To be concerned with how my boyfriend acted when I was ill?

OP just go to the relationship thread and see how MNers are usually treated by their husbands and boyfriends. Do you want to settle like them? A little while ago we were arguing about whether being expected to cook a roast dinner two days after giving birth was reasonable. Again… is this the standard you want?

I wouldn’t have asked DH because I wouldn’t have needed to.

Maybe she doesn't remember because she was delusional from the fever.

Me too. What has happened to people’s empathy? Having had tonsillitis throughout my childhood and 20s, I was hospitalised regularly and once they swelled up so badly, I couldn’t breathe and they had to put a needle in to drain my tonsils. My ex husband, despite his faults, if I were ill, he would force me to stay in bed and bring me meds/drinks/whatever he could think of. It’s not a case of because you’ve always nursed him when he’s unwell that you expect the same back. It’s basic humanity. No one should watch someone they love suffering if they can do something about it. You’re at the age where you’re finding someone to be with and possibly have kids. Think very carefully about your future and if this is something you could deal with. It doesn’t matter he had work the next day. If he truly loved you, he’d have walked on his hands and knees to somewhere to get you what you needed. You’re not being a princess or a snowflake. Ignore those on here with husbands who do jack shit and who have settled for the bare minimum. Lots of love to you OP.

He sounds like a fair-weather friend. I disagree with the posters who say you are ‘snow-flakey.’ I think you are upset at the lack of warmth and kindness.

In this situation I think he done what he could and to be fair you did get back to sleep being ill does suck but it was late at night and their wasn't much to be done and as for the food you did say you didn't want to go so he probably thought that you wouldn't want something bringing back

My dh wouldn't think to bring some food back either if I said I wasn't going to dinner ... I wouldn't expect him to either

He brought back a tablet, tablets don’t work for you so you had some tea and went to sleep? I’m sorry but I think you sound hard work.

Why did he say it was "really good" you were never ill? That's a separate point but a bit concerning. Did he say it like "it's great, you're not ill!" (I'm pleased for you) or "it's great your not ill" (I like low maintenance because I'm low effort).

All of this. Unless you're about to give us a massive drip feed, you're the unreasonable one here.

Op, I actually think that Lemsip Gate is a red herring.
I think that you don’t feel that this man truly loves you .

Had been in a few relationships then a marriage of 20 years, my experience says it's not a man for long term relationship.

It’s the timeline that gets me.

All day (until 10:30pm): OP has a sore throat and runny nose, but doesn’t get or ask for meds

10:30: goes to bed

Between 10:30 and 10:45:

Falls asleep
Wakes up “suffocating”
Asks BF to go to the store

Between 10:45 and 11:
BF goes to the store and back
They look up the nearest pharmacy
OP tries to go back to sleep and fails
BF tries ringing reception, goes to reception, gets a tablet and comes back

Ha, well if you wouldn't need an ambulance for the "suffocation" I don't know what you'd be complaining about! 😉

Yeah, we have very different views. I think that adults should behave and should be treated like adults, and shouldn't expect to be babied and coddled. Not even when they have the sniffles for a couple of days. If an adult needs something, s/he is perfectly capable of communicating that need, and doesn't need her/his partner asking 'What do you need? What can I do for you?' every five seconds. If you think that's what being loved and cared for involves, fine, but I would hate every second of it. I would find it unbearably suffocating and stifling. (And no, I don't mean that literally.)

*because he didn't think to check she had what she needed.

I think our different endings to that sentence sum up our divergent views in a nutshell. I agree the OP could have asked, but I also think it's notable that he wasn't considerate enough to check given the context of the medicine meanness the night before. In isolation, fair enough, it's a slip, he didn't think, she didn't ask, whatever. But this is now a pattern of not considering or caring about her needs when she's ill. He doesn't want to take care of her. And that doesn't work for her.

Also given OP appears to have no difficulty in stating her very specific needs, I'd assume the BF thought that if she did want something she'd let him know and then berate him for getting the honey mustard dressing rather than the blue cheese one.

"when he got back I told him I didn't feel like having dinner"

From the OP. She didn't feel like having dinner, not 'going out for dinner'. And I assume, given that she's 30 years old and not 5, if she'd wanted him to bring her something, she could have said 'hey, can you bring me back some chips' before he left, or texted him while he was out if that's what she wanted. Instead, we get this childish sulking and whining because he couldn't read her mind.

The boyfriend of the OP wasn't objecting to the price or effectiveness of the requested medication. Let's no reframe this for him as a scientific consideration calculated to best assist her, or intellectual objection. He just couldn't be bothered to get what she asked for.

This below essentially answers all posters who have quoted me, I think:

1. No. He was supposed to go to the other pharmacy 5 minutes away. That's the whole question under discussing in this thread.
2. I had read it as she had said she didn't feel like going out for dinner. Agree, reading it back that is not entirely clear but using my context clues, that was presumably that was why she was put out that he didn't offer to bring her anything back when he took himself out. Happy to be corrected by the OP.
3. Fortunately I'm not married to 64% of posters and my own requirements for relationships are not subject to democratic vote!
4. Yes, I think lower standards is the apposite description in this particular case, as I think we all agree that I expect more effort from my partner in this scenario and the 64% expect less, no?
5. I discussed this thread with my own DH who was similarly surprised and glad we were in a relationship where we'd make more of the effort for each other, and that it had reminded us to be particularly grateful for each other since apparently its not the norm! If I haven't been clear, I'd very much expect to give as well as receive this level of effort.
6. Yes. It's a turn of phrase. I simply don't believe that any of you read the OP and genuinely thought that the OP was saying that she thought she was about to die of asphyxiation - it's just being taken literally in order to suggest that the OP is a drama queen and shame her for her relationship expectations.
7. I agree that the OP thinks her boyfriend is not up to scratch and for that reason I hope they don't stay together. I hope that she finds someone who treats her as she wants to be treated and that he finds someone who expects to be treated as he is willing to treat them. Trying to change someone is a mug's game, but so is trying to bury your own wants and needs in order to maintain a relationship with someone with such mismatched expectations.

Just a reminder - You had a cold, he was working, you had all day to get meds, you told him you didn't want dinner, you waited till nearly 11pm to ask him to go out - which he did - after a cup of tea you went to sleep.

Those are the facts you've presented.

You're being dramatic.

yep , and lemsip is ridiculously priced and still increasing even with the evidence it’s not that effective. Just a big rip off .

That's exactly what I've always been told too. Might as well have a couple of paracetamol with hot Ribena, or hot honey and lemon, or whatever, if it's the hot flavoured water that you like, and save money on the overpriced lemsip. The OP saying that 'flu relief hot drinks are the only thing that works' for her sounds to me like the placebo effect.

@drusth

Saying paracetamol is exactly the same as Lemsip is disingenuous. Lemsip also has phenylephrine hydrochloride (a decongestant) to help relieve headache, fever, blocked nose, body aches and pains, and a sore throat.

Many studies have found that phenylephrine hydrochloride is no better than a placebo.

My GP told me not to waste money on flu relief hot drinks as "a cup of tea and a paracetamol will be as effective and cheaper"

I have very high expectations of my partner. And vice versa. So if I said to him that I was "very sick" he would leap to help me-probably trying to find me a doctor. Conversely, I wouldn't say I was "very sick" if I had a cold, and I wouldn't demand a specific form of paracetamol, rather than just paracetamol.

@MrRydersParlourGame

Man brings exactly the medication the OP said wouldn't work for her instead of the medication she very clearly asked for.

What was he supposed to do conjure up a packet of Lemsip from thin air? He brought her what she wanted and needed a pain-killer, probably paracetamol, and probably from the stock the hotel keeps for guests. To insist it's not in the correct form for her is pretty 'princessy' in my book. If she was as really really ill as she has said, she would have taken it.

If I was abroad with a friend with a cold who turned their nose up at paracetamol but was insisting I go out to get a paracetamol drink solution instead, I would be tempted to leave them to it frankly.

Man apparently doesn't know that other human beings, as well as him, need to eat unless told at each meal time.

Jesus wept.

Odd? Man assumed that when someone says to him "I didn't feel like having dinner" they meant what they said. OP is a grown up, if she meant she didn't want to eat out then she should have said that and so please could you bring me something back. She's complaining that he couldn't read her mind to know she meant the opposite of what she said.

Yes, of course she wasn't seriously ill but by my yard stick this man is self-involved and/or doesn't care about her very much.

That's it.

That's fine but 64% of posters disagree with you.

Plenty of people don't recognise this conclusion because, rightly or wrongly, their expectations of partners are considerably lower than mine and some others. Fair enough, whatever makes you happy.

No that's your 'conclusion' because most posters don't agree with you - that's a very sweeping statement to make that other posters have 'considerably lower' expectations than you. Many posters have said upthread that they have caring partners but don't agree with OP's attitude and would have different expectations of them in the scenario OP has given. I do wonder about some of the posters saying "how dreadful, OH would do xyz for me as we've got a wonderful relationship" and then condone a women who spends her whole thread basically slagging her OH off and belittling everything he does - frankly I wonder how many of those partners agree with your idea of a wonderful relationship (or maybe their expectations of their partners are low?)

Incidentally, for the very literal-minded posters, the 'feeling like I was suffocating' thing is clearly a descriptor of symptoms and her own sense of them, not a literal statement that she was actually unable to get enough oxygen into her body or was accumulating fatal levels of CO2.
See also "I thought I was going to die of embarrassment" and "it felt like my throat was on fire", amongst other turns of phrase in order to avoid future confusion.

'Feeling like I was suffocating' I had assumed was OP's description of her symptoms, but obviously she wasn't actually, she was describing a feeling. "I thought I was going to die of embarrassment" is hyperbole which wouldn't make much sense in that context. However, reading back over OP's posts, I wouldn't be surprised if she has a tendency to use hyperbole and exaggeration to make a point. There are lots of gaps, assumptions and her timeline doesn't make sense.

The negative way OP talks about her BF and how anything he does is not good enough is pretty unpleasant to read. I hope, if they stay together, she will work on this and also learn to speak up and not expect others to be mindreaders. He probably needs to learn that she does this and ask her more questions.

"Man apparently doesn't know that other human beings, as well as him, need to eat unless told at each meal time."

The OP had very clearly told her boyfriend that she didn't want to eat dinner, so he went out to eat on his own. I'm struggling to see what he did wrong here. She clearly communicated her wishes (not to eat dinner), but he himself wasn't ill and therefore he did want to eat dinner, so he did so. I don't understand what on earth the OP is moaning about here. What did she (and you) expect him to say?

OP: I don't feel like eating dinner.
Boyfriend: Fine, what do you want for dinner?

He listened to her wishes and respected them. He didn't try to force her to eat something when she obviously didn't want to. He didn't sit in the hotel room and eat in front of her, which might have come across as rude and obnoxious and might have made the OP feel even worse (I know when I'm ill and don't want to eat, the smell of food makes me nauseous).

I genuinely do not know what you and the OP are finding to complain about here. Feels like you're both finding fault for the sake of finding fault. Do you think he should have nagged her to eat or forced her to eat something when she didn't want to? I sure as hell don't.