Having to teach someone a lesson is a common activity for parents who are actively raising children and teaching them how the world works, but every so often, the opportunity arises to teach fellow adults an important lesson as well.
One husband had to do just that when he discovered a nerve-wracking habit his wife had, but felt bad after the fact. So, he turned to Reddit and made a post asking if his methods were sound.
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The post on the AmITheAsshole subreddit starts strong.
“My wife has a horrible habit that I discovered 2 months ago,” the husband begins . He learned that if his wife has to briefly go into a store, she’ll leave their infant son in the car.
He had no idea she did this. “I told her I was not comfortable with her leaving him in the car alone even for a minute and she told me she’s been doing it since he was born and it’s always been fine,” he wrote, “She told me she does it to pick up food, run into the post office or pharmacy, etc. I was floored.”
He told her to never do this again.
The conversation seemed to have opened her eyes. “She told me she never stopped to think about the potential dangers and that she would stop doing it.” Problem solved, right?
Wrong. So wrong.
Recently, the husband was driving home when he saw his wife’s car parked at a gas station. Assuming she ran in to grab a snack, he thought he would park next to her to say hi when she returned.
So he pulled up next to her car and was horrified to see their son in his car seat.
Even worse, the doors were unlocked.
“I don’t know what came over me, but in that moment I decided to take my son and put him into my car […]. I then drove to the other side of the gas station parking lot and waited for my wife to come out.”
He said it took six minutes for his wife to reappear. She quickly began to panic when she saw her son missing, but the husband stepped in right as she pulled out her phone to presumably call 911.
When she saw her son was safe, the wife was relieved.
However, that relief quickly turned to anger, and she was then asking her husband why he would do that to her.
“I told her she needed to learn her lesson and she promised to stop leaving him in the car, and that she was extremely irresponsible. It was so easy for me to pull up and take him. No one else at the gas station even noticed! So if he really was taken there would’ve been no help and it would’ve been 100% her fault.”
Of course, that answer didn’t please her.
“She proceeded to call me cruel and psychotic and tried taking our son out of my car into hers. I said no and that I would be driving him home, and I left. She came home not much later but ignored me the rest of the day.”
Later, she began demanding an apology from him, which he refused. “She’s been [guilt-tripping] me the rest of the day saying no mother should experience the fear I put her through. Did I go too far?”
The comments were happy to tell him that no, he didn’t go too far at all.
“Your wife is right. No mother should have to experience that fear, and she opens herself up to it constantly. She deserves what she got,” wrote one respondent.
Many others brought up the other dangers besides a potential kidnapping, like one user who said, “[…] what would happen if your wife forgets or she takes longer… have you read about babies [sitting] in hot cars and what can happen?”
Thankfully, an update was provided.
The husband said he apologized for how he went about proving his point, but not for caring about their son’s safety. She also apologized for lying and being unsafe.
When pushed about why she did this, she just said she’d been doing it for so long she no longer sees an issue. “I asked if she thinks she’s dealing with some kind of postpartum mental health issue as I don’t consider this normal, she broke down crying saying she doesn’t know what’s wrong with her.”
“She has agreed to seek counseling and until there is a major change/improvement I will be running all errands with my son or we will be doing them together […].”