A woman is looking to Reddit after an incident with her boyfriend left her questioning the fate of their relationship. 

The issue at hand is not a grand betrayal but something more nuanced: his constant use of his phone when they are together. The woman, who is 19, has a strict personal rule about putting her phone away in the company of others. 

She values being surrounded by people who share this mindset. However, her boyfriend, whom she names John in the post, frequently uses his phone during their time together. This behavior not only annoys her, but makes her feel neglected and unimportant, she writes.

“I don’t need to have attention every second we are together,” the woman writes. “But him grabbing his phone out of nowhere while I talk to him just makes me feel like he doesn’t care.” The feeling is exacerbated by a lack of communication about why he is using his phone in these situations.

The tension bubbled over on a recent dinner date during which John was on his phone. What the poster didn’t know was that he was dealing with an urgent issue related to a group project. 

However, he didn’t communicate this to her, leading her to make a passive-aggressive comment about his phone usage. She later apologized for her reaction but remains firm in her stance against his constant phone use in social settings. 

“If he needs to check on something important, it’s fine, but TELL ME. Just a simple ‘wait a sec, this is important’ is enough,” she shares. 

While the woman was vocal about her feelings, John views the recent incident as an overreaction, seeing phone use as a minor issue compared to the strength of their relationship. He believes it’s unnecessary to justify why he’s on his phone, which frustrates her. 

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For her, it’s not just about the phone itself but about respect and attention in shared moments. She emphasizes, “I did say it out of anger but I do mean it—I don’t want to be in a relationship with someone who is constantly on their phone.” 

As the argument lingers in her mind, she has turned to Reddit for advice, hoping for some outside perspective. One user validates her stance, saying, “This isn’t just about the phone, it’s about communication. If he just said, ‘Hey, I need a sec to deal with this,’ it wouldn’t even be an issue.”

The poster responds saying that this could be a deeper issue, but she remains firm in her boundaries. “Maybe it’s harder for him than I think, but calling it just a detail really hurts. In every other way he seems perfect but this is a big deal breaker for me,” she writes. 

She acknowledges, “It’s okay for him to use his phone, but not constantly. I value having a conversation or quality time with him when he is not looking at a screen. If he wants to look at a screen it’s fine but then just tell me to shut up and I will do something for myself as well.”