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He prioritizes his sleep, not his family's safety.
By Alexandra Blogier — Written on Mar 31, 2023
A mom was in a worst-case scenario situation recently when she experienced a family emergency that her husband slept through, ignoring her desperate cries for help.
She wrote into the subreddit r/AmITheA–hole wondering if she was wrong for her reaction to her husband’s behavior.
She offered background information on her husband, stating that he wakes up early for work, yet stays up late at night to play video games. According to the mom, “when he gets home at 5, he has to get his 2-hour nap so he could both makeup for lack of sleep and also be ready to stay up late to play with his console.”
“He values his sleep and has one rule in the house that he enforces strictly, which is to not be interrupted while sleeping…. The kids and I would sometimes wake him up but for serious reasons. He got mad and started locking the door.”
Fast-forward to the family emergency, during which the mom’s 3-year-old son got burnt by a hot oil spill while her 14-year-old daughter was cooking. The mom reported, “I heard him scream and saw that the oil was covering his hand and half of his arm. I brought the first aid kit but he was in so much pain and his skin looked really bad.”
She rushed to wake her husband, knocking on the door but got no response.
When the mom tried to open the door to tell her husband that their son was hurt, the door was locked.
“I spent a while between knocking on the door (he had his phone turned off) and getting dressed after my daughter asked the neighbor to drive us to the hospital. I couldn't waste more time because my son was crying. The neighbor took us to the hospital.”
“I couldn't help [but]feel livid the whole time,” the mom explained. Emergencies happen, and it’s important to have a plan in place with one’s family on how to navigate them when they do.
Disaster preparedness is an important topic to keep in mind, whether the emergency situation is a natural disaster or something different. Yet the most important part of responding to an emergency is communication– which the mom and her husband definitely did not have.
When the mom and her kids got home from the hospital, her husband was pacing around and asked why she didn’t answer his texts, while she had been busy at the hospital with their injured child.
“I blew up on him after I showed him our son's injury and told him that I pounded on the door to wake him up but he said had his earbuds on and didn't hear a thing.”
“I called him reckless and neglectful for ignoring a family emergency,” the mom said. Her husband’s incredibly defensive response was that she left their son “unsupervised, causing him to get a burn.”
The mom took action— she removed the lock on the bedroom door. When she took the lock off, her husband yelled that she had no right to do so.
“I refused to respond,” the mom said. “I just walked off to calm down.”
Only her husband didn’t stop. He called her bossy, and said that “by removing the lock I've destroyed his peace and quiet and caused him sleep deprivation.”
“I could be wrong for what I've done,” she said, “but I was frustrated and mad.”
The comments on Reddit were overwhelmingly in her favor, and many advised her to take her husband’s negligent behavior seriously and ask for a divorce.
“What the f–-k did I just read?” asked the first commenter. “Your husband takes an early evening nap so he can stay up late to play video games? Do your kids have any relationship with him because it sounds like he never sees them awake. Obviously, [you’re] Not Th A–hole.”
The mom responded to the questions, replying, “the kids barely interact with him. My 14-year-old has her own stuff to be busy with but my 3-year-old misses spending time with his dad and wakes up early to see him since it's the only time of day he gets to see him.”
The dad’s lack of commitment to his family had many commenters up in arms.
“Accidents happen, no matter how much you stay alert,” said one person. “But I don't believe your husband didn't hear you calling, he chose to ignore you.”
“Oh my God,” the mom said. “This thought popped [into] my head shortly after I started knocking, but I try to give him the benefit of doubt and tell myself no he wouldn’t do that but seeing how he's more concerned about the lock than our son's condition makes me believe that he did hear me but chose to ignore me.”
One person stated the clear truth— “He failed you and your family in an emergency. There is no excuse in the world that would ever make this ok.”
While the mom didn’t respond to the comments telling her to leave her husband, she did come on the thread to say that her son is feeling better, although it’s hard to keep him from re-injuring his arm—one can imagine her husband is of no help there, either.
Alexandra Blogier is a writer on YourTango's news and entertainment team. She covers celebrity gossip, pop culture analysis and all things to do with the entertainment industry.