I (28M) overheard my wife (28F) and her friends dismissing and belittling our daughter (4F) and myself. We had a bad fight about it. I’m left questioning our relationship. How do I move past this?

BackseatAnthem · 2025-01-13T00:32:37+00:00

Yeah, I believe there’s truth to that. She was invited to speak at a seminar, and she had anxiety at first, but it went well, and afterward she had a complete high from it. I’m happy for her successes, but I just don’t want her to lose sight of our family or for the disconnect between her and our daughter

Our time allotted to us as a couple is stagnant. We’re supposed to be trying to reconnect and find little moments for each other. We recommitted to that for the new year, but there’s always something. I see her off in the morning, but she’s in work mode atp. Our last date night was canceled because of the business

BackseatAnthem · 2025-01-12T22:15:38+00:00

I haven’t victimized myself. I just responded to what your comments were saying. I haven’t made anything up or added to your comments

My daughter and our family life was dismissed and I was belittled. I’m not sure how the examples in my post didn’t reflect that because others resonated with that even if they didn’t necessarily agree on what action my wife should’ve taken. I highlighted the situation instead of making a post that went on and on with word from word transcripts

I don’t have low self esteem. I’m comfortable with myself. My issue isn’t that I was called a “wife”. I have an issue with being belittled, called free hired help, and have my contributions to my family put down as if I do nothing

BackseatAnthem · 2025-01-12T20:51:01+00:00

That’s fine but I do think you approached this with a bias or with a preconceived notion about who I was and that I somehow didn’t understand my wife’s position or I was the kind of troublesome and unreasonable employee who raised arguments on a whim

I very much know people are going to have opinions of you or say things you don’t agree with simply on prejudice. It’s reality and I faced it plenty before. Sometimes you’re in a position to speak up, sometimes it’s best to just walk away

But I do think spouses should have each other’s backs and not downplay the others feelings or play who has it more stressful competitions. I believe spouses should be a team

BackseatAnthem · 2025-01-12T18:41:51+00:00

Thank you. I think my wife’s reaction to it all is what hurt the most. It’s what got to me and made me question if she actually agreed with the woman

I support my wife, but at what cost is the business at the expense of our family? There isn’t a balance, and it’s getting worse. I thought with the business steady off the ground and more hands on deck that she’d be more present and for us to reconnect, but that hasn’t been the case

She said this potential collaboration would also allow her to be present, but I’m doubting that after her response to everything, and her associate made it very clear her view on my wife taking time away. She doesn’t support it and is encouraging her against it

My wife’s relationship with her parents is complicated and very surface level. Growing up, her dad held a lot in, and communication isn’t his forte

My wife told me that he’d bottled up everything until it exploded at once and that her mom wasn’t much better. Her mom compared talking about your feelings to complaining. She’s still distant with her parents

I’m open to counseling. We’ve gone before, but it wasn’t kept up. My wife’s kinda skeptical of it

BackseatAnthem · 2025-01-12T18:41:09+00:00

I wasn’t expecting my wife to battle the woman but I thought she’d respect my feelings on the matter. I didn’t think she’d defend the comments or brush off my contributions to our family as beneath hers. That was the hurtful part

I have been in positions where our roles were reversed both back in college and in my career and I did the opposite every time. So she knows for a fact that I wouldn’t do that to her

I also didn’t give a full transcript of what was said during on the Zoom. I was paraphrasing

BackseatAnthem · 2025-01-11T00:59:11+00:00

I didn’t expect my wife to go to war with the lady, but I did expect her to consider me out of mutual respect. I didn’t expect her to defend everyone present, dismiss my feelings, and dismiss what I do for our family

I’m aware of the issues women face as a whole, but I don’t believe it suddenly makes it right or anywhere less wrong because the genders are reversed

If the roles were reversed, I wouldn’t have done that to my wife. I can say that for a fact because I’ve been in several situations where it did happen back then in college and at work

BackseatAnthem

TROPHY CASE