'AITA for telling my husband that I didn't want to come home after coming back from a health resort with the 2 kids, while he didn't do anything?' UPDATED
"AITA for telling my husband that I didn't want to come home after coming back from a health resort with the 2 kids, while he didn't do anything?"
(English is the author's second language.)
Hi, so I (27F) and my husband (33M) have been married for 7 years already. We have 2 kids (a girl 3 and boy 5). He works for 40 hours a week while I work 32 hours a week.
He dresses them and brings them to childcare and makes them ready for bed and puts them to sleep. I do the household, cooking, laundry (he helps me from time to time but only if I ask). He goes with the dog in the morning and I go in the evening.
It was always like that, and I never had any issues so far, till I went to a therapeutic center with our 2 kids for 3 full weeks. In the time I was gone, I asked him to do 3 normal chores.
Cleaning the toilet, sending a packet back, and cleaning the laundry in our kids' room. He did none of that. I flipped and went mad, and he said he did so many things like cleaning out stones from the garden, even though they would be collected in January.
So his work wasn't necessary. He told me I should appreciate that he does household stuff at all and it's my own fault I went to a therapeutic center I could stay with the kids and he could've taken care of the kids like always.
He told me I suck at communicating because I'm sick of it, telling him what to do. After a few arguments, I flipped and basically told him I'd rather not come back home at all.
Now, he went on a work trip and I'm now alone with the Kids and need to clean up after the 3 weeks. Now the question AITA and what should I do after he comes back?
Edit: I'm not a native speaking English and thought that health resort is the term what we use in Germany as "Mutter-Kind-Kur". I changed that. I went to a therapeutic retreat because of overload with everything.
Here’s what people had to say to OP:
NTA it’s ridiculous he couldn’t do basic household management while you were away and you were stuck cleaning up after him when you got back. It’s actually appalling that he didn’t think to clean the toilet once in 3 weeks. He shouldn’t have to be told to clean up after himself.
NTA. Those are… not things an adult should need to be told or asked to do. Those are basic functions of adult and parent life.
NTA. I immediately thought about Mutter Kind Kur when I read your post. Dear readers, especially American ones, this kind of several weeklong therapy stay that includes childcare is really great to support both mothers and fathers who desperately need help.
And yes, apart from a 10€ / day copay for food, it gets covered by public health insurance. But nowadays, it’s incredibly hard to get approved by a doctor/ the health care provider. This isn’t a spa for stressed out parents. This is a stay for parents who have such severe mental or physical health problems that they are basically falling apart.
OP it says a lot about your husband that he has let it go this bad for you to need this stay. He basically had a three week long child free vacation and was too lazy to do very easy chores. I am so so sorry 🥲
A year later, the OP returned with an update.
So after a year I just wanted to share what happened and how its now going. After he came back from his business trip, he brought me flowers and chocolate. We sat down together, and I openly addressed all the issues that had been eating away at me over the past few years. He also brought up the things that had bothered him.
I also told him that if we didn’t work on our relationship, separation would be my only option, and that if he didn’t improve his attitude toward hygiene, I wouldn’t want the children to stay with him if we separated. He was immediately very eager and wanted us to get to work on things right away.
So we allowed ourselves a “quiet phase” for two months. We lived in the same house but slept in separate bedrooms. We also set up a detailed plan for each week about who would do what, and each of us got our own free time while the other took care of the kids.
I have to say, it’s only been going uphill since then. We haven’t argued as much, and if we did, it was only about minor things. There were no big fights anymore. He really started to take care of the things that had bothered me and now takes his own initiative around the house.
I hardly have to tell him anything anymore. Of course, some things have stayed the same, and I still clean some things myself because he simply doesn’t see those as a priority. But I’m glad that in the end, things turned out well.
Thank you for all the kind messages from the previous thread! Many of them really made me laugh and sweetened my day. It definitely made that time a lot more bearable.
Here’s what people had to say to OP:
I'm so glad everything has worked out for you!
It's good he made changes after your discussion. But have you made changes, about issues that he said bothered him? It's good that you are both communicating better, keep it up.
Communication is king in a relationship. If someone doesn't want to work on communication, they probably aren't interested in the relationship. I'm glad you and your husband were.