'AITA for telling my wife I can't always do things for her just because I work from home?'

"AITA for telling my wife I can't always stop work to do things for her?"

I've worked from home for five years ever since my employer realized we could easily do our jobs from home without needing an office at all. It works out very well because it allows me to take my kids to school in the morning, come home and start work and then pick them up on my lunch break. My wife works at an office but her workday starts about an hour after mine.

A typical day looks like this: I get up at 6:30am and get the kids ready for school. I take them to school at 7:30am. I get home around 8:00, make some coffee, and then start my work day at 8:30am. During this time, my wife is still asleep. We typically go to bed around the same time every night.

Most of the time, I also use that time between 8 and 8:30 to prepare lunch for my wife. Sometimes either she or I have packed something the night before but if it's something like a sandwich, then I'll make it fresh right before she leaves. However, I can't always do this.

Today, I dropped my kids off at school when one of them noticed they forgot their lunch bag. We live fairly close, so I could go home, grab the lunch bag, and bring it to the school for her. This, however, had me getting home at almost exactly 8:30. I had made my wife well aware that this week is going to be hectic and I will be swamped with work all week, so this shouldn't have come as a surprise.

But my wife, as she typically does, didn't get out of bed until just a few minutes before she had to leave, giving her just enough time to get dressed, do her hair, put on makeup, and head out the door. She has a history of having problems with punctuality and has for as long as I've known her.

She asked me to put her lunch together because she didn't have time, but I reminded her that I was swamped and literally couldn't spare a minute, much less the several minutes it would take to go do that.

My job is very deadline-based, so there are times I need to be working on a certain task by a certain time, and it needs to be done. If I don't do my job, many other people can't do theirs, and it would hold up our whole process.

I hold a senior position with 10 years at my company, so it's unlikely I'd be fired if I missed a single deadline, but it's not something I want to do if I can help it. I can be frustrating when she acts like I can always just drop what I'm doing.

As she left, she said, "I don't know why you care so much about this company you work for; you should care more about your family." and then walked out the door. I feel like that's unfair because I believe I have an excellent track record when it comes to caring about my family.

I've often thought about asking her to be the one to get up and take the kids while *I* sleep sometimes, but I never do because in the end I am glad she's able to get extra sleep before she heads to a job where she's on her feet all day. Yet somehow she thinks IATA for making work a priority in this rare situation. Is she right?

What do you think? AITA? This is what commenters had to say:

your-mom04605 said:

NTA. You sound like a great partner and parent. I think your wife is being unreasonable, she knows she’s being unreasonable, and is projecting that on you. I think you two should have a conversation and let her know how unfair that was of her to say and how it made you feel, and things like that are not ok.

ScarletNotThatOne said:

NTA. She doesn't want to blame herself for her lateness, so you're the ready target.

OP responded:

This has been a recurring theme. I'll point out that she's running late and she'll blame it on something, anything other than the fact that she kept lying in bed scrolling through IG instead of getting up sooner.

Careful-Bumblebee-10 said:

"As she left, she said, "I don't know why you care so much about this company you work for; you should care more about your family." and then walked out the door."

This is a wild thing to say when she sleeps through you getting your children ready for and to school and then make her lunch much of the time. NTA.

Huge_Many_2308 said:

Well no need to make lunch for her ever again. Let her deal with the kids in the morning for a week and see if her opinion changes.

brit_brat915 said:

NTA, sis could have made her own meal or simply eaten out that day 🤷🏽‍♀️

OP responded:

I guess I've shot myself in the foot when I've asked her not to eat out as much to save money, which led me to make her lunches to begin with.

unbelievablefidelity said:

Why are you the only one getting up at 6 and tending to the kids? Why are you the only one driving them to school? If she works an hour later….why doesn’t she drive them and then go to work? Why does she get to sleep in?

OP responded:

A lot of it is because I'd rather just do it myself than stay in bed and hope she gets them out the door on time. The only time she takes them is if I'm sick and not feeling well enough to do it which is thankfully not very often.

Taking them to school is also one of the few times a day I get to go out and be amongst humanity so I don't mind that part. But yeah, if we could trade off that responsibility every once in a while I would but again...the punctuality.

Downtherabbithole14 said:

NTA. Seems like you are doing more than your fair share of making sure things run smoothly. She has it pretty easy. I'll be honest, when my husband was 100% remote and I got into a habit of asking him to do things since "he was home" but there were times when he was straight with me and said "if I have time, I'll do it" NBD!

It eventually led to a conversation where he felt that I was relying on him too much bc he was remote and I apologized and backed off and tried to prepare and plan better for some of the things. I think its time you have that conversation.

And OP responded:

I have reminded her many times that just because I work from home doesn't mean that I can just stop what I'm doing and do whatever she wants me to. I wouldn't walk into her office and ask her to perform some unrelated task, and that's essentially what she's doing. Yet despite being reminded of this, she still doesn't seem to get it.