'AITA for hating where my partner wants to live and wanting to take my baby back home?'
"AITA for wanting to take my baby back home after my partner insists on living somewhere I hate?"
My partner and I have been together for about 5 years, and we have a 10 month old daughter together. The issue is that he insists we split our time and live about half the year in another country(on a completely different continent) because he hates living in Europe, which is where I’m from.
He goes on frequent rants about how terrible Europe is and why he doesn’t want to be there. But if I say anything remotely negative about the country he prefers, he gets defensive or outright angry.
He’s been renting an apartment there since before we met, so this isn’t new for him. The problem is the living situation. The apartment is quite small around 70-80 square meters, with one bedroom, a small bathroom, and a combined kitchen/living room.
On top of that, he works from home full time and takes all of his work calls (inc important meetings) in the living room. This basically means I’m expected to keep our baby completely quiet during those times. If she’s fussy or making noise, I have to either take her out for a walk or stay confined to the bedroom so he can work undisturbed. It can feel like I’m constantly being pushed out of the main living space.
Sleeping is also an issue. He has obstructive sleep apnea and snores extremely loudly to the point where I can hear him through walls, and he sometimes stops breathing for several seconds at a time. It’s honestly stressful and impossible for me to sleep next to him. Because of that, he sleeps on the sofa every night.
Recently, we’ve been arguing more because I told him I don’t want to keep spending time there anymore. I feel completely suffocated stuck in a small apartment with a baby, no real personal space, constantly working around his schedule, and not feeling comfortable or at home.
I told him I want to go back to my home country with our daughter, at least for now. He got very upset and accused me of trying to keep his child away from him and said I just don’t want him around.
During the argument, he also brought up that he “can’t sleep in the bedroom anyway,” as if that somehow makes the situation acceptable or unchangeable, which just made things more frustrating.
From my perspective, it feels like everything is set up around his preferences where we live, how the apartment functions, when I can use shared space and I’m just expected to adapt. He doesn’t seem to understand why this is overwhelming for me, especially with a baby. If I want space I’ve been told I need to go on walks with the baby or stay in the bedroom.
I don’t think it’s unreasonable to want more space, stability, and to be in a place where I actually feel comfortable , but he’s making me feel like I’m the problem for not being okay with this arrangement. Am I wrong for wanting to stop living like this and go back home with our child?
Here's what people had to say to OP:
Valuable_Oil7787 says:
I think a bigger question is why on earth are you with this man when you literally want to live on separate continents?
Alert-Shame-7280 responded:
Because I was led to believe this wouldn’t be the situation long term. He told me he’d give up the apartment once we had a baby, but now there are constant excuses for why he can’t. We’ve only been here two days and he’s already upset that I want to go back. At the same time, he expects me to stay because he doesn’t want to be away from the baby.
Koolakanga says:
Butter him up, play nice, do your usual trip back to your country where you plan on staying for a few months, but then when he says it’s time to move back to his country. You refuse, stay in your country with your baby. What he chooses to do from there is up to him.
BroodLord1962 says:
Sorry, but why the hell did you have a child with this person? He clearly does not want to stay in Europe.