When people suggest that you live with someone before you agree to marry them, it’s because they hope you’ll uncover anything unsavory about living with them before making it permanent.
Maybe you hate the way they eat. Maybe they fold their fitted sheets like a monster.
Maybe they make you sleep on the floor when they work the night shift, cringed the “Am I the A**hole?” (AITAH) subReddit.
Redditor Cucumbertrees found herself increasingly frustrated after her boyfriend started a new job that included night shifts. He started to complain about her not letting him get enough sleep.
But when he kicked her out of the bedroom and told her to sleep on the couch or floor, the Original Poster (OP) wasn’t sure what they could do to make this work.
She told the sub:
“AITAH for not agreeing to sleep on the floor?”
The OP had been kicked out of her bedroom for her boyfriend’s night shifts.
“My boyfriend (35 Male) works overnight, and every morning between 4:00 AM and 6:00 AM when he’s off, I (24 Female) am asked to leave the bedroom so he can receive a good rest.”
“Am I selfish for not wanting to leave the bedroom when he comes in from work?”
“He says I’m being selfish whenever I don’t leave the room. He says my sleeping beside him makes the room extremely hot and that my movements wake him up.”
“But for me, sleeping out in the living room for another few hours is uncomfortable, and I hate it… it’s much brighter than our room as our bedroom has blackout curtains. The couch isn’t big enough to lay on (it’s technically a loveseat), and the floor is way too hard on my body.”
The OP didn’t feel that her boyfriend was being considerate of her needs.
“We own an air mattress that I could sleep on, but we also have a cat who would pop that baby in an instant.”
“We also talked about buying another couch, but he’s not willing to contribute to purchasing a couch ‘because I’m the one who wants it.'”
“So what do I do in this situation?? I feel it’s unfair that I constantly have to sacrifice five to six hours of sleep for myself so that he can have a peaceful eight hours.”
“I do also work. It’s not overnight like him, but I do work five days a week, 40 hours per week.”
“Am I wrong in this situation? And if I am, how should I continue to go about it?”
“AITAH?”
Fellow Redditors weighed in:
- NTA: Not the A**hole
- YTA: You’re the A**hole
- ESH: Everybody Sucks Here
- NAH: No A**holes Here
Some questioned how the OP could possibly think she was being selfish.
“NTA. This is wild. How can he sit there and call you selfish when he literally kicks you out of bed so he can sleep alone?”
“Why are you with this guy? He clearly doesn’t care about your well-being. Move out and find someone who is willing to actually create a pleasant home life with you.” – Nobody_asked_me1990
“This seems to be a pretty common theme with couples that have a ‘big’ age difference. For some reason, these older dudes feel the need to push their younger partners around when they feel like it.”
“Tell him to go sleep on the couch or get a hammock or whatever. Why are his needs more important than yours?” – GabagoolMutzadell
“NTA. I’m sorry he’s treating you this way.”
“Have you been together long? Has he always treated your needs as less than his own? For a man 11 years older than you, he doesn’t seem caring or mature.”
“Again, I am sorry you are being treated like this.” – lynnlugg777
“Leave him and find someone closer to your age who won’t think you’re naive and easily manipulated due to the age gap. He wouldn’t dare to make such a ridiculous demand of someone of a similar age. He’d end up sleeping on the floor or single.” – Ehrillien942
“As someone who worked overnights for eight years, you are NTA here. But most people commenting on here don’t have a freaking clue how difficult it is to work the night shift and get a decent sleep routine. You are probably included.”
“Six to seven hours of sleep on the night shift is a GOOD day. Coming home, showering, probably grabbing a bite to eat, and then winding down as the sun is coming up is SO F**KING HARD, so I can see where he is coming from if you’re unconsciously disrupting his winding down time.”
“I always slept in a different room, personally, but it sounds like you guys don’t have the layout for that to be possible. You guys need to discuss an agreed-upon ROUTINE where you both have to make a bit of sacrifice.”
“Does he not get home at the same time every night? 4:00 AM to 6:00 AM is quite a discrepancy as far as when his shift ends. I kind of call bulls**t on that. If it were me, I’d have a set time he comes to bed, say 7:00 AM. Depending on you and your work schedule, you could treat this as your alarm. If he doesn’t follow your agreed routine, that’s HIS fault.” – LookZestyclose1908
Others agreed and wished the OP would reconsider her relationship status.
“So you’re just gonna be his doormat? Your quality of sleep doesn’t matter? Consider you’ve moved in with a man who doesn’t care about you…” – Cute-Profession9983
“NTA. Why does he want a girlfriend, especially one he lives with, if he doesn’t want to sleep next to her?”
“Can he turn on a fan or AC? I get being hot because that’s me too, but I just turn the AC on and the girlfriend grabs another blanket or I throw the covers off.” – Notpossiblept
“You need to see he’s showing you what he thinks you’re worth. NTA, but think about it.” – Last-Pipe7655
“It looks like you’re not ready to live together.”
“And if this attitude of his continues (unwilling to compromise, only thinking about what he wants and needs), then it looks like you will never be ready to live together.”
“Some couples have trouble sharing a bed, but they can still have a healthy relationship because they know how to find a solution that works for both of them.”
“Kicking you out and not participating in finding a solution to your problem other than to kick you out is selfish of your boyfriend. That’s not the behavior of someone who cares about your well-being, to be perfectly honest.” – charmer143
“Oh no no no. NTA. I work nights, and my husband’s alarm for his job goes off about an hour after I get home. I’d rather die than bother him with only that much sleep left.”
“I either stay awake (in the other room) or sleep on the couch myself if I’m too sleepy. His alarm wakes me up anyway (not his fault; I’m a light sleeper), but I have the rest of the day to sleep.”
“You should dump him and find someone who actually cares about you.” – Perfect-Map-8979
“The relationship sounds very red flaggy from this snapshot, but so did my sister’s when she first moved in with her boyfriend. It’s next door to his parents, and his mother caused a lot of problems and discomfort for my sister, and the boyfriend wasn’t willing to do much about it.”
“There were other problems too, a lot to do with sharing space, and my sister decided to move out, but they didn’t break up.”
“They gave themselves a couple more years, and then she moved back in, and it’s so far been great for the last two or three years. They were always a good match, just not ready to live together until they’d matured a bit more.”
“If OP’s boyfriend cares and WANTS her to live with him, then he’ll help find a compromise that makes them both happy.” – Rile_E
After receiving feedback, the OP offered some clarifications and shared an update.
“Thank you everyone for the feedback. I want to clarify a few points.”
“1. I’ve only been asked to sleep out of the room for the past two nights. 2. He is typically the one to leave the room if he is uncomfortable. 3. He’s been on the night shift for the past two weeks.”
“4. It’s a new job that he has only been working for about three months now.”
“5. He pays 70% of the rent, including all the other bills and both our cars insurance. I only pay a small amount for rent.”
“6. We have been dating for two and a half years. We met through mutual friends.”
“7. I moved into HIS apartment about five months ago.”
“We talked about him compromising and going half on a couch, which is still a bit in the air as he has made points of me not paying practically anything every month.”
“He says that I make enough money and don’t pay any bills to afford a comfortable couch… but he doesn’t have the funds to buy one right now as he’s salaried and only gets paid once monthly. He said that we could work out the financial arrangement for the couch once he’s able to, or I could just pay for one now.”
“He’s also mentioned that he working on finding another job that pays the same or just as much that isn’t a night shift. As far as our sleep arrangements and our schedule, we are working on it.”
Based on the information that the OP gave the subReddit in the beginning, it seemed obvious that she was being taken advantage of by her boyfriend, but after some further clarification, it seems the couple is simply in the transition period that happens when going from job to job sometimes.
Hopefully, a little more practice with the routine would make a difference, but a bigger couch wouldn’t hurt, either.