To not wait with my wife for her message?

[Cnthnfne]

I’ll keep this brief: I (38M) was shopping with my wife (36F) and children (DS9 & DD7). After we had done most of our shopping, DW wanted to get a massage at a massage stall.

As we joined the queue, I asked DD is she wanted to wait in the queue with DW or if she wanted to visit a few shops with me & DS.
She said she’d wait with DW and I went off to another shop with DS.

After 5 mins, DW phoned me and said she wanted to go home: after 5 mins of waiting DD became bored and starter complaining about the wait and DW left the queue.

When I got back to them, DW was raging, annoyed at me for not staying and waiting with her. I offered to wait in line for her whilst she shopped but DW just walked off, towards the car park.

the journey back was in complete silence. She has been felling unwell lately, and perhaps I should have been more thoughtful but I feel her walking off and then it not talking to me is an overreaction.
we had some days book off this week but I fear they will be wasted as she’ll be in a foul mood.

Op said it was a ten minute massage! Of course he could have taken both children while she had
a ten minute massage, and no wonder she was annoyed that she didn’t even get that.

So you all went shopping together then towards the end when the kids were gonna get bored she wanted you to keep them entertained by yourself while she queued at a busy stall and had a massage? Selfish af imo. If you want a massage you plan one and book it at a convenient time for everyone. Not just drop it on someone in the middle of another activity.

This sums it up.

It's completely unreasonable to communicate via subtext instead of actual words, expect people to get your meaning via telepathy and then strop for days if they don't understand what you wanted.

Also unreasonable to accuse anyone who doesn't understand subtext and telepathy of being selfish, as half this thread has done.

@ineedsun, @BoogieBoogieWoogie, Yes, in Mumsnet world, this sort of behaviour is weird and freakish.
If he has asked a mate, I suspect he would have been told how he should have guessed what she actually wanted and been told that being the baddie to her selfless angel is part of the job.
That he went to Mumsnet rather than a make friend makes it suspicious.

We always only get one side of the story. Perhaps she's unreasonable. Women sometimes are. Silent treatment is abusive on here whenever men do it. But now it's because she's 'carrying the world'?

Yes! The whole thing is so strange.

So he needs it spelling out to him and is incapable of thinking through a problem without female guidance? Do you always assume men need guidance ...darling I'm going out your dinners there, put it in the oven on 5 ...were going out at 3 you will need to go to the toilet....he's an adult and a parent he doesn't need a mummy it's obvious a massage means you can't do childcare you don't breed to be micro managed to be a parent.
I don't get women who assume men are incapable without guidance.

Why is it his problem to solve? She could also have thought it through and said the daughter should go with him. She chose to change the plan so should have more or equal responsibility in sorting out such issues.

Fuck me this is a weird one.

If dp or I wanted to go get a sporadic treatment (haircut/nails) then we'd obviously accommodate the other but frankly, we wouldn't do that. The kids would obviously get bored.
Our situation is different, we don't go anywhere with shops because of one of my dc, (sen) but even if we did, I can't really imagine I'd ask dp to have the kids whilst I had my lashes done. Shopping makes kids bored enough, let alone a detour for a massage.
Can she book in with a local masseuse or something when the dc aren't having to wait around?
I think her moods sound quite unpleasant and if this is regular if I were you I'd be getting my ducks in a row.
Life is to short for living with someone who makes the atmosphere so uncomfortable. Good luck pal 💐

In reality if he’d have gone to a mate he’d have probably been told ‘yeah, fucking women expect you to mind read. Keep her happy and play along. Just say yes dear’. I don’t think that’s acceptable frankly, on an individual level because of the damage that does to a relationship but also for the reputation of women in general as it is a lazy trope, wheeled out at times. I don’t want to be lumped in with people who behave in such a dysfunctional way.

Honestly i don't think that was the best time to have a massage, while shopping with 2 kids. Perhaps book her in for a proper massage on one of the days off this week. You stay home with the kids, while she goes out.

It was a stall in a centre, they are normally cheap and affordable ....and quick....if he didn't want to look after both kids he could have said. It's not rocket science to work out that a 7 year old doesn't understand a queue is going to be 15 boarding minutes followed by a treatment you just take them off.
Affording a full massage at £60 or so and getting the time to go is a totally different thing to a £15 shoulder massage

It's her last-minute massage so she's the one responsible for thinking it through. Those are absurd analogies because this isn't exactly an everyday household task. And it would literally take one sentence to communicate that he needed to take the daughter so this is hardly onerous guidance.

There’s some serious mental gymnastics going on here!

You want someone to do something, you tell them. If you don’t and they don’t do what you want, it is 100% on you. Regardless of sex.

To then punish someone for not understanding what you haven’t told them is plain nasty. Again, regardless of sex.

It’s basic communication.

She wanted you to take both children without her having to ask. She might feel this happens a lot that she feels you don't think about her which is why she's reacted like this - unless she's just a really unreasonable huffy person.

I think it's a bit strange to try to get a massage when shopping with 2 children but massage chairs are cheap and don't take long but I would have seen the queue and not bothered.

Book and pay for a proper massage for her she obviously needs some time to herself

I am a man, so I am speaking from my own experience.
I suspect to me and most men, he would have failed to read between the lines. The trope is that women expect that

Unless there’s a massive backstory, your DW sounds a bit self-centred for wanting to get a massage on a family day out.

She should go and have a proper massage another time, without the kids.

This is not something to sulk about. It all sounds a bit childish tbh.

There is no reason for you to wait in the queue for her massage.

It may be better for her to arrange for a proper relaxing massage elsewhere.

FML
how do you come to this conclusion? If this was a man who had a strop and sulked all day over such a non event there would be cries of 'he's abusive' and 'ltb' but because it's a woman it's automatically his fault
Just when you think you've seen it all

This. Usually when people react this way its because something has been building up and the small incident is the final straw. Don't focus on the incident, focus on the bigger picture.

Who goes for a massage while out shopping at a shopping centre with two young kids? I mean, who does that?
Also why didn't she just phone you and ask if you could take dd off her hands as she was playing up?

She sounds fucking nuts.

Did the wife lose her words? Why didn't she say DD had to go with OP? Did she just stand there mute whilst this was going on?

This. A man who sulked for days despite his wife apologising would get his balls roasted on here no matter what his wife had done.

I think tour dw is being very unreasonable. You shouldn’t have left your dd to stand in a boring queue, but then your dw could have pointed out this wasn’t sensible and asked you to take your dd, too, before you left with your ds. I don’t understand why, having allowed your dd to stay with her, your dw couldn’t have waited in the queue for you to come back and take your dd off her hands. And I don’t really understand how she can be so selfish that she expects all of you to stand in a boring queue so that only one of you then gets a back massage. But then if she has been unwell, recently, that is probably affecting her mindset - and maybe she had stood in boring queues for other activities for the rest of the family during the day? Basically, though, she sounds unreasonable and sulky.

Something that would (rightly) never be said about a man throwing a strop and giving his wife the silent treatment for not understanding something he never actually said.