Mom tired of teen son's weaponized incompetence gives him a dose of his own medicine

As a parent, one has to sometimes be strict with their children to teach them life lessons. That's what this mother ended up doing after getting frustrated over her son's weaponized incompetence. u/Odd_Hat-2030 shared on Reddit that her 15-year-old son messed up household chores intentionally so he would not have to do them. The mom started the post by saying, "I'm tired. My son has been messing up all of his chores on purpose."

The mother revealed that she'd started teaching her teenage son to cook more complex things and other household chores like proper cleaning, laundry, etc. When he initially messed them up, she thought he was just having a hard time learning them. So, she spent more time teaching him these things. "It was driving me insane because I tried so many ways to teach him and I was getting quite frustrated. I even went to book an appointment to see if he had ADHD or something," she revealed. She later canceled it after overhearing his conversation with his friend. He was bragging about how he got out of his chores by messing them up. 

She sat him down and tried talking to him about it, but he refused to own up to his actions. The mom shared, "He went as far as saying it wasn't a big deal. He can't do it." After this, the mother decided to give her son a taste of his own medicine. She revealed, "I have been messing up his stuff on purpose to show how much of an inconvenience it is. For example, I forgot to turn on the dryer, so he ended up having wet clothes." Due to this, she and her son got into an argument. Her son told her he knew she was doing this on purpose. "I told him that is the point and I won't stop until he does his stuff correctly. He won't talk to me and my husband is on his side," she concluded.

She explained further in the comments what her son was doing. "It truly was driving me insane why he was messing up. Like I got messing up or mixing the wrong chemical the first time. But I started to use sticky notes. I removed the bleach so he wouldn't make mustard gas. Like the floor cleaner says floor cleaner and he used it in the sink. I probably should have seen what he was doing sooner, but I truly thought he was having issues," she shared.

People in the comments supported the mom for teaching her son a lesson. u/theshowjaguar commented, "My parents inspected my chores and I got to redo them if they were not properly done the first time. Learned pretty quick not to mess it up or it would just take longer and longer to fix it." u/kindly_egg_7480 wrote, "He is messing things up on purpose and your husband is on his side? I do not get it. He is lazy, manipulative and lying to your face. Why would your husband be ok with that? He needs serious consequences. Stop doing things for him. He can do his laundry and cook for himself from now on."

u/franglaisedbeignet expressed, "You need to buckle down. Might I suggest taking away anything he enjoys or loves, like a phone, computer or freedom? He can get privileges back once he learns respect and can complete a task sufficiently. I would fully stop doing anything for him." u/happyweekend69 said, "He's 15. That's not long until adulthood when nobody is gonna hopefully hold his hand through everything. He needs to learn now so a partner doesn't have to mother him for the rest of his life."