'AITA for snapping at my husband for using his 'niceness' to control me?'
"AITA for snapping at my husband for being “forcefully nice?"
ThrowRA-nicehusband writes:
My husband is a nice guy, but sometimes he doesn’t listen to me, and that really triggers me if he does it frequently enough. For example, he will ask if I want some oranges, I’ll say, “No, thank you,” then he’ll peel some oranges for me and offer me some.
I’ll say, “No, thank you,” again, and he leaves the bowl of oranges there. But imagine this happening in multiple scenarios daily. Ninety-five percent of our fights are because he does not listen to me, thinks he knows better, and keeps insisting and imposing his ideas on me.
Today, I was holding our baby daughter (2 months) and eating. He told me to eat first and that he would hold our daughter. I told him, “I’m fine, it’s finger food, and I got it.” I told him to eat first and then take care of the baby after.
Well, he insisted that I should eat first and told me to give him the baby. I told him again, “No, I’m okay, I can hold the baby.” He then came over, grabbed the baby, and repeatedly said, “Eat! Eat first! I’ll eat after.” I told him explicitly, “No, let go.
No, I’m fine. No, don’t take her. You aren’t listening to me, and this WILL lead to a fight. This is disrespectful. Please stop,” while maintaining my hold on our baby. He kept grabbing the baby from my arms, and I finally let go because I didn’t want to make our baby feel uncomfortable or, worse, hurt her (like, God forbid, we drop her while both trying to grab her).
I was so pissed off that he would not listen to me again and went as far as to "start a tug-of-war" with our baby. He says he’s always just trying to be nice, and I end up snapping at him. It’s also important to know that what we value the most in a relationship is different.
He values feeling like he’s cared for and loved. I value being respected. I told him that by not listening to me repeatedly (multiple times a week), he’s disrespecting me. So now I feel crazy. I know he's trying to be nice, but I end up in a fight about how he doesn't listen to me at least twice a month.
Here are the top rated comments.
lydocia says:
He's not trying to be nice, he is trying to be controlling. You have to do as he says. You have to eat when he says. What's next? Ask for his permission to poop? Playing tug-o-war with a baby is actually INSANE. Control and other abuse usually ramp up affer big events like having a baby. Is he showing any other red flag?
dryadduinath says:
NTA. Forceful, yes, nice, no. Steamrolling you when you’re saying no is so far from nice. Doing it multiple times every single day is …I don’t even know what to say. I would lose my mind. He’s not trying to be nice. People who try to be nice don’t do things they are explicitly told not to do. …On the off chance this actually is him trying, he is the worst at it anyone has ever been.
No-Sea1173 says:
You're not crazy. The problem is that he decides he knows what's best for you, and then enforces that over your protests. He's not being nice, he's demonstrating that he thinks of you and your opinions/needs as less important / right than whatever he imagines. It's disrespectful and it disenfranchisement. It's manipulative.
GingerbreadWitch_878 says:
NTA. I used to hate when my now~ex husband said that he was just trying to do something nice. It meant he had done something thoughtless/disrespectful/that I had explicitly asked him not to and was then trying to guilt trip.
You and your husband need to sit down and have a long conversation. He may think he is doing something good, but what he is actually doing is treating you like a child who doesn’t know what is best; how long has he thought he knows what you need better than you do?