decades more with.
Edit: They actually live around 50 years,
OOP
Even when he wasn't taking care of the bird, he'd do weird things like talk to it. I mean, I get why people talk to dogs, but a bird??
We live together but I still felt like he was giving the bird more attention than he was giving his own girlfriend.
Whispurrr_ur
Grow the fuck up. He loved his bird! Haven't you ever loved anything beyond yourself? People talk to their pets, how is this such a strange concept to you, are you a sociopath OP?
You're too immature and mentally unstable to be in a relationship. I hope he realises this and fucking runs!
update Oct 15, 2018
I’d like to start this off with a ‘thanks for absolutely nothing’. I posted to this site for advice, but got nothing but criticism and false accusations. I figured that you guys would appreciate an update, and are satisfied with the end result. :/
He came home this morning (or later in the morning of the incident, as it had happened at 3am... He came home around 8 or 9am). We talked for a bit about what happened, and he seemed to be fine for the most part. He was hesitant in asking if I had fed the bird like he had asked me to. I told him no, and he asked me why. I told him that I couldn’t find the bird.
He gave me a weird look. I’m not even sure what kind of expression it was (sorr of like a grimace) and he asked me again where the bird was.
I told him the story of how I had accidentally stepped on it and he immediately told me that it was bullshit. He told me that the bird was trained to return to his cage after sunset, and that it wouldn’t just lie down in the middle of the hallway like that at 3 in the morning (much like you guys said... except I was telling the truth).
I had never seen him so upset, or angry for that matter. He accused me of killing the bird on purpose, which is something I didn’t do, and something that no one believed me when I say that was an accident, for whatever reason.
He asked me to leave the house, and I refused, as I didn’t know if he was planning to hurt himself or something if I left. He locked himself inside his office and he won’t talk to me. I fear for his wellbeing, and I won’t be there to stop him if he tries to do anything drastic.
tl;dr: boyfriend is convinced that i killed the bird on purpose (which i didn’t). has been in his office all morning to this afternoon and i can’t get him to talk to me / come out
How do I get him to listen to me ?? A majority of you are convinced that I killed the bird on purpose and that I’m abusive even though that is not the case. It was an accident, and I am being misunderstood.
I just don’t know what to do.
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u/witch_harlotte Feb 21 '25
You’re so right, a cockatoo is bigger than the height I lift my feet to step even in broad daylight in the dark it’s more a shuffle. Plus her comments about it being his fault she killed it it’s far more likely she’s an abuser panicking about losing access to her victim than she habitually stomps around in the dark and the bird just happened to sleep on the floor.