Relationships don’t always work.
People grow, circumstances change, and life is always pressing us forward to the next thing.
What happens though when a relationship has failed and not everyone has been able to move past it?
That was the issue facing Redditor and Original Poster (OP) Traditional_Gear926 when he came to the “Am I the A**hole” (AITA) subReddit for judgment.
He asked:
“AITA For Showing Up To A Party With My Pregnant Wife That My Ex Was At?”
OP began with some history.
“I (35m) used to be married to my high school sweetheart ‘Kelly’ (35f).”
“We got married after undergrad, and overall I would say that we were really happy.”
With one exception.
“The biggest conflict that I would say we had was the topic of children.”
“Not the idea of actually having them but when.”
“I’ve always wanted to be a dad and wanted to have my kids while I was still young enough to run around with them while they were kids and have a good adult relationship with them once they got older.”
“Kelly brought up a lot of good points about needing to get married, living fully on our own, and being out of debt first.”
“For about five years, I worked a job I had no passion for solely because of the large paycheck, and I was able to wipe out our debt completely (we didn’t have a lot, to begin with in the first place).”
“Then Kelly said she wanted a house, so we got one, then a few months in, she talked about wanting to go to grad school.”
“Even though we often fought about children, in the end, I always supported her choices because I didn’t want her to resent me.”
“I would often ask her if Kelly had ever changed her mind about wanting kids, but she assured me that she still did, just not now.”
“I asked when would she be, and it always felt like she kept moving the goalpost whenever she’d list her requirements, and that I was painted as a jerk for ‘pressuring’ her for kids.”
Everything was fine, until…
“Unfortunately, after weeks of not feeling well, Kelly was diagnosed with an illness. It was rough, but I stood by her and she pulled through, but the cost was her fertility.”
“I felt like a jerk again because of part of me resented Kelly for not agreeing to have kids sooner, and that resentment grew when Kelly refused to look into using a surrogate, insisting that either we were both the bio parents or neither of us were.”
OP decided to cut his losses.
“In the end, I couldn’t take it and just divorced her.”
“A lot of people called me selfish, sexist, misogynistic, etc., but I just wasn’t sure if this was something that I would be able to truly let go of.”
“I let Kelly keep the house and moved out of town.”
“Eventually I met and fell in love with Angela (32f), and after shortly moving into together, she got pregnant so we got married.”
“She’s entering her third trimester with our baby girl, and I’m so excited.”
He then explained the situation at hand.
“A friend back in college moved back to the states and wanted to have a small party to see everyone.”
“He invited Kelly and me, so I checked in with him privately and asked if it would be okay to bring my wife, and he said that it was cool so I did.”
“This was the first time I saw Kelly in person for years, and she looked well enough.”
“I was polite but kept my distance and thought everything was good until the next day when I got a barrage of texts and DMs blasting me for having the audacity to parade my heavily pregnant new (younger) wife in front of my infertile ex-wife.”
OP was left to wonder,
“I had no malicious intentions and it has been a few years, plus I asked beforehand just to double check, so AITA?”
Having explained the situation, OP turned to Reddit for judgment.
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
Redditors decided: NTA
Some saw no issue with what OP had done.
“NTA.”
“You divorced, it doesn’t sound like you screwed her over in it, and you each have your own lives now.”
“She should have known having kids was important to you since that was obviously a wedge issue in your relationship with her.”
“So she shouldn’t have been shocked that you went on to achieve that goal.”
“Also, 32 is essentially the same age as 35. It’s not like you showed up with a pregnant 20 y/o.” ~ MagnusAlbusPater
“Oh totally!”
“The ‘younger wife’ is not really relevant when you are that close in age. If he was like 40 and had a 20-year-old then yeah. But come on.”
“The ex sounds petty.” ~ valk-n-chips
“NTA.”
“I don’t think you are an a**hole.”
“It’s sad that Kelly is infertile, but you didn’t bring your wife to rub her infertility in her face. You reached out to your friend, and you got the okay.”
“Just block anyone sending you nasty texts.”
“Also, from what you wrote, it sounds like Kelly never wanted kids, and she kept leading you on with the hope that you’d eventually drop the issue.”
“Divorcing her was the right move too, if not, your resentment would have kept growing.” ~ Dumplings_Lemon
Others wanted a bit more context.
“Out of curiosity, the people saying you were selfish and misogynistic, did they know the full story?”
“Because it sounds like your wife didn’t want kids, which was a separate issue from her infertility.”
“It won’t come up, but if it does with people you care about, I’d probably say, ‘I was about to divorce my wife when she fell ill for, what I feel like, was lying to me about wanting children.'”
“‘It was a coincidence she fell ill, and I’m not heartless enough to leave my sick wife.'”
‘”However, when all was said and done, she still had no interest in kids and now could no longer have them even if she changed her mind, but my mind didn’t change.'”
“‘I still wanted kids, and once she was healthy enough, I followed through on my original plans.'”
“‘But again, I wasn’t heartless, and I gave her the house and a debt-free life.'”
‘”However, I really resent anyone who thinks I left because my wife got sick. I left because it felt like she was going to keep putting off the kids conversation until she could no longer have children, and it just happened that that came with an illness rather than old age.'”
‘”And even before she was sick, that something that I would’ve divorced her over as it’s not fair to me.”’~ MagicCarpet5846
Others felt it was just a bad situation.
“NTA.”
“Sh*t happens.”
“Your ex couldn’t have known she’d wind up infertile. She had every right to choose when to have kids.”
“But the truth is, every year that you wait is a year more for something to go wrong. Fertility is more fragile than people think. She’s not to blame. She rolled the dice and lost.”
“You weren’t misogynistic for leaving.”
“The parameters of your marriage and your future changed. You’re NTA for wanting your heavily pregnant wife with you at a party.” ~ Low_Engineering8921
“NTA.”
“You were both invited to the party, and the host said you could bring your wife. The world does not stop just because you are divorced. People move on.” ~ squirtwv69
OP did return to answer a few common questions.
“ETA: Talked about this with someone in the comments”
“Kelly said it would be too upsetting at the idea of me having a child with another woman regardless of how the child was conceived.”
“It was either adopt or nothing at all.”
“I honestly felt like there was no way we could progress in the relationship without one of us resenting the other, so I filed.”
“If she truly didn’t want kids, she put on a great performance.”
“Before her illness, she would constantly gush over other people’s babies, insisted buying a house in a good school district for our future kids, and even talked in extensive detail about wanting to be a stay-at-home for up to 6 years.”
“I think Kelly just assumed we’d always have time, and then life threw a curve ball.”
“If Kelly had stated that she would’ve been open to having children sooner under the condition that I be the primary caretaker, I would’ve done it.”
“I would’ve even taken a lesser paying job so I could have the free time to do it.”
“I NEVER wanted to put her in a position where she felt like she would have to give up her career entirely.”
“I did NOT leave Kelly while she was still sick. It was a year after she was healthy again, and we had been in therapy for months.”
Circumstances change, and we are all doing the best we can with the information that we have.
Of course, that information is always changing too.
In this case, perhaps OP didn’t really have a correct choice.