In a recent Reddit entry posted in r/relationship_advice, user u/get-a-lifee shared a post captioned “told my wife (F35) that she couldn’t do it without me (M34). Turns out she can.”
In the post, the author shared that his wife, who is currently on a paid break from work, spends every day except Monday and Friday (when she gets some childcare) with their children. “We went into having kids knowing she wanted to be a working mother. So this has been an adjustment… to say the least,” he said.
After one day when his wife had been talking care of their children (along with their neighbours’ kids), the poster said that she asked him to take over when he was back from work to give her a break.
“I didn’t respond well,” he admitted. “I made excuses and didn’t offer help and for the first time in years my wife lost her temper and cursed at me.”
“She made me sit down and write a list of things I did for the family that day and compared it with her… longer list, I apologised,” the poster added. “She accepted and I figured things would go back to normal. They haven’t.”
The man got his wish, and isn’t enjoying it
The app user shared that his wife “used to include [him] in parenting our kids,” stating “I did dance pick up most weeks and bedtime was split. I gave baths. Made dinner. All the stuff.”
But “since [their] fight, [his] wife hasn’t asked [him] for any help with the kids. The first morning [he] woke up on what was supposed to be my morning with the kids, [he] figured she was just being nice or trying to prove a point but it keeps happening.”
He’s no longer involved in their bedtimes, and has had all of “his” child-rearing tasks taken over by his wife, he says. And he notes that “the kids haven’t even noticed. It’s like she’s replacing me.“
In a resulting argument, the man said that his wife accused him of having next-to-no contact with their children unless she arranged it. In response, he “said something along the lines of ‘I’d like to see how long you can manage without me.’”
Turns out, she’s managing pretty well
“She’s started running again. She’s cooking really healthy and often. Every night I come home to my perfectly happy Stepford wife, doing it all without me and I feel empty inside,” the poster said.
He added that he wasn’t happy with her positive progress as he became less present in her life. “At this point I want to beg her to go back to how things were,” he said. “This wasn’t what we agreed on.”
People had, well, opinions
“Stop waiting for your wife to ask for help with your kids. If you’re an active parent, you shouldn’t need to be asked ‘to help.’ It’s a combined responsibility,” one commenter said.
“This is why women check out of relationships. She shouldn’t have to manage you. You’re a grown ass man who is capable of taking some responsibility for his kids,” another added.
“He’s upset because his fantasy that he was a good husband and Dad has been shattered. His ego took a hit. He doesn’t care at all that he created more work for his wife by not pulling his weight. He doesn’t care his kids basically don’t have a Dad,” yet another person said.
In a recent edit to the post, the man shared that he has since taken the comments into account and ran his wife a bath, putting her favourite music on Alexa and telling her to take a break from the kids.
“Relationships are hard. And humans aren’t perfect,” he said at the end of his post. You can say that again...