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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/notadaycareaita on 2023-09-25 16:44:46.

My wife (37F) and I (39M) have been married for 13 years and have 3 kids (11, 8, & 6). Both my wife and I work full-time. I work a standard M-F schedule, but my wife’s job regularly requires her to work on weekends, anywhere from 1-3 Saturdays a month. She will take days off during the week to compensate for this.

It can be stressful for me because our kids are all in activities now and of course they are always on weekends. So I’m the one running them all over to practices, games, shows, etc. Or I’m the one coordinating carpools with other parents. It can be exhausting.

About 6 months ago, a new family moved in a few houses down the street from us. They have 3 kids about the same ages as ours. We’ve met the parents a handful of times, but we’re not going to be friends with them. They aren’t married (not judging, just saying) and the BF is not the father of the kids. The mom is nice and sweet, but the guy…not so much.

The kids spend a lot of time outside roaming the neighborhood (can’t say I blame them, I wouldn’t want to be in a house with that guy either). If they see our kids outside, they will stop by and play together. But it’s always at our house, they never go play at their house. Again, can’t blame them and I don’t really want my kids going there anyway.

But since Sundays are pretty much my only day of the week to get any free time, I like to relax on those days if I can. My wife had to work this past Saturday and all 3 kids had activities going on, so I was running around all day. That night, I told my wife I would like a chance to relax for a bit on Sunday and asked if she could take the kids out of the house for a few hours so I could just chill. She had no problem with this.

But Sunday rolls around and instead of my wife taking the kids somewhere, the neighbor kids ended up at our house somehow. I really just wanted a few quiet hours at home, but that wasn’t going to happen. So, I told my wife I was going somewhere to watch a football game and would be home later.

While I was out, my wife kept texting me about coming home because the kids were driving her nuts. I told her to send the neighbor kids home and do something with our kids, but she feels bad kicking the kids out. I told her we aren’t a daycare and the neighbor kids aren’t our responsibility. She asked me to come home, but I told her I needed more time to relax.

I was gone for about 4-5 hours and when I got home, my wife was not happy. She was mad that I told her I was leaving instead of asking if it was OK. She was mad that I left knowing that there were 6 kids at our house. She was mad that she didn’t get a break that weekend even though she had taken Thursday off and had the whole day by herself.

I told her that she was the one who changed the plans for Sunday and if she had just taken the kids out of the house like she said she would, she wouldn’t have been stuck watching 6 kids. She said I was a jerk for not staying to help.