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The original was posted on /r/twoxchromosomes by /u/Svetunia on 2023-09-06 01:38:44.

My teenage son is social and likes to hang out with friends. On his way home from school, he texted, asking if a friend could come over for a bit. I said yes, because I believe it’s healthy for teens (and all kids) to hang out with friends IRL. I always run this by my spouse if he’s home, like “hey, do you mind?” But he wasn’t home at the time so I made a decision without consulting him because the friend was only coming over for a few hours max and I didn’t think it was a big deal. It was a Friday night and it’s pretty normal for high schoolers to want to hang with friends on the weekends. (He still does not understand this.)

Turns out, it wasn’t cool with my spouse and he blew up on me about it. Spoke to me like I was a misbehaving child. Said I “should have let him make this decision” and that he “already had plans for the kids to clean their rooms”. Never mentioned that to me, so naturally I had no idea.

He made a huge deal about it, yelled at me, made me feel like a child who should have asked her dad’s permission before letting someone visit the house. Am I wrong for not getting his permission/ok first? I feel like this was a huge overreaction and that it’s controlling behavior on his part.

He does this type of thing pretty regularly and it has gotten to the point that I tell my kids to just “ask dad” in order to avoid his inevitable freak out (and to keep the peace) and they both say things like “why is everything dad’s decision?”

It seems that it’s okay for him to make decisions (like what the kids are doing) without my input but it’s never okay for me to make decisions without him being involved. And even when I do involve him, he’s pissy because he expects the kids to speak to him first before speaking to me. As if he’s irritated if he’s consulted second.

I totally get that if you’re going to have someone in your space, you should probably give your partner/roommate, etc a heads up. And I usually do if he’s around. But it’s feeling like I need “permission” now and that I shouldn’t be making simple decisions without explicit approval. Like, should I have waited to answer my kid and said “let me talk to dad first?” I feel like I do that a lot and even my kids know that this is ridiculous. I do a lot to keep the peace, I guess.

***Throwaway account. My post was removed from another subreddit so I copied it here. Needing some reassurance.