At the risk of stating the obvious, childbirth is one of the most painful experiences humans go through. Sure, everyone has differing pain levels and tolerances, and modern medicine can do a lot to ease or numb the pain if you have access to those resources, but it’s still fair to say that it’s not typically a pleasant process. So it follows that most of us going through labor will probably not be at our most pleasant when it happens, or at the very least, not overly focused on the other people in the room. One husband and new father on Reddit didn’t seem to grasp that fact while his wife was giving birth, and is now contemplating taking (rather drastic) action because of it.
The husband (aka OP, or original poster, in Reddit-speak) explains in the post that he and his wife (ages 32 and 34, respectively) just had their first baby today — as in, the day of the post. As in, he snuck away from his newborn child and recovering wife to post on the Reddit AITA (aka Am I the Asshole?) forum, of all things, in the hours after the birth. (No, we don’t have proof that he snuck, but we can imagine.)
What could be so important that he would use this precious time to post about it online? Please join us on this ride with us and find out.
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“All Was Going Well”
Image Credit: gorodenkoff/Getty Images OP jumps right into the story, writing that he was in the delivery room, “all was going well, and I was holding her hand trying my best to be supportive.” OP’s wife was in pre-labor, he said, experiencing “irregular contractions that she said weren’t painful yet.” OP was next to her, telling her “I loved her and that she was doing great but [making] sure not to talk too much either.”
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Drama in the Delivery Room
Image Credit: New Africa - stock.adobe.com Suddenly, OP says, his wife started telling him to “please get out.” He asked her what happened, and “she says she just doesn’t want me there right now.” According to OP, he froze in surprise for a few seconds, “after which the midwife tells me to get out or she’ll call security.”
“I feel humiliated,” OP wrote. “Not only was I banned abruptly from watching my child’s birth, but it was under the threat of force.”
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Some Backstory
Image Credit: Milos Dimic / Getty Images It sounds like this is the latest in a series of his wife’s actions and habits that OP finds questionable. “Throughout our marriage, I’ve suspected that my wife wouldn’t be with me if it wasn’t for my job and family background,” OP says. His reasoning? “Her eyes don’t light up when I come home from work. I start our long hugs and she ends them early. Her eyes wander when I’m talking to her. I don’t think she loves me nearly as much as I love her.”
OP clarifies that he doesn’t think his wife is a “gold digger” and said she might love him “on some level, but I don’t know that she has ever been in love with me. If I died tomorrow, I don’t know if it would take her very long to move on.”
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OP Considers Retaliating
Image Credit: damircudic / Getty Images Following the situation in the delivery room, OP is considering changing his will to partially exclude his wife. OP explains, “I live in a state where the right to an elective share is 25% of separate property. We don’t have a prenup, so this means that my wife has a right to at least 25% of my separate property if I die even if I were to disinherit her in my will.” Previously, OP’s will stipulated that his wife would receive 100 percent of his separate property if he died. Now, he says, “I’ve decided to will her 30% of my separate property… and 100% of our communal property if I die. The rest of my separate property, including income-producing assets and heirlooms, goes to my children and other family members.”
Long story short, he’s decided to cut her out of 70 percent of his property.
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Reddit’s Response
Image Credit: Getty Images/Westend61 So, OP wants to know, is he the asshole for deciding to change his will after what happened in the delivery room — without telling his wife? According to Reddit, the answer is a resounding yes.
“Perhaps you should ask her why she wanted you to leave and move forward with a better understanding,” said the highest-rated comment, with 8.6K upvotes. The commenter continued, “I would have fully preferred to be alone with medical people at delivery. It would have been easier for me to focus on my needs and delivery than to be acting as part of a couple during delivery. I knew it would bother my husband greatly if I delivered alone so he was present each time. He does not know this 20+ years later but I would have still preferred to have been alone… We have a solid relationship and marriage and preferring only medical staff had nothing to do with him. Find out her reasoning before you consider it marriage ending.”
Other commenters pointed out the absurdity of OP posting this on Reddit the very day his child was born. “You are having a baby TODAY and you are on reddit?!” wrote one reader. “Your wife is still bleeding and you are having a tantrum … What a joke.” Redditors described OP as being “extremely petty and self-absorbed” while his wife was “well within her right to demand space from him so she could focus on birthing a human.”
Our take? They’re right — he’s definitely being petty and self-absorbed. “Birth is not a dignified process, and labor and delivery is not the place for your ego,” as one commenter put it. While it’s understandable for OP to feel hurt about what happened, secretly changing his will in retaliation is… not the way to go. “Be an adult about it and have a civil conversation with your wife about how you don’t feel appreciated or loved, and find a couple’s counselor (after the baby’s at least a few weeks old),” said one Redditor, and we have to agree. “Maybe she expresses love differently than you do… You say you don’t think she’s a gold digger, but your first move is to limit her inheritance in case you die? How is that going to fix anything? Talk to your wife.”
Repeat after us: Communication before secret will-revising. And also, as this commenter put it: “There are very, very few circumstances where I think it’s appropriate to give people a blanket pass for just about anything they say, no matter how shitty, but centimeters 8-10 of labor is one of them.”
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