Man Who Pretended to Be Too Stupid to Engage in Child Care, Told Wife She’d Find Life Harder Without Him, Begs Her to Take Him Back Once He Gets 50% Child Custody After Their Divorce and Sees How Hard Parenting Is – Also: Weaponized Incompetence
Note in this story that marriage and parenthood did not make this man more responsible, mature, godly, ethical, loving, or godly.
On the contrary, a lot of married men (and some married women) get lazy in a marriage and their spouse ends up taking on more housework or childcare, while the spouse sits around all day after they get home from work playing video games or watching NetFlix.
This post gets into the topic of Weaponized Incompetence, which a lot of men use against their girlfriends or wives – they pretend to be too stupid to know how to do household chores, or they claim to not know what needs to be done around the house unless the spouse specifically tells them what needs to be done, or what not, so that the girlfriend or wife ends up doing it all.
I’ve previously in my life had women friends and women co-workers on jobs who played victimized or dumb so that I’d do their job tasks for them – and I’m a woman, I’m not a man.
This Weaponized Incompetence tactic can be found among some women, but it seems to be more common among men in romantic relationships, where the man feigns incompetence so that his wife will take on more of the housework or childcare.
(Link): This Guy Said His Wife Kept “Complaining” That He Wasn’t Helping With Their Baby, And Now He’s Confused As To How She’s Doing Better Without Him
“He just wants his household manager, housekeeper, and free in-home childcare back. He is sad because the divorce made life harder for him.”
by Alexa Lisitza
April 17, 2024
There has been a lot of discussion about weaponized incompetence, which refers to when someone pretends they don’t know how to do something so that someone else will do it, and it’s especially common in relationships.
A perfect example of weaponized incompetence recently went viral when husband and father Puzzleheaded_No3393 (who we’ll call Puzzle) shared why his wife asked for a divorce in a now-deleted post that was saved for viewing by moderators
Here’s what happened in Puzzle’s own words: “I’m not looking for pity or understanding here. I know I’m not getting it. Me and my ex-wife have a 14-month-old son. After he was born our marriage fell apart,” he said.
“She said I wasn’t pulling my weight with childcare and chores, but at the same time, she expected me to know what to do without her telling me. It was bad. We argued a lot and I ended up telling her that her life would be harder without me. She got really quiet and I thought that was the end of the argument. It made things fall apart and we are getting divorced.”
Now, “We’re living separately; each got a new apartment. As for our son, the law in our state [Kentucky] is that 50/50 is the default custody arrangement.”
“It is automatic unless one parent proves neglect on the part of the other. We don’t have that, so on the advice of both our lawyers, we are splitting time and doing alternating weeks since we separated. We usually switch on Mondays with the daycare pickup and drop-off.”
“I knew being a single parent wasn’t easy but I didn’t really know until now. This is where I realize how badly I fucked up because I’m drowning. The weeks I have my son, I don’t get anything done, and I can barely even function at work because I’m so exhausted.”
“I spend the whole week I don’t have him catching up and I can’t even get everything done. My apartment is a mess and I can hardly keep up with errands and chores. It sucks. I realize I fucked up because I thought since I was having a hard time, my wife would be too, and we could call off the divorce and work on things. But she doesn’t want to.”
“She says her life is easier without me and she is the opposite of me and can apparently keep up everything fine. She says she isn’t exhausted anymore and realized it’s easier having one person to take care of instead of two.”
“I know I messed up and should have been a better husband. I can’t even ask for less time with my son because I can’t afford the child support. Right now, neither of us has [to pay child support] because of 50/50 and equal income, but if we go off 50/50, my lawyer says the person with less time will pay child support. I hate myself for fucking up so much. Wtf did I do?”
Puzzle said he was not looking for pity and knew he wouldn’t get it, and WOW was he right.
“So buddy wants her back to just keep getting out of chores and so he can go back to that good lifestyle?” user Fit-Humor-5022 posed after reading the post.
JoBeWriting responded in agreement: “That’s what stood out to me too,” they said. “In all that rant, not one word of ‘oh, my wife is beautiful, she is smart, she is my best friend, I miss her so much, etc.’ No. Just, ‘I realized caring for a toddler is hard, actually, and I need Wife Mom to do it for me.'”
People had no sympathy, largely because he didn’t appear to feel bad for unloading all duties onto his wife. “He doesn’t even regret it because he realizes how truly wrong he is. He admits he messed up and that it’s his fault the marriage fell apart, but to me this doesn’t feel like genuine remorse or a desire for redemption,” user lapetitlis said.
“He just wants his household manager, housekeeper, and free in-home childcare back. He is sad because it’s made life harder for him. I get the feeling that even if he promised to change and she took him back, things would go right back to ‘normal,’ with Puzzle’s wife exhausted and overwhelmed.”
I mean, how can you feel bad when he assumed his wife would have an equally hard time raising a baby she had already been basically raising by herself for over a year?
“His stupid ass thought she couldn’t manage without him?” user WeeklyConversation8 said. “She already was, which is why she was fine when he left. Now he’s realized how much she actually does. He wasn’t contributing anything, except stress.”
(Link): Dad Says 50/50 Custody Has Him ‘Drowning’ But His Wife Won’t Get Back Together Because It’s Cut Her Workload In Half
He claimed that his life would be much easier if his wife was handling all of the childcare responsibilities again.
By Nia Tipton
Apr 09, 2024
A dad admitted that he can’t handle joint custody with his ex-wife and is finding it hard to be a single parent.
Posting to the subreddit “r/TrueOffMyChest,” he claimed that he wasn’t looking for “pity” or “understanding” about his situation but revealed that he’s hoping his wife will change her mind about their divorce so that he doesn’t have to be responsible for their son without her help.
He said 50/50 custody has him ‘drowning,’ but his wife won’t get back together because it’s cut her workload in half.
In his Reddit post, later uploaded to X, he explained that he and his wife have a 14-month-old son, and shortly after he was born, their marriage fell apart. She accused him of not pulling his weight when it came to both childcare and household responsibilities, but he disputed, saying that at the same time, she expected him to know what to do without telling him.
Unfortunately, this is the reality in many heterosexual marriages and relationships, made even worse when children are involved. According to the Pew Research Center, 78% of mothers say they do more than their spouse or partner when it comes to managing their children’s schedule and activities, 65% of mothers help their children with homework or other school assignments, 58% provide comfort or emotional support to their children, and 57% meet their children’s basic needs, such as feeding, bathing or changing diapers.
Mothers also tend to take on more household chores and responsibilities; 41% of married or cohabiting parents say this is the case in their households, compared with just 8% who say the father does more.
The dad said the disparity between him and his wife caused them to argue all the time, and he told her that her life would be much harder without him.
Needless to say, that was the last straw, and divorce followed shortly after.
Now, the two of them live separately, and since they’re in the state of Kentucky, 50/50 custody is the default agreement.
“It is automatic unless one parent proves neglect on the part of the other. We don’t have that, so on the advice of both our lawyers, we are splitting time and doing alternating weeks since we separated. We usually switch on Mondays with the daycare pickup and drop off,” he explained.
However, now that he’s a single parent, he’s finding it hard to adjust to caring for his son when he does have him. He admitted that he was “drowning” and didn’t really know what he was in for with having split custody of his child.
Continue reading “Man Who Pretended to Be Too Stupid to Engage in Child Care, Told Wife She’d Find Life Harder Without Him, Begs Her to Take Him Back Once He Gets 50% Child Custody After Their Divorce and Sees How Hard Parenting Is – Also: Weaponized Incompetence”
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