Woman disgusted by husband's 'weird' behavior after her stillbirth. AITA?
"AITA for being upset with my husband's reaction to our stillborn baby?"
Mid-to-late last month I (27f) delivered a stillborn. After she was delivered the doctor was easily able to find out that there had been an issue with the cord and she simply wasn't getting what she needed to survive, so she died in the womb.
It was no ones fault and could not have been helped or prevented, just a terrible accident. I was 6 months pregnant so everyone knew we were expecting. My husband (29m) has a huge family, and everyone is super close and talk everyday and most of them live together.
I told my family what happened immediately, but my husband asked to tell his family on his own. I said okay, I understand he needs some time with this and I understand he lost as much as I did.
The problem came up this morning. I reminded him every 2-3 days that he really needed to tell his family. I offered to do it for him more times than I can count.
He would occasionally make excuses where he'd say he needed to 'do the dishes' or 'wash the car' and didn't have time to call them, so I would do whatever excuse he was using so he had time, just to come back and he still had not done it.
I finally told him yesterday that if he would tell them then I would do it this morning, and I followed through.
It had been over 3 weeks since she died at this point. In this time I had missed dozens of calls and texts from his family asking how we were/how the baby was/if we wanted to come over for dinner/that they bought us a pack of diapers because Costco had a sale.
I had ignored every single member of his family because he kept telling me he would 'get around to it'. I never lied to anyone, I just literally ignored them. I got texts and calls every day that I just blocked because I don't even know what I would say if I had talked to them, and I certainly wouldn't have lied about THIS.
I've honestly barely seen my husband over these past few weeks. He goes to either our guest room or office and just sits on his phone.
I've left him alone and given him space, but I've also been doing all of the funeral arrangements, paperwork, handling what we need for our work LOA's, handling the insurance and taking care of our house and other kids all on my own. Honestly I'm kind of disgusted with him, although I feel bad.
Anyways, he was absolutely shocked that I actually did it, I'm not sure why. He's been locking in our spare room all morning now texting me all kinds of nasty things that I'm ignoring, and telling me that I ruined his relationship with his family now and accusing me of not loving or caring about our dead daughter.
I understand my husband is grieving, and I feel awful that he's having a hard time, but dodging texts and calls from 20 people for weeks and pretending like everything was fine has been exhausting. It feels like he's trying to ignore that it ever happened and while I'll never forget our daughter we have to move on with our lives.
I think I definitely crossed a boundary, but I also think I was in the right to. So, AITA?
Let's find out.
sheramom85 writes:
NTA. It sounds like he really hasn't been there for you at all and you have been carrying the entire burden. Additionally, you should be recovering from childbirth. Has he been taking care of you at all? You did NOT cross a boundary.
One, you have the right to share your loss with whomever you choose and two, again, he has not only left all of the burden on you and has not let you grieve or recover, he also left you to play pretend for weeks so he could lock himself in a room or 'do the dishes.'
Honestly you should have done it weeks ago. Your recovering and grieving process has been stalled or interrupted for weeks now.
purplemilesalien writes:
NTA. Unless there's something absolutely strange about the way his family reacts to the news of a stillborn, if his relationship with his family is 'ruined,' he did it himself. By not telling them about your stillborn baby for three entire weeks.
whathopuck writes:
I delivered stillborn twins a few months ago, and you are NTA. Your husband is absolutely grieving but so are you.
It is not fair that all practical things are falling to you, as well as the emotional heavy lifting of informing people, all while you are physically recovering from birth (you're probably still bleeding pretty heavily, I was at three weeks out) as well as having your hormones go wild on you.
Ideally, he should be taking a lot of this off of your shoulders or, if you are physically up to some of it, doing it TOGETHER. My husband and I held our babies and said goodbye together.
We went to the funeral home and made decisions together. We told people sort of together (mostly via text as we'd been keeping our nearest and dearest informed when I went into the hospital).
We went to pick up their urns together. In a couple of weeks, on what would have been their due date, we will go scatter their ashes together. We have decided to try again for another baby, and will deal together with the emotional turmoil that that will bring.
Together. Because we are PARTNERS. We are a team. Because the only thing that lessens pain like this is being able to share it with someone who really understands. Your husband may be in pain, but you do not deserve this. Sending you great love.