"AITA for not accompanying my wife to her ex's funeral?"
laliluboi94
My wife and I have been married for nearly half a year and have been together since 2020. Before our relationship, her ex was her first boyfriend and her youthful love. After five years in a relationship, they broke up amicably. In the last few years, her ex became terminally ill to the point where he suffered a stroke and was permanently disabled.
One day, out of nowhere, most likely out of loneliness, he reached out to my wife and messaged her. He explained his grave situation - how his recent girlfriend had left him and that there was nobody and nothing in his life anymore.
Initially, my wife was opposed to having contact with him. She told me that she didn't want him to be a part of her life again. However, I encouraged her to speak to him because I feared that she would regret missing this opportunity to be there for her ex before it would be too late.
She then agreed. But after a few weeks of contact, she realized that she didn't want the contact anymore and therefore the communication between them faded away. Two weeks ago, we received a message through my parents-in-law that her ex had passed away. My wife was shocked by this news and I tried to comfort her as best as I could.
When she learned that a funeral would be held, she expressed a desire to attend in order to say goodbye. She asked me to accompany her to the funeral, but I declined and explained that I felt very uncomfortable with the idea of going to a funeral for someone I didn't know or hadn't met in my life yet, and that I would feel out of place.
Additionally, the funeral is scheduled for a Thursday in the late morning - a day and time when I have to work. Taking a day off is not possible due to important deadlines at work.
The funeral location is also several hours away from where we live, making it difficult for me to attend. I told her that if the funeral were on a weekend, I would have driven her, but during the week it would be challenging.
As a result, my wife had to use public transportation, which extended the trip by a few hours. In the end, she was very upset and angry with me, expressing how inmeasurable disappointed she was. She mentioned that I did not understand the weight of someone's passing and wished for more support from me as her partner.
She also shared that she spoke with her friends who couldn't understand my perspective and why I didn't accompany her to the funeral. She stated that some of her friends would even take a day off to drive her to the funeral and called me egotistic.
In the past few days, she has been ignoring me and giving me the cold shoulder every time I tried to reconcile with her. Today, she used public transportation to get to her parents-in-law's location near where the funeral will be held.
After chatting with her for a bit, she reiterated how disappointed she is in me and expressed that she feels unsupported by me. Am I wrong here? Should I be more supporting? AITA?
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's post:
pottersquash
NAH. I agree with your wife. I don't understand your perspective as to why you did not want to accompany your wife. You should have. She was in grief, it wasn't about your comfort.
When you got married you added to your life a whole other person who had and has a life that isn't yours. You did that cause you wanted a future with them. And yes, you don't share their past but your future includes both the joy and grief shared by you both.
Now, if truly you couldn't make it work, you can't make it work. Thats why your not the AH here. Not possible, is not possible, but henceforth realize its your job to always make the possible happened when your spouse needs you and this was a time when they needed you. You are wrong, but you aren't an AH.
EconomyReference3193
YTA and you won't be married long unless you get your act together. First off, you never should have pushed her to have contact with him. If she wanted to have contact because her was ill, you could have encouraged that. But why you pushed her to be in contact with him is just weird.
Second, after you did push her into this, you didn't want to attend the funeral with her. So you make her take public transportation and go alone. All because you didn't feel like going.
I have been married 25 years. So let me tell you this. Marriage is full of doing things you don't feel like doing. But you do them because they need to be done and because your life revolves around your spouse and whatever children you have. Send her flowers and apologize profusely.
DonutMcFiend
YTA for everything that has already been said, but let me add a more cynical take on how much you screwed up. Funerals are a place of remembrance and people often tend to forget the bad moments and idealize the dead, especially when they die young.
After the funeral, your wife was probably going to be comparing the two of you either way, but now he's the angel that went too early and you're the jerk that made her take the bus.
She can't be with him now, but if she starts wishing she could, that's just as bad. I do empathize with you though - I'd be uncomfortable going too - but not going was a really bad move.
derpyderp42
YTA. Your spouse communicated her needs, and they aren't frivolous. Unless you're going to be fired, you should have made arrangements to be a husband. Because with this kind of behavior, you may not be much longer.