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“AITA For Telling My Wife My Job Has To Come Before Hers?”
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“AITA For Telling My Wife My Job Has To Come Before Hers?”

Wife Locks Herself In A Room And Spends Night Crying After Husband Prioritizes His Job Before Hers“AITA For Telling My Wife My Job Has To Come Before Hers?”Wife Locks Herself In Her Room And Cries All Night After Husband Tells Her That His Job Has To Come Before HersHusband Wonders If He Did The Wrong Thing By Telling His Wife That His High-Paid Job Has To Come Before HersHusband Wonders If He's The Bad Guy For Telling Wife That His Job Is More Important Than HersBoth Wife And Husband Have Urgent Tasks At Their Jobs, Husband Prioritizes His As He Earns 5 Times More, Gets Called A JerkBoth Wife And Husband Have Urgent Work Tasks Come Up, Husband Who Earns 5 Times More Prioritizes His, Gets Called The Jerk“AITA For Telling My Wife My Job Has To Come Before Hers?”“AITA For Telling My Wife My Job Has To Come Before Hers?”“AITA For Telling My Wife My Job Has To Come Before Hers?”
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The good old-fashioned song claims that money makes the world go round, and we have absolutely no reason to disagree. Moreover, money is definitely the greatest invention of mankind. For instance, because all other inventions, even taken together, can be bought for money.

At the same time, money, despite its many advantages, also has some flaws. For example, because of money, many families have been destroyed at different times. Mainly, of course, due to lack of money. But it happens that because of a lot of money, family dramas arise as well.

Do you want an example? Here it is, a brand new post on the AITA Reddit community that has already racked up around 16.6K upvotes and 3.5K comments. As we have already said, the combination of money and family drama multiplies the effect, and here that is exactly the type of family drama that takes place.

More info: Reddit

The Original Poster and his family live in a VHCOL city

Image source: Henrique Pinto (not the actual photo)

So, the Original Poster and his wife, as well as their two children, five and three years old, live in a city with a very high cost of living, but they can easily afford it. Mainly thanks to the husband, who earns about five times more than his wife, while admitting that if they received the same amounts, they would not be able to live there.

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“AITA For Telling My Wife My Job Has To Come Before Hers?”

Image source: Unique_Confusion9528

The OP has a high-paid job, while his wife works a lot for much less money

Despite the high salary, the OP’s work is not the most exhausting. He works approximately 35 hours a week, and the only major requirement is that he must be on call all the time for about one week every month. At the same time, his wife works very hard – up to 50 hours a week – has an extremely picky boss, and is often stressed at her workplace.

Image source: Unique_Confusion9528

As the OP admits, he has repeatedly tried to persuade his wife to change jobs, but she, perhaps out of a sense of loyalty or just out of fear of something new, each time refused. As a result, it is the husband who takes on a lot of housework, cooking and childcare.

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Image source: Unique_Confusion9528

One day, the OP and his wife both received urgent work tasks almost at the same time

Everything went on as usual, until finally, once again, the same week came, during which the OP should always be in touch. One day, his wife received a message from her boss that she urgently needed to fulfill a “request” from a client. As the wife herself said, this task could very well wait until the next day, but it would be better if she did it that day – just so that the next day, the boss would not grumble at her.

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Image source: Unique_Confusion9528

The OP didn’t mind, but remarked that if he suddenly had to rush to the office, it was really urgent. The wife, as the OP noticed, muttered something in the affirmative in response, but nothing beyond that. And then, two hours later, the husband received a message asking him to urgently come to the office.

Image source: Unique_Confusion9528

The husband wanted to rush to his office, but it turned out that his wife was already doing her own task and demanded that he look after the kids while she was busy

Usually the OP could deal with such issues remotely, but now the nature of the problem required his personal presence. He quickly got ready and went to the exit – but then it turned out that his wife was already doing her work assignment, so somebody had to stay with kids.

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Image source: Unique_Confusion9528

The woman said that since her task appeared first, the husband had to wait until she did everything and tell his team that he could not do his work right now. The OP was indignant, stating that he just had a task that was absolutely urgent, and if he did not complete it, he could have problems at his job.

In the heat of the quarrel, the OP told his wife that his job has to come before hers as it brings them way more money

A quarrel broke out, but the husband could not stand it and just left the house and went to his office. Meanwhile, his wife called him and started arguing again. In the heat of the moment, the OP blurted out something like, “It’s only because of my job that we can afford our home and lifestyle. So my job must always take precedence over yours, otherwise we’ll just end up on the street!” After that, the wife hung up.

Image source: Engin_Akyurt (not the actual photo)

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Returning home three hours later (it was already around 11pm), the OP found his kids sleeping on the couch in the living room, surrounded by cereal spills. The door to the bedroom was locked, and the wife refused to talk. In the morning, the children told dad that their mother had been crying in the bedroom all evening, so they had to take care of the food themselves and just go to bed in the living room.

Commenters basically supported the OP and also suggested that his wife change her stressful job

Most of the people in the comments supported the OP, outraged, first of all, by his wife’s behavior, as she did not feed her kids before going to bed. In addition, according to many commenters, the husband should talk to his wife again and persuade her to change jobs – at least so that she experiences less stress.

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Some commenters suggested that the OP simply hire a nanny – but, unfortunately, as the man himself admitted, there is no such service as an emergency nanny. After all, an urgent call to work can happen at any minute throughout the whole week. In addition, the OP added that he had tried to persuade his wife to go to psychotherapy, but she repeatedly said something like “I’m too busy” or “they won’t help me.”

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By the way, maybe the Original Poster’s wife could be helped by your advice or some brilliant fresh idea! In any case, just feel free to express your own opinion on this family drama.

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Oleg Tarasenko

Oleg Tarasenko

Author, BoredPanda staff

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After many years of working as sports journalist and trivia game author and host in Ukraine I joined Bored Panda as a content creator. I do love writing stories and I sincerely believe - there's no dull plots at all. Like a great Italian composer Joaquino Rossini once told: "Give me a police protocol - and I'll make an opera out of it!"

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Oleg Tarasenko

Oleg Tarasenko

Author, BoredPanda staff

After many years of working as sports journalist and trivia game author and host in Ukraine I joined Bored Panda as a content creator. I do love writing stories and I sincerely believe - there's no dull plots at all. Like a great Italian composer Joaquino Rossini once told: "Give me a police protocol - and I'll make an opera out of it!"

Saulė Tolstych

Saulė Tolstych

Author, Community member

Read more »

Saulė is a photo editor at Bored Panda with bachelor's degree in Multimedia and Computer Design. The thing that relaxes her the best is going into YouTube rabbit hole. In her free time she loves painting, embroidering and taking walks in nature.

Read less »

Saulė Tolstych

Saulė Tolstych

Author, Community member

Saulė is a photo editor at Bored Panda with bachelor's degree in Multimedia and Computer Design. The thing that relaxes her the best is going into YouTube rabbit hole. In her free time she loves painting, embroidering and taking walks in nature.

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BusyLizzy
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

NTA. I think the wife's job is pushing her to breaking point and her behaviour suggests a mental heath issue.

Tamra
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I don't care how pissed off his wife was, that's absolutely no excuse to leave a 3 and 5 year old to their own devices while she cries it out behind a locked door for hours.

Nightshade1972
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Seriously--what if one of the kids swallowed their beverage wrong, or choked on a piece of cereal?! If Wife is immature enough to lock herself in her room so she can have a self-pitying cryfest, would she even notice if one or both kids had a medical emergency?! She'd probably find a way to blame that on OP, too--"If you'd been here, little Timmy would never have choked! This is all *your* fault!" Sounds like OP's better off divorcing her and taking the kids with him.

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Bunzilla
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Yep, everything suggests that the wife is essentially being emotionally abused at that job, and she really needs to quit and find a new one. But it sounds like she refuses to do so, like so many people in an abusive relationship are made to feel like they can't survive without that relationship/job. Hope he manages to get her to quit and she finds a new job that's better for her.

Vira
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I think people also forget how friends and family will pressure a person to stay in bad situations. It's amazing how many people will acknowledge abusive work environments, or abusive relationships, or toxic households, but when it's right in front of them, they will accuse the victim of being lazy, or weak, or whining. I wouldn't be surprised if keeping the job makes her feel like less of a house-wife/leech and the job itself makes her feel like she can't do any better. People underestimate how their comments about others influence their loved-ones to self abuse.

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BusyLizzy
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

NTA. I think the wife's job is pushing her to breaking point and her behaviour suggests a mental heath issue.

Tamra
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I don't care how pissed off his wife was, that's absolutely no excuse to leave a 3 and 5 year old to their own devices while she cries it out behind a locked door for hours.

Nightshade1972
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Seriously--what if one of the kids swallowed their beverage wrong, or choked on a piece of cereal?! If Wife is immature enough to lock herself in her room so she can have a self-pitying cryfest, would she even notice if one or both kids had a medical emergency?! She'd probably find a way to blame that on OP, too--"If you'd been here, little Timmy would never have choked! This is all *your* fault!" Sounds like OP's better off divorcing her and taking the kids with him.

Load More Replies...
Bunzilla
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Yep, everything suggests that the wife is essentially being emotionally abused at that job, and she really needs to quit and find a new one. But it sounds like she refuses to do so, like so many people in an abusive relationship are made to feel like they can't survive without that relationship/job. Hope he manages to get her to quit and she finds a new job that's better for her.

Vira
Community Member
2 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I think people also forget how friends and family will pressure a person to stay in bad situations. It's amazing how many people will acknowledge abusive work environments, or abusive relationships, or toxic households, but when it's right in front of them, they will accuse the victim of being lazy, or weak, or whining. I wouldn't be surprised if keeping the job makes her feel like less of a house-wife/leech and the job itself makes her feel like she can't do any better. People underestimate how their comments about others influence their loved-ones to self abuse.

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