Last weekend my husband (M42) and my (F42) went golfing. I asked my husband how it was going and he said “good but Colin (BIL, 41) won’t shut up about how him and Marie have like no intimacy. It’s annoying.”
I was with my sister (F40) and all of our kids at the time so I asked her what was up. She just rolled her eyes and told me that Colin won’t help around the house so by the time she gets home from, dinner on the table, gets the kids ready for bed and school tomorrow, she’s exhausted and just wants to read a little before bed. She said he’ll come home from work and will work out, or watch sports, or find any excuse to be busy so he doesn’t help.
Flash forward to dinner later that night. Everyone is done eating so my husband gets up and starts clearing the table. When Marie and I get up to help he waves us off and he says that he and Colin would do it since they golfed all day and he knew how tired we were after being with the kids. This was after he had ordered the dinner, picked it up, and brought wine and ice cream from my favorite place to go with it.
Colin, predictably, said he had something to and went to walk outside. I said “Colin, maybe if you helped clear the table then Marie might be in the mood later.”
Colin lost his shit. He started ranting about how he’s busy and how he doesn’t have time to help, and that he doesn’t want a “transactional” relationship where he has to pay for sex with “favors.”
It got pretty heated because I didn’t back down. At one point he pointed at my husband and said “what, you’ll blow him tonight because he did the dishes?” I explained that it wasn’t about doing the dishes, it was that my husband helped out when he knew I was tired and had taken care of dinner and wine and dessert.
Colin ended up storming out and driving away. He didn’t come back to the house until after we left. Marie says he hasn’t said a word to her since Saturday night. I feel kind of bad because it wasn’t necessarily my place to say anything and now Marie’s marriage is paying the price, but on the other hand maybe me saying something will be the wake up he needs to realize he’s not acting right?
Comments
ESH.
Colin was out of bounds sharing intimate details about his marriage with your husband. Your husband was out of bounds re-sharing those details with you. You were out of bounds confronting Colin.
NTA. Lord. Someone had to say it to him. Might there have been a better time or way? Idk. You’re totally correct tho.
NTA. But your BIL is. Your sister would be better off trading him in for a better model. He’s not busy he’s lazy and thinks helping is women’s work.
Maybe it’ll wake her up to the fact that her husband is just another child, expecting to be taken care of instead of being a partner so she’ll wake up and leave his worthless ass.
Do people really sit around griping about not getting enough sex? Like casually? I’d feel so awkward around you both if I were Marie, knowing how much you know about (and TALK about) my sex life.
Getting into a fight about it is super weird. Mind your own business.
You may be correct but you shouldn’t be inserting yourself when you weren’t asked. That conversation was one Marie and her husband should have had, not you.
> I said “Colin, maybe if you helped clear the table then Marie might be in the mood later.”
This is absolutely insane to say at dinner.
Overall ESH but YTA for this.
ESH
Everyone who is not Marie and Colin need to stop getting directly involved into Marie and Colin’s intimacy woes. I realise that they’re partly why this is open to public review in the first place, but you should really stay out of it.
NTA… Colin is more lazy and him saying he is busy is him trying to justify not helping out
It feels like the marriage is dying on front of your own eyes
And clearly Colin doesn’t wanna hear anything nor change
esh. i totally get speaking up on behalf of your sister, cause same, i do not play about my sister. however, you’re right, it wasn’t your place to say anything about their relationship to him, especially in front of your husband and sister. bil is in the wrong for the obvious reasons here. this might be a situation where you need to reach out to him to apologize for speaking out of turn to help your sister’s home life get back to normal. the fact that he blew up in the way he did and he has been ignoring your sister should tell you this is not a wake-up call for him. and it seems like it’s also not a dealbreaker for your sister or something that she’s not okay with as she is still with him.
YTA
This wasn’t your place to comment on or try and interfere with their relationship
Nobody asked for your advice, as your input was completely unwarranted.
The comedian Christina P. has a funny joke about this, and the punchline is something like “clean dishes make me wanna suck stuff.” https://youtu.be/xRqGE-99DP8?si=Cr186sos_TPc-kYu
YTA. It’s called choreplay. Shit doesn’t work and never has.
You’re NTA. Her marriage was “paying the price” before you said anything, because Colin is a selfish AH
NTA he doesn’t want to help and doesn’t get it. You didn’t wreck their marriage his misogynistic views did
NTA… he made it everyone’s business when he wouldn’t stop talking about it. If he didn’t want feedback she should’ve kept it to himself. Colin is not a partner. He’s more of another chore. He’s a grown child who expects his wife who’s EQUALLY AS BUSY to cook his meals, clean up after him, take care of his children as well as everything else she’s already doing, and THEN give up the cheeks later that night. He isn’t a partner. He always tries to get out of doing anything as if his wife is supposed to be his maid. He’s lazy and entitled & hopefully Marie sees that for herself.
lol so kinda YTA.
I think your husbands more subtle approach while it didn’t yield the intended results was a better way to handle the situation. You outed your husband and sister so that probably wasn’t the best look for anybody. But obviously I understand wanting to help. It seems like your sister has a husband problem I doubt he’ll change, he doesn’t seem like someone willing to do the work on himself much less go to therapy. Your sister needs to decide if this is how she wants to continue to live. Keep in mind someone as hotheaded as you BIL seems like the type to want to stray if he doesn’t get his way..
You weren’t wrong, but you definitely poked the bear. Colin heard the truth and couldn’t handle it. If a grown man thinks doing basic house stuff is “paying for sex,” that’s his problem, not yours.
You were just pointing out a pattern that was obvious to everyone else- Colin refusing to help around the house was clearly affecting intimacy. You didn’t make threats or insults, just stated a truth that he didn’t want to hear. That said, it wasn’t strictly your place to intervene in someone else’s marriage, so the fallout isn’t entirely surprising
NTA. If Colin wants to complain and share information about his sex life with the world – he should be ready for input on how to make it better.
Did marie get mad or say anything about you going off on him if she did then yes you are if not then it all depends on if she’s mad cuz she told you what’s wrong
Wow. Putting aside any legitimate comments on commenting on someone else’s marriage… Some of these comments are pretty revealing. They explain why so many women are choosing to stay unmarried, and not have children. And, why you have a whole flotilla men, whining, and complaining that they can’t find wives. We have finally reached the point where women have a choice. And they are not choosing these men.
YTA. I do agree with what you said. But it’s not your place to police other people’s sex lives.
My GF says it turns her on when I do Dishes and help around the house.
Tell him this example.
NTA for what you said, but YTA for the way you brought it up in a public way.
Guess you’re not the asshole, because Colin is obviously more of an asshole, so ESH I guess…except for your husband, he seems like a good dude.
NTA.
He’s lazy, won’t help with basic house stuff, expects his wife to do everything, but still moans and complains that she won’t have sex with him. Maybe if she wasn’t tired from doing all the stuff he refuses to do, they’d have more sex.
ESH
You’re right- without Marie’s blessing you overstepped.
You also could have said “Colin- did you hear (husband’s) reasoning? You’ve had your time. Marie and I are going to have a drink together while you and husband tidy up.”
Your sister is foolish to continue a marriage so one sided. Apparently he brings nothing to the game but a paycheck and thinks his wife should still be attracted to him even tho he doesn’t do shite to help with anything. It’s her choice however. OP has said her piece now and can still express her feelings to her sister, but let sis deal with her own excuse of a husband and her marriage.
NTA. Your BIL doesn’t understand how important it is to actually be a partner to your partner, and be a fully functioning member of a team. It’s not about being transactional and providing sexual favors because someone did a chore (no!), it’s about knowing that your partner has your back and is pulling their weight in the relationship, and because you’re sharing the load and working well together, you have more physical and mental energy for getting into a spicier frame of mind.
NTA. if he keeps nothing. yeah no intimacy for you. you suck the energy our of her and you want her to still work for yah? lazy ah
Colin’s raised the subject first, but he might not have been pleased that the husband told his wife about it; that might be part of what’s going on here (I’m assuming that Colin hasn’t said anything about it to the OP).
It’s clear that Colin’s being forced to confront the reality of how his wife feels about having to shoulder the lion’s share of the responsibilities within their marriage, and he doesn’t like it. It could be that it was a crisis that had to happen; maybe Colin will mend his ways and become a better husband, or maybe he won’t and Marie will (understandably) leave him.
Updateme
Yeah YTA.
He needs to help around the house, no doubt. He just doesn’t want to.
What’s weird here is that he is actually bang on the money about how that relates to sex. It can come off as transactional and for all that he sounds like a lazy arsehole. Which I’m guessing is because he tried all that before and he got no sex or he did but it wasn’t coming from the right place.
They need therapy.
They dont need you flinging a grenade into their room.
Did you really think he would go, oh ok that’s a good idea?
Her marriage was already paying the price
BIL knows exactly why their marriage is falling apart, he just doesn’t care because he thinks it’s “helping” and not equal responsibility.
Honestly, I’m petty, but I’m glad he got called out and felt humiliated, because he should.
So he views your sister as property. NTA
Stay out of their marriage. Only the two people in the marriage set up their values and roles. For Colin, it would be more likely that he’d hire a maid than do the domestic chores.
He misunderstood anyway. It’s not transactional It’s freeing her from exhaustion, but that’s for them to discuss.
So BIL complained to your husband, not to you, and then you gave your advice about their sex life after dinner? I understand your good intentions, but YTA, that was none of your business.
YTAH, you should have asked the wife before doing something like this. If she approved, then you could have taken your jab.
Now it seems like she’ll take the brunt of your comments.. You should have clued her in, she may have told you no way because she knows how he acts.
The BIL is not as emotionally intelligent as your husband. Very much the AH.
NTA. It might not have been your place, but it happened. You were trying to help both of them. Suggest to your sister that she and hubby need 1. Therapy, and 2. To learn about each other’s giving and receiving love language.
Marriage counseling is in order.
My guess he is already cheating or getting ready too. Typical gaslighting before an affair.
This won’t actually help anything. A shit husband is a shit husband. He’s not interested in changing.
That being said, I would have done the same thing.
NTA,
Even though it probably wasn’t your place to say it, this is all on BIL.
BIL is a child, it’s not favors, because it isn’t her job to do 100% of the domestic labour. It’s maintaining one’s own life. Does he think the dishes will do themselves if he ended up divorced and living alone?
Studies show that men who pull their own weight at home, tend to have great sex lives partially because their partners are not too tired to be horny and because nobody finds a gigantic baby attractive. It’s not about “transactions”, it’s about being attractive and ensuring that your partner has the energy to get freaky.
NTA
NTA. Also, tell her that she needs to total up (AM chores, hours at work, and PM chores) the number of hours that she puts in each day, and tell him that after a 16 (or whatever it is) day, all that she has left is 8 hours to sleep. Sorry Colin; no time or energy for sex
NTA. We call it domestic foreplay. And it works both ways. My husband recognizes that I carry a huge mental load for the family, so he does a lot of the quick chores and cooking. I recognize that he saves me from laundry and yard work so I deal with the people-ing tasks that exhaust him.
Leaves us both grateful and with energy.
NTA. It’s not “helping around the house” or a “transactional relationship” it’s called doing your share in a house you live in. BIL is a pos and sister should dump him.
YTA BUT!!!! IT WAS NECESSARY!! Colin is a lazy ass and Marie is a married single mom.
Yea he knows he’s not acting right but he had her trained with gaslighting and you ruined that…NTA ..he probably IS too selfish to change and will get divorce papers one xmas
Colin is a man baby…
YTA your sister is a whole adult with her own mouth and brain.
Read the book “Boundaries” by Henry Cloud it’s on Amazon
My husband always says, “The only people that know what’s in the soup are the people cooking in the kitchen.” You don’t know all the ins and outs and you couldn’t possibly. It’s their relationship.
YTA. Way out of line and none of your business. Hopefully, they’ll cut you off.
Marie should start playing Tears by Sabrina Carpenter on repeat.
A little initiative can go a very long, long way
Baby, just do the dishes, I’ll give you what you (What you), what you want
A little communication, yes, that’s my ideal foreplay
NTA someone needed to say something. I don’t have anyone to speak up for me but if I wasn’t the default parent 24/7 maybe I’d want to as well.
He may be an asshole husband, but this was your fuckup. No way is it your fucking place to lecture somebody about their marriage and sex life. Stay in your lane.
YTA.
NTA, but you could have blacked down once you made your point.
It sounds like your husband gets it though.
I get a kick about how the BIL walked away when your husband asked him to help.
BIL is definitely the AH
Mostly NTA… but ESH really. the way you brought it up was very offside and probably explained his reaction. I thought you would have followed him outside to somewhere private and then bring up. And a better way to address this first would be to hear him out so he has a chance to explain his excuses then you can address those and challenge them.
However, his reaction was kind of ass too and it had to be addressed at some point. Hopefully he actually reflects on this and does something about it.
He has no idea what a partnership means! He needs to learn that when he helps with his family that, that gives his wife an opportunity to breathe and feel lighter and maybe even be in the mood for some intimacy later. NTA
ESH except your sister. Your husband shouldn’t have shared what Colin told him I’m confidence, you definitely shouldn’t have meddled in your sister’s marriage, & Colin obviously sucks because he’s a bad husband. Support your sister but the rest is none of your business.
NTA I mean, it could have been handled better but it needed to be said. And clearly it he still isn’t listening. He wants to do whatever he wants, and have her take care of everything, including him. F that. She should divorce him, her life would be easier and more peaceful I bet.
Hot take maybe but your husband should not betray his brother’s confidence. Then you couldn’t have but into their business
Gosh, just imagine how he’ll handle her menopause when she straight up wants nothing to do with him after a lifetime of this LOL. Sounds like a very immature man. Bet he’s a mamma’s boy.
NTA The marriage isn’t dying because of what you said. The marriage is dying because you said what his wife has been saying and Colin DGAF. Eventually she’ll accept Colin won’t change and by then it’ll be too late to save it.
You were bang on with what you said but YTA.
It wasn’t your place to say and certainly not around the dinner table with multiple people. You will have made it worse now.
NTA. You’re entirely right and Colin is behaving like a child. So many men do nothing around the house, see their wife do all the work and be exhausted ever night because she handles the entire mental and physical load, and then wonders why she doesn’t want to have sex every night. They dont understand that they have made it into just another exhausting chore for her. Colin needs to wake up and start pulling his load before his marriage dies. And hopefully your sister wakes up and realizes Colin sucks.
It’s not helping, it’s doing his part as a husband and father. NTA. He’s defensive cause deep down he knows he’s a lazy pos. UPDATEME
Colin sounds really fun. I mean clueless.
NTA. Sounds like Colin and Marie have more issues than just lack of intimacy.
NTA – Colin is.
YTA what you said was correct, but it wasn’t your place to say it. If Marie wants to have that conversation with her own husband, that’s her choice.
Marie’s marriage was paying a higher price in silence. Now he’s not doing anything AND not bothering her. It’s an improvement.
YTA.
Colin may be lazy, but it’s not your place to do what you did, especially in front of everyone. Then you can’t even take the cue that you took things too far and kept doubling down on it? Get a life OP and stop meddling in other marriages.
There are marriages where is dead in the bedroom for one reason or another. I think Colin is an AHOLE
If you think helping around the house magically fixes a dead bedroom, you’re delulu. Go check out the horror stories in r/deadbedrooms, men bending over backwards, doing everything, and still getting nothing. Eventually they give up, because why try if nothing changes? Men need sex to feel loved and motivated, not as some transactional ‘reward’ for chores.
This may be a bigger reason for breakups then financial problems. Both my brother and my male college roommate told me they think their marriage would have survived if they hadn’t had kids. I think their wives were exhausted from raising the kids, doing housework, working a job and cooking and were too tired for sex.
The guys just saw that the sex life cooled way down without caring about what caused it to.
Your heart was clearly in the right place but this was not the way to go about it. Based on everything you know about him how did you expect him to react to that? You’re not the ah but you definitely didn’t help. You just embarrassed him so of course now he’s going to be defensive and double down. He’s clearly an awful partner and deserved to be called out but I think what you really intended was to help your sister and that is not what happened. I think you made things harder for her.
where’s that mental load comic? it’s not about it being transactional. women just have a lot bouncing around their skulls all day, and sex doesn’t feature until all that is cleared. give your wife more mental space and she might just have time to think dirty thoughts and get the motor idling over.
Going against the grain and saying YTA.
You are right to advise your sister and support her but humiliating him in front of everyone is NOT the answer or will get him on board.
Your husband should’ve suggested to him that from experience to help even a little when he gets home from work wild go a long way and BOTH you and your husband should’ve suggested couples therapy so they can work out their differences.
Now BIL is on the defensive and nothing will be solved and probably made things worse for your sister
Colin sure spent a lot of time and energy to explain he doesn’t have either.
YTA because it was none of your business and you betrayed what should have been a confidential conversation
Maria‘s marriage isn’t paying the price. The marriage was in trouble before that.
What you did counts as a wake up call. If he is too stubborn to listen, I‘m sorry for your sis
Esh You might be right but it’s really none of your business and you also threw your husband under the bus. Especially when you only have one side to their issues.
Then you arguing with him further is real asshole territory. Can your sister not speak for herself?
Not the point, but it seems disingenuous to pretend that relationships aren’t at least somewhat transactional.
Colin thinks if he helps around the house his dick will fall off. He’s not going to wake up, but maybe Marie will. It wasn’t really your place to say anything, but you didn’t hurt the marriage, it already sucks.
He reacted badly because your words triggered him… who knows you’re right but that means he’ll actually have to do stuff!
I’m glad your husband showed him up and that not all guys are lazy arses!
I HAD to jump in here, but defiantly NTA!!! I could have written this myself because this is the exact reason my last relationship fell apart!
NTA and Collin is a POS. He’s too busy to be apart of the household. Just wait and see how busy he’ll be if she leaves him and he HAS to do it all alone like her. Then she’ll get a real break!
“If you want to anger a strong man, tell him a lie. If you want to anger a weak man, tell him the truth.”
They would definitely benefit from some couples counseling and researching the work of Dr Jennifer Finlayson-Fife, Esther Perel, & Emily Nagasoki
NTA. You did your sister a huge favor. Colin needs to man up and start helping around the house. He sounds like a boy.
NTA, but it probably would have gone over better if you had responded with, “ooh husband, thank you. With you doing the dishes, I know I’ll have enough energy for adult games tonight.”
Instead of pointing out what Colin is doing wrong, you are pointing out what your husband is doing right.
What you said wasn’t wrong, but it was not your place.
Someone said they were going against the grain, but it seems I’m going against the grain by saying: NTA.
Colin seems to be a little bitch. His wife should go on strike, just for shits and giggles.
He stopped trying after getting married.
ESH. You are absolutely right about Colin and his selfishness being the reason for a lack of intimacy, but I don’t think it’s your place to step in like that. You need to let them handle it as a married couple. Your husband should not have entertained Colin’s over sharing and he definitely should not have shared it with you. This whole family is disfuncional.
Why does everyone reduce situations to “asshole”?
“Asshole” needs to be reserved for the extremities of uncivilized behavior.
Being nosey and interfering isn’t necessarily being an asshole. It just causes family strife.
You should have made a low-grade suggestion and then kept the rest of your opinion to yourself: “Discretion is the better part of valor”.
You could have made a converse suggestion to the SIL, again keeping it casual.
After that it’s not your business.
The way you phrased it did make it seem weird and transactional, but even if you had phrased it better, I’m sure he would have gone off on you.
What does your sister think about what you said? I feel like whether you’re the AH or not depends on that. Like if you said this reasonably knowing it would make her life harder, Y T A. But if you genuinely thought you were helping, N T A. In the end, it’s not really your business though, you can only encourage and support your sister.
Eh, even though it’s true, it wasn’t really your place to say it. This is a conversation that needs to be had between that couple.
But it sounds like this is something they’ve already talked about, since neither of them were particularly surprised to hear it brought up.
This relationship might already be past the point of saving.
But someone really needs to explain to this dude that if a woman doesn’t want to have sex with you, she doesn’t WANT to have sex with you. Like, she’s not punishing you. She’s not “withholding” sex. She wants to want to, but she doesn’t want to. It could be a million reasons why she doesn’t want to, but when she gives you a very clear and specific reason, LISTEN TO HER! She is telling him exactly why she has no interest, he doesn’t care and is refusing to change, and wants her to sleep with him even if she doesn’t want to. That’s… sick.
She doesn’t want a “transactional” relationship – she needs to feel loved and respected, and the way she needs him to show up for her and show that love and respect, is by helping out with the kids and house. He refuses to love her the way she needs to be loved, therefore she can’t love him the way he needs to be loved.
She needs him to help out more, and he needs her to have sex more. But she can’t give him the sex unless he gives her the work. That’s not “transactional”, that’s simply cause and effect. If he’s simply not willing to do what she needs, she can’t give him what he needs. She’s not choosing this, it’s not her fault, it just IS this. If he refuses to budge, this marriage is doomed and they need to stop wasting any more time on each other.
you can be right and still be TA. YTA.
BIL is a dunderhead. You told him the truth. Reality. But he’s too stupid to understand. He can’t be helped. Just be good to your wonderful husband. In the very best way possible: you deserve each other! 🤭💓
You’re not wrong. But none of this was your business. Should have just stayed out of it unless someone asked your opinion the topic, or asked you to bring up the intimacy issues in their relationship. Did your sister request you do this? Is she currently pleased with the outcome?
NTA- for saying something to him someone does need to talk some sense into him. But YATA when it comes to conversations between your husband and his brother, that your husband confided in you with, and the conversations you have with your sister-in-law about this topic, or any other topic for that matter. They confided in you. Maybe they didn’t want him to know that they had told you anything. That makes people not fully trust you and maybe now they will have second thoughts before confiding in you. Maybe not your husband but possibly SIL. Especially if he’s mad that she was talking to you about it. It’s no problem that she talks to you about it. It’s a problem that he now knows that she was talking about him and her issues with you.
Let’s say for instance he is physically abusive, and you all had no idea. What do you think would happen when you and your husband left for the night, after that interaction? Yeah, see that’s why you never ever do that when someone confides in you, it is not up to you to speak up and say anything. All you are there to do is listen and give advice. Unless otherwise suggested.
With all that being said, I know you meant well. Heck, I probably would’ve done the same. My mouth does get ahead of me at times. We all just need to be mindful is all I’m saying. Hopefully what you said to him will get him thinking. I mean yeah he was mad, yeah he acted like he didn’t receive the information quite well. But in a few days he may change his attitude and his way of thinking. Hopefully. 🤞
YTA. After that entire, ridiculous argument you had to have figured out that Colin has been cheating. He left home to bang his mistress and now his cheating it’s so obvious that he can’t even have a basic conversation with his wife.
While it may not have been your place, both of them opened the door by telling you and your husband.
Your sister’s husband is very disrespectful to her. If he does this in public, how does he treat her in private? No wonder she is not in the mood.
I would suggest she hire a housekeeper. There is no reason for her to have to do everything. If he doesn’t like it, he can help. Otherwise, he doesn’t get a say. She can start spending more time on herself.
I would also advise her to get her ducks in a row, just in case.
Mostly esh.
Your bil seems like an overgrown man-child that still wants mommy to make him chicken nuggies and tuck him in. Wonder what happens if your sister gives him responsibility for taking care of some chores and stops doing them?
Your sister is triangulating with you, which is simultaneously one of the most natural and one of the most damaging things people do in a relationship. She has a problem with her husband, and because her relationship is fragile, she talks to you. She needs to be talking with him and figuring out how to be partners, and she wants to reduce her anxiety, so she gets you on her side. This strengthens your relationship with her, while damaging your relationship with him and her relationship with him.
Because you’re tired of hearing about it, because she’s talking to you and not him, you decide to tell him about himself. Mostly because your sister has trashed your relationship with your bil by triangulating with you. You let it out that you know an intimate secret about his relationship with his wife, which is already a sore subject because they never talk about it in a healthy way, and then you keep pushing. Now you’ve helped damage their relationship further, because nothing one likes their intimate secrets being shared.
Your husband seems like a cool dude, though.
He wants a wife appliance: cleaning, cooking, childcare, and sex. And he’s willing to emotionally abuse her (silent treatment) to force her into the role.
A little bit of TA cuz you didn’t have her blessing but it was necessary cuz yikes on bikes.
Ambushing someone in that setting wasn’t really tactful… a quiet whisper or explain why your husband did what he did might have been more effective however you embarrassed him and sacrificed his wife’s integrity in the process….
Talking to your husband to talk to him might have been a better example for him to learn … hopefully he pulls his big girl panties up and decides to be a loving husband than. Little crybaby
Sex shouldn’t be some reward or a treat to dangle in front of someone if they do what you want. Not in a relationship.
You could use that same logic such as – maybe if she was more intimate with him, hed do more things and help out more
NTA. It’s actually been proven that women are not sexually attracted to or turned on by partners they have to constantly pick up after because they use all their stress hormones for caregiving. And, let’s be real, a man who acts like a child isn’t a turn-on.
In the second paragraph you did an excellent job exploring how being tired and stressed out can sap a woman’s libido.
Later, when Colin was involved, your explanation wasn’t as clear and Colin wouldn’t be totally off to think you were framing it transactionally. You did fix it but you know how people can dig in their heels.
Yta to bring it up when and how you did.
He’s the A all the rest of the time.
YTA. Had nothing to do with you
“Helping” means it’s the woman’s responsibly and her husband is doing her a favor by doing what is actually his fair share of the housework and parenting. We need to rethink this and rephrase it to “doing his fair share” or “doing his part.”
Colin is the AH here.
NTA Either way, this was a good wake-up call for them. Either Marie is going to see she’s married to a man who has zero interest in being a true partner, or he will realize he’s a lazy ass who needs to step up. And sometimes, hearing it from someone else actually resonates more.
>I feel kind of bad because it wasn’t necessarily my place to say anything and now Marie’s marriage is paying the price
How can you type this out and still wonder? You even admit that this was a net negative for her.
You were morally in the right, but YTA for choosing this battle on Marie’s behalf. Meddling in other peoples’ marriages is super dangerous for exactly this reason. You have no idea what other dynamics are at play behind the scenes.
Not to mention this was literally the worst possible why to address this. Surprising someone after dinner with confrontation about their struggling sex life is 100% guaranteed to cause a blowup, even if that person is in the wrong. This couple needs a marriage counselor, not a surprise struggle session brought up by a family member. I bet it felt really good for you though so congrats..
It wasn’t your place to start that shitstorm. And you won’t be the one to finish it either.
The truth hurts you called him out now hes butt hurt. Maybe this will lead to change
He lives in that house and is a parent to those kids.
Taking care to make sure the house and family are safe and comfortable isn’t a “favor”.
It’s the goddamn job.
Also, I’ve observed the very best foreplay is taking care of the chores so your partner has energy for intimacy.
Colin is both an idiot and an asshole.
NTA