Wife praised for refusing to be stay-at-home mom

‘I heard them having a whole discussion on how it’s so sad that our children won’t get to have a proper childhood with a mom at home,’ wife said

Wife praised for refusing to be stay-at-home mom (Getty Images)

It’s become increasingly common for children to grow up with two working parents instead of one staying at home.

In a recent Reddit post shared to the popular “Am I The A**hole?” subreddit, one wife explained that she and her husband both work to support their six-year-old boys. Because of her in-laws’ “old-fashioned” opinions they don’t agree very often, which only became worse when they were staying at her house.

“They have been here for two days now and on the first day I heard them having a whole discussion on how it’s so sad that our children won’t get to have a ‘proper’ childhood with a mom at home, like my husband and his cousin got. While they were in the living room and I was in the kitchen and they knew I could hear,” she wrote in her post.

Instead of addressing her husband’s parents she decided to go to her husband and ask him if he could go to his parents and ask them to stop making comments about her. He replied by telling his wife that was just their “opinion” and that she should learn to defend herself if the comments bother her that much.

“This sort of struck a nerve because it’s true that I usually ask him to do small things like telling the drive-thru person if our order is wrong, because it just makes me feel weird and guilty,” she clarified. “But somehow it feels like more his responsibility because it’s his family involved here?”

The next time her father-in-law made a “pointed comment” she decided to speak up telling him how much her husband makes and how much rent in their city is. “We literally cannot live on his salary so I don’t know why you think I should be home all day,” she told him.

“They were pretty quiet after that. Now my husband is really angry with me because I put him down in front of his family who are all richer than us and will look down on him.”

AITA for using my husband's salary to make a point to his family (after he told me I should stand up for myself instead of expecting him to do it for me)?
byu/PlaneKoala1680 inAmItheAsshole

After posting many people took to the comments to defend the poster and how she decided to handle the situation.

“Common sense dictates that if your family has a problem with your spouse, you have their back. Still, I think you handled things perfectly given the fact that your husband is a textbook ah and doesn’t defend you when he should. He doesn’t get to be mad for the way you chose to do what he said, you just took his advice,” one comment began.

“Also, is he a teenager? Why is he so pressed about his family knowing such trivial things as your rent and general income? If he didn’t want you to say those things, he should have had your back I guess.”

Another commenter agreed, writing, “Your husband wants you to stand up for yourself and you did. You are not staying at home in part because their son does not earn enough for you to stay at home.”

“It’s telling that your husband did not mind when you were being put down, but is now angry because his family will ‘look down on him’. Like I wonder how he justifies the double standard.”