'AITA for not letting my husband into the labour room & picking our child’s name?' UPDATED 1 YR LATER
"AITA for not letting my husband into the labour room & picking our child’s name?"
This is a throwaway account because I’m so annoyed and need to vent. This will be a lot, so I’m sorry in advance. I, 28F, had been together with my husband, 27M, for nearly 10 years. We got married at 21, had our first son a year after, followed by our daughter three years later.
I built my whole life around my family. We got good jobs; he worked full-time, I worked from home, we had a good home in a great neighborhood, and we put our children in good schools. We also had a successful business on the side. I thought we did everything right.
My best friend, since we were in middle school, lived close. We had our daughters around the same time, and we’d have play-dates all the time. We leaned on each other a lot. I gave her all the support when she was going through issues with her daughter’s deadbeat father and got her in contact with a good lawyer.
I leaned on her when I was recovering from my traumatic second birth and the depression that followed. We leaned on each other for everything.
Ten months ago, I found out I was pregnant for the third time. I was really uneasy about this because of my traumatic experience the second time. Also, my husband and I both agreed we were done after our two children. I considered not having the baby, but my husband insisted we keep it.
I was still uneasy about the pregnancy and borderline miserable for the next six months. I was diagnosed with hyperemesis gravidarum and was throwing up 20 times a day for six months straight. I lost a ton of weight, had to stop working, and was sent to the hospital frequently due to severe dehydration.
My husband stood by me and showered me with attention, for which I was so grateful. He cut down his hours at work to look after me, the house, and the kids. My best friend would come to our home frequently to check on me and also, help with the house. When I hit 6 months, the hyperemesis gravidarum decreased a lot, and I was almost back to myself.
One night after having a movie night with my family, my husband and I were getting ready to sleep. He fell asleep right away while I quickly checked on the kids before getting into bed. His phone was vibrating like crazy, so out of genuine curiosity, I unlocked his phone. We used to do this a lot when we were younger, so I didn’t think too much of it; I was already sitting in bed.
I saw messages from my friend; they were frantic messages. One of them said, "Please come over, I need you," another said, "I know I shouldn’t be messaging here, but I miss you," and "Come over when she’s asleep." I think I was there in a daze for nearly 5 minutes. I cried a lot quietly, and the fatigue kind of left me.
I scoured his phone looking for more. I saw emails and DMs from them both, even using apps like Kik to message, and the pictures. But the worst part was finding out my husband left me one time in the hospital with my mother while he went back home, where my kids were being babysat by my friend, and got intimate in OUR bedroom, with our kids in the house.
I kicked him out the following morning after confronting him and filed for separation some time after. For the next two months, he had been begging for forgiveness, then complaining and insulting me that I’m not letting him see his kids or that I’m stopping him from going with me to doctor appointments (which I had been).
We had planned months earlier about who was going to be in the labor room; it was going to be my mother and husband. He called me when I was 35 weeks, questioning the labor situation (at this point, he had moved in with My ex-friend’s house shortly before this call. I said no, and he got very angry.
Lots of my in-laws and family members told me to put our differences aside for our baby. I still said no. I gave birth to my son with my mother and sister present and didn’t feel any regret about my choice. After my second traumatic birth, I just wanted to make sure this one was as stable as possible, which it was. We were going to name our child after his father who passed away.
I went along with it to make him happy but changed my mind and picked a name I had always loved since childhood. This aggravated him even more… AITA?? Because I’m being guilt-tripped by many people right now. All I want is for everyone to leave me alone and for me to just be with my kids.
Edit: Just wanted to add that I do let him see the kids… that would be crazy if I didn’t. My children love their dad; I just have certain boundaries now that we aren’t together, and he doesn’t respect them. He gets angry and says things that are categorically not true. He got to meet our newborn son hours after I gave birth.
Here's what people had to say to OP's post:
NTA, this is a scenario where you should feel safe and comfortable. He was cheating and left you in the hospital so you shouldn't listen to him.
"lots of my in laws and family members told me to put our differences aside for our baby"
You can tell everyone of them that you put the safety of your baby and yourself ahead of someone else's wants. You made the right decision. They should be grateful that you had enough strength to put your lives and safety first. Nta.
Absolutely NTA. Your soon to be ex-husband and your ex-friend are both monumentally huge pieces of s^%&. Wow. I'm so sorry. I hope you find someone else to love and love you after this is all settled.
You're not the a^%$ole overall, and I think you advocated for yourself in the Labour room perfectly.
However, you should be working out some sort of custody arrangement so that the kids can see their father. They should still have a relationship with their father and using them as a punishment for his infidelity is not fair on them.
I'd also try to work out an age appropriate way to explain why you're not staying with Dad e.g. Dad did something that was hurtful to me and I don't want to be a partner to him anymore but it doesn't affect how we both feel about you. None of it is anything to do with you/you're not responsible for any of this. We'd both like you to have a good relationship with us as parents.
Also, speaking as someone whose parents divorced, organise some therapy/counselling sessions for them. They need someone who is on their side.
Illustrious-Book-613 OP responded:
completely understand. I didn’t file automatically because I was in such a vulnerable state I doubt I would be able to have handled it great when I was pregnant. And i wanted some time to myself postpartum.
I’m 4 weeks out but Im just now piecing together what I should ask for. I want to make it in a way that the kids see their father (who they do love) but I’m stuck trying to figure out if I should fight for full custody and 50/50.
I really hate the idea of his new girlfriend potentially being around my kids. Also I spent basically more time with our kids. My oldest son hates new environments and my daughter has just turned 3 she’s so clingy to me, Makes me anxious. That why I’m figuring it out carefully with a lawyer
About a year later OP came back with this update:
So, I’m back after nearly a whole year. I completely forgot about this post because I’ve been so wrapped up in other things. For anyone who doesn’t want to read the whole post, here’s a summary:
“My husband had been cheating on me with my best friend while I was pregnant. I was close to giving birth and decided not to have my then-husband in the labor room with me. I also chose a name for our baby that he didn’t agree with.”
Like I said, it’s basically been a whole year. My baby turned one today, and after celebrating his birthday and Christmas with my kids, it finally hit me this is my new reality.
First of all, my ex-husband and I finally went through with the divorce proceedings. I had been holding it off during my pregnancy and early postpartum period to avoid added stress and to carefully plan for my children and myself. I was awarded primary physical custody of our children.
Their dad visits once a week, and the two older kids (7 and 4) spend every other weekend with him. My youngest will start doing the same in a couple of months, which makes me nervous. He’s especially clingy with me, all my kids are but my youngest has really only known me as the most present parent.
One of the main stipulations in our custody agreement is that my ex’s affair partner is prohibited from seeing the kids. My poor kids have been confused enough by their parents’ sudden split, and I didn’t want them even more confused by seeing their “aunt,” who is supposed to be Mommy’s best friend, with their dad. It was deemed emotionally detrimental in court.
As for the baby name, he’s been so bitter about it; I think he’s still annoyed about it. His side has been trying to convince me to change the name to something we’d both like, especially after the divorce was finalized. But it’s been a year now, and the baby quite literally answers by the name I gave him, so I’m not going to be changing it.
He was also unhappy with the child support payments, among other payments, and asked for some revisions. One main thing he asked to change was the cost of our kid's school tuition, he pays for their tuition, which he felt was too much and too harsh. But the court stuck with the original payments.
As for my ex-husband and ex-best friend, they continued dating. I found out that they had started seeing each other a month into my third pregnancy. They had actually slept together during my second pregnancy but didn’t pursue a relationship then because, as they put it, “they weren’t ready to ruin things and didn’t want to hurt anybody.”
My exes side have been very supportive of their relationship, even inviting her to holiday gathering like thanksgivings or family holidays. Because of this my kids don’t go very often to these events. I don’t know after this whole fiasco I’m coming to the realisation that perhaps my exes side never really liked me all that much. But that’s okay.
I eventually spoke with my ex-best friend to ask why they did it. She claimed that they were just friends but grew close while she was dealing with issues involving her deadbeat ex-boyfriend. Both of them insisted that my ex-husband just wanted to “protect her,” which supposedly turned into “love.”
Hearing this hurt me a lot, but at the same time, I felt relieved to know the truth. When I sat with this information for a while, it stopped hurting. It made me realize that I didn’t still love my ex-husband and could finally let go of him and their betrayal. They broke up a week ago. Apparently, it’s just a break, though who knows.
Although my kids go to their dad's house every other weekend, it has helped a lot with making time for myself. Obviously, I'm figuring out who I am without being a wife or mom all the time. In many ways, I find what happened to be a true blessing, which is why I’m no longer angry.
As for me, I’ve been seeing someone. It hasn’t been very long, nor is it that serious yet but we get along great. Initially, my ex-husband made the whole situation difficult. He didn’t want me to have any man, specifically, around the kids.
Edit: I don’t know how to do update posts, so my apologies if it’s wrong. This is likely the last update, just wanted to check in to let everyone know I’m okay
Here's what people had to say after the update:
"They broke up a week ago. Apparently, it’s just a break, though who knows." Of course they did.
"He didn’t want me to have any man, specifically, around the kids." Rich coming from Mr. "I slept with your best friend". You go on and live your best life and he'll go crazy. F^%$ him
Good job. Never let that snake "friend" back into your life, even if she comes crawling back now.
She claimed that I had not been the greatest friend to her at times during our very long friendship either
Omg. None of us are perfect and most of us can't be "the greatest friend" all the time BUT that doesn't mean we f^%$ our friends' husbands when they aren't "the greatest." She's literally the worst.
I felt like strangling her in that moment, I couldn’t think of a single thing I did wrong that could warrant her doing that to me. but it is what it is.
In other words, she had always been filled with resentment and this was what she did in return. Why do you even listen to that s#*t? Never let her back into your life.
I took it as her looking for a reason to justify what she did in some messed-up way. To basically reduce her guilt.
Congratulations on dumping the Jerry Springer cast and moving onto a real life. Of course he doesn’t want you to be happy because he gets some odd high screwing life’s up. He’ll do it to his current mate or she’ll do it to him. Keep your distance and best of luck!