'AITA for asking my pregnant wife to leave after she faked breaking up with me?'
"AITA for asking my pregnant wife to leave after she faked breaking up with me?"
So, my wife and I have been together for 3 years , and she’s currently pregnant with our first child. For some context, I’m a surgeon and have always had long hours. This has been a known part of my life since before we started dating.
Recently, she’s been asking me to leave my job to do something with better hours, like private practice, because she says we need more time together. While I totally understand her perspective, being a surgeon is what I’ve worked my entire life for, and my long hours are just part of that. I can’t just flip a switch and move into clinic work; it’s not that simple, and it's not what I trained for.
Anyway, the other day, out of the blue, she says she doesn’t want to be in this marriage anymore because of the issues we’ve been having. Mainly, she wants more of my time, which, as I said, isn’t possible given my career. When she told me she wanted out, I just said, “Okay.”
I told her that I appreciate her being honest and that if she truly feels like she can’t be happy with me, I understand. I’m a secure person, and if she’s not happy, I’m not going to convince her to stay with me just for the sake of staying together.
She seemed surprised by my reaction and asked why I wasn’t fighting for our marriage or trying to “fix” things. I told her that if I did, it would feel like I’m begging her to stay, and that’s not what I want. If she’s unhappy, she doesn’t owe me a reason to leave. The point is that she doesn’t want to be with me, and that’s enough.
This seemed to frustrate her even more. She said something like, “So you’d rather walk away than work on the reasons why I’m unhappy?” I told her it’s not that.
I would’ve been happy to have a conversation about making things work realistically, but she already decided she wanted out, and I firmly told her that I wasn’t going be in a situation with my partner where they expected me to beg or grovel for their love. I respect myself too much for that.
She started crying and confessed that this whole thing wasn’t real—that she was just testing me. She wanted to see how I would react because she’s been feeling neglected with me not being around enough, and she thought that “breaking up” would force me to address that.
By that point, I’d already changed my mind. I told her I can’t be with someone who would casually say they want to end our marriage just to get a reaction out of me. If she’s willing to throw around the idea of breaking up so easily to make a point, that’s a huge red flag for me. I told her I deserve a relationship built on mutual respect and commitment, and this isn’t it.
Now I’ve decided to leave. I’ve asked her to move to her parents’ place since the house is mine. She’s pregnant, and I know this complicates things, but after what she did, I don’t feel like this marriage is salvageable. Was I too harsh?
Here's what people had to say to OP:
Here’s my take. First, NTA. I hate this kind of garbage ultimatum behavior. It’s childish. I understand why you reacted the way you did. However. I believe what your wife wants is to feel like a priority. I’m not in your marriage, but feeling like a priority doesn’t necessarily mean changing your work or life.
When you are with your wife, how do you two interact? Are you present? Do you try to take some of the burden of planning things to do together, of making her feel special? Does she do things for you that you don’t acknowledge and take for granted?
Are you vulnerable with her and do you tell her that the hours you put in are for both of you? Yes, fulfillment for you in your career but also to build a life that hopefully will be quite comfortable with you being a surgeon.
I don’t think one childish episode from your wife, who is pregnant and perhaps has a lot of hormones messing with her, is sufficient reason to give up and walk away if you truly love her.
Fellow attending Physician here, different discipline than but I have similar availability issues at home. Marriage is built on trust. I would urge you to give her a chance with being pregnant. Not because of the baby necessarily, but because of how pregnancy messes with a woman’s brain. Consider counseling. Was she like this before the pregnancy?
NTA. You do not marry a surgeon and expect him to be home most of the day or even at predictable hours. She needs to grow up, get therapy or something. Not too harsh at all, she knew what she was walking into. Congratulations on the upcoming baby btw.
Unpopular but YTA. You sound so cold towards your marriage . She is probably feeling lonely and emotional as well with the pregnancy.
I feel sorry for his kid, with this lack of empathy