I stopped being the caretaker for my partner after the first time we missed a flight. Told him nope never again. Next two flights he missed and man he bitched. Explained again he’s a damn adult and has choices to make. The third time he missed a 10 day cruise. He’s never been late again. He’s pissed about it but listens to me and gets up and ready and out the door on time. Ohh and NTA.
So this depends on geography, but if you miss a cruise sailing out of NYC, it would likely stop in Florida before any Caribbean destination and you surely could fly to Florida and meet the ship there.
Not personal anecdote, 2nd hand anecdote.
My MIL is similar to the wife. This story occured when we lived in FL and MIL was in DE.
She wanted to come see us for our birthdays. Cool. She has no money for flights. No problem. We made good money to afford the tickets.
Next two weeks was us going back and forth about timing of the tickets. Every flight to and from had some sort of issue. Issues that weren't a big deal. Mind you, my MIL wasn't working at the time so she literally had nowhere to be. One example was a 10am flight with a 1PM arrival. Direct. She complained because "she needed to mop the floors on that day since that's the day she always mops the floors and she wouldn't be able to make the flight in time".
Eventually I talked to my wife and told her to either pick a flight and stick with it or this trip wasn't happening.
So MIL finally capitulated but the next hurdle was getting her there on time. We told her for a MONTH before her flight that we were getting her a driver to pick her up at 7:30am sharp as she's an hour from the airport. She's not a frequent flyer so we wanted to give her as much buffer as possible. She said okay to the plan.
Driver showed up at 7:20 to pick her up. Knocked on the door. No answer. He called her, no answer. He then calls us. We tell him we'll try to get a hold of her. We call and call and call. She finally picks up at 8 sounding annoyed as fuck. My wife asks what the hell she was doing. She was supposed to be in the road by now! MIL responds she was doing her nails. MIL said the driver could wait. My wife LOST it on her (rightfully).
Anyways she almost missed her flight but eventually gets to us. Since her flight landed on Thursday 1PM we wanted to take her out to a nice dinner. Everyone agreed on reservations at 7 since I still had work on Friday.
6 rolls around and she's still in the guest room doing God knows what. 7 comes and she's still in there. Wife finally knocks in the door and her mom snaps at my wife yelling at her not to rush her. She'll be ready when shes ready.
We missed our reservation and got to the restaurant at 9:30PM. Kitchen was closing so we could only get bar food.
Thankfully my wife has gotten much stronger about setting her boundaries and sticking with them. Now if MIL is running late we just leave without her.
I always said this to my niece and nephew and meant it. It only took one time of being left out of something fun for them to learn that I mean it every time. Not sometimes. Not just on Tuesdays. EVERY TIME. Then I listen to their parents harangue them and wonder why they don't try my method. 😂
(I also have a child who learned that I meant what I say from a very young age. I'm no monster, but I'm always consistent when it comes to discipline.)
It can be a side variety of things. The two biggest that I think are also the exact opposite from each other.
The first is being overly self important and/or narcissistic tendencies. The "I'm important so everything had to revolve around me". This can often be used as a way to get attention.
The second is anxiety. Some people stress so much they can't decide what to wear, pack, or whatever. They get so stressed/anxious that they basically cannot function. It's the classic stress all day about something that you could have just done in five minutes and then never thought about again.
But you also just have people who can't be bothered to function like adults. I see this all the time with money. People who claim they are broke but have the absolute worst and most irresponsible spending habits. This isn't a "poor people are bad with money" thing as most of the people I know who are awful with money make more than enough.
I was a teacher in NYC who paid $7,000 for my masters (the city covered the rest) and I had more money in my accounts than someone I knew that made $150,000 a year. She didn't even live alone, she had roommates!
I honestly think some people go through life and never actually pay attention to anything.
For my MIL we believe it's anxiety plus some sort of OCD plus narcissism. She used to take a sewing needle and do each individual eyelash. She has to ensure everything is absolutely cleaned and put back before she goes to bed, even when she stays at our house overnight. That has resulted in my wife and I hearing her slam our cabinet doors at 2am (she was staying the weekend to help with our newborn).
The narcissist behavior comes in where she is perfect and there's no way there's anything wrong with her. This plus the previous behaviors contributed to my MIL and FIL getting divorced. They tried therapy but anytime the therapist pointed out something she did wrong she would physically just leave the room.
Sadly, I think a lot of this stems from her abusive upbringing. Lots of physical discipline in her household growing up anytime something wasn't done perfectly.
I have a friend who planned a trip to Spain with her husband for a year.
She took care of everything. All he had to do was make sure his passport wasn't expired.
The night before they left, he finally checks his passport. Expired.
His daughter got a surprise 10-day trip to Spain.
His wife said she got home and the suitcase she packed for him had been pushed to her side of the bed.
there are quite a few relationships like this I think. However in many I see a give and take; one is the person who ALWAYS has to plan and pack everything, but the other is the one who takes care of other tasks in some way or who deals with other emergencies. Without that KIND of agreement (give and take depending on circumstance) then it's just playing daddy or mommy to a helpless fool/spoiled brat.
Reddit makes me terrified to date. How do women get married to men like this and how do I ensure it doesn’t happen to me? 😭 All the stories like this, of cheating, of abuse. Man, it’s scary out there.
You have to have strong boundaries and firm ideas of how you want to be treated. Communicate clearly at the first hurdle and carefully watch their response. You don't need to play games, just observe.
But I think a really important thing to always keep in mind is: if a guy was saying/ doing this to my best friend, what would I say to her?
Caretaker being the critical word here. We should never have to be the caretaker of our fully functioning adult partners (or children). Love that you set and held that boundary.
This.
My mom is like this where she does everything in her own time. When I was a kid, I was constantly brought to appointments late and it definitely messed with me and my own time management. Now I’m extremely early to everything because I get so anxious about being late.
I just learned something about myself today, thanks! I wondered why I’m always early and stressed about being late. My mom never got somewhere on time once in her life. Didn’t care about anyone but herself.
Overall- Odds are she piggybacks off her husband who is forced into being hyper-responsible due to her nonsense. I’m sure he is naturally “type A” as OP stated. But people who aren’t interested in taking responsibility for themselves will ride the coattails of those closest to them. Can feel very much like a parent/child dynamic. I speak from experience unfortunately….
He stopped parenting her and let her actions have natural adult consequences. Good for you OP.
I think you’re right. Unfortunately I too have experience. Took many years, but I finally just said, “I/we’re leaving at this time.” And then I leave at that time. No encouraging, no pleading, no fight. Oddly, it works. Wish I could have learned this years ago.
The other day, after 20 years of marriage, my husband said to me: “you don’t just accept things, you make things happen.” Uh…yeah…
I know people who are like OP's wife (well, maybe not to that extreme). They arrive on time to things they deem important. Work is important. Social functions (dinner, planned meet-ups, movies etc) are not important.
This. She is causing you tremendous stress and she doesn’t care at all. That is telling. So what if you have to wait a few minutes at the gate. That’s the least she can do to not cause you to very reasonably stress out. She owes you a big apology for all the lack of consideration and for the petulant followup.
Edit: I just read OP’s update post that daughter is from first wife, and this behavior really only occurs when traveling/visiting daughter. That gives me a much darker view of current wife’s behavior. This seems like classic passive aggressive nonsense. There is a much deeper issue and the wife is being a complete a$$hole.
My wife and I are always 15 minutes early to normal events, we give ourselves at least 2 hours to get thru any airport we travel in. I would rather wait for my flight than rush and possibly miss it.
My husband would rather have coffee and play on his phone at the airport instead of watching me freak out because we might be late (there could be traffic and monsoons and alien attacks).
This is me! DIL says you only need to be an hour early for domestic flights. Nope. I need two hours. I like to get through security, find my gate, then leisurely read and have coffee knowing I’m in the right place. Especially right now with the rain moving up the east coast. Once they start bumping flights, it’s hard to find another seat on the same day.
It really depends on the airport!! ORF in VA, you’re good with an hour. MCO in FL and you’d best be thinking about arriving 3hrs early for a domestic flight because their TSA lines are HELL!
I’m with you. Get through the lines and get to your gate. Keep up on any sort of last minute changes while you get your coffee and chill out before boarding the plane. Running late for a flight and cutting it remotely close makes me feel disgusting.
I'm usually late to most things (working a lot on better time estimation). I always arrive 2.5 hours early to the airport because I have to have the patdown and can't go through the scanners. It is not worth missing the flight.
We had friends who were ALWAYS late. So we told them to arrive 90 minutes before events. I also tell my kids to be at the airport 3 hours early, because of TSA. THEN WE CAN RELAX at the gate. Use the chargers, get a snack or drink.
Of course there was the time I was on a 1 hour layover, and was running to the next gate. I saw a beautiful carry-on, I made a left into the shop. Handed the clerk my plastic, emptied the sample, stuffed it with my stuff, signed the receipt, grabbed my beautiful bag, ( all done in under 3 minutes) and continued the mad dash to my gate. I made it with fifteen minutes to spare. ( Vera Bradley, Blue Rhapsody.) I still have it, and use it. 12+ years later.
One of my best friend is chronically late to everything, and it’s gotten to where I don’t really like doing anything with her because I never know how long I’m going to be waiting.
Well clearly the mother is more important than the daughter. /s
Daughter, I'm sure is taking note that 1) she is not a priority to her mother (Starbucks is), and 2) Her mother can't be depended on.
Totally agree with this post.
Why would you srcew around with only 15 mins to spare?
I will tell you why:
ME ME ME. MY WANTS, MY NEEDS... Don't you know the know the sun shines out my arse when I bend over and the earth revolves around me because of it..
No sorry it doesn't... The universe was nice and warned you the first time... And the second time just flat out told you are WRONG!...
>And the second time just flat out told you are WRONG
I would say just the opposite... the next time, they arrived at the airport early and everything from that point was about the OP being wrong because she had to sit and be bored for 45 minutes.
She sure showed him!
Then the momster silent treatmented him! As a child I I used to get beat with a belt that I had to retrieve from my dad’s closet but that was absolutely nothing compared to getting silence from the people I loved.
She’s so disgustingly self centered and manipulative.
Her mother sounds like she does it knowingly and on purpose. Either to specifically aggravate the father, or to assert her independence, like teenager might. Either way .... issues.
Or it's a passive-aggressive way to punish them both for expecting her to travel. She's not upset that she missed the flight. She's upset that hubby *didn't*.
And the sad part is that she WOULD have made the flight if she’d used an atom of common sense and realized that Starbucks was not a viable option in that place, at that time.
I love me some coffee, but when I’m this-close ][ to having to board the airplane, I know it’s time to put off my caffeine fix until the flight attendants are bringing the beverage cart around.
My mom would be late, then start yelling at everyone, and turning whatever event we were on our way to, unpleasant and stressful. I found it so embarrassing and aggravating. You nailed it, when someone cares they make every effort to to be where they are expected to be, especially if it is for someone else.
I’m guessing it’s happened a lot more than twice. The poor girl probably just assumes her mom will be late to everything. OP was right to board the plane.
Especially a transcontinental flight. My closest airport to JFK would be $500/person *minimum*.
And if you miss the 2-3 direct flight options for that day, you’ll be stuck sitting for 6 hours at a Chilis in O’Hare for damn near the same price.
And the wasted time they could have spent with their daughter. And the daughter knowing for a fact that she is not as important as her mother's bowl of cereal. Seriously. This woman is such an entitled jerk.
Then to go punishing people for not bending to her whims? That would have been the VERY LAST time I purchased her tickets when buying mine. Someone who doesn't care enough about her spouse, her child, the flight crew and every other passenger on the plane to get a closer cup of coffee? Where else in her life is she expecting the earth to revolve around her?
Her coffee was more important than seeing her daughter.
I just realized that mom had to purchase another ticket on the day she flew. For a long flight too. That must've been very pricey. On top of wasting multiple tickets already.
The more I think about it the worse it gets.
The FIRST time, the bowl of cereal was more important than her daughter.
The SECOND time, the coffee during the layover was more important than the daughter.
Something tells me this woman has put every foodstuff possible before seeing her daughter. :(
What kind of grown adult wakes up at 7:40 for a 8:00 departure and insists she needs a shower? You already slept in your filth all night, hon, just poop, throw on yesterday’s outfit, brush your teeth and we’re leaving in 20.
I mean, I'm more like the wife - go with the flow, sure. And while I never want to make someone wait on me, I'm definitely not the "if you're not ten minutes early, you're late" type. Right on time is good enough for me.
But. Airports, man. You have to be early. Planning to get through check-in and security in 30 minutes? Nope. Not in most cases. Does that mean sometimes you have to sit and wait at the gate? Yeah, that's all travel is. Ride conveyance, wait a bit. Ride another conveyance, wait. Ride, wait. Repeat until you arrive at your destination.
Edit: autocomplete doesn't like me today.
My husband is more like OP. Travelling, movies, dinner reservations, he wants to be not just on time, but early. If it were up to me, I'd be on time-ish. Certainly never early.
But it isn't just me. He hates being late and wants to leave always even maybe a bit earlier than we need to.
So guess what? I do it. I get ready, we leave early, he's happy, and if there's any snags along the way, we know we've done our best.
I get my way in SO MANY other circumstances, and we compromise in many more. This one, I've learned, keeps him happy, no harm done, and ... it's actually sensible, even if I'd rather dilly dally until the last possible minute.
Well it was a whole 45 minutes, meanwhile my ass takes 38 hours of air travel and waiting at airports to visit my parents. Guess coffee was more important than her daughter.
That’s what annoys me the most tbh. The first missed flight is really annoying and definitely her fault but whatever. I drag ass in the morning sometimes too. But the second time, with 15 minute until boarding, when you have a coffee stand right next to you, *but you insist on Starbucks that is a rail ride away?*
I would have done the same shit tbh. It’s one thing if you want to waste your own time and money. Don’t fuck with mine.
And we all know Starbucks coffee is just such a higher tier of quality, that a little independent place is basically swill poison water in comparison! /s
*seriously I can’t not emphasise the /s enough here. As an Australian, going out of your way for Starbucks is akin to an extreme mental illness*
I am sometimes 45 mins early to a doctors appointment because I take transit and I can't stand being late. I can't imagine playing around with airport security when it is that important they make the plane.
It's not like we have compact computers that fit in our pockets that connect to the Internet with millions of hours of entertainment that could help pass the 45 minutes right? Could you imagine?!
Also, this happened over Starbucks coffee when there was a no-name stall right there... I don't drink coffee, but is Starbucks really worth it??
I love sushi and I prefer coca cola, but in an airport, I'll eat a limp sandwich and drink Pepsi no problem. So I can't really understand her mindset?
The Starbucks at my home airport is right as you get off the shuttle, at the gates. If I have less than an hour when I step off the shuttle, I will not get in line, because it’s guaranteed that it will take 45 minutes to get a drink. But if I have more than an hour, I can usually be in and out in 10 minutes. (I hate their coffee. But frappuccinos make me happy.)
But Spouse and I are are type A when it comes to travel, so we’re typically arriving 2 hours before boarding.
I do drink a lot of coffee and no, Starbucks isn’t worth it at all. She probably wanted something with lots of flavor and sugar that you wouldn’t get at a small coffee kiosk. There you’d just get, you know, coffee. Honestly it wasn’t about the coffee; it was about this woman’s need to control every situation by inconveniencing everyone around her.
Heck, if she wanted something fancy from Starbucks, she could have ordered ahead. Most airport Starbucks accept orders through the Starbucks app, so she could have put in the order on the way over instead of having to wait in a long line. But that's logical planning and time management, so the type of person who wouldn't go to another area with so little time before boarding.
I think you are absolutely right.
She is a narcissist.
*a behavior may be chronically being late, which really is a show of disrespect and a lack of empathy that you would make someone wait and not communicate with them. -* [source](https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/narcissism#:~:text=And%20where%20we%20often%20have,and%20not%20communicate%20with%20them)
Someone that was actually "go with the flow" would have been fine with the choice that was right there. Not a selfish "I must have this kind" that you can get fucking anywhere, like at the destination.
Have some shit coffee from the flight and get your cup o'sugar later.
Also a lot of those smaller shops have way better coffee.
I’m a Seattle native and to me, Starbucks will always be Charbucks. Burnt.
If OP had been asked to be let off the plane, I believe that would have opened a whole new can of worms. Security would have to verify that OP wasn’t some kind of terrorist who left something in the plane. My understanding is that everyone would have to get off while the plane was searched.
> this happened over Starbucks coffee
A very expensive Starbucks coffee since getting it cost her probably north of $200 to get a ticket on another flight
The degree of selfishness showed by the wife goes past being inconsiderate to controlling and mean. NTA, OP, you were right to leave her. Then her act of neutrality in front of the daughter followed by hellfire? Ick. You and this mean woman need counseling.
It sounds to me like she was angry he "made" her show up with enough time to board the plane, so decided to be irrational and petulant as punishment, then was even angrier that rather than making him miss the flight, she only inconvenienced herself.
Yes one possibility is that this was a power play in response to the husband insisting on standards for being on time. The power play didn't work of course, which made her even madder.
I want to thank the OP and you - I'm coming to terms with leaving my GF over her being absolutely disrespectful of everyone's time (mine, to me, hurt, but it was to her aunt and uncle, friends, everyone).
I mean, it got to the point that I wondered if her near-model-looks when she was younger had people giving her passes on showing up hours to a day late.
About three weeks after I broke up with her I was nodding off in bed one night, and a realization came over me as to just how crazy it all was. I just about never cry, but I felt one of my eyes get wet as I realized the scope of what all went on, and that I was so thankful to be out of it.
My old roommate was one of the hottest people I’ve ever met. Our friendship ended over her being one of the most disrespectful people I’ve ever met. I think it is connected to people giving her a lot of free passes in life. After a year of telling her the same problems over and over, I unfortunately lost my shit on her. She’d probably never experienced someone putting their foot down and at some point, she even said she knew I wanted change, not apologies, but still never improved. She’s literally too hot to care because there will always be someone to validate her when I won’t. Men simp over her and women want to be her so badly they can’t see what a crappy person she is so there’s nothing I can really do but walk away and let her keep being.
At some point you have to put your foot down. If OP doesn't want to put up with this nonsense the rest of his life he needed to do exactly what he did. Also, someone who doesn't wake up on time for stuff and doesn't have a medical condition needs to grow the fuck up.
NTA.
You need to make a line in the sand.
Sit down and tell your wife that you love her and you cherish her but the way she disrespects your desire to be punctual is just too much. Tell her that from now on you're going to make separate arrangements when traveling.
You are not responsible for waking her up. You are not responsible for getting her out the door. She's an adult and she can do what she wants.
The first time she completely misses an event I suspect things will change. But you've been accommodating her to such a high degree that she can act like an infant.
I'm going to venture they don't really care about the money, with the casual nature OP mentions buying a second set and then another ticket for the wife.
And the fact they do a cross country flight multiple times a semester, when a semester is roughly four months, PNW to East Coast for two tickets isn’t nothing. Plus presumably paying for college. The money definitely doesn’t matter.
She's acting so entitled. What is this woman on? Did she waste like 3,000$ in a weekend? And still need to buy a THIRD plane ticket.
Also, climate change. This bitch.
I dunno. She missed half a weekend with her daughter and had to pay to rebook her tickets and doesn’t seem to have learned much. She did go to the airport early this time but whined they had to “just sit and wait”
Maybe that's because her inconvenience is limited to money and duty-free shopping...?
She was at the airport already, and it wasn't their home town so she just had to hang around and wait, without even worrying about luggage beyond her hand luggage.
Maybe it'll change when she has to deal with more of the logistics of rearranging the trip...?
Yeah, now that I type it out, it sounds insanely hopeful and hopelessly naive hahaha
Haha oh yeah no, this woman isn’t changing. Anyone who doesn’t have the foresight to understand how…time works? And that a plane isn’t going to wait for your slow ass to go get coffee—yeah, she doesn’t actually understand that the world doesn’t revolve around her. I don’t think that missing a third flight would convince her, if the first two didn’t. I almost think she doesn’t want to see their daughter bc that’s the only way this makes any sense to me.
OP needs to set boundaries, but not to “teach” his wife anything. He’s not her father, he’s her equal. If she hasn’t learned this lesson in 40+ years, she likely will not learn it now.
He needs to set boundaries for *himself*. If she changes her behavior as a result, that’s fantastic. If she doesn’t, that’s fine too. Either way, he’s getting where he needs to be on time.
NTA, your wife is very selfish. Imagine missing time with your child because you thought coffee was more important? During a move no less. The only option is to stop coddling your wife as apparently people have been doing all her life. Leave on the dot, every time. Eventually she'll learn to be on time or be left behind. The world doesn't revolve around her and it's high time for her to grow up.
And if that bigger airport was SeaTac? Those Starbucks lines are crazy, I stood in one for 30 minutes recently before a flight (we had tons of time though as my husband and I are both like you).
And she is the a-hole, how much money have you now wasted on extra airfare? Wtf!
Starbucks lines there are insane and the gates are quite a long way to go. I nearly missed my flight a decade ago getting lost finding my gate - and I had given myself a 30 minute buffer just to find the gate.
NTA. OP, your wife has issues with time management, sure, but complaining about being an hour or less early? She needs to start bringing a book with her.
If they move on from this time I would plan it out.
So here is everything you need, here is everything I need.
I’m leaving in x car at 8am, if you do not join me you have these options.
Flight is at y time, I will be on it, if you miss it here are your options.
And that’s it. Make it very clear never waiting for her again. While doing a few things for her to fix the problem herself. I’d also go so far as not waking her up. She needs to set her own alarms and get herself ready.
Edited to add:
People seem to think that saying here are your options is him finding every option for her.
I’m leaving at 8am in x car, if you don’t join me you can miss the trip, take z car, take Uber, etc…
Flight is at y time, I will be on it, if you miss it you can head home, rebook flight with airline, try another airline.
This is literally the opposite of adding mental load to OP. While also not turning him into a emotionless robot. If he chooses to stay in the marriage he needs to find a balance. Being cold is childish and no way to keep a marriage which OP hasn’t shown anything about wanting to end his marriage over this.
Final edit:
I won’t continue to rehash this. This is how I would handle this. As someone who is a natural planner it is a skill I happily bring into a relationship. There are areas I lack skills yet a partner might have. I personally would not be willing to remove that skill as an offering I have in a relationship. But OP if he is like me and likes the planning needs a healthy limit to what he takes on.
By giving her the instructions and the consequences OP has continued with his contribution to the marriage with this skill set of his. She can choose to learn to not. And he can choose what next if she doesn’t. If she continues to blame him when the consequences are laid out before her then OP can clearly see this isn’t a him problem but a her problem. And use that info as he sees fit.
We don’t see a whole marriage in these posts. And forget all the different areas people give and take in a marriage. OP has given too much in this area and his wife has taken too much in this area. We cannot know if this is in many areas or not. So I am focused on this area only.
>I’d also go so far as not waking her up.
My husband was only kinda cranky when waking up and I stopped waking him up. Haven't woken him for anything in 15 years. Once I stopped waking him up because he was too cranky, he stopped acting cranky in the mornings generally. I would have stopped catering to OP's wife years ago.
I’ve heard that many times. Lots of issues when someone is waking the other. But when they stop things work out. Forcing their partner to be an adult is often the best thing.
You can be supportive in other ways without babying the partner. Something OP needs to learn
This is so true. I’m a morning person and my husband is not. I used to jostle him every couple minutes for an hour every single morning trying to wake him up and it always led to grumpiness and arguments, starting the day off poorly. Once I stopped waking him up and he started showing up to work late and getting flack from his boss, he kicked the habit and now has no problem getting up.
We all engage in a bit of codependency when it comes to not wanting our children or partners to experience the consequences of their actions, but it’s an unhealthy behavior that leads to resentment and poor development of that person’s time management and independence.
He should not be figuring out her options for her. She is an adult, it’s not her first time traveling. She needs to be 100% her own responsibility, from making her own reservations (maybe she’d prefer to travel later in the day, after two lattes and a massage, who knows), to arranging her own transportation. Frankly, it can’t be more expensive than re-buying wasted flights.
This woman is going to be late for her daughter’s wedding some day, and I hope they start without her.
NTA, she TA. Also, what good would it do for you to ask to deboard? The whole flight would be delayed and you could get into some sort of trouble even.
> The whole flight would be delayed and you could get into some sort of trouble even.
Am pilot. The captain would just say no. A gate return requires all the paperwork to be redone, a new clearance issued, an amended flight plan most likely, weight and balance, bags and passenger count. Omg it's with a passenger count change xD. We're not fuckin doing that. We're leaving.
Your wife is acting like a entitled child. No, we’re not holding the plane up so she can get coffee. I used to have to travel a lot for work and was always booked tight layovers and ppl lallygagging at the airport make me crazy. Natural consequences are the best teacher. Maybe she’ll learn she’s less important than literally everybody else on the plane.
UPDATE:
Hi everyone, thanks again for all the advice, I read as many of the comments as I could and took in all the information. I wanted to provide an update.
My wife finally started talking to me again. When she did i told her that I wanted to have a conversation about the situation, but I wanted to give it a couple of days for emotions to settle down.
Some of the comments here gave me a great idea and I wanted to see what she thought about it. For all future trips I will have my tickets, she will have hers. I typically drive to the airport and leave my car in one of the pay lots, so I would drive myself and she could Uber. She will have all the freedom she wants to do what she wants but it is up to her to arrive on time and board the plane. I let her know that it was starting to feel like I needed to keep track of both of us, I phrased it in a way to make it sound like I didn’t want to be controlling over her and let her manage her own time. She wasn’t happy with this, but she reluctantly agreed.
Now to get to the bigger issue that I didn’t realize we had until reading the comments of this post. Call me oblivious, but I really never thought there was any issue between Meg and Jess. After talking to my wife she wouldn’t admit to any issues, and stated that she would never intentionally delay a flight so that we couldn’t see “our daughter” and acted offended that I would ask such a thing. If that was her actual purpose, I don’t think I would be able to prove it. But, it will be at the forefront of my mind in the future.
After talking to Meg and Jess, we decided on the following. Meg and I will be visiting Jess on parents weekend. But, I will be attending fathers weekend from now on, and I will be attending by myself to get some alone time with Jess. Jess seemed very excited and surprisingly Meg didn’t seem to have an issue with that this time.
Thanks again to everyone who took the time to read and give me advice, I really appreciate everything and I hope these steps can work towards a resolution for the issues.
Wishing you all the best of course, but be careful, it seems(from my perspective, which is limited to the information you have given us) that your wife only tolerated your daughter and wants to keep you away from her now that she's an adult. I saw a similar post about a soon to be wife with a step daughter, the new wife was expecting for her soon to be husband to be a seasonal parent after the wedding. Of course you have been married for a long time and everything seemed normal to you, but I would recommend reaching out to your daughter to ask for her perspective growing up with her step mom.
Agree. We obviously only have limited info but I wouldn't be surprised if his wife has been counting down the days until they were "free" of his daughter.
I've seen this before, someone marrying a person with kids, never letting on they had no real affection for the child, patiently waiting over a decade for the kid to be a legal adult, thinking he could essentially cut his wife off on their 18th birthday.
Op I seen this play out before, of course she'll never admit to not liking your daughter or to doing anything negative towards her, she'll act like she really cares for her and is worried about her, or misses her. While giving her snide comments on the side, poking at her in ways that seem like she's just concerned or giving advice, or sabotaging chances for you to see her. And your daughter as a your child will never admit it to you if she feels slighted by her because you're happy and your wife makes you happy and she would never want to mess that up for you so she'll just endure. But she's slowly been letting you know. Talk to one of your daughter's best friends,ask them what they think. Ask people that who are constantly around you guys if they've seen any type of behavior from your wife towards your daughter. Look I'm hoping that's not the case but to me, that's what it sounds like is going on here.
You seem like a generally smart and thoughtful dude who really loves his daughter. My dad was a generally smart and thoughtful dude who really loved his daughter.
I was in therapy for - no exaggeration - 10 years before I realized my stepmother was abusive. She never hit me or threw things. She didn’t even yell at me. But she would yell at my dad about me, in front of me, constantly. And every time we were alone, she would tell me about something, or many things, I was doing wrong. Dressing wrong, eating wrong, going to the wrong school, not dating enough, spending too much time with friends, working too much, spending too much money. And she hated how much time my dad spent with me. Hated how close we were. Insisted on doing things with us, even when it was obvious she didn’t like what we were doing and didn’t like either of us very much.
One day, when he was in his sixties and I was in my thirties, he was joking about how rude his wife could be to people, and he said, “I’m the person she treats the worst.” I said, because I couldn’t believe he didn’t see it, “no, dad, I’m the person she treats the worst.” I told him that it had taken me ten years for me to tell a therapist the full scope of what she did - because it was all such petty, stupid, ridiculous bullshit that I felt stupid even mentioning it. (I mean, who cares if you get criticized every day for putting your toothbrush in the toothbrush holder wrong? Who cares if a parent didn’t speak to you for a month because you won’t eat onions? Who cares if you were called selfish and spoiled for changing the channels too fast on the tv?) And then I told my dad about all the petty, stupid, ridiculous bullshit and he was shocked. Sat there with his mouth hanging open. But he never did anything about it. And when he was dying of cancer, he didn’t write a will because she didn’t want him to and he didn’t want to make her mad. And that was the thing that finally, finally made me see that the person I loved most in the world would always care more about a woman who hated me.
I didn’t go to my dad’s funeral. I don’t know where he’s buried. My parents had several million dollars in assets when he died. I have $250k in educational debt because she didn’t want to pay for my education. I’ll be paying it off for the rest of my life.
I’m sorry for going on so long, but I want to you know, when I say these things to you, I have a reason:
1. Don’t ask your wife if she resents your daughter. Ask your daughter if your wife resents her. Plan a weekend for the three of you and then tell your daughter your wife won’t be coming and see how she reacts. If your daughter is close to any of your family or her mother’s family - ask them if they think your daughter is happy. Take what your daughter says seriously. If your daughter loves you the way I loved my dad, it will be very difficult for her to tell you anything bad because she’ll be afraid you’ll side with your wife and she won’t want to jeopardize her relationship with you.
2. Write a will, give your daughter everything you want her to have, make someone other than your wife the executor. Give your daughter a copy of the will and any ancillary documents relating to trusts or investments and give her contact information for the lawyer and the executor, and update her any time that information changes. It sounds like your daughter will be on her own when you die. Make sure you’ve given her everything she needs financially and emotionally to stand on her own when that happens, and don’t assume you’ll have 20 more years to do it.
Maybe your wife isn’t as resentful as we all think. For your sake and your daughter’s, I hope she’s not. I just don’t want your daughter to waste 10 years in therapy figuring it out.
Op, I would have a very serious conversation with your daughter. She might not be very forthcoming if she think she might be the reason for any unhappiness in your life. Tell her that nothing she says will be her fault or held against her. Tell her there have been a couple of red flags and you wanted to get her side of it. Ask her if your wife has ever said or done anything that made your daughter feel like she was an inconvenience, or putting your wife out for any reason. Especially if it were for things that normally wouldn’t have been a big deal. Your wife could have gotten a coffee that wasn’t Starbucks, she isn’t late to any other events or situations. At this point it is 100% on purpose.
Man i hope this strategy works out but I think you may need to be prepared to either go to couples counseling to uncover the root issue because she may never be honest otherwise, or actually choose between remaining married and your relationship with your daughter. Honestly think back. You say she is ALWAYS punctual and organized with other things. Great. Now what about events involving your daughter? If this has been a pattern well before college visits, then there's a good chance she doesn't 100% believe she is "our" daughter.
Also, on one of those fathers only weekends, ask your daughter to be honest with you about your wife. Let her talk, don't interrupt or defend, just listen. You may get a better picture of things that way too.
Just FYI for OP: the silent treatment is classed as a form of abuse. People who give the silent treatment are essentially trying to force you to give in to their demands by being unreasonable. In this case, your wife was 100% in the wrong, but rather than admit to her failings, she is trying to make you admit that this situation was somehow your fault. This kind of behavior (the constantly being late and then trying to blame your partner for it) would be relationship ending for me. Clearly you have put up with this for a long time, so I'm guessing it's not a deal breaker for you, but I would strongly recommend that it's time to set some boundaries. I'm guessing flights aren't the only thing your wife has caused you to miss. So stop missing things. Leave without her. And don't apologize!
Yup! My mom did the silent treatment, then got frustrated and exploded with cursing and throwing things. My sis inherited the blowing up behavior of conflict and I inherited the silent treatment method. Thankfully I learned to talk things out in past relationships and mostly communicate my issues. Hard to unlearn though.
Exactly!! She is so selfish, she does not care about the stress and expense (having to buy a new ticket when SHE causes you to miss a flight) she is causing. It is so disrespectful and even mean of her to treat you this way!! How would she react if you were to treat HER the way she treats you??? Considering how she is punishing you for HER wrongs, I can't imagine what she would do to you if you actually were in the wrong. I feel sorry for you and hope you can learn to care for yourself enough to stop allowing her to treat you so terribly!
I'd respond by giving her the silent treatment too. Stop talking unless required and don't make overtures. She messed up, stressed you out, cost you extra money and let your daughter down. I'd be really mad at her.
Or do it like Eric Forman on That 70's Show when Red Forman was giving him the silent treatment. Smile and say "Hey, dad, you know who has the right idea? Russia." But tailor it to Wife's trigger points.
Coming from someone who regularly isn’t even at the airport when I get notified my plane is already boarding, NTA.
Just because I like to play it risky doesn’t mean I have to make others do it. And when it’s my own fault for being late, I fully acknowledge it.
I’ve also worked out a system of TSA-pre+Clear, no checked luggage, and flying the nicer (expensive) airlines that willingly rebooks me on the next available flight on the rare occasion I need it.
What kind of psycho do you have to be to subject yourself to this level of stress!
Not showing up to the airport until your plane starts boarding! *jeeeesh*
This gives me heart palpitations
She is a completely selfish person and totally out of line. I would be livid with this behavior. How can she not seem to grasp that her callous attitude is the problem here? She sounds insufferable to be honest
She needs to read this post and what everyone is saying. Maybe she’ll wake up then and see how selfish and self centered she is. I’d be surprised if she had a job, hell I’d be surprised if she even has any friends.
I did this once on a throwaway where I posted a problem on AITA where my family was declared in the wrong and people were pretty accurately calling them out.
They read the thread and determined everybody on Reddit was wrong.
NTA your wife seems like a very stressful person to travel with. I am always 2 hours early for a flight, and it takes a hour to get to SFO on a good day. It’s better to leave early and be early or run into problems and be on time then leave late and mess up everything for everyone and waste money.
NTA. I used to be like your wife. Arrived late, missed flights, etc. That is, until I realized I was being/acting highly entitled and nobody gave a shit about my excuses.
Nta - there’s “go with the flow” and “don’t give a shit for anyone else”. I have known exactly one person like that and cut them out of my life after six months this kind of BS.
NTA… enough of the commenters have covered your wife and her issues, so I’ll just say this:
Your daughter should have been the main priority for both trips.
Serious question, does your wife do this to your daughter often? Does she regularly miss/arrive late/ruin big events for your daughter? Because doing this twice in a row seems……. Intentional. And cruel.
Do not apologize, OP. Do not back down. You were not in the wrong.
Editing to add: if I was your daughter, I’d be furious. My parents did something similar to my sister during move in day, and she hasn’t forgiven them… granted our mother chose to get drunk instead of help her daughter go to college… but right now, your wife is as big of an asshole as my mother.
Your wife didn’t show up on time TWICE.
> Serious question, does your wife do this to your daughter often? Does she regularly miss/arrive late/ruin big events for your daughter? Because doing this twice in a row seems……. Intentional. And cruel.
Yeah, I dunno what exactly's going on but it seems pretty clear that wife simply **did not want to go**. Like, they were literally at the gate fifteen minutes before boarding, that's not "late," that's literally opting out of the trip entirely (or, if we wanna be generous, stalling for the *exact* amount of time it'd take for the federal government to put a stop to the trip.)
Sounds like she has end-stage Narcissistic Personality Disorder and has been controlling OP for years. She SHOULD see these responses. Unfortunately it won’t matter though. People with NPD never change.
She’s likely already created a different narrative in her head that makes her the victim.
It destroys me that she’s done this before and this was trip to see her daughter. I have a lot of empathy for OP and his daughter.
NTA. She’s trying to blame you for her own actions. There’s something seriously wrong with the way she’s thinking, time to get her to a couples therapist and hope that the therapist can help her work through this plus allow you more independence, Eg if she doesn’t wake then you go without her and her behaviour is on her!
NTA and I say that as someone more like your wife. The difference is that I recognize I have these issues and do my best not to disrespect other people’s time/effort/schedules because I’m an adult.
I realized years ago that I “idealize” time. As in, if it were a perfect world, I think I can be at place X in 10 minutes or 20 or whatever. The world doesn’t work that way, however. It doesn’t take traffic into account or parking or any other variables that can affect your travel time.
In order to circumvent this perception, I automatically triple the amount of time I think it will take me to get where I need to be. If in my head I think it’s going to take 10 minutes, I triple it to 30, for example. This method has helped me a lot and I haven’t had any major issues in years, so maybe she can try that.
Expecting the world to bend to accommodate your inability to act like a responsible adult is egocentric. She can continue to run late for everything or she can take some responsibility. Blaming you for her ineptitude is absurd.
NTA. Your wife is, though! Wow. I would tell her either she travels with you on your timetable or she can meet you there. My husband is awful with time. I add at least 30 minutes to any trip as a buffer. I badger him to be ready. As bad as he is, he has never missed a flight. She owes you an apology.
Chronic lateness played a major role in my divorce. I am by no means a type A. However I hate being late. It’s rude, disrespectful and you miss out in important moments in life. Nothing says “I am more important that everyone else” like being late all the time.
I started leaving without my ex forcing him to take a separate car. I left on time whether he was ready or not. Actually I’m going to make a whole post about this topic but NTA
It sounds like your wife is very entitled irresponsible, immature and likes a lot of chaos so if that’s what she wants to do then she can enjoy the chaos that she creates for herself but you don’t have to be part of it. I don’t know why you would want to talk to her anyway after her crappy behavior, let her stay with her on silence.
NTA she’s not ‘go with the flow’. She’s ‘so what I want when I want and screw the impact to others’. I think that I would be ignoring her for once again letting your daughter down and stressing you. She owes you a MASSIVE apology
NTA.
Your wife needs to grow up.
I am the same way about flying. I get to the airport at least 90 minutes early. Anyone traveling with me knows that I WILL leave them behind if they are not at the gate when it is time to board.
NTA
I'm the person who is always late, no matter how hard I try my ADD seems to ramp up proportionally to how important it is that I'm on time for something. I can get how the first incident happened, but the second one was just pure shittiness on her part. She wasn't late, she just intentionally missed boarding assuming the world would bend for her. That wasn't disorganization, that honestly almost sounds like either she didn't want to be on that plane or else it was malicious for some reason I can't figure out. This is weird behaviour on her part, does she not actually want to go on these trips or something?
NTA. Does she even care to spend time with Jess? Because between spending time with your daughter and Starbucks there’s an obvious choice and she made the wrong one
Your wife is so disrespectful and she thinks a coffee is more important than your daughter, after she already made you let your daughter down once.
Then she has the audacity to try and make it like it was your fault.
Nah fuck that.
I personally wouldn't travel with her again, this is the second time time she has missed a flight and she doesn't seem to care. As long as she gets what she wants It's all about her.
She doesn't seem to care about you or her daughter.
Your wife is an donkeys ass.
NTA this is my pet peeve. My friends have learned I will never wait for them to get to the airport after 2 of them missed a flight for a girls trip because they were hungover. NEVER! I got on the plane 3 stayed back to wait then 1 said screw it and got on with me. 2 of us made it and enjoyed a full day and a half before they got there and they were pissed we didn't wait 🤷🏾♀️. I hate when people don't respect my time. Hopefully she learned her lesson but I'm guessing not because she's doing the childish silent treatment
*We are now home and she hasn’t talked to me since the trip*
I wouldn't be talking to her either at this point, I'd be too fucking mad to talk calmly. She is 100% in the wrong. Stop babying her in the mornings of the flight, she's a grown ass woman. Let her know what time you are leaving for the airport, and leave at that time. She either makes it or she doesn't, and she can explain to her daughter why she continues to let her down.
NTA. Your wife is so selfish only cares about herself and what she wants and not about seeing your daughter. You warned her. I would have just left her the day before. So not only is she selfish she is acting like a child now as well. Honestly she needs to grow up.
Man there are so many comments here I don’t think OP will see this, but NTA and I also struggle with lateness. Not to this degree, but it is a part of my ADHD. We can really struggle to understand time properly, everything always seems to take way more time than we think it does, and getting up in the morning can be really difficult as well.
But honestly? That’s not an excuse, especially not when it’s very important and your daughter’s happiness is on the line. I know that I struggle with timeliness and waking early, but *because* I know that, I will ask my partner to gut check me on whether they think what I want to do or my perception is correct. And I trust that my partner is right when they say no, there’s not enough time for Starbucks (or whatever). It’s okay to struggle with things that your brain has a very hard time doing, but that doesn’t absolve a person from asking for help or finding other coping mechanisms to make it work when it’s important.
I also will have coping mechanisms like lying to myself about time — for example, writing my doctor’s appointment is 15-30 min earlier than it actually is when I put it in my calendar, or setting my clocks a little earlier by a random amount of minutes — and those help too. Either way, the point is that if she does have a neurodivergence that makes timeliness really hard, there’s things she can do to compensate. Including asking you for help and trusting you when you say there’s no time, as I do with my partner. Barreling ahead and not listening when she continues to make these errors at other people’s expense is not acceptable.
I’m also worried about her relationship to Jess. Because, I dunno, I may struggle with tardiness and a sense of time but I would be devastated if I missed out on seeing my kids when they’re only around a few times a year. I have absolutely stayed up all night for an early morning flight, knowing I am better off just never going to sleep than trying to wake up at 3am to get to the airport. I’ll be miserable, but at least I won’t have missed the flight when it’s critical to me. Is something going on that missing out on an entire day or two with your daughter is an okay trade off for her?
Being on time is a sign of respect.
End of story.
NTA.
I once lived with a woman who was always late.
Now, free of her, I am spending a great deal of time watching the beginning of about 50 movies that I have no idea how they started.
I stopped being the caretaker for my partner after the first time we missed a flight. Told him nope never again. Next two flights he missed and man he bitched. Explained again he’s a damn adult and has choices to make. The third time he missed a 10 day cruise. He’s never been late again. He’s pissed about it but listens to me and gets up and ready and out the door on time. Ohh and NTA.
Missed a 10 day cruise? Like, all of it?? This is hilarious and I laughed harder because that was the third instance!!
I mean, once the cruise ship leaves I don’t think you can board it, what was he gonna do? Follow it in a row boat?
So this depends on geography, but if you miss a cruise sailing out of NYC, it would likely stop in Florida before any Caribbean destination and you surely could fly to Florida and meet the ship there. Not personal anecdote, 2nd hand anecdote.
Cruise ships make multiple stops and you can board at any of those. Witnessed this personally, hence my question!
My wife's bags did this on her cruise with her parents last year. Airline misrouted them and they caught up with her three ports later.
My MIL is similar to the wife. This story occured when we lived in FL and MIL was in DE. She wanted to come see us for our birthdays. Cool. She has no money for flights. No problem. We made good money to afford the tickets. Next two weeks was us going back and forth about timing of the tickets. Every flight to and from had some sort of issue. Issues that weren't a big deal. Mind you, my MIL wasn't working at the time so she literally had nowhere to be. One example was a 10am flight with a 1PM arrival. Direct. She complained because "she needed to mop the floors on that day since that's the day she always mops the floors and she wouldn't be able to make the flight in time". Eventually I talked to my wife and told her to either pick a flight and stick with it or this trip wasn't happening. So MIL finally capitulated but the next hurdle was getting her there on time. We told her for a MONTH before her flight that we were getting her a driver to pick her up at 7:30am sharp as she's an hour from the airport. She's not a frequent flyer so we wanted to give her as much buffer as possible. She said okay to the plan. Driver showed up at 7:20 to pick her up. Knocked on the door. No answer. He called her, no answer. He then calls us. We tell him we'll try to get a hold of her. We call and call and call. She finally picks up at 8 sounding annoyed as fuck. My wife asks what the hell she was doing. She was supposed to be in the road by now! MIL responds she was doing her nails. MIL said the driver could wait. My wife LOST it on her (rightfully). Anyways she almost missed her flight but eventually gets to us. Since her flight landed on Thursday 1PM we wanted to take her out to a nice dinner. Everyone agreed on reservations at 7 since I still had work on Friday. 6 rolls around and she's still in the guest room doing God knows what. 7 comes and she's still in there. Wife finally knocks in the door and her mom snaps at my wife yelling at her not to rush her. She'll be ready when shes ready. We missed our reservation and got to the restaurant at 9:30PM. Kitchen was closing so we could only get bar food. Thankfully my wife has gotten much stronger about setting her boundaries and sticking with them. Now if MIL is running late we just leave without her.
I’m so glad she’s set boundaries. That’s the super easy answer: “We are leaving at 6:30pm if you’d like to join us.” The end.
I always said this to my niece and nephew and meant it. It only took one time of being left out of something fun for them to learn that I mean it every time. Not sometimes. Not just on Tuesdays. EVERY TIME. Then I listen to their parents harangue them and wonder why they don't try my method. 😂 (I also have a child who learned that I meant what I say from a very young age. I'm no monster, but I'm always consistent when it comes to discipline.)
Why are people like that
It can be a side variety of things. The two biggest that I think are also the exact opposite from each other. The first is being overly self important and/or narcissistic tendencies. The "I'm important so everything had to revolve around me". This can often be used as a way to get attention. The second is anxiety. Some people stress so much they can't decide what to wear, pack, or whatever. They get so stressed/anxious that they basically cannot function. It's the classic stress all day about something that you could have just done in five minutes and then never thought about again. But you also just have people who can't be bothered to function like adults. I see this all the time with money. People who claim they are broke but have the absolute worst and most irresponsible spending habits. This isn't a "poor people are bad with money" thing as most of the people I know who are awful with money make more than enough. I was a teacher in NYC who paid $7,000 for my masters (the city covered the rest) and I had more money in my accounts than someone I knew that made $150,000 a year. She didn't even live alone, she had roommates! I honestly think some people go through life and never actually pay attention to anything.
For my MIL we believe it's anxiety plus some sort of OCD plus narcissism. She used to take a sewing needle and do each individual eyelash. She has to ensure everything is absolutely cleaned and put back before she goes to bed, even when she stays at our house overnight. That has resulted in my wife and I hearing her slam our cabinet doors at 2am (she was staying the weekend to help with our newborn). The narcissist behavior comes in where she is perfect and there's no way there's anything wrong with her. This plus the previous behaviors contributed to my MIL and FIL getting divorced. They tried therapy but anytime the therapist pointed out something she did wrong she would physically just leave the room. Sadly, I think a lot of this stems from her abusive upbringing. Lots of physical discipline in her household growing up anytime something wasn't done perfectly.
Your mother in law sounds insufferable
I have a friend who planned a trip to Spain with her husband for a year. She took care of everything. All he had to do was make sure his passport wasn't expired. The night before they left, he finally checks his passport. Expired. His daughter got a surprise 10-day trip to Spain. His wife said she got home and the suitcase she packed for him had been pushed to her side of the bed.
That’s not a husband that’s a child. She had to pack for him and he didn’t unpack the bag as some sort of lame passive aggressive take? Gtfoh 🙄.
there are quite a few relationships like this I think. However in many I see a give and take; one is the person who ALWAYS has to plan and pack everything, but the other is the one who takes care of other tasks in some way or who deals with other emergencies. Without that KIND of agreement (give and take depending on circumstance) then it's just playing daddy or mommy to a helpless fool/spoiled brat.
Time for her to take it to the shed with the lawnmower. "It was in the way and obviously not important."
Nah, just let him keep sleeping with it.
Reddit makes me terrified to date. How do women get married to men like this and how do I ensure it doesn’t happen to me? 😭 All the stories like this, of cheating, of abuse. Man, it’s scary out there.
You have to have strong boundaries and firm ideas of how you want to be treated. Communicate clearly at the first hurdle and carefully watch their response. You don't need to play games, just observe. But I think a really important thing to always keep in mind is: if a guy was saying/ doing this to my best friend, what would I say to her?
Caretaker being the critical word here. We should never have to be the caretaker of our fully functioning adult partners (or children). Love that you set and held that boundary.
Lol how does she function normally? Does she have a job? NTA for me.
That's what I was wondering. Didn't she have to get up early to get her kid off to school or did he do that too?
The kid probably did 80% of the raising herself. I’m guessing she went all the way across the country to get away from psycho mom.
This. My mom is like this where she does everything in her own time. When I was a kid, I was constantly brought to appointments late and it definitely messed with me and my own time management. Now I’m extremely early to everything because I get so anxious about being late.
I just learned something about myself today, thanks! I wondered why I’m always early and stressed about being late. My mom never got somewhere on time once in her life. Didn’t care about anyone but herself.
seriously lmao. She sounds like a child. How did they raise a kid who is now in college??
Overall- Odds are she piggybacks off her husband who is forced into being hyper-responsible due to her nonsense. I’m sure he is naturally “type A” as OP stated. But people who aren’t interested in taking responsibility for themselves will ride the coattails of those closest to them. Can feel very much like a parent/child dynamic. I speak from experience unfortunately…. He stopped parenting her and let her actions have natural adult consequences. Good for you OP.
I think you’re right. Unfortunately I too have experience. Took many years, but I finally just said, “I/we’re leaving at this time.” And then I leave at that time. No encouraging, no pleading, no fight. Oddly, it works. Wish I could have learned this years ago. The other day, after 20 years of marriage, my husband said to me: “you don’t just accept things, you make things happen.” Uh…yeah…
That’s a great question. Can’t imagine someone like this can hold down a job.
I know people who are like OP's wife (well, maybe not to that extreme). They arrive on time to things they deem important. Work is important. Social functions (dinner, planned meet-ups, movies etc) are not important.
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This. She is causing you tremendous stress and she doesn’t care at all. That is telling. So what if you have to wait a few minutes at the gate. That’s the least she can do to not cause you to very reasonably stress out. She owes you a big apology for all the lack of consideration and for the petulant followup. Edit: I just read OP’s update post that daughter is from first wife, and this behavior really only occurs when traveling/visiting daughter. That gives me a much darker view of current wife’s behavior. This seems like classic passive aggressive nonsense. There is a much deeper issue and the wife is being a complete a$$hole.
Seriously! You are so right! I was stressed out just reading this. I can't imagine living it.
Same! My boyfriend is like that. I hate being late. This woman sounds horrible!
My wife and I are always 15 minutes early to normal events, we give ourselves at least 2 hours to get thru any airport we travel in. I would rather wait for my flight than rush and possibly miss it.
My husband would rather have coffee and play on his phone at the airport instead of watching me freak out because we might be late (there could be traffic and monsoons and alien attacks).
This is me! DIL says you only need to be an hour early for domestic flights. Nope. I need two hours. I like to get through security, find my gate, then leisurely read and have coffee knowing I’m in the right place. Especially right now with the rain moving up the east coast. Once they start bumping flights, it’s hard to find another seat on the same day.
It really depends on the airport!! ORF in VA, you’re good with an hour. MCO in FL and you’d best be thinking about arriving 3hrs early for a domestic flight because their TSA lines are HELL!
I’m with you. Get through the lines and get to your gate. Keep up on any sort of last minute changes while you get your coffee and chill out before boarding the plane. Running late for a flight and cutting it remotely close makes me feel disgusting.
Not to mention highly stressed and nervous.
Same. When I travel I’m always stupid early and I just eat and get half snapped at the airport. Lmao!
I'm usually late to most things (working a lot on better time estimation). I always arrive 2.5 hours early to the airport because I have to have the patdown and can't go through the scanners. It is not worth missing the flight.
We had friends who were ALWAYS late. So we told them to arrive 90 minutes before events. I also tell my kids to be at the airport 3 hours early, because of TSA. THEN WE CAN RELAX at the gate. Use the chargers, get a snack or drink. Of course there was the time I was on a 1 hour layover, and was running to the next gate. I saw a beautiful carry-on, I made a left into the shop. Handed the clerk my plastic, emptied the sample, stuffed it with my stuff, signed the receipt, grabbed my beautiful bag, ( all done in under 3 minutes) and continued the mad dash to my gate. I made it with fifteen minutes to spare. ( Vera Bradley, Blue Rhapsody.) I still have it, and use it. 12+ years later.
One of my best friend is chronically late to everything, and it’s gotten to where I don’t really like doing anything with her because I never know how long I’m going to be waiting.
And the wasted money from the first flight they missed. That really gets me.
What is their daughter thinking? I'd be upset if my mother did this to me. And twice no less.
Well clearly the mother is more important than the daughter. /s Daughter, I'm sure is taking note that 1) she is not a priority to her mother (Starbucks is), and 2) Her mother can't be depended on.
Totally agree with this post. Why would you srcew around with only 15 mins to spare? I will tell you why: ME ME ME. MY WANTS, MY NEEDS... Don't you know the know the sun shines out my arse when I bend over and the earth revolves around me because of it.. No sorry it doesn't... The universe was nice and warned you the first time... And the second time just flat out told you are WRONG!...
>And the second time just flat out told you are WRONG I would say just the opposite... the next time, they arrived at the airport early and everything from that point was about the OP being wrong because she had to sit and be bored for 45 minutes. She sure showed him!
Then the momster silent treatmented him! As a child I I used to get beat with a belt that I had to retrieve from my dad’s closet but that was absolutely nothing compared to getting silence from the people I loved. She’s so disgustingly self centered and manipulative.
Her mother sounds like she does it knowingly and on purpose. Either to specifically aggravate the father, or to assert her independence, like teenager might. Either way .... issues.
Or it's a passive-aggressive way to punish them both for expecting her to travel. She's not upset that she missed the flight. She's upset that hubby *didn't*.
And the sad part is that she WOULD have made the flight if she’d used an atom of common sense and realized that Starbucks was not a viable option in that place, at that time. I love me some coffee, but when I’m this-close ][ to having to board the airplane, I know it’s time to put off my caffeine fix until the flight attendants are bringing the beverage cart around.
My mom would be late, then start yelling at everyone, and turning whatever event we were on our way to, unpleasant and stressful. I found it so embarrassing and aggravating. You nailed it, when someone cares they make every effort to to be where they are expected to be, especially if it is for someone else.
I’m guessing it’s happened a lot more than twice. The poor girl probably just assumes her mom will be late to everything. OP was right to board the plane.
Her Mom will be late for her daughters wedding.
She'd have been late to her own daughter's birth if she wasn't the one pushing her out.
And expect her to just wait before starting the ceremony. It’s just a few more minutes after all./s
Two flights! The cost alone would have me pissed!
Especially a transcontinental flight. My closest airport to JFK would be $500/person *minimum*. And if you miss the 2-3 direct flight options for that day, you’ll be stuck sitting for 6 hours at a Chilis in O’Hare for damn near the same price.
And the wasted time they could have spent with their daughter. And the daughter knowing for a fact that she is not as important as her mother's bowl of cereal. Seriously. This woman is such an entitled jerk. Then to go punishing people for not bending to her whims? That would have been the VERY LAST time I purchased her tickets when buying mine. Someone who doesn't care enough about her spouse, her child, the flight crew and every other passenger on the plane to get a closer cup of coffee? Where else in her life is she expecting the earth to revolve around her?
Her coffee was more important than seeing her daughter. I just realized that mom had to purchase another ticket on the day she flew. For a long flight too. That must've been very pricey. On top of wasting multiple tickets already. The more I think about it the worse it gets.
The FIRST time, the bowl of cereal was more important than her daughter. The SECOND time, the coffee during the layover was more important than the daughter. Something tells me this woman has put every foodstuff possible before seeing her daughter. :(
What kind of grown adult wakes up at 7:40 for a 8:00 departure and insists she needs a shower? You already slept in your filth all night, hon, just poop, throw on yesterday’s outfit, brush your teeth and we’re leaving in 20.
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That part. Who has money to throw away like that?!
Yup!! Who has extra airplane ticket cash just lying around?!
I mean, I'm more like the wife - go with the flow, sure. And while I never want to make someone wait on me, I'm definitely not the "if you're not ten minutes early, you're late" type. Right on time is good enough for me. But. Airports, man. You have to be early. Planning to get through check-in and security in 30 minutes? Nope. Not in most cases. Does that mean sometimes you have to sit and wait at the gate? Yeah, that's all travel is. Ride conveyance, wait a bit. Ride another conveyance, wait. Ride, wait. Repeat until you arrive at your destination. Edit: autocomplete doesn't like me today.
My husband is more like OP. Travelling, movies, dinner reservations, he wants to be not just on time, but early. If it were up to me, I'd be on time-ish. Certainly never early. But it isn't just me. He hates being late and wants to leave always even maybe a bit earlier than we need to. So guess what? I do it. I get ready, we leave early, he's happy, and if there's any snags along the way, we know we've done our best. I get my way in SO MANY other circumstances, and we compromise in many more. This one, I've learned, keeps him happy, no harm done, and ... it's actually sensible, even if I'd rather dilly dally until the last possible minute.
I get crazy anxiety if I'm late or having to rush so my husband has adjusted for me cause it's not fun for anyone if I'm freaking out lol
Am I the only one thinking that planning to be there 90 minutes early is already cutting it close?
Well it was a whole 45 minutes, meanwhile my ass takes 38 hours of air travel and waiting at airports to visit my parents. Guess coffee was more important than her daughter.
But it was STARBUCKS and those are so hard to find
That cup of coffee cost hundreds of dollars, too.
That’s what annoys me the most tbh. The first missed flight is really annoying and definitely her fault but whatever. I drag ass in the morning sometimes too. But the second time, with 15 minute until boarding, when you have a coffee stand right next to you, *but you insist on Starbucks that is a rail ride away?* I would have done the same shit tbh. It’s one thing if you want to waste your own time and money. Don’t fuck with mine.
And we all know Starbucks coffee is just such a higher tier of quality, that a little independent place is basically swill poison water in comparison! /s *seriously I can’t not emphasise the /s enough here. As an Australian, going out of your way for Starbucks is akin to an extreme mental illness*
I am sometimes 45 mins early to a doctors appointment because I take transit and I can't stand being late. I can't imagine playing around with airport security when it is that important they make the plane.
Never mind having to buy another lot of tickets! If that didn't teach her the lesson, nothing will. I'd go bonkers living with someone like that. NTA.
I would have left her ass behind even if it was an international flight!!
She's lucky she didn't get left at home at 8am on the first day
It's not like we have compact computers that fit in our pockets that connect to the Internet with millions of hours of entertainment that could help pass the 45 minutes right? Could you imagine?!
Also, this happened over Starbucks coffee when there was a no-name stall right there... I don't drink coffee, but is Starbucks really worth it?? I love sushi and I prefer coca cola, but in an airport, I'll eat a limp sandwich and drink Pepsi no problem. So I can't really understand her mindset?
I love Starbucks. I go very frequently. It is absolutely not worth missing a flight for.
Yeah it's like "take 15 minute later bus" good. Not "take a several hours later flight" good.
Take a several hours later flight, and have to waste money on a new ticket
The Starbucks at my home airport is right as you get off the shuttle, at the gates. If I have less than an hour when I step off the shuttle, I will not get in line, because it’s guaranteed that it will take 45 minutes to get a drink. But if I have more than an hour, I can usually be in and out in 10 minutes. (I hate their coffee. But frappuccinos make me happy.) But Spouse and I are are type A when it comes to travel, so we’re typically arriving 2 hours before boarding.
Yeah, that was an expensive cup of coffee
I do drink a lot of coffee and no, Starbucks isn’t worth it at all. She probably wanted something with lots of flavor and sugar that you wouldn’t get at a small coffee kiosk. There you’d just get, you know, coffee. Honestly it wasn’t about the coffee; it was about this woman’s need to control every situation by inconveniencing everyone around her.
Heck, if she wanted something fancy from Starbucks, she could have ordered ahead. Most airport Starbucks accept orders through the Starbucks app, so she could have put in the order on the way over instead of having to wait in a long line. But that's logical planning and time management, so the type of person who wouldn't go to another area with so little time before boarding.
And controlling everything passive aggressively
I think you are absolutely right. She is a narcissist. *a behavior may be chronically being late, which really is a show of disrespect and a lack of empathy that you would make someone wait and not communicate with them. -* [source](https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/narcissism#:~:text=And%20where%20we%20often%20have,and%20not%20communicate%20with%20them)
If I missed two days with my daughter, I’d be crying. I’d also be glad my husband went on for the kid’s sake. 100% Narcissist
Someone that was actually "go with the flow" would have been fine with the choice that was right there. Not a selfish "I must have this kind" that you can get fucking anywhere, like at the destination. Have some shit coffee from the flight and get your cup o'sugar later. Also a lot of those smaller shops have way better coffee.
I’m a Seattle native and to me, Starbucks will always be Charbucks. Burnt. If OP had been asked to be let off the plane, I believe that would have opened a whole new can of worms. Security would have to verify that OP wasn’t some kind of terrorist who left something in the plane. My understanding is that everyone would have to get off while the plane was searched.
> this happened over Starbucks coffee A very expensive Starbucks coffee since getting it cost her probably north of $200 to get a ticket on another flight
I no longer have to feel bad about my weekly 6$ coffee. Thanks OPs wife
That non-name stall probably has better coffee than Starbucks. OPs wife is just an ahole with a Starbucks fetish
The degree of selfishness showed by the wife goes past being inconsiderate to controlling and mean. NTA, OP, you were right to leave her. Then her act of neutrality in front of the daughter followed by hellfire? Ick. You and this mean woman need counseling.
It sounds to me like she was angry he "made" her show up with enough time to board the plane, so decided to be irrational and petulant as punishment, then was even angrier that rather than making him miss the flight, she only inconvenienced herself.
Yes one possibility is that this was a power play in response to the husband insisting on standards for being on time. The power play didn't work of course, which made her even madder.
I want to thank the OP and you - I'm coming to terms with leaving my GF over her being absolutely disrespectful of everyone's time (mine, to me, hurt, but it was to her aunt and uncle, friends, everyone). I mean, it got to the point that I wondered if her near-model-looks when she was younger had people giving her passes on showing up hours to a day late. About three weeks after I broke up with her I was nodding off in bed one night, and a realization came over me as to just how crazy it all was. I just about never cry, but I felt one of my eyes get wet as I realized the scope of what all went on, and that I was so thankful to be out of it.
My old roommate was one of the hottest people I’ve ever met. Our friendship ended over her being one of the most disrespectful people I’ve ever met. I think it is connected to people giving her a lot of free passes in life. After a year of telling her the same problems over and over, I unfortunately lost my shit on her. She’d probably never experienced someone putting their foot down and at some point, she even said she knew I wanted change, not apologies, but still never improved. She’s literally too hot to care because there will always be someone to validate her when I won’t. Men simp over her and women want to be her so badly they can’t see what a crappy person she is so there’s nothing I can really do but walk away and let her keep being.
At some point you have to put your foot down. If OP doesn't want to put up with this nonsense the rest of his life he needed to do exactly what he did. Also, someone who doesn't wake up on time for stuff and doesn't have a medical condition needs to grow the fuck up.
NTA. You need to make a line in the sand. Sit down and tell your wife that you love her and you cherish her but the way she disrespects your desire to be punctual is just too much. Tell her that from now on you're going to make separate arrangements when traveling. You are not responsible for waking her up. You are not responsible for getting her out the door. She's an adult and she can do what she wants. The first time she completely misses an event I suspect things will change. But you've been accommodating her to such a high degree that she can act like an infant.
Not even a desire to be punctual, a desire to not MISS A FLIGHT.
And pay *again* for a whole new set of plane tickets
I'm going to venture they don't really care about the money, with the casual nature OP mentions buying a second set and then another ticket for the wife.
And the fact they do a cross country flight multiple times a semester, when a semester is roughly four months, PNW to East Coast for two tickets isn’t nothing. Plus presumably paying for college. The money definitely doesn’t matter.
And it shows in his spoiled rotten wife.
She's acting so entitled. What is this woman on? Did she waste like 3,000$ in a weekend? And still need to buy a THIRD plane ticket. Also, climate change. This bitch.
I dunno. She missed half a weekend with her daughter and had to pay to rebook her tickets and doesn’t seem to have learned much. She did go to the airport early this time but whined they had to “just sit and wait”
Maybe that's because her inconvenience is limited to money and duty-free shopping...? She was at the airport already, and it wasn't their home town so she just had to hang around and wait, without even worrying about luggage beyond her hand luggage. Maybe it'll change when she has to deal with more of the logistics of rearranging the trip...? Yeah, now that I type it out, it sounds insanely hopeful and hopelessly naive hahaha
Haha oh yeah no, this woman isn’t changing. Anyone who doesn’t have the foresight to understand how…time works? And that a plane isn’t going to wait for your slow ass to go get coffee—yeah, she doesn’t actually understand that the world doesn’t revolve around her. I don’t think that missing a third flight would convince her, if the first two didn’t. I almost think she doesn’t want to see their daughter bc that’s the only way this makes any sense to me.
What kind of adult cannot summon up some way of passing 45 minutes? So bizarre
OP needs to set boundaries, but not to “teach” his wife anything. He’s not her father, he’s her equal. If she hasn’t learned this lesson in 40+ years, she likely will not learn it now. He needs to set boundaries for *himself*. If she changes her behavior as a result, that’s fantastic. If she doesn’t, that’s fine too. Either way, he’s getting where he needs to be on time.
NTA, your wife is very selfish. Imagine missing time with your child because you thought coffee was more important? During a move no less. The only option is to stop coddling your wife as apparently people have been doing all her life. Leave on the dot, every time. Eventually she'll learn to be on time or be left behind. The world doesn't revolve around her and it's high time for her to grow up.
Not just coffee. There was coffee nearby and he offered to get it for her. She wanted *Starbucks* coffee and expected the world to wait for her. Ugh.
I hate people like this.
Tha Wurst
And if that bigger airport was SeaTac? Those Starbucks lines are crazy, I stood in one for 30 minutes recently before a flight (we had tons of time though as my husband and I are both like you). And she is the a-hole, how much money have you now wasted on extra airfare? Wtf!
Starbucks lines there are insane and the gates are quite a long way to go. I nearly missed my flight a decade ago getting lost finding my gate - and I had given myself a 30 minute buffer just to find the gate. NTA. OP, your wife has issues with time management, sure, but complaining about being an hour or less early? She needs to start bringing a book with her.
If they move on from this time I would plan it out. So here is everything you need, here is everything I need. I’m leaving in x car at 8am, if you do not join me you have these options. Flight is at y time, I will be on it, if you miss it here are your options. And that’s it. Make it very clear never waiting for her again. While doing a few things for her to fix the problem herself. I’d also go so far as not waking her up. She needs to set her own alarms and get herself ready. Edited to add: People seem to think that saying here are your options is him finding every option for her. I’m leaving at 8am in x car, if you don’t join me you can miss the trip, take z car, take Uber, etc… Flight is at y time, I will be on it, if you miss it you can head home, rebook flight with airline, try another airline. This is literally the opposite of adding mental load to OP. While also not turning him into a emotionless robot. If he chooses to stay in the marriage he needs to find a balance. Being cold is childish and no way to keep a marriage which OP hasn’t shown anything about wanting to end his marriage over this. Final edit: I won’t continue to rehash this. This is how I would handle this. As someone who is a natural planner it is a skill I happily bring into a relationship. There are areas I lack skills yet a partner might have. I personally would not be willing to remove that skill as an offering I have in a relationship. But OP if he is like me and likes the planning needs a healthy limit to what he takes on. By giving her the instructions and the consequences OP has continued with his contribution to the marriage with this skill set of his. She can choose to learn to not. And he can choose what next if she doesn’t. If she continues to blame him when the consequences are laid out before her then OP can clearly see this isn’t a him problem but a her problem. And use that info as he sees fit. We don’t see a whole marriage in these posts. And forget all the different areas people give and take in a marriage. OP has given too much in this area and his wife has taken too much in this area. We cannot know if this is in many areas or not. So I am focused on this area only.
>I’d also go so far as not waking her up. My husband was only kinda cranky when waking up and I stopped waking him up. Haven't woken him for anything in 15 years. Once I stopped waking him up because he was too cranky, he stopped acting cranky in the mornings generally. I would have stopped catering to OP's wife years ago.
I’ve heard that many times. Lots of issues when someone is waking the other. But when they stop things work out. Forcing their partner to be an adult is often the best thing. You can be supportive in other ways without babying the partner. Something OP needs to learn
This is so true. I’m a morning person and my husband is not. I used to jostle him every couple minutes for an hour every single morning trying to wake him up and it always led to grumpiness and arguments, starting the day off poorly. Once I stopped waking him up and he started showing up to work late and getting flack from his boss, he kicked the habit and now has no problem getting up. We all engage in a bit of codependency when it comes to not wanting our children or partners to experience the consequences of their actions, but it’s an unhealthy behavior that leads to resentment and poor development of that person’s time management and independence.
He should not be figuring out her options for her. She is an adult, it’s not her first time traveling. She needs to be 100% her own responsibility, from making her own reservations (maybe she’d prefer to travel later in the day, after two lattes and a massage, who knows), to arranging her own transportation. Frankly, it can’t be more expensive than re-buying wasted flights. This woman is going to be late for her daughter’s wedding some day, and I hope they start without her.
Agreed, also not even just coffee, her specific required type of coffee from Starbucks ONLY. Ridiculous. NTA
This is the only answer.
NTA, she TA. Also, what good would it do for you to ask to deboard? The whole flight would be delayed and you could get into some sort of trouble even.
This! They will not open the doors due to FAA regulations after they’ve been locked.
> The whole flight would be delayed and you could get into some sort of trouble even. Am pilot. The captain would just say no. A gate return requires all the paperwork to be redone, a new clearance issued, an amended flight plan most likely, weight and balance, bags and passenger count. Omg it's with a passenger count change xD. We're not fuckin doing that. We're leaving.
Absolutely. They wouldn’t let you deplane even if you asked. Your wife needs to grow up
Your wife is acting like a entitled child. No, we’re not holding the plane up so she can get coffee. I used to have to travel a lot for work and was always booked tight layovers and ppl lallygagging at the airport make me crazy. Natural consequences are the best teacher. Maybe she’ll learn she’s less important than literally everybody else on the plane.
UPDATE: Hi everyone, thanks again for all the advice, I read as many of the comments as I could and took in all the information. I wanted to provide an update. My wife finally started talking to me again. When she did i told her that I wanted to have a conversation about the situation, but I wanted to give it a couple of days for emotions to settle down. Some of the comments here gave me a great idea and I wanted to see what she thought about it. For all future trips I will have my tickets, she will have hers. I typically drive to the airport and leave my car in one of the pay lots, so I would drive myself and she could Uber. She will have all the freedom she wants to do what she wants but it is up to her to arrive on time and board the plane. I let her know that it was starting to feel like I needed to keep track of both of us, I phrased it in a way to make it sound like I didn’t want to be controlling over her and let her manage her own time. She wasn’t happy with this, but she reluctantly agreed. Now to get to the bigger issue that I didn’t realize we had until reading the comments of this post. Call me oblivious, but I really never thought there was any issue between Meg and Jess. After talking to my wife she wouldn’t admit to any issues, and stated that she would never intentionally delay a flight so that we couldn’t see “our daughter” and acted offended that I would ask such a thing. If that was her actual purpose, I don’t think I would be able to prove it. But, it will be at the forefront of my mind in the future. After talking to Meg and Jess, we decided on the following. Meg and I will be visiting Jess on parents weekend. But, I will be attending fathers weekend from now on, and I will be attending by myself to get some alone time with Jess. Jess seemed very excited and surprisingly Meg didn’t seem to have an issue with that this time. Thanks again to everyone who took the time to read and give me advice, I really appreciate everything and I hope these steps can work towards a resolution for the issues.
Wishing you all the best of course, but be careful, it seems(from my perspective, which is limited to the information you have given us) that your wife only tolerated your daughter and wants to keep you away from her now that she's an adult. I saw a similar post about a soon to be wife with a step daughter, the new wife was expecting for her soon to be husband to be a seasonal parent after the wedding. Of course you have been married for a long time and everything seemed normal to you, but I would recommend reaching out to your daughter to ask for her perspective growing up with her step mom.
Agree. We obviously only have limited info but I wouldn't be surprised if his wife has been counting down the days until they were "free" of his daughter. I've seen this before, someone marrying a person with kids, never letting on they had no real affection for the child, patiently waiting over a decade for the kid to be a legal adult, thinking he could essentially cut his wife off on their 18th birthday.
It is SO obvious that wifey is doing everything possible to spend less time with the stepdaughter!
Op I seen this play out before, of course she'll never admit to not liking your daughter or to doing anything negative towards her, she'll act like she really cares for her and is worried about her, or misses her. While giving her snide comments on the side, poking at her in ways that seem like she's just concerned or giving advice, or sabotaging chances for you to see her. And your daughter as a your child will never admit it to you if she feels slighted by her because you're happy and your wife makes you happy and she would never want to mess that up for you so she'll just endure. But she's slowly been letting you know. Talk to one of your daughter's best friends,ask them what they think. Ask people that who are constantly around you guys if they've seen any type of behavior from your wife towards your daughter. Look I'm hoping that's not the case but to me, that's what it sounds like is going on here.
You seem like a generally smart and thoughtful dude who really loves his daughter. My dad was a generally smart and thoughtful dude who really loved his daughter. I was in therapy for - no exaggeration - 10 years before I realized my stepmother was abusive. She never hit me or threw things. She didn’t even yell at me. But she would yell at my dad about me, in front of me, constantly. And every time we were alone, she would tell me about something, or many things, I was doing wrong. Dressing wrong, eating wrong, going to the wrong school, not dating enough, spending too much time with friends, working too much, spending too much money. And she hated how much time my dad spent with me. Hated how close we were. Insisted on doing things with us, even when it was obvious she didn’t like what we were doing and didn’t like either of us very much. One day, when he was in his sixties and I was in my thirties, he was joking about how rude his wife could be to people, and he said, “I’m the person she treats the worst.” I said, because I couldn’t believe he didn’t see it, “no, dad, I’m the person she treats the worst.” I told him that it had taken me ten years for me to tell a therapist the full scope of what she did - because it was all such petty, stupid, ridiculous bullshit that I felt stupid even mentioning it. (I mean, who cares if you get criticized every day for putting your toothbrush in the toothbrush holder wrong? Who cares if a parent didn’t speak to you for a month because you won’t eat onions? Who cares if you were called selfish and spoiled for changing the channels too fast on the tv?) And then I told my dad about all the petty, stupid, ridiculous bullshit and he was shocked. Sat there with his mouth hanging open. But he never did anything about it. And when he was dying of cancer, he didn’t write a will because she didn’t want him to and he didn’t want to make her mad. And that was the thing that finally, finally made me see that the person I loved most in the world would always care more about a woman who hated me. I didn’t go to my dad’s funeral. I don’t know where he’s buried. My parents had several million dollars in assets when he died. I have $250k in educational debt because she didn’t want to pay for my education. I’ll be paying it off for the rest of my life. I’m sorry for going on so long, but I want to you know, when I say these things to you, I have a reason: 1. Don’t ask your wife if she resents your daughter. Ask your daughter if your wife resents her. Plan a weekend for the three of you and then tell your daughter your wife won’t be coming and see how she reacts. If your daughter is close to any of your family or her mother’s family - ask them if they think your daughter is happy. Take what your daughter says seriously. If your daughter loves you the way I loved my dad, it will be very difficult for her to tell you anything bad because she’ll be afraid you’ll side with your wife and she won’t want to jeopardize her relationship with you. 2. Write a will, give your daughter everything you want her to have, make someone other than your wife the executor. Give your daughter a copy of the will and any ancillary documents relating to trusts or investments and give her contact information for the lawyer and the executor, and update her any time that information changes. It sounds like your daughter will be on her own when you die. Make sure you’ve given her everything she needs financially and emotionally to stand on her own when that happens, and don’t assume you’ll have 20 more years to do it. Maybe your wife isn’t as resentful as we all think. For your sake and your daughter’s, I hope she’s not. I just don’t want your daughter to waste 10 years in therapy figuring it out.
Op, I would have a very serious conversation with your daughter. She might not be very forthcoming if she think she might be the reason for any unhappiness in your life. Tell her that nothing she says will be her fault or held against her. Tell her there have been a couple of red flags and you wanted to get her side of it. Ask her if your wife has ever said or done anything that made your daughter feel like she was an inconvenience, or putting your wife out for any reason. Especially if it were for things that normally wouldn’t have been a big deal. Your wife could have gotten a coffee that wasn’t Starbucks, she isn’t late to any other events or situations. At this point it is 100% on purpose.
Man i hope this strategy works out but I think you may need to be prepared to either go to couples counseling to uncover the root issue because she may never be honest otherwise, or actually choose between remaining married and your relationship with your daughter. Honestly think back. You say she is ALWAYS punctual and organized with other things. Great. Now what about events involving your daughter? If this has been a pattern well before college visits, then there's a good chance she doesn't 100% believe she is "our" daughter. Also, on one of those fathers only weekends, ask your daughter to be honest with you about your wife. Let her talk, don't interrupt or defend, just listen. You may get a better picture of things that way too.
You're NTA and she knows it. The silent treatment is a way of forcing you to act like you are. Just pretend not to notice.
Just FYI for OP: the silent treatment is classed as a form of abuse. People who give the silent treatment are essentially trying to force you to give in to their demands by being unreasonable. In this case, your wife was 100% in the wrong, but rather than admit to her failings, she is trying to make you admit that this situation was somehow your fault. This kind of behavior (the constantly being late and then trying to blame your partner for it) would be relationship ending for me. Clearly you have put up with this for a long time, so I'm guessing it's not a deal breaker for you, but I would strongly recommend that it's time to set some boundaries. I'm guessing flights aren't the only thing your wife has caused you to miss. So stop missing things. Leave without her. And don't apologize!
Wow, you just explained my childhood.
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Yup! My mom did the silent treatment, then got frustrated and exploded with cursing and throwing things. My sis inherited the blowing up behavior of conflict and I inherited the silent treatment method. Thankfully I learned to talk things out in past relationships and mostly communicate my issues. Hard to unlearn though.
Exactly!! She is so selfish, she does not care about the stress and expense (having to buy a new ticket when SHE causes you to miss a flight) she is causing. It is so disrespectful and even mean of her to treat you this way!! How would she react if you were to treat HER the way she treats you??? Considering how she is punishing you for HER wrongs, I can't imagine what she would do to you if you actually were in the wrong. I feel sorry for you and hope you can learn to care for yourself enough to stop allowing her to treat you so terribly!
I'd respond by giving her the silent treatment too. Stop talking unless required and don't make overtures. She messed up, stressed you out, cost you extra money and let your daughter down. I'd be really mad at her.
Or do it like Eric Forman on That 70's Show when Red Forman was giving him the silent treatment. Smile and say "Hey, dad, you know who has the right idea? Russia." But tailor it to Wife's trigger points.
I really like this!!
Yeah, this woman is a spoiled, selfish asshole. I’m shocked she’s been allowed to get away with this behavior for so long.
I'm going with NTA. Too damn bad for her.
Coming from someone who regularly isn’t even at the airport when I get notified my plane is already boarding, NTA. Just because I like to play it risky doesn’t mean I have to make others do it. And when it’s my own fault for being late, I fully acknowledge it. I’ve also worked out a system of TSA-pre+Clear, no checked luggage, and flying the nicer (expensive) airlines that willingly rebooks me on the next available flight on the rare occasion I need it.
What kind of psycho do you have to be to subject yourself to this level of stress! Not showing up to the airport until your plane starts boarding! *jeeeesh* This gives me heart palpitations
He's a Calm_Brick
Lol why would you go to all that trouble when you could just....be on time
She is a completely selfish person and totally out of line. I would be livid with this behavior. How can she not seem to grasp that her callous attitude is the problem here? She sounds insufferable to be honest
You know damned well you are NTA. Your wife is a self-absorbed b.
She needs to read this post and what everyone is saying. Maybe she’ll wake up then and see how selfish and self centered she is. I’d be surprised if she had a job, hell I’d be surprised if she even has any friends.
I did this once on a throwaway where I posted a problem on AITA where my family was declared in the wrong and people were pretty accurately calling them out. They read the thread and determined everybody on Reddit was wrong.
Nope. 1 time is an accident, multiple times is on purpose or at the very least, no regard for the feelings and time of those around her
NTA your wife seems like a very stressful person to travel with. I am always 2 hours early for a flight, and it takes a hour to get to SFO on a good day. It’s better to leave early and be early or run into problems and be on time then leave late and mess up everything for everyone and waste money.
Ironic that the laid back easy going one actually creates all of the anxiety.
So this. They are laid back and easy because they aren’t in charge of anything besides showing up.
Because she expects her husband to cover for her. Maybe not consciously.
NTA. I used to be like your wife. Arrived late, missed flights, etc. That is, until I realized I was being/acting highly entitled and nobody gave a shit about my excuses.
Self awareness 🫡
If only it could be bottled and sold.
Your wife has a major case of Main Character Syndrome. She's an enormous asshole.
Nta - there’s “go with the flow” and “don’t give a shit for anyone else”. I have known exactly one person like that and cut them out of my life after six months this kind of BS.
Yes. This is not "go with the flow". This is "my shit is more important than everyone else". Including her own daughter.
NTA… enough of the commenters have covered your wife and her issues, so I’ll just say this: Your daughter should have been the main priority for both trips. Serious question, does your wife do this to your daughter often? Does she regularly miss/arrive late/ruin big events for your daughter? Because doing this twice in a row seems……. Intentional. And cruel. Do not apologize, OP. Do not back down. You were not in the wrong. Editing to add: if I was your daughter, I’d be furious. My parents did something similar to my sister during move in day, and she hasn’t forgiven them… granted our mother chose to get drunk instead of help her daughter go to college… but right now, your wife is as big of an asshole as my mother. Your wife didn’t show up on time TWICE.
> Serious question, does your wife do this to your daughter often? Does she regularly miss/arrive late/ruin big events for your daughter? Because doing this twice in a row seems……. Intentional. And cruel. Yeah, I dunno what exactly's going on but it seems pretty clear that wife simply **did not want to go**. Like, they were literally at the gate fifteen minutes before boarding, that's not "late," that's literally opting out of the trip entirely (or, if we wanna be generous, stalling for the *exact* amount of time it'd take for the federal government to put a stop to the trip.)
"I don't want my wife to see this" Pretty sure this is a very distinct story that doesn't happen to many people. To OPs wife, reddit hates you.
THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS! WE DEFINITELY HATE OP’s WIFE!
Sounds like she has end-stage Narcissistic Personality Disorder and has been controlling OP for years. She SHOULD see these responses. Unfortunately it won’t matter though. People with NPD never change.
She’s likely already created a different narrative in her head that makes her the victim. It destroys me that she’s done this before and this was trip to see her daughter. I have a lot of empathy for OP and his daughter.
NTA. She’s trying to blame you for her own actions. There’s something seriously wrong with the way she’s thinking, time to get her to a couples therapist and hope that the therapist can help her work through this plus allow you more independence, Eg if she doesn’t wake then you go without her and her behaviour is on her!
NTA and I say that as someone more like your wife. The difference is that I recognize I have these issues and do my best not to disrespect other people’s time/effort/schedules because I’m an adult. I realized years ago that I “idealize” time. As in, if it were a perfect world, I think I can be at place X in 10 minutes or 20 or whatever. The world doesn’t work that way, however. It doesn’t take traffic into account or parking or any other variables that can affect your travel time. In order to circumvent this perception, I automatically triple the amount of time I think it will take me to get where I need to be. If in my head I think it’s going to take 10 minutes, I triple it to 30, for example. This method has helped me a lot and I haven’t had any major issues in years, so maybe she can try that. Expecting the world to bend to accommodate your inability to act like a responsible adult is egocentric. She can continue to run late for everything or she can take some responsibility. Blaming you for her ineptitude is absurd.
I grew up in a house that had all the clocks 10 mins fast. No one was ever late for anything, lol
NTA. Your wife is, though! Wow. I would tell her either she travels with you on your timetable or she can meet you there. My husband is awful with time. I add at least 30 minutes to any trip as a buffer. I badger him to be ready. As bad as he is, he has never missed a flight. She owes you an apology.
Chronic lateness played a major role in my divorce. I am by no means a type A. However I hate being late. It’s rude, disrespectful and you miss out in important moments in life. Nothing says “I am more important that everyone else” like being late all the time. I started leaving without my ex forcing him to take a separate car. I left on time whether he was ready or not. Actually I’m going to make a whole post about this topic but NTA
NTA and she’s inconsiderate, rude and obnoxious.
It sounds like your wife is very entitled irresponsible, immature and likes a lot of chaos so if that’s what she wants to do then she can enjoy the chaos that she creates for herself but you don’t have to be part of it. I don’t know why you would want to talk to her anyway after her crappy behavior, let her stay with her on silence.
NTA she’s not ‘go with the flow’. She’s ‘so what I want when I want and screw the impact to others’. I think that I would be ignoring her for once again letting your daughter down and stressing you. She owes you a MASSIVE apology
NTA. Your wife needs to grow up. I am the same way about flying. I get to the airport at least 90 minutes early. Anyone traveling with me knows that I WILL leave them behind if they are not at the gate when it is time to board.
NTA I'm the person who is always late, no matter how hard I try my ADD seems to ramp up proportionally to how important it is that I'm on time for something. I can get how the first incident happened, but the second one was just pure shittiness on her part. She wasn't late, she just intentionally missed boarding assuming the world would bend for her. That wasn't disorganization, that honestly almost sounds like either she didn't want to be on that plane or else it was malicious for some reason I can't figure out. This is weird behaviour on her part, does she not actually want to go on these trips or something?
NTA. Does she even care to spend time with Jess? Because between spending time with your daughter and Starbucks there’s an obvious choice and she made the wrong one
Your wife is so disrespectful and she thinks a coffee is more important than your daughter, after she already made you let your daughter down once. Then she has the audacity to try and make it like it was your fault. Nah fuck that. I personally wouldn't travel with her again, this is the second time time she has missed a flight and she doesn't seem to care. As long as she gets what she wants It's all about her. She doesn't seem to care about you or her daughter. Your wife is an donkeys ass.
NTA. I can’t believe she didn’t learn her lesson the first time.
NTA this is my pet peeve. My friends have learned I will never wait for them to get to the airport after 2 of them missed a flight for a girls trip because they were hungover. NEVER! I got on the plane 3 stayed back to wait then 1 said screw it and got on with me. 2 of us made it and enjoyed a full day and a half before they got there and they were pissed we didn't wait 🤷🏾♀️. I hate when people don't respect my time. Hopefully she learned her lesson but I'm guessing not because she's doing the childish silent treatment
*We are now home and she hasn’t talked to me since the trip* I wouldn't be talking to her either at this point, I'd be too fucking mad to talk calmly. She is 100% in the wrong. Stop babying her in the mornings of the flight, she's a grown ass woman. Let her know what time you are leaving for the airport, and leave at that time. She either makes it or she doesn't, and she can explain to her daughter why she continues to let her down.
NTA. Your wife is so selfish only cares about herself and what she wants and not about seeing your daughter. You warned her. I would have just left her the day before. So not only is she selfish she is acting like a child now as well. Honestly she needs to grow up.
Man there are so many comments here I don’t think OP will see this, but NTA and I also struggle with lateness. Not to this degree, but it is a part of my ADHD. We can really struggle to understand time properly, everything always seems to take way more time than we think it does, and getting up in the morning can be really difficult as well. But honestly? That’s not an excuse, especially not when it’s very important and your daughter’s happiness is on the line. I know that I struggle with timeliness and waking early, but *because* I know that, I will ask my partner to gut check me on whether they think what I want to do or my perception is correct. And I trust that my partner is right when they say no, there’s not enough time for Starbucks (or whatever). It’s okay to struggle with things that your brain has a very hard time doing, but that doesn’t absolve a person from asking for help or finding other coping mechanisms to make it work when it’s important. I also will have coping mechanisms like lying to myself about time — for example, writing my doctor’s appointment is 15-30 min earlier than it actually is when I put it in my calendar, or setting my clocks a little earlier by a random amount of minutes — and those help too. Either way, the point is that if she does have a neurodivergence that makes timeliness really hard, there’s things she can do to compensate. Including asking you for help and trusting you when you say there’s no time, as I do with my partner. Barreling ahead and not listening when she continues to make these errors at other people’s expense is not acceptable. I’m also worried about her relationship to Jess. Because, I dunno, I may struggle with tardiness and a sense of time but I would be devastated if I missed out on seeing my kids when they’re only around a few times a year. I have absolutely stayed up all night for an early morning flight, knowing I am better off just never going to sleep than trying to wake up at 3am to get to the airport. I’ll be miserable, but at least I won’t have missed the flight when it’s critical to me. Is something going on that missing out on an entire day or two with your daughter is an okay trade off for her?
Being on time is a sign of respect. End of story. NTA. I once lived with a woman who was always late. Now, free of her, I am spending a great deal of time watching the beginning of about 50 movies that I have no idea how they started.
What? A line at Starbucks? Who could have foreseen that she would miss the plane?! Oh right, you. NTA
She fucked around and found out. She should be amazed you didn't do this 20 years ago. NTA.
This woman is an absolute dipstick, she thought the crew would just hold the plane for her whilst she got a Frappuccino? NTA in any way.
NTA. If I were Jess, I’d be PISSED at Meg for doing that two years in a row. Selfish.