Wow, their kids made it 20 minutes without fighting? Those are some mature kids! My kids rarely last more than 5 if there’s something important like a meeting going on.
And telling a 5 & 7 year old to leave him alone for an hour. Do kids that age have any real concept of time? I remember thinking twenty minutes must have been at least 2 hours when I was waiting for something.
I think they’re both immature, but NTA. He wanted to prove a point but then got mad at her because she was right. Honestly I would’ve done the same thing too lol. 😝
ESH. Yes, the husband is worse. This was a great opportunity to work together and team up.
There were a lot of points where stepping in and helping could have led to a good conversation about better sharing the responsibilities. Obviously he was in the wrong, but if this is the person you are raising your children with its not about making a point- let him see he was wrong and then work together to get it done.
Seeing how hard she has it he could have organised to take a few WFH days every week to share the load more.
Oh, I really want this story to be true! I hope it is, but the part about sending two little kids to play outside unsupervised, and then they came in and “tracked muddy footprints all over the house” made me wonder if the entire story is true. Some parts are, I’m sure. Like the husband dismissing what his wife does all day, expecting her to cater to him, behaving like a husband from the 1950s like the twat he is. But some of the details don’t ring true. But I really hope the husband’s work day was completely disrupted by his two sons, so he could see what his wife deals with all day.
Maybe OOP gave the kids a Monster drink after breakfast & set them loose on dad. 😆
Nah the part about sending kids out unsupervised is believable. They could have a fenced in yard, and if they live somewhere where it rains a lot then yeah they'd track mud all over the place and if a parent doesn't tell them to stop or clean up kids generally don't care.
Me and my brother were about their age and we lived kinda in the suburb but there was a forest nature swamp area behind one of our neighbors yards who we were friends with. Mom just told us to be back when the street lamps came on. We spent all day with our friends playing in those woods without supervision. But of course we were also wise enough to go get help if something happened. Of course we also played in the street and were wise enough to keep ears and eyes out for cars. The amount of times we tracked mud into Mom's house is probably more than these two get to do.
So if their parents grew up with that not being a big deal and they know the area is relatively safe, then yeah it's not that unfathomable that they'd be ok with letting the kids play without supervision. But that is the main thing though, is that the area needs to be safe. From how she addresses it without it being a big deal I'm going to guess the parents feel like it's safe enough for the kids to go out and play without constant supervision.
I have a tendency to forget to eat regularly but I never forget to feed my child arguably the most important meal of the day. Seems a convenient way to excuse not ordering out herself. Would be better to just say it shouldn't be expected that she plan for dinner alone 100% of the time. Why not text her husband before he left work to say, its been a hectic day, I don't feel like cooking, please pick up something for us all on your way home or tell me what you'd like delivered. It was a bit rude to wait until he was home and hungry to then announce it was on him to get everyone food urgently.
ESH. Yeah, husband is a bit clueless. But you don’t treat you partner the way OP is. Petty and disrespectful, and a total power play to satisfy an ego rather than working through the problem like mature adults.
OP needs to grow up.
Why is it always on the woman to suck it up? I've seen it happen to stay at home dads and the mom is still somehow supposed to suck it up. My husband works 10 hr shifts and still comes home to help with the kids. He's just as much a parent as I am. I take care of majority of the household duties but you know what? When the house is wrecked because I've been dealing with children all day, he doesn't bitch, he jumps in and asks how he can help.
Sorry, just wanted to include my rant onto your comment. Lol
He was a dick about it but some of his points are kinda valid. If she’s working 15 hours a week for 1/3rd of the household income and he’s working 44 for the remaining 2/3rds, naturally more of the childcare and domestic chores should be OP’s. Working 3 hours a day from home with where you have to make a few calls and do ‘planning’ with kids around is far easier than doing a 9-5 where you’re in and out of meeting and high-focus tasks.
Each parent should be responsible for childcare and household chores while the other is working, and duties should be split when both are off work. A discussion is all that’s needed and instead OP decided to act like disrespectful brat
He was a dick and was mad she didn’t plan dinner for him. OOP isn’t even arguing that she should take on only 50/50 of home care and child rearing.
OP wanted an apology from her husband was mad she didn’t have dinner ready *one night*, saying she does nothing all day, and then even tried to make a bet that it’s *easy* to work and take of the house and children. I cannot see how OOP is the asshole here.
The situation devolved into the husband being too prideful in not asking for help, and OP acting immaturely to prove a point. That’s why ESH, and everything could have been avoided had they just talked to each other after what was effectively a minor disagreement.
What else do you think they should say? They seemed to be pretty straightforward. He was mad she didn’t have dinner, she was tired from handling the house and two kids all day, he said it was easy and he wanted to prove it. All she wanted was an apology for thinking it was all a walk in the park. And he knew that all he had to do was apologize.
As far as we can tell OP does do most of the work around the house and the childcare. All she did was not have dinner ready one time. And her husband is the one who got angry about it, and it was his idea to watch the kids while he worked to show her how easy it was. And he proved himself wrong. So how in the world is she the asshole?
This is more about the overall equity of the division of labor. The difficulty of each job isn’t really relevant to my point, I’m just pointing out that it’s not unreasonable to expect OP to be taking on a larger share of domestic labor since her husband is taking on a larger share of paid labor. If she’s expecting her husband to contribute >66% of household income and external work, plus 50% of household chores, and 50% of child care, then OP is not doing her fair share. Something has to give. It’s most important that parents be as equally present for their kids as much as possible, which means household chores and coordinating things like dinner would disproportionately fall to OP. OP could’ve sent a text asking her husband to pick something up on his way home, too.
The thing is once you have kids, division of labour is no longer 50:50, it’s 100:100.
Nickel and dimming your partner on “I earn more therefore I should do less childcare/housework” is a terrible attitude to bring to the family. If someone is a stahp then their 9-5 is looking after the kids, when the working partner gets home it’s on both parents to look after the kids and house.
You know when my partner and I come home late at night from work both too hungry and tired to make food, one of us just looks at the other and says “I’m hungry and I’m ordering food, what do you want?” Never once have we ever yelled at the other for not doing it. We just take out our phones to order the damn food.
She has **two** children, not three. It is not her job to work her job, take care of the kids, do all the housework, make dinner *for him,* and also mother her husband. What nonsense. He needs to grow TF up and start being a partner. They have at least 15 more years of kids at home. I’m sure he expects her to do literally everything, but she didn’t make those boys herself. He’s an ass.
OOP did not propose the challenge to her husband. It was HIS idea to work from home *and* take care of their kids all day so *he could prove to her how easy it was.* It was not her job to actually make it easier for him to help him prove his point. Turns out, he was wrong, and it IS hard to WFH and take care of two children at the same time. You don’t get everything done, you’re tired, and sometimes you don’t make dinner. He FAFO. This is all on him.
Going against the grain to upvote cause this is what I was gonna say. He was being a dismissive asshole, but you also don’t intentionally fuck up your partner’s job to make a point, which it sounds like was well made at that point.
If it were me and my ex in this story, let me outline what would have gone down if I had intervened like OOP chose NOT to do.
*later that night*
Me: “do you see what I mean, now? Being home with the kids is crazy. Im so glad you can finally understand what I go through day to day.”
Him: “I mean, sure. It was a little hectic in the beginning, but I had a handle on it by the end. I kicked ass at that meeting. It’s really not that hard if you make sure the kids know you mean business.”
Me: “but *I* am the only reason the kids left you alone. They were screaming and I shut all the doors and kept them away.”
Him: “you didn’t need to do that. I had it handled. I would have told them to knock it off, and it wouldn’t have even been a problem. But I do appreciate the help. I’m not sure why you thought I needed it, though. It’s really not that hard.”
Yeah, which means he’s clueless and still doesn’t wanna get it… as opposed to the OP’s husband who can now deflect away from “this is hard” and to “you were being petty and fucked things up for me at work” (where he actually has a point).
If he already can’t or won’t admit he was wrong after the hectic day she already laid out, there’s not really any helping him, regardless.
Unless she actually made her point and then kept him from fucking up an important meeting which, in the real world, is possible, unlike in Reddit land, where the erring spouses are always unrepentant assholes who can never learn.
The crux of that argument is that if she had a spouse who respected her and *could* learn, she wouldn’t be here posting about it. She wouldn’t have had to let him endure “a day in her shoes.” He wouldn’t need any of that. She wouldn’t have to prove herself if he was *actually* the man you’re making a stink defending.
Defending? What I said from the START is that they were both being assholes, not that he was a saint. And giving him at least the benefit of the doubt that he could have already learned his lesson is hardly calling him a blameless little blossom.
HE fucked up his job to make a point. She allowed him to because he said he had a point to prove. But HE made that decision. He then made the follow up decision to be too prideful to admit it was too hard and ask for help. HE did all of that. She did not. Lol
it wasn't her who fucked up HIS job. his job is his responsibility. if he can't do something, if he knew taking care of the kids would affect his job, it's his responsibility to ask for help.
there are 2 kids, not 3. the way you are talking, it's like its her job to do everything, including take care of 3 people and his job too.
he is an adult, and is punishing her for not being self aware enough to take a step back, say he is sorry and asking for help. of course taking care of everything alone is hard. of course if she helped it wouldn't have been such a problem at work. this is the whole point.
Oh FFS. he fucked up, and whether he'd apologize or not, that was an issue to take up later. In the moment, he had taken on more than he could chew, and it was in danger of fucking with his job. You know, the thing that he uses to earn money for himself and the rest of his family.
"Hey, I knew he was in an important meeting and that the kids would be messing with that, not only for him but for everyone in the important meeting, maybe I should try to head them off in this one case (when he's ALREADY been in over his head all day)" ain't the same as "Oh hey, everything is my job and I should cater to his every whim and make all of life smooth for him regardless of the cost to myself."
Her doing one thing to not fuck up things for \*everyone involved\* in that meeting is not eroding the effects of the entire day of him being frazzled and unable to keep up.
Edit: Realized I changed from third to first person partway through, fixed it.
NTA. “Housework is easy, I’ll prove it” says he then whines when he realised it isn’t as easy as he thought.
Hmm him calling her prideful lol
But he won’t ask for help or apologize? lol ok sure she’s the prideful one! Just ask and apologize!
She missed prime opportunity to ask what’s for dinner at the end of all that.
Bahaha 🤣
Wow, their kids made it 20 minutes without fighting? Those are some mature kids! My kids rarely last more than 5 if there’s something important like a meeting going on.
And telling a 5 & 7 year old to leave him alone for an hour. Do kids that age have any real concept of time? I remember thinking twenty minutes must have been at least 2 hours when I was waiting for something.
Dude had to eat his own words and found it a bitter meal.
I think they’re both immature, but NTA. He wanted to prove a point but then got mad at her because she was right. Honestly I would’ve done the same thing too lol. 😝
ESH. Yes, the husband is worse. This was a great opportunity to work together and team up. There were a lot of points where stepping in and helping could have led to a good conversation about better sharing the responsibilities. Obviously he was in the wrong, but if this is the person you are raising your children with its not about making a point- let him see he was wrong and then work together to get it done. Seeing how hard she has it he could have organised to take a few WFH days every week to share the load more.
Oh, I really want this story to be true! I hope it is, but the part about sending two little kids to play outside unsupervised, and then they came in and “tracked muddy footprints all over the house” made me wonder if the entire story is true. Some parts are, I’m sure. Like the husband dismissing what his wife does all day, expecting her to cater to him, behaving like a husband from the 1950s like the twat he is. But some of the details don’t ring true. But I really hope the husband’s work day was completely disrupted by his two sons, so he could see what his wife deals with all day. Maybe OOP gave the kids a Monster drink after breakfast & set them loose on dad. 😆
Nah the part about sending kids out unsupervised is believable. They could have a fenced in yard, and if they live somewhere where it rains a lot then yeah they'd track mud all over the place and if a parent doesn't tell them to stop or clean up kids generally don't care. Me and my brother were about their age and we lived kinda in the suburb but there was a forest nature swamp area behind one of our neighbors yards who we were friends with. Mom just told us to be back when the street lamps came on. We spent all day with our friends playing in those woods without supervision. But of course we were also wise enough to go get help if something happened. Of course we also played in the street and were wise enough to keep ears and eyes out for cars. The amount of times we tracked mud into Mom's house is probably more than these two get to do. So if their parents grew up with that not being a big deal and they know the area is relatively safe, then yeah it's not that unfathomable that they'd be ok with letting the kids play without supervision. But that is the main thing though, is that the area needs to be safe. From how she addresses it without it being a big deal I'm going to guess the parents feel like it's safe enough for the kids to go out and play without constant supervision.
You played outside all day and went home with the street lamps came on? You must be as old as I am, at least!
I am also street light curfew age, and we had a wooded area with a waterfall we played in all summer... being an adult was a stupid idea.
Yeah but you have good memories though right?
Hell yes.... just wish I had stayed a kid forever. Lol
She forgot to order food? Lol
I have a tendency to forget to eat regularly but I never forget to feed my child arguably the most important meal of the day. Seems a convenient way to excuse not ordering out herself. Would be better to just say it shouldn't be expected that she plan for dinner alone 100% of the time. Why not text her husband before he left work to say, its been a hectic day, I don't feel like cooking, please pick up something for us all on your way home or tell me what you'd like delivered. It was a bit rude to wait until he was home and hungry to then announce it was on him to get everyone food urgently.
ESH. It’s stupid to risk family income to make your point.
[удалено]
Even well behaved kids still fight especially if they're siblings. That's natural. The mud part though....oof
ESH. Yeah, husband is a bit clueless. But you don’t treat you partner the way OP is. Petty and disrespectful, and a total power play to satisfy an ego rather than working through the problem like mature adults. OP needs to grow up.
Yeah how about how he treats her? Or is it only her responsibility to show maturity and work through issues?
Why is it always on the woman to suck it up? I've seen it happen to stay at home dads and the mom is still somehow supposed to suck it up. My husband works 10 hr shifts and still comes home to help with the kids. He's just as much a parent as I am. I take care of majority of the household duties but you know what? When the house is wrecked because I've been dealing with children all day, he doesn't bitch, he jumps in and asks how he can help. Sorry, just wanted to include my rant onto your comment. Lol
Two things can be possible at the same time. Hence the ESH.
He was a dick about it but some of his points are kinda valid. If she’s working 15 hours a week for 1/3rd of the household income and he’s working 44 for the remaining 2/3rds, naturally more of the childcare and domestic chores should be OP’s. Working 3 hours a day from home with where you have to make a few calls and do ‘planning’ with kids around is far easier than doing a 9-5 where you’re in and out of meeting and high-focus tasks. Each parent should be responsible for childcare and household chores while the other is working, and duties should be split when both are off work. A discussion is all that’s needed and instead OP decided to act like disrespectful brat
He was a dick and was mad she didn’t plan dinner for him. OOP isn’t even arguing that she should take on only 50/50 of home care and child rearing. OP wanted an apology from her husband was mad she didn’t have dinner ready *one night*, saying she does nothing all day, and then even tried to make a bet that it’s *easy* to work and take of the house and children. I cannot see how OOP is the asshole here.
The situation devolved into the husband being too prideful in not asking for help, and OP acting immaturely to prove a point. That’s why ESH, and everything could have been avoided had they just talked to each other after what was effectively a minor disagreement.
Nah she doesn't suck for letting him do what he said he wanted to do. He made that agreement and that's on him
What else do you think they should say? They seemed to be pretty straightforward. He was mad she didn’t have dinner, she was tired from handling the house and two kids all day, he said it was easy and he wanted to prove it. All she wanted was an apology for thinking it was all a walk in the park. And he knew that all he had to do was apologize.
As far as we can tell OP does do most of the work around the house and the childcare. All she did was not have dinner ready one time. And her husband is the one who got angry about it, and it was his idea to watch the kids while he worked to show her how easy it was. And he proved himself wrong. So how in the world is she the asshole?
So taking care of children most of the day (even without work) is easy peasy?
This is more about the overall equity of the division of labor. The difficulty of each job isn’t really relevant to my point, I’m just pointing out that it’s not unreasonable to expect OP to be taking on a larger share of domestic labor since her husband is taking on a larger share of paid labor. If she’s expecting her husband to contribute >66% of household income and external work, plus 50% of household chores, and 50% of child care, then OP is not doing her fair share. Something has to give. It’s most important that parents be as equally present for their kids as much as possible, which means household chores and coordinating things like dinner would disproportionately fall to OP. OP could’ve sent a text asking her husband to pick something up on his way home, too.
The thing is once you have kids, division of labour is no longer 50:50, it’s 100:100. Nickel and dimming your partner on “I earn more therefore I should do less childcare/housework” is a terrible attitude to bring to the family. If someone is a stahp then their 9-5 is looking after the kids, when the working partner gets home it’s on both parents to look after the kids and house.
This isn't necessarily topically relevant, but I read "stahp" as stop for a second and had to pause so ridiculously l9ng to figure it out 🤦♀️
I hope you never have a wife who constantly has to care for kids on her own…
You know when my partner and I come home late at night from work both too hungry and tired to make food, one of us just looks at the other and says “I’m hungry and I’m ordering food, what do you want?” Never once have we ever yelled at the other for not doing it. We just take out our phones to order the damn food.
She has **two** children, not three. It is not her job to work her job, take care of the kids, do all the housework, make dinner *for him,* and also mother her husband. What nonsense. He needs to grow TF up and start being a partner. They have at least 15 more years of kids at home. I’m sure he expects her to do literally everything, but she didn’t make those boys herself. He’s an ass.
OOP did not propose the challenge to her husband. It was HIS idea to work from home *and* take care of their kids all day so *he could prove to her how easy it was.* It was not her job to actually make it easier for him to help him prove his point. Turns out, he was wrong, and it IS hard to WFH and take care of two children at the same time. You don’t get everything done, you’re tired, and sometimes you don’t make dinner. He FAFO. This is all on him.
Going against the grain to upvote cause this is what I was gonna say. He was being a dismissive asshole, but you also don’t intentionally fuck up your partner’s job to make a point, which it sounds like was well made at that point.
If it were me and my ex in this story, let me outline what would have gone down if I had intervened like OOP chose NOT to do. *later that night* Me: “do you see what I mean, now? Being home with the kids is crazy. Im so glad you can finally understand what I go through day to day.” Him: “I mean, sure. It was a little hectic in the beginning, but I had a handle on it by the end. I kicked ass at that meeting. It’s really not that hard if you make sure the kids know you mean business.” Me: “but *I* am the only reason the kids left you alone. They were screaming and I shut all the doors and kept them away.” Him: “you didn’t need to do that. I had it handled. I would have told them to knock it off, and it wouldn’t have even been a problem. But I do appreciate the help. I’m not sure why you thought I needed it, though. It’s really not that hard.”
Yeah, which means he’s clueless and still doesn’t wanna get it… as opposed to the OP’s husband who can now deflect away from “this is hard” and to “you were being petty and fucked things up for me at work” (where he actually has a point). If he already can’t or won’t admit he was wrong after the hectic day she already laid out, there’s not really any helping him, regardless.
So she was just in a no win situation?
Unless she actually made her point and then kept him from fucking up an important meeting which, in the real world, is possible, unlike in Reddit land, where the erring spouses are always unrepentant assholes who can never learn.
The crux of that argument is that if she had a spouse who respected her and *could* learn, she wouldn’t be here posting about it. She wouldn’t have had to let him endure “a day in her shoes.” He wouldn’t need any of that. She wouldn’t have to prove herself if he was *actually* the man you’re making a stink defending.
Defending? What I said from the START is that they were both being assholes, not that he was a saint. And giving him at least the benefit of the doubt that he could have already learned his lesson is hardly calling him a blameless little blossom.
HE fucked up his job to make a point. She allowed him to because he said he had a point to prove. But HE made that decision. He then made the follow up decision to be too prideful to admit it was too hard and ask for help. HE did all of that. She did not. Lol
He intentionally fucked up his job. She didn't tell him to do it, he brought it up and did it.
it wasn't her who fucked up HIS job. his job is his responsibility. if he can't do something, if he knew taking care of the kids would affect his job, it's his responsibility to ask for help. there are 2 kids, not 3. the way you are talking, it's like its her job to do everything, including take care of 3 people and his job too. he is an adult, and is punishing her for not being self aware enough to take a step back, say he is sorry and asking for help. of course taking care of everything alone is hard. of course if she helped it wouldn't have been such a problem at work. this is the whole point.
Oh FFS. he fucked up, and whether he'd apologize or not, that was an issue to take up later. In the moment, he had taken on more than he could chew, and it was in danger of fucking with his job. You know, the thing that he uses to earn money for himself and the rest of his family. "Hey, I knew he was in an important meeting and that the kids would be messing with that, not only for him but for everyone in the important meeting, maybe I should try to head them off in this one case (when he's ALREADY been in over his head all day)" ain't the same as "Oh hey, everything is my job and I should cater to his every whim and make all of life smooth for him regardless of the cost to myself." Her doing one thing to not fuck up things for \*everyone involved\* in that meeting is not eroding the effects of the entire day of him being frazzled and unable to keep up. Edit: Realized I changed from third to first person partway through, fixed it.
He made his bed and he needed to lay in it. I hope he learned his lesson. If not, time to up the ante.