Help! My Boyfriend Has Just Issued Me an Insane Ultimatum About Weed.

[lemonsharks]

“I can’t believe he’s trying to control me like this.”

ADVICE BY R. ERIC THOMAS
MAY 07, 2022

Dear Prudence,

I’m in love with my boyfriend. We’ve been dating nine months, and it’s been going really well. I’m 26 and it just feels like this is who I want to be with my whole life. We’re still obviously in our first year, so a lot of our relationship is experiencing new things—and new conflicts—for the first time. This one has stumped me. He has a security clearance that requires that he not do drugs. When we first started dating, I thought I would also maybe go for a clearance one day, so I had also been drug-free (years ago, I smoked weed pretty regularly). He said that was important to him. Nine months later, I’m completely rethinking my career, and want to start partaking again casually. I was SO excited because I really enjoy it and was just letting him know I would be happy to keep it a “secret” from him so he can remain ignorant for clearance reasons.

I was shocked when he said that smoking was actually a deal breaker, and if I chose to, he would break up with me. (He previously smoked as well before quitting to get his clearance.) I guess I knew that this was important to him, and in the beginning we were on the same page, but I’m a changing person, and for him to not even be willing to compromise in any way makes me feel resentful. He’s turning it into a “you’re choosing marijuana over our relationship,” but I feel more like my desires are being ignored because he won’t even talk to me about it. I’m worried this is the beginning of a pattern where he asks something of me that I might change my mind on and instead of it becoming a conversation, it becomes an ultimatum. He says marijuana is the only thing he feels this strongly about. I finally told him that I wouldn’t smoke, but I am so, so resentful and don’t know how to move past this.

— Can’t Smoke My Own Pot

Dear Can’t Smoke,

It’s a little unclear whether your boyfriend’s objection at this juncture is to marijuana or to adhering to security clearances, but either way it sounds like he’s expressing an anxiety about his job and making it about your relationship. You have a couple of options here: You can ask him what this marijuana thing is all about. You can try to revisit the initial conversation and say that you don’t feel like you’re choosing marijuana over your relationship but that you noticed it struck a nerve with him and you’d like him to explain some more of his feelings about it to you. Or you can tell him that ultimatums are actually not a workable relationship dynamic for you and ask him to come up with another way of communicating his desires. Or you can hold the line.

I’m concerned by the intensity of his response here. He is exerting a level of control over you and your behavior that isn’t appropriate, and dangling the threat of a breakup for non-compliance is unhealthy and unhelpful. This early in a relationship, we should be looking for solutions and commonalities, not conflicts and problems. If he’s making this such a big deal without being willing to talk it through, he may not be as invested in the relationship. Or he may not be the right person to be in a relationship with right now.

Comments

[lemonsharks]

I have three thoughts:

1. By telling her bf she had started smoking again at all, LW torpedoed any plausible deniability he might otherwise have had vis a vis his security clearance.

2. It is completely reasonable to not want to be in a relationship with a drug user. “I can’t be in a relationship with you if you smoke weed.” is a boundary and if LW won’t or can’t respect that boundary that is a her problem.

3. The only person I’m getting controlling vibes from here is the LW.

[shirou]

Agreed on all counts. The columnist's response is ridiculous. Dear Prudence has really been going to pot lately.

[cimorene]

Yes, and #2 is what I really got hung up on in the letter!!

Even aside from how completely plausible and normal it is for someone to be unwilling to consider a relationship with a drug user (or substitute some other addictive substance here), they both indicate a bonkers attitude to ultimatums here. So having any points that you won't negotiate on is controlling? I've gotta wonder if they both somehow don't really understand what an ultimatum is, or have assumed that the partner isn't even potentially sincere, and are reading his ultimatum as an attempt at manipulation.

[jadelennox]

yeah, and the security clearance or legality is irrelevant to how bonkers this is! If someone I'd been dating for nine months started smoking cigarettes, that would be a deal breaker for me. Hell, if my current partner of (depending on how you count) 25-30 years started regularly smoking cigarettes, we'd be having a series of extremely tense conversations about what things would be necessary for us to stay together. It doesn't have to be a rational or legal boundary to be a boundary, and a relationship of less than a year is a healthy time for people to be making it clear what their boundaries are.

[ermingarden]

Agreed! The columnists' expectation that you should be "willing to compromise" on seemingly any issue is a concerning one. Sometimes you do have a hard line, and it's actually good to tell your partner what that is. LW expresses a worry that this is the beginning of a pattern, but we can't extrapolate that from a single ultimatum. If BF had initially said he'd be fine with LW smoking, then changed his mind, that could be different, but he's been really clear about it all along.

[mommy]

Marijuana might be legal in LW's state but it's still very illegal on the federal level, and even a suspicion of drug use has torpedoed careers. If the boyfriend has a federal job and clearance then LW's desire for recreational marijuana use is a risk to his livelihood. I consider LW the unreasonable one in this situation, even though I also believe in legalization on the federal level.

[movingfinger]

WTAF. LW and Prudence/Eric Thomas are idiots if they think LW's weed use couldn't affect the boyfriend's security clearance. For one thing, weed stink is pernicious, and no way could LW's boyfriend claim he didn't know. (More, it's likely LW's weed odor will transfer to him, to clothes he probably needs to wear to work in his security-clearance-required workplace. Uh oh.)

Boyfriend's position is reasonable! He started dating a non-smoker, non-pot-user. He prefers a partner with those qualities. Sounds like LW, who is "SO excited to start partaking again" and has changed their career path to be able to do so, is not the right partner at all for this guy, and he is seeing that very clearly. Bye-bye, LW.

[sara]

It's not even a question of odor -- if they're wiping down his stuff at work and putting the swabs in one of those machine things it's plenty damaging for him to have been in regular physical contact with a user.

Which he may not want to be for other entirely valid reasons as well.

[shanaqui]

Over and above any practical concerns, LW knew that this was important to him. Did they just figure his feelings would get out of their way now they've decided he didn't really mean it?

[ashbet]

As much as I support federal legalization, I have been in a serious longterm relationship with someone with a high-level clearance, and they do NOT fuck around.

The LW’s partner said this was important to him, and she has just… decided that stopped mattering as soon as she decided to change her mind??

This is not controlling behavior on his part, he’s setting a boundary.

(As an aside, weed smell gets into EVERYTHING, and I would not want to date or live with someone who regularly smoked — edibles are less of an issue.)

But, yes, the government could yank his clearance over this, and it’s reasonable for him not to want to risk his career.

[adrian_turtle]

We are also talking about somebody who once used pot, then stopped, and feels strongly about not being around it. This can be the behavior of a recovering addict, as well as that of a cautious person who is worried about keeping his security clearance.

[ermingarden]

Nooooo this is a really bad response! An ultimatum is not inherently manipulative! LW's BF is saying that if LW continues to smoke pot, he'll break up with LW. We have no reason to think that isn't true. There's no requirement that you have to be "willing to compromise" on absolutely everything, and explicitly drawing a hard line – when there really is a hard line – is a good thing, so that everyone's on the same page. If BF were threatening to break up over just about everything, then we might be talking about control and manipulation, but this is one specific thing and the ultimatum seems to be genuine.

I'm also very annoyed by "you can ask him what this marijuana thing is all about." We know what it's about! It's about his security clearance! As others have noted, depending on the agency he works for and the position he holds, LW's smoking very well may endanger BF's career.

[conuly]

...look, a dealbreaker is a dealbreaker. "I can't date somebody who smokes marijuana" is valid, as is "I can't date somebody who drinks alcohol, even just a little" or "I can't date somebody who is/isn't religious" or "I can't date somebody who doesn't like/can't have cats" or even "I can't date somebody who isn't 5'9" and very attractive". Outside opinions may vary about how reasonable certain dealbreakers are, but it's not unreasonable to say "This is it, that's my rule for whom I date".

[green_grrl]

Right? Prudie is saying, “Now is the time to compromise,” but under a year is also the time to cut for incompatibility?

[ioplokon]

This early in a relationship, we should be looking for solutions and commonalities, not conflicts and problems.

Idk I thought the point of dating was to assess compatibility and shared values? It stinks when you're 6-9 months in and it doesn't work out, but isn't it way worse if you pretend things are fine for years & then have to deal with assets/children/families?

Imo with ultimatums, it's controlling if you issue them when you know the relationship can't/won't end? But like, you're allowed to break up with people for any reason... And 'I don't want to lie or do an elaborate game of make believe to maintain my security clearance' is... Kinda not a stupid reason. Also idk what his clearance is for but skirting the rules can still get him in trouble or make him a target for extortion.

[jamoche]

GF and Prudence seem to think this is just another job, and if BF does get kicked out of it, no big, you can just find another similar one.

I've worked at tech companies that'll rush you straight out the door for violating their security/secrecy policies. They're highly desirable, highly specialized, and if you screw up that badly you will never get a job anywhere *close* to that one again. You might as well just change industries entirely.

If GF was in Silicon Valley, she'd be the one "borrowing" BF's pre-release tech and posting it on social media, and then Shocked Pikachu Face when he got fired. Which has happened.

[swingandswirl]

... did the columnist not do one iota of research before writing this? For that matter, did they take their brain out and put it in a jar for safekeeping before putting fingers to keyboard?

(And I am starting to get REALLY annoyed with weed apologists. It fucking well is a drug, an illegal-in-several-places one at that, and people are WELL within their rights to have hard boundaries about using it/having people in their lives who do.)