One of the most difficult subjects for most couples to address and solve are issues around finances.
When two people can’t agree on how to spend their money, it can very quickly impact other areas of their life together, stressed the “Am I the A**hole?” (AITA) subReddit.
Redditor Mission-Time1179 didn’t know what to do anymore when his wife wouldn’t stop bringing her own food to restaurants and embarrassing their family.
But when she embarrassed them on their son’s birthday, the Original Poster (OP) had to speak up.
He asked the sub:
“AITA for telling my wife she embarrassed everyone during our son’s birthday dinner?”
The OP’s wife wanted to save money.
“For starters, I just want to say we do have money and don’t have a need to save money.”
“My wife (42 Female) currently works as a part-time nurse. I (42 Male) work in the local police department as a detective.”
“We have two kids, our son (12 Male) and our daughter (13 Female).”
“My wife has started wanting to save money and it’s starting to annoy the kids.”
“An example, we were giving the kids $10 each week for allowance, but my wife decided that $10 was too much and lowered it to $3. I have told her that I think the allowance amount is too low, but she disagrees.”
Her efforts to save money were embarrassing her family.
“Another example is that she will buy meals to bring to the restaurant to be microwaved. We have gotten looks before and it’s always turned down.”
“It results in her making a fuss and will be asked to leave.”
“I have told her that she needs to stop and that when we go out, I am fine with her ordering whatever she wants.”
“I normally pay for the groceries, the bills, and food that we eat out.”
“My wife helps with small payments and will buy our kids cheap clothing. My daughter does have like to wear designer clothing and I normally will buy the clothes and then hear about it later from my wife.”
The OP wanted things to be different for his son’s birthday.
“My son was turning 12 and he wanted to eat out at his favorite steakhouse. I did ask that my wife not bring any of her meals along to the restaurant.”
“We arrived at the restaurant and sat down at the table. My wife got up to use the bathroom and we order our drinks.”
“When the drinks arrive, we told the waiter what we want to eat and my wife ordered a small salad.”
“The waiter came back over with a meal and said, ‘Ma’am, we can’t warm this up for you.'”
“I saw my son and daughter both look embarrassed, and I apologized to the waiter.”
“My wife spent the rest of the dinner staying silent and wouldn’t touch the salad she ordered.”
This latest incident led to an argument.
“When the evening was over and we got home, my wife and I began to argue about the evening.”
“I told her that she was in the wrong for bringing a meal when I asked her not to.”
“She started to argue back that eating out is a waste.”
“I then said, ‘Well, you embarrassed everyone, including our kids.'”
“She asked me to leave the bedroom, and I am now staying in the guest bedroom.”
“AITA for telling my wife she embarrassed everyone during our son’s birthday dinner?”
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 said the OP had a right to be embarrassed.
“Outside food is a potential sanitation issue, not just frugality to the point of tackiness.”
“The venue trying to upsell you Packaged snacks might be mild enough, and accommodation for food issues like allergies might be reasonable, but not a hot meal for a person without the latter problem.” – AlanFromRochester
“It’d be one thing if she brought a cold food item to just whip out and eat but to ask the staff to warm her food up for free? The audacity.” – xaantera
“Honestly, this stuff she’s doing, your kids will be dissecting it with their therapists endlessly as adults if something doesn’t change.”
“Your preteens should get to find you guys embarrassing for entirely normal parent stuff, not legitimately embarrassing behavior that’s making an entire group of adults on the Internet cringe.” – withbellson
“She can NOT bring outside food into restaurants!! This is such a no-no from a health code standpoint, on top of the obvious embarrassing her family part…”
“You are definitely NTA, OP. Your wife is struggling, it sounds like, but she has got to pull herself together on some of this and find a middle path, not just either extreme end of the spectrum.” – pizza1sgr8
Others agreed but also thought his wife was hiding something.
“I was thinking that she may also have some debt that she doesn’t want to talk about and is trying to save money to pay it off?” – riley125
“I was thinking that maybe she lost her j job, or something may have happened at work. Her behavior is definitely not normal.” – BooBooKittyKat1
“Being a nurse right now is pretty stressful. I agree though, this isn’t normal behavior at all… she needs individual therapy and possibly a visit to the doctor if this was a sudden unexplained change.”
“OP needs to check their credit ASAP. NTA” – LeeLooP*eP*o
“This is how gamblers act when in the hole.” – MJDAndrea
“Addicts of anything really will act like this. Once rock bottom starts approaching, they start panicking and acting unusual.”
“Not all addicts are what you see on TV. Sometimes they look perfect on the outside and it’s only when s**t hits the fan that you can see how unwell they are.” – Catsaregonnacat
Others were more concerned that it might be a disguised mental health issue.
“NTA. But she sounds mentally unwell, frankly. Has she had a physical exam lately? This behavior is not normal.” – Squinky75
“Could very well be that she’s getting a bit extra on the paranoia side since she’s a nurse and very well could be seeing some s**t many people aren’t seeing, and maybe that’s getting her into ‘prepper’ mode.”
“This pandemic has done a whole lot of s**t to people besides the virus infections. People are cracking from the stress.”
“No AH here until OP gets to the bottom of this with some compassion maybe.” – toss_it_out_tomorrow
“I’ve been a nurse 20+ years. 5 years ago I went from a hospital to lTC/hospice because of my own autoimmune diseases.”
“When the pandemic hit, one of my closest friends begged me to come back, they were so in need. So I did, back into ICU/CCU virus ward I went.”
“Daily, I am called names, threatened, escorted to my car. All for taking care of sick people.”
“She sounds like she’s honestly had a break and needs to see someone. Also, she’s at the age where her hormones will start to flux, she could be showing signs of a serious problem.” – IrishiPrincess
While the subReddit was cringing right along with the OP and understood why he and his children were upset, they also believed there most be something going on behind the scenes with his wife, even something the OP didn’t know about.
Until the OP figured out what that thing might be, there’s no telling why the wife has chosen to fixate on money in this way, or what will help her stop.