During the pandemic, a lot of people who never considered working from home (WFH) were suddenly required to do so. Some adapted easily while others had trouble separating work life from home life.
A stay at home mom (SAHM) whose husband is trying to work from home and parent at the same time turned to the “Am I The A**hole” (AITA) subReddit for feedback.
McGuyblow asked:
“AITA—I (36, female stay at home mom) told my husband (36, male who works from home) that he should start working at the office?”
The original poster (OP) explained:
“My husband and I have pretty different parenting styles. He is a lot more about strict guidelines and cleaning, etc… than I am.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I want things clean and ask my daughter to clean her toys at night just like him. But staying at home with our 2 kids (3 year old and 5 month old), I don’t feel like negotiating with my toddler all day and fighting every little thing with her.”
“Husband got upset that I let her get more toys out when there’s already some out, and told me in front of her that I shouldn’t let her have more toys when she already has some out. He also said he asked her to clean up some toys in her room, but that she isn’t listening and now I let her have more.”
“I didn’t know he asked her to clean up some toys. I told him that’s his job to follow through his parenting when he asked her to clean up some toys—he didn’t follow through.”
“I didn’t ask her, he did, in my opinion, it wasn’t my battle. I was going to have her clean up her toys later on in the day. Because otherwise more will come out anyways.”
“So I told him maybe he should go work in office so that I’m not getting micromanaged during my job—stay-at-home mom (SAHM). He said I’m a jerk for saying that and now isn’t talking to me.”
“Am I the a-hole?”
“I genuinely feel justified in just wanting to handle what I do at home while he focuses on work and stops trying to push his parenting style on me when I’m already just trying to survive and sleep deprived.”
“I end up being in a bad mood or frustrated after and then I have less patience for my kids which makes me even more frustrated.”
The OP summed up why they might be the a**hole in their situation.
“I told my husband to stop being home so much so that I stop getting micromanaged. I should appreciate that he gets to stay home and help me out.”
Redditors weighed in by declaring:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
- INFO – more information needed
Redditors decided the OP was not the a**hole (NTA).
“NTA, he IS micromanaging you. It’s pretty demeaning – it’s not like you’re an employee and he is literally the boss of you, although he is really trying to get you to come around to thinking of him as The Boss.”
“If it’s feasible in terms of the baby’s feeding schedule, consider leaving him with both kids and going away for the weekend (or at the very least, a whole 8-hour day at a spa), so he can spend all his time arguing with your toddler and see what hills he feels like dying on after that.” ~ Dreamy-Mimi
“And don’t prep a single thing, and make sure you leave a list of things you usually get done that he needs to do- clean the kitchen, do a load of laundry, prep dinner, read to toddler, work on her numbers or letters, etc…” ~ utahforever79
“This brings up a good point. Clearly, he didn’t die on the hill of ‘clean up your toys’ when he was the one who gave the instruction, then berated OP for not enforcing his uncommunicated wishes!” ~ Entire-Ad2058
“NTA. Kid is 3, and being that strict with a 3-year-old is exhausting. You are not wrong to object to him trying to manage how you parent without him communicating what he told the kid or handling his own sh*t instead of foisting it on OP.” ~ Zestyclose-Height-36
“My son was not able to comprehend a full explanation as to why he needed to clean up. Around four, and especially now at five years old, he understands when I negotiate with him. He may have taken longer to understand stuff, but now that he does, he is a magnificent negotiator.” ~ Salt-Improvement-263
“As a SAHM too, NTA. I’ve had conversations similar to this, not with my husband but my parents. My mother made us keep our toys in our rooms as children, in contrast, my kids have toys that stay in our living room.”
“I don’t follow my 3-year-old around all day picking stuff up as soon as she puts it down, and they think I should. It’s just not important to me.”
“I was a child who stayed in my bedroom, and my kids are rarely in theirs. I allow them some freedom, because it’s their house too, and we all clean up at the end of the day together.”
“If he thinks toys on the floor should be one of your most important battles with a toddler and a baby, I think he’s a bit out of touch, and though maybe you were a little harsh with delivery, I can understand why.” ~ angrynoot
“NTA. Ask him how he’d like it if you barged into the home office during a Teams meeting and started berating him for doing his slide deck all wrong or ordering him to do his spreadsheets a different way?”
“Yeah, he’d go nuts.”
“Well, absent a legit kid safety issue (as in, kid running around with scissors, not kid has four toys out instead of three), during work hours, husband stays in his own lane and does all his work (Sales? Accounting? Whatever it is) just like you stay in your lane and do all the parenting.”
“No one puts on airs and acts like they’re the other’s know-it-all, micromanaging boss. No one takes out the stress/frustration of their respective jobs on a toddler. THAT is how this has to work.” ~ PARA9535307
“I’m petty, so I would probably say something like, ‘If you can do your job and take care of the kids, I’m going to go and get a massage’.” ~ theycallme_mama
“Or, I’d say—and follow through—since you want to work from home and be in charge of the household too, I’m getting a full-time job outside of the house and you are now the SAHD!” ~ Choice-Try-2873
“Or start looking over his shoulder and nitpicking his emails.” ~ Illustrious-Stable93
“You’re NTA. Hubby is acting like your boss and needs to go focus on his own job and let you do yours.”
“This is the problem with work from home roles. People become a nightmare with no social interaction. Just anxious and overbearing with too much time on their hands.”
“I think it’s weird to force a toddler to clean up the toys every five minutes. Maybe baby wants to take a break with one toy and come back to it. Let baby clean up at the end of the day when they’re totally done playing. Y’all are making playtime a chore.” ~ ayeayecaptcha
“He has two options. He can either work during the day and let you do the parenting or he can also do the parenting which means if he wants something enforced he’s the one who has to sit there and enforce it.” ~ Vivid_Motor_2341
“If your husband is this focused on the tidiness of toys for your THREE YEAR OLD, I’d argue he needs way more work to do and a whole lot of therapy. This is how you end up with neurotic kids who are afraid to be creative and authentically play.” ~ FatsMcCats
“I don’t think work-from-home (WFH) is the issue. It sounds like you two need to sit down and discuss parenting style.”
“This is bigger than WFH vs in office. After you talk about parenting, you should sit down and also go over expectations and boundaries with WFH/SAHM roles.”
“I don’t think him bringing it up infront of kiddos is acceptable and frustrating that he’s putting enforcing his parental style to be managed by you. It’s really hard when your job IS parenting, but he’s also a parent. Y’all need to sit down and talk.” ~ Big_Range_7295
“To add to this, Dad needs to read some parenting and child development books. My husband was overly strict and expected things that developmentally weren’t appropriate for their ages. I was constantly trying to negotiate with him that he was expecting too much.”
“Unfortunately, it didn’t dawn on me until the kids were much older, that I had read those kinds of things, he hadn’t and he wasn’t aware I had. So he thought we were coming from the same level of knowledge (none) and I was coming from more experience with kids even before we had ours and a fair bit of studying of the subject.” ~ myssi24
“They both need to have a unified front with raising their children, otherwise they will have children that play them against each other.” ~ PhilsFanDrew
“NTA, although it does sound more like you need a clear discussion of his parenting role when is also working at home.”
“Can he have a separate office and keep the door closed? Is he working in common spaces so ends up interacting with your children? Or is he getting up for some coffee and decides to get involved in whatever you’re already doing?”
“Another consideration is how do you determine when both of your work days are ‘over’ and who is then primarily responsible for the kids?”
“This sounds a bit like you are ‘on’ all the time, but then your husband will get involved without truly taking over for you. That would get exhausting, so talk with him about how you can decide together on a clearer division of responsibilities.” ~ Dog-Mom2012
Seems like Reddit clearly has this mom’s back.
And that her husband needs to back off.
If he wants to micromanage her watching the kids, he can just watch them himself–and she can take a much-needed break.