“Really, what would you do without me!!”, he said jokingly after fixing something in the house.
Usually, I would have rolled my eyes and answer ” you know, I probably would be a bag lady by now!”. And we would have laughed at the apparent silliness of this conversation. Such a great relationship, such a sense of humor. Ha ha.
This time, to my horror, I understood he meant it. This man was convinced I would have difficulties organizing my life without him.
I thought about the fact that we were both working full-time and contributing the same amount to the family budget.
I thought about the fact that during the week I was also handling the totality of childcare for our son, fixing all the meals, and generally running the house.
I thought about the fact that his idea of a good weekend is doing what he wants while I go along with his program.
I thought about how many time I resigned to follow him in his career  moves (4!), and how many times he did (0!).
I looked at him in the eyes, and answered seriously: “What I would do without you? Well, exactly what I do today, minus serious constraints. Now the real question is : what would you do without me?”
I could see his smile fade when he realised first that I was serious, second that I was right. Seriously, what would he do? Hire a nanny / cook / maid, or resign from his executive job to take care of all of this himself ?
Now, he is a nice guy, and reasonably egalitarian (by this I mean better than the average, even if it does not mean much). There were times when he was doing most of childcare, when I was under pressure at work and still recovering from a rotten childhood. But he had not updated his view of the relationship, and I more importantly, I had not either !
So here we were, ridiculously feeling I was the one being dependent, whereas I was the one doing all the work.
So now, consider your own situation. Are you feeling emotionally dependent on your partner? Do you feel you would not cope without him or her? That you would be overwhelmed by life demands on your own?
Now look at your relationship and your contribution: who is contributing the most? Who is adjusting to the other’s needs? Who takes care of whom in reality? Is one of you not having any constraint from the relationship, but getting all the benefits ?
Then this one is the dependent one, not the other way around.
PS: strangely enough, I have not heard the “what would you do without me” comment since then. Not once.