Many people are under the impression that in a shared home, everything in the fridge is fair game.
After all, the saying “what’s yours is mine, and mine is yours” has been around for quite some time.
However, even if many things in a household are shared, not everyone feels that way when it comes to food.
And these people don’t take too kindly when they discover that food they felt was theirs has been eaten by someone else.
Whether or not they actually stuck any claim to it.
A recent Redditor recently helped himself to a sweet delicacy that had been sitting dormant in his family fridge for quite some time.
However, the original poster (OP)’s wife was not at all pleased to discover her husband had been picking away at this treat.
As she believed that this treat was rightfully hers.
Wondering if he did anything wrong, the OP took to the subReddit “Am I The A**hole” (AITA), where he asked fellow Redditors:
“AITA for eating most of her birthday cake?”
The OP explained why their wife was furious at the OP’s dessert samplings:
“My wife (32 F[emale) and I (35 M[ale]) were recently on vacation over the 4th of July, which also happens to be my wife’s birthday.”
“We had all the normal traditions for our family, including cake.”
“We all had a piece day-of but almost nobody ate cake the entire rest of the trip.”
“When the time came to return home, in-laws (MIL made the cake) offered to send the whole thing with us because they ‘didn’t need all that and we will probably just throw it away’.”
“My wife hates food waste, so she brought it.”
“The journey home was two days by car.”
“It has since been two additional days since we got back.”
“Each night after dinner, I’ve had a reasonably sized piece of the cake for desert.”
“I used to be a bigger guy and while I have much better habbits now, I still have a soft spot for baked goods.”
“The cake was ‘budgeted for’ though and I had been looking forward to eating a little.”
“Well today my wife saw that there was only one slice left and was irate.”
“Saying I was completely selfish and had eaten almost all of HER cake.”
“I told her the cake had been available to all for nearly a week (counting days it sat on the counter before we took it home with us) and that nobody had bothered to touch it but me.”
“I did apologize after she finished explaining to me that it upset her but I don’t understand why it’s such a big deal to begin with.”
“The cake was right there…she never even had a bite.”
“For additional context, in the past she has requested that certain foods be saved for her as leftovers etc.”
“I’ve obliged, only for that food to sit until it had become moldy and she claims she ‘forgot it was in there, oops’.”
“For someone who hates food waste, allegedly, I find this behavior doubly puzzling.’
“It isn’t, nor has ever been a ‘my cake’ or ‘your cake’ situation in our family.”
“It’s just THE cake, to be shared.”
“There has never been an expectation beyond making sure the birthday person gets the first slice.”
“After that, its just a regular old cake.”
“Desserts are just understood to be periodically available and if you want some, it’s there.”
“Different rules for small children notwithstanding.”
“Finally…we ate on the drive.”
Idk why people exclude those two days from when the cake was available.”
“Obviously we didn’t drive 48 hours straight without sustenance.”
“And the first night we obviously had to park and rest somewhere.”
“And besides that we were home for dinner on the second day as well.”
“Was I wrong here?”
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
While the Reddit community was somewhat divided, they generally agreed that the OP was not the a**hole for eating his wife’s birthday cake.
Many believed that the OP was valid in pointing out that as his wife was mostly ignoring the cake, he had a right to enjoy himself, even if some felt he should have at least always made an offer when he cut himself a slice, with others wondering if he should have been eating a week old cake to begin with.
“NTA.”
“I think your only fault here is, as someone who hates food waste myself, every time you went to get a piece of cake you should’ve announced it.”
“‘Honey, I’m cutting a slice of cake’.”
“‘Want me to cut you a slice too?'”
“That way, if she says yes, you enjoy it together.”
“If she says no, then it’s on her for not partaking.”- Ok_Reputation_3612
“NTA.”
“The ‘saving’ a food for someone who might want it, until the food goes bad, annoys me greatly—as a person who actually doesn’t like food waste.”
“She could have said she didn’t want you to eat it.”
“There’s still a piece left, if she wants it now.”
“I do not believe she was waiting for day six to eat four pieces of cake.”
“This is a weird control thing that my sister-in-law does too.”
“She wants something ‘saved’ for her in case she wants it later/tomorrow.”
“Half the time their fridge is full of entrees that the kids and my brother aren’t allowed to eat, which my brother ends up throwing away when she acknowledges the item is no longer edible.”- 7625607
“NTA.”
“She wanted to have her cake and eat it too.”- Hatsu_Homo
“NTA.”
“Its almost time for the cake to be thrown out anyways.”- smol9749been
“NTA.”
“After several days of sitting there untouched, that cake was fair game IMO.”
“She clearly didn’t care that much about it if it took a week for her to even look in the box.”
‘And there was still a slice left for her to eat!”- Dusty_Old_McCormick
“NTA.”
“After several days of sitting there untouched, that cake was fair game IMO.”
“She clearly didn’t care that much about it if it took a week for her to even look in the box.”
“And there was still a slice left for her to eat!”- Dusty_Old_McCormick
“NTA.”
“The difference between this post and others I’ve seen in the past is the fact that you had like one slice a day over 4 days.”
“You did not eat it all at once it one sitting leaving her no chance.”
‘I’m sure she saw you eating it.”
“She could’ve had a piece at the same time you were also.”
“The only thing I guess you could do better – because you know how she reacts – is every time you get a slice say ‘hey honey, do you want a slice of cake?’”
“And every other day, maybe say ‘hey honey the cake looks like it’s drying out. We might wanna eat it’”
“Friendly reminders but not nagging.”
“I have to do that sometimes to My husband but most of the time he has eyes and can see in the fridge and I don’t need to.”- Ryoko_Kusanagi69
“When anyone I know (including myself) gets a birthday cake, we go out of our way to share with family and friends.”
“I don’t see it as ‘my birthday cake’ I just see it as a cake on my birthday.”
“Everyone can celebrate with me kinda thing.”
“So from this I’d say you’re NTA.”- AggressivePicture831
Some, however, understood why the OP’s wife got as upset as she did, as it was her birthday cake, feeling the OP could have communicated things better, even if he was still entitled to a slice or two.
“NAH.”
“And communication on both sides could have solved this early.”
“You explicitly saying ‘I’m going to have some for dessert each night until it’s gone or gone bad’ would have given her the opportunity to say something like ‘lemme set some aside for myself’.”- Physical_Revelry
The OP later returned with an update, sharing how he hoped he tried to make things right with his wife, as well as her response to his actions:
“I have decided to simply bake her the exact same cake, in a smaller tin just for her.”
“It will be her cake and nobody else will touch it.”
“If it gets wasted, so be it. I hate the waste but its not worth the division.”
“The remade cake was much appreciated.”
“She has yet to take a single bite.”
“Not going to track progress.”
“The cake was made as an apology, not to test the theory.”
It’s a fair argument to say that the one celebrating the birthday should be the one who has first dibs on any leftover birthday cake.
However, if the OP’s wife has a problem with food going to waste, then one can’t help but wonder why she was so upset when her husband decided to enjoy her birthday cake that she was all but ignoring.
As many have pointed out, though, perhaps she wouldn’t have gotten so upset had the OP merely made the offer.