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Guy Refuses To Wake Up Early Every Day To Make Coffee And Iron Clothes For Teacher Wife

A man hitting the snooze button on his alarm clock.
Weiquan Lin/Reddit

We’ve all asked a favor of someone or depended on someone to help us out every now and then.

Which can sometimes include reminding us not to forget something or to remember to do a certain thing.

However, putting that entire responsibility in the hands of others is never a wise thing to do, as we must hold ourselves accountable.

Nor is it fair to blame others when we forget or neglect to do the very thing we asked them to remind us to do.

The wife of Redditor threwawayplz was becoming more and more dependent on him in the mornings.

While the original poster (OP) was initially happy to help his wife, even going the extra effort, doing so slowly became literally exhausting.

Resulting in his finally having had enough.

Wondering if he was being unfair for feeling this way, the OP took to the subReddit “Am I The A**Hole” (AITA), where he asked fellow Redditors:

“AITA for not wanting to wake up early to help my wife get ready for work?”

The OP explained why he finally felt the need to draw the line with his wife.

“I (30 M[ale]) love my wife (30 F[emale]) very much, but we have been having some rocky mornings lately.”

“She is a teacher and has to leave the house before 7 a.m. to be at work on time.”

“I don’t have to be at work until later in the morning and usually sleep until 8.”

“Occasionally when I happen to wake up early, I will help her get ready by making coffee or ironing her clothes, but now she says she needs me to wake up at 6:30 and help her get ready every day.”

“Am I wrong in saying she is being unreasonable to expect that every day?”

“AITA?”

Fellow Redditors weighed in on where they believed the OP fell in this particular situation by declaring:

  • NTA – Not The A**hole
  • YTA – You’re The A**hole
  • NAH – No A**holes Here
  • ESH – Everyone Sucks Here

The Reddit community unanimously agreed that the OP was not the a**hole for refusing to get up early to wake up his wife.

Everyone agreed that the OP’s wife needed to be more responsible and stop depending on her husband to get up, also agreeing that the OP deserved the right to sleep in longer if his schedule allowed it.

NTA.”

“I’m assuming you don’t have kids, but assuming that is indeed true, it is bananas to me that a grown woman – even one who struggles with mornings in general – would need her spouse to get up and help her get ready.”

“There are a plethora of things she could be doing to help herself, and it leaves the question for me of ‘how would she handle this if she wasn’t married?'”

“Maybe there are a few things she could do in the evenings, with or without your involvement, to make the mornings easier (like ironing clothes or setting the coffee to brew on a timer), but anything you do would just be to be a kind, supportive partner, it’s not your ACTUAL responsibility nor something you should be committed to doing day in and day out.”- owls_and_cardinals

“I am in your wife’s situation.”

“The idea of making my partner (who is on a different work-time schedule to me) get up early just to ‘help’ me adult is ludicrous.”

“In fact, it’s a point of pride if I can leave the house without having disturbed them (and they pride themselves on the same for their work times.)”

“NTA.”

“You get up early to let the dog out for a piss or to get toddlers to daycare or kids off to school.”

“Your grown-@ss wife can get herself to work like every other independent and functioning adult in the world can.”- Schezzi

“Ok this is nuts IMO.”

“I have NEVER ironed my wife’s clothes for work or her iron mine.”

“Why not do it the evening before?”

“The same with the coffee? Have it ready, so all she has to do is turn it on to brew….?”

“Sounds like poor planning on her part, NTA.”- TacoStrong

“NTA completely unreasonable. You are her partner, not parent.”

“If she had a disability, or was pregnant, or it was about helping kids if yall have some, I would get it, but assuming none of these are the case, it is unreasonable.”

“I would ask her why she thinks you should help her. I am honestly curious why now.”- Beautiful-Celery-949

“NTA.”

“She sounds stressed and is unloading on you instead of communicating.”- livelife3574

“NTA.”

“My suggestion, both of you incorporate a bedtime routine that gets you both ready for work in the morning.”

“You pack your lunches, lay out your clothes, set the coffee timer, make your refrigerator oats, put the things near the door together.”

“It can be a special romantic time for you as a couple, and as a bonus, you crawl into bed connected and stress-free, and both of you have easier mornings.”- Esmer_Tina

“NTA.”

“She is an adult and can plan her mornings accordingly.”

“It is great that you have helped her in the past!”

“Maybe suggest that she prep the night before.”

“Examples would be to prep the coffee so all she has to do in the morning is start it. She could also iron her clothes the night before.”

“Help suggest tasks that will make her morning easier for her.”- CarelessOrange8492

“NTA.”

“She can iron her clothes the night before, can get a programmable coffee maker that she can set the night before, ALL of this could be done the night before.”

“You’re not her parent, and she’s not a child, though she’s acting like one over this.”-PurplePassiflor1234

“NTA.”

“Your wife is an adult and fully capable of getting herself off to work.”

“Coffee pots are preprogramable so it can be made the night before.”

“Clothes can also be ironed the night before or on weekends.”- Independent-Work5275

“NTA.”

“It’s not your responsibility to get up early to help her get ready as if she were a child. She should learn to manage her time and organize herself.”

“If it makes you happy to make her a cup of coffee, why not, but what she’s asking for is too much.”- Ousmousse

“NTA.”

“An adult should be able to get themself ready for work.”- aeroeagleAC

“People really still buy clothes that need to be ironed?”

“That’s wild.”- metrictwo

“NTA.”

“And this is coming from someone in a similar situation.”

“My husband needs to leave by 5:15 am.”

“I could technically wait until 7:30 am to leave the house.”

“However, I CHOOSE to get up early with him.”

“We get up anytime between 3:30 and 4:30.”

“He starts getting ready, and I go start the coffee.”

“Then I feed the cats breakfast and scoop litter boxes, see if the trash is ready to go (if so, I remove the bag and stick in front of the door).”

“We normally finish up about the same time, and the coffee is ready then.”

“We sit down and have a cup of coffee (or a few cups) together while we check YouTube, watch some news or something.”

“When he leaves (taking the trash with him), I either do some stuff around the house or occasionally will go and lay back down for an hour or so if I’ve had trouble sleeping or don’t feel the best.”

“It just starts my day out on a good note to spend a little quality time together.”

“But there is never any DEMAND that I do anything for him. I would probably still get up and feed the cats, or else they would come and torment me, but if I felt like his ‘servant’ or he just got his coffee and left, that’s all I would do.”

“He would be making his own coffee.”

“I certainly wouldn’t be ironing any clothes for him.”- Damage_Miserable

“NTA.”

“I will say that I do make my wife breakfast every day to help her get ready for work.”

“But I just retired, and after 30 years of waking at 4am to go to work, getting up at 6 am feels like sleeping in to me.”- Solrackai

“NTA.”

“Wouldn’t she expect her students to prepare to be ready for their school day?”- Suzdg

“Iron the night before.”

“Have coffee ready to go or get one with timer and have already brewed when awaking.”-JBM6482

“NTA.”

“On the assumption you are childless.”

“You are not responsible for helping your wife get ready for work. She’s an adult.”

“If she wants clothes ironed, she can do it the night before.”

“Being a teacher is a thankless job with long hours.”

“That said, that was her choice of career, not yours, and while you should 100% support her in it, there are limits to where that support extends, and I think this is beyond what should be considered reasonable.”- Smitttycakes

Sleeping in is a luxury not many people have.

It would be more than understandable if the OP’s wife were jealous of him for having said luxury when she does not.

Even so, getting to work on time is her responsibility and hers alone.

One can only imagine that blaming him for her tardiness to the school principal would likely go over no better than a student telling them, “the dog ate my homework…”

Written by John Curtis

A novelist, picture book writer and native New Yorker, John is a graduate of Syracuse University and the children's media graduate program at Centennial College. When not staring at his computer monitor, you'll most likely find John sipping tea watching British comedies, or in the kitchen, taking a stab at the technical challenge on the most recent episode of 'The Great British Baking Show'.