Seriously considering breaking up with my long term girlfriend because of her pretend beef with firefighters F26/M30
Hear me out, and this is going to sound so fucking stupid, but I actually don’t know what to do anymore.
My girlfriend (F26) and I (M30) have been together for two years. We have lived together for a little over one year, having gotten a home together in a nice neighborhood after both of our previous leases expired. We both have decent jobs, own our cars, go half on everything, have good savings, good credit, and are working towards putting a down payment on a home that we can begin mortgaging.
In other words, everything in our relationship is absolutely stellar.
Except the goddamn firefighter thing.
It all started around four months ago. We were going on a date, and I was driving us downtown to the venue. On the way out of our neighborhood, there is a small firehouse that serves as this areas fire station since it’s kind of out of the way. I would guess it has maybe six firemen inside at any given time. Two fire trucks, and some smaller support vehicles. Pretty normal semi-rural fire station.
As we’re driving by, my girlfriend notices that the firemen have a large projector set up outside and are watching a movie while grilling. She does a double take and goes, “what the…?” before scoffing. “Daaaamn, those dudes ain’t doing shit!”
I looked around. “What do you mean?”
“Those firefighters back there. They’re leaned back straight chilling. Lazy!”
I laughed about it this time and explained that typically full-time firefighters stayed at the fire station during their long ass shift so that they wouldn’t have to come from somewhere else if an emergency happened, and as such they get very comfortable there. Cooking meals, reading, sleeping, training, and, yes, watching TV and doing other leisurely activities.
My girlfriend literally TURNED her nose up at that, scoffed again, and went “oh HELL no! Lazy!”
I laughed again, a little less enthusiastically this time, and asked, “well, what do you think they should be doing?”
She slapped her hand against her thigh and said, and I swear, “literally anything! they should be going out, LOOKING for fires!”
That one threw me, and as I tried to explain that it doesn’t work that way, that they aren’t like cops on patrol, she dismissively waved her hand and slapped her thigh again.
“Lazy!”
Lazy.
Lazy.
Goddamn, I’ve come to hate that word.
I quickly changed the course of the conversation that night, as it was starting to annoy me how nonsensical it was, but since then it’s become almost like a bit of hers. We can’t go anywhere without her seeing a fire truck or a station, and laughing, or jeering, or doing that stupid fucking thigh slapping gesture and saying “lazy!” in a false, sarcastic, extremely high-pitched tone.
It’s driving me insane.
I’ve had talks with her about it. I’ve been patient. I’ve asked her to drop the joke, it isn’t funny anymore. I’ve told her point blank that it’s actually annoying now. I’ve genuinely crashed out one time and we had a mini shouting match over how it’s childish, diminishing, and simply ruining our relationship. She won’t let it die. It’s gotten to the point where I don’t even want to drive anywhere with her anymore because I know if I see a fire truck/station she’ll HAVE to say something, even if it’s just a small sigh, and it’ll piss me off all over again. Hell, I can’t even see one when I’m alone and going about my day without it souring my mood.
I genuinely don’t know what to do. I don’t want to leave her. I love her. But this is just too much. I feel like I have to be getting psyop’d or something because I can’t stand this anymore.
I’m open to any and all suggestions because at this point I feel like it’s seeped into my brain and poisoned my image of her in what could possibly be an irreparable way.
TL;DR: Girlfriend has developed a super annoying bit about how firefighters are somehow lazy and it’s threatening to derail our entire relationship.