Husband offers to pay wife's salary as a SAHM. She says 'that's offensive.' AITA?
When this husband upsets his wife with a financial proposition, he asks Reddit:
"AITA for telling my wife that I could pay her salary to be a SAHM?"
Hi, my wife and I have 4 children. They’re all under 5 and both my wife and I are late 30. Our youngest is now 6 months old and my wife already talks about going back to work. I don’t want her to.
She is a great mom and when she is home everything is just amazing and she is happy and not stressed out and the children are happy. When she goes back to work, she is still a great mom but she is stressed out, tired and in a bad mood. So I said no this time.
I don’t want her to go back to work. She got very upset and started talking about her life and independence. I told her that neither she or I are independent anymore since we are a team and have small children to take care of.
And if she means financial independence I could pay her salary and even double it if she wants. I make good money now and I can afford it. She got even more angry and called me an AH.
I don’t think I did anything wrong so I told her that if she wanted to go back to work then I don’t want to be with her anymore because I’m not happy withall the unnecessary stress. I want divorce. She started crying. It usually works on me but not this time.
Now a few weeks later she said she agreed to my terms but now she is very distant and cold towards me. If I don’t speak to her she could go days and weeks without even looking my way.
She leaves the flowers I get her every week on the counter rather than be happy, kiss me and put them in vases around the apartment like she used to.
She doesn’t touch anything of the food I bring her that she loves like cakes and chocolate etc. there’s just no glow around her. And we haven’t been together in an intimate way since. She doesn’t let me touch her all together not only intimately. AITA?
Let's see what readers thought.
flowmojoebo writes:
YTA. And, you can't even figure out why there's no glow around her. "So I said no this time. I don’t want her to go back to work." If you are supposed to be a team, you need to act like it. This is controlling and it is not your place to give or deny approval to your wife. You need to work with her to figure out a solution that works for everyone.
tiredbrokejoke writes:
YTA. This is a discussion, you can't unilaterally decide she's not going to work anymore and give her an ultimatum. Have you ever thought that she might want time to be away from the kids and with other adults?
She might seem more stressed if she's working, but at least she's getting a small break from constant childcare. Apologize to her and explain to her how you feel.
Tell her you feel that she seems more tired and stressed when she is working and ask if that's how she actually feels. If she's open to it, you could discuss her only working part time until the kids are older.
napalnacied writes:
ESH - her way more but OP not off the hook. Going straight to divorce was way overkill. Maybe a compromise of her working part time should have been suggested to. Also OP wife can still be more than a mom and wife. OP may even be guilty for being a bit oblivious - maybe.