'AITA for saying hurtful things to my wife due to her social media usage?' UPDATED 4X

"AITA for saying hurtful things to my wife due to her social media usage?"

I feel terrible about this, but I also sort of stand by what I said. My wife (34F) and I (32M) have been happily married for 8 years. We have two kids, 6 and 4. Until recently, we've been able to effectively divide our household chores and parenting duties equally.

About 6 months ago, my wife's tiktok and instagram algorithms started showing her content that's primarily been involving criticism of men, particularly in terms of their contributions to marriages, parenting, and chores.

I'm all for constructive discussions about gender roles and stuff like that, but the content I've seen from her account take it to an extreme, stereotyping all men as lazy, and neglectful.

In the past few weeks, my wife began posting her own content about our personal life, portraying me as a negligent and uncaring husband and father who doesn't pull his weight around the house.

I was really hurt when I saw these posts on our account, particularly because she has close friends, and family members on both sides who follow her account and are reaching out to me asking me if everything is okay in our marriage now that she's posting her own content, and not just reposting other videos she finds.

Not only was her content way inaccurate, but I feel uncomfortable opening up these elements of my personal life to all of our friends and family, let alone strangers who have found themselves engaging as well.

I attempted to discuss this with her. She shrugged it off, and accused me of being insensitive to the struggles with women, and not understanding her need for an outlet to vent.

I completely lost my patience in front of the kids. I told her she was being a f-king keyboard warrior more interested in getting clout from toxic women online than the reality of our life. I also told her she was being an ungrateful d#ckhead and spreading lies about me and our marriage.

As soon as I called her a d$^%head and seeing her reaction to what I was saying, as well as hearing my daughter starting to cry, I regretted it.

She looked more sad than angry with what I was saying, and she just sort of shut down and hasn't spoken to me since, outside of very minimal conversations about breakfast or plans for the kids.

I feel like I have a right to be upset about what she's saying on social media, but I think I took it way too far. I really don't know how to approach the rest of the discussion we obviously need to have.

Here's what the jury of internet strangers had to say...

owlman17 said:

NTA. A lot of replies here are calling OP the AH for losing it in front of the kids without trying to understand the feelings behind the behavior. From OPs post it looks like the wife is unwilling to have a discussion yet keeps posting on social media for everyone to see.

I have a few friends that subscribe to the idea of the manosphere and it looks like the female version is doing the rounds these days. Boggles me how people fail to see the perspective from the other gender.

Sensitive-Turnip-326 said:

NTA. Your wife has basically allowed herself to become red pilled. It’s just as dumb as when a guy does it.

MurphysLaw4200 said:

You definitely could've handled it better and not in front of the kids, but you're NTA. If my wife was trashing me on social media, and our friends and family were seeing it, I would be ABSOLUTELY FURIOUS.

I think I would leave for (at least) the night if I found that out because I couldn't stand to be near her. Ugh hope you get this worked out.

wallstreetbetsdebts said:

NTA. You can apologize for yelling when she apologizes for lying about your relationship on social media. Y'all need therapy.

Burgundyshirley7 said:

NTA. If my partner spread lies about me online, especially man-hating-culture lies, I would have told her to pack her bags and get the f out.

Ihateyou1975 said:

NTA. You were wronged and she didn’t care. She’s allowing others to think you are a deadbeat. I would have lashed out as well.

OP came back with this update 6 days later:

I don't really know where to begin. A lot of things happened really quickly, and I'm super emotional, and need to use you guys as a sounding board again.

I told myself I wasn't going to do this again, because I really didn't want my situation being stolen and ending up on tiktok or whatever, but I'm just finding that I need more direct realism from strangers rather than just people patting me on the back.

I'm pretty sure my marriage is over. I don't know.

I sat her down to talk to her about it again, this time away from the kids, and a lot more confident that I was going to keep my cool. I prefaced the conversation by saying I didn't want this to be an argument, I just wanted to get to the bottom of this behavior, and wanted to explain how it was affecting me, and how other people view me.

Pretty much the moment I began talking, she shut me down, and... I don't know if what she did is gaslighting, or if she's having some sort of mental break, or maybe a wizard came down and magically hypnotized me for the past several months, and I'm just now coming out of it.

Basically, she said that everything she is saying on SM is true, and that I have no right to police what she does or says online. I decided my best course of action would be to try to challenge her on the "everything I'm saying is true" part by breaking down the chores for her, and showing the division of labor. In fact, I used the same list I typed up in a comment from my previous post, which is here:

Me: Take the kids to school, Pick them up from school, Cook dinner, Clean up + dishes after, Lawn duties, Adult laundry

Her: Sweep + mop the house 2 times a week, Kids laundry + towels and linens, Dusting the common areas Breakfast for kids, Packing daily lunches/snacks for kids, Maintains finances (this is what she does for a living)

Together: Folding and putting away laundry, Weekly "house cleaning day" where we go from room to room with the kids to set good housekeeping examples for them, We alternate bath + bedtime routines for the kids, Bathroom cleaning (she takes the half bath, I take the master, and we both take the kids together)

This is how she responded to all of it:

Take the kids to and from school: "Wow, you sit in a car for an hour, great job dad!"

Cook dinner: "Cooking is your favorite thing to do so it's not really work"

Dishes afterwards: "Ohhh you clean up after yourself, do you want a cookie?"

Lawn duties: "So you spend an hour away from the kids every weekend, next"

Laundry: (paraphrasing) "This is also the bare minimum"

It was at this point that I noticed how everything I'm doing is the bare minimum and "expected of me," while she expects to be treated like a hero and a martyr for doing her chores. I found this to be highly transactional and adversarial for really no reason.

I asked her why she was only bringing this up now instead of communicating with me, and she didn't have a real answer. Something to the effect of, "it's not my job to teach you things you should already know" which I'm paraphrasing, but the discussion got really heated at this point.

The discussion had spiraled completely out of control, and she started to pound the table, and at one point threw her mug into the sink so hard that it broke. Things had gotten completely unproductive, so I went to go wake the kids up from their nap, and take them to a friend's house for the day for things to calm down.

I went into their room and started getting them ready, and when I walked out into the hallway (out of view of the kids), she came from around the corner and smacked me, screaming that I, I guess because I was taking the kids out for the day, that I'm weaponizing them and manipulating the situation to make her seem crazy. The kids did not see this.

I don't even remember the small details of what happened next. The kids were scared, I eventually got them into the car, and left.

I went to my friend's house, who already knew everything that was going on. I just stayed there for a bit while the kids played with his dog in the back yard.

A few hours later, the police show up at the house. Thankfully she didn't make any insane accusations like I feared when they pulled into the driveway. Essentially she just told them that I "took her kids without her permission" and told them where I was.

They told her that they can't do anything about me taking the kids, because I'm their custodial father. They came to sort of tell me what was going on, and to let me know what they talked about. I did not tell them about her smacking me.

But I'm just done now. Barring a serious neurological disease causing the issue, there's no conversation that I can have with her that will allow me to get past all of this. My friend agrees with me. My marriage is over. I'm calling a lawyer tomorrow, and I'm going to be as low-conflict as I possibly can to get this all over with and move on with my life. That's all I can do. Thanks for listening.

Update from OP in the comments:

Responding to the top level comment with a response to some popular sentiments:

Sorry for not answering questions sooner. I found that getting all of this off my chest and talking on Reddit wasn't really helping. I just found myself wallowing in the situation, so I got off and just hung out.

Apparently my wife went to the hospital for something, stayed there for a few hours, and is now back home. We texted a bit, and it seems like she's beginning to understand the gravity of the situation.

For everyone telling me to file a police report, I'm going to meet with a lawyer tomorrow and take their recommendations first and foremost. They're most likely going to recommend I file a report, but... I don't know that I'm ready emotionally to take these steps. Despite the fact that our relationship was deteriorating, this all happened really fast.

This went from a solvable, annoying problem to "my life as I know it has ended" so everything I do feels heavy, and every decision I make is going to have severe long term ramifications for myself and the kids, and I'm just trying not to take that lightly.

The smack wasn't so much of a "smack", more like a, not sure how to put it, maybe like a push made with her fist? It didn't hurt, I was just in shock for the most part. I didn't really know what to do or say, so I just removed myself from the situation. When she did it, and got done screaming, she looked like she didn't realize what she had done, then proceeded to let me take the kids.

I know I said that there are several things that I'm not going to be able to get past, but I can't shake the feeling that something about this situation is off. It didn't make sense a few months ago, the big fight still doesn't make sense, and the situation is only getting worse. Is she suffering from some sort of mental break? What the f(*& is happening to my wife.

I guess I'll go try to respond to some other comments directly now.

Edited to add: Just looked, and it appears she removed all traces of that c&^p from her social media

OP provided this update in the same post:

I spoke with the attorney that I set the meeting for this morning. We started discussing the paperwork, the fees, and basically everything I need to initiate a divorce. He did recommend I file a report with the police, just like everyone else did.

About 2 hours ago, my mother in law called me. She had been speaking with her daughter for a couple of weeks, and was already worried that her daughter had been having an episode similar to the ones she was having when she was younger.

For those of you who had missed it in the comments, she is openly bipolar, but it's well controlled, and she hasn't really had an "episode" in many years, for lack of a better way to describe what she believed to be mild anger issues.

Anyway, after our last fight, my wife called her sobbing, saying she doesn't know what's wrong, and that we just had a fight that spiraled out of control, and now I'm leaving her and taking the kids. My mother in law said she was going to fly into town, and told her to go to the hospital in the mean time if she's afraid of hurting herself or anyone else.

So she called the police to tell them what was going on (not to report me for "kidnapping" the kids, as I previously thought, also based on what the police officer told me which was just false I guess), and then she went and checked herself into the hospital for short term psychiatric care.

She was evaluated, and determined not to be a danger to herself at that time, and was sent home with an anti anxiety medication and a referral.

Her mom and I talked for a long time, and she started talking to me about her episodes and how they would present themselves, and to be honest, it sounded a lot like what's been going on.

Apparently my wife was noticing something small or insignificant (her mom's words) and then the anger would spike, and there would be a chain of different thoughts in a weird progression that ultimately ends up being angry at something that didn't really happen, but "could" happen. I'm not really sure I fully understand, but I listened, and appreciated her telling me.

Not that I really know what to do about any of this. I can say right off the bat that I'm not as angry about her smacking me as you all are. Especially if she is having an untreated manic episode, realizes it, and tries to work on it.

I'm going to take a few days to process this with my kids. My wife knows how to contact me if she needs to, but it seems like she's been giving me a lot of space, especially since she spoke with her mother.

Thanks for reading everyone. I guess I'll update with a post later on with what happens this week. I wouldn't get your hopes up over something juicy or entertaining, as I would like for this all to be over, so that we can all move on with our lives.

OP added one more update:

I want to thank everyone for their input here.

My wife's psychiatrist hasn't really... confirmed anything with her mental health, but he does have her on some medication which basically made my wife herself again, other than some other minor side effects. They are proceeding under the assumption that she has bipolar disorder, but the evaluation was super quick before they gave her a treatment plan.

To be honest, it made me feel like the entire service was just a pill mill because she was prescribed medication on her first 30 minute visit and the "evaluation" was like maybe 10 questions according to my wife. But apparently she needs to be taking this medicine in conjunction with a behavioral therapist, and then the therapist and psychiatrist get together and tag team the issue I guess.

Her mother has also been an absolutely incredible woman these past couple of months. I really don't know where I would be, or where the situation would have ended up without her, and I couldn't be more grateful that she jumped in and essentially took control of the situation with a lot more love and grace than I could have ever imagined.

I'm sorry to say that I didn't immediately divorce my wife and call the police to have her arrested. I know some of you were really passionate about me doing that. While the "smack" put me in a lot of shock, I reflected on it as more of a wake up call that something was wrong, rather than overreacting about it and treating her as a legal adversary.

I'm not a doctor, so this is just how I understand what happened based on what the doctor told us: My wife experienced an episode of prolonged mania, which the psychiatrist classified as "chronic mania."

Social media has dopamine-releasing effects which could have been a double-edged sword in the sense that it may have been easing symptoms in the moment, but also sort of prolonging the overall issue, as she may have been consuming validating content, and allowing it to shape some of the altering effects of mania.

It's possible that she was showing symptoms, or that they were very slow to present themselves over the course of months or maybe even years, and eventually those symptoms just sort of come to a head. Part of my wife's treatment plan is to severely reduce the use of social media down to just interacting with people she knows personally for now.

However, what seems like really great news for our marriage then turned into some new problems. My wife has been absolutely grief stricken. She became very depressed in guilt for what she claims she put me and our family through.

Telling her it's okay, and that we're going to be just fine, and that we love her... it's falling on deaf ears, and no amount of consolation from me is helping. Her mom steps in to help, and it works, but mostly temporarily.

We're hoping this level of depression is something that can be worked through in therapy, rather than a side effect of her medications, but right now she's just sort of "submitting" herself to the family, and turning all of her "love languages" up to 10 trying to make up for everything that's happened.

I told her the other day that the best thing she can do for not even us, but for herself, is to just focus on the treatment, and everything will be like it hasn't even happened. She's just so, so apologetic and I don't want her to be. She's been crying a lot, and I just don't know how to help her sometimes, outside of what I've been telling her.

One conflict we're having right now is that she's trying to make up for a lot of the conflict with s&^, and while we've had s@* with her being in this state a few times now, I don't feel "clean" about it.

While she's back to being "herself" in a lot of ways, in other ways, this feels less like authentic, mutually enjoyed $#x, and more like "apology #@x" which makes her more very submissive, and I'm having a difficult time articulating why I don't feel right about it. I just want her to slow down and focus on becoming 100%.

That being said, we're going to be fine. Everything is going to be fine. My wife will get past this hurdle, and we'll live happily ever after.

I do want to thank people for their input here. There were times where I began to think that this wasn't going to be a helpful exercise, because some of the comments made me feel like I was doing the same sort of self-defeating doomscrolling that my wife was doing, and letting a lot of negativity influence how I approach the situation.

And to be fair, there was a lot of that, but there were a lot of people that had me focusing on details that I don't think I would have picked up before things really exploded between my wife and I.

Everything is really fuzzy now, but I think it was a one person that told me to look a little deeper at the mental health aspect of the situation, which sparked a conversation with my incredible mother in law, and drove us to a real solution.

And despite these comments frankly being few and far between, I can't say that Reddit hasn't been incredibly helpful, and for that, I wish I could show more appreciation for the community than just thanking you all.

This should be my last update before I pop back onto my main account, and back into obscurity. Thank you, thank you, and thank you again for all of your input and support.