Having a baby takes a huge toll on a woman’s body.

Then, in the months that follow, her body is healing – while she is waking up to feed the baby, which deprives her of that much needed rest.

So anyone will understand that she is more tired, and potentially a little more reactive to say the least, right?

Well not the guy in this story, whose own exhaustion seems to be clouding his compassion and ability to empathize with his wife.

Read on to find out what he said to cause friction in his exhaustion-strained marriage.

AITA for refusing to wake my wife up in the morning?

My wife and I have three young kids, including a 6 month old baby who still sleeps in our room.

I’m an early bird.

I routinely get up at 5:30am to enjoy a few silent moments of sanity and get some things done before the kids take over.

My wife is a night owl and hates waking up.

As a kid growing up her family nicknamed her “The Lion” on account of her morning temperament and blonde bedhead.

They would draw straws and the loser would have to get her up in the morning.

This topic made it into wedding speeches and continues to be a running joke to this day.

Let’s see how their opposite sleep habits caused tension in their relationship.

That said, she comes by this honestly these days.

We’re chronically sleep deprived because kids.

She’s on maternity leave and is up at least once or twice in the night nursing while I’m blissfully passed out beside her, so I don’t blame her for pushing her wakeup times.

I also don’t blame her for staying up later, as once the kids go down around 7:30pm, then we put the house back together, then we get stuck to the couch recovering from the day, and then she might get an hour to watch TV before we do it all over again.

Here’s the issue: she always asks that I wake her up in the morning and then ensure she’s awake 10 minutes later.

This is where the situation started to get on his nerves.

This has frustrated me from the start.

I suggested she use a silent/vibrating phone alarm or her Apple Watch if she’s concerned about waking the baby, but apparently those aren’t good enough.

I wear my Garmin smartwatch and a cheap $20 dumb silent vibrating alarm wristband that could wake the dead.

There’s been a few times where I’ve agreed to wake her up at a certain time, but forgot and then woke her up 15 minutes later.

It usually doesn’t cause any issues but today I got her up at 7:20am instead of the agreed-upon 7:00am, as I lost track of time attending to my son who woke up early.

Read on to find out what happened when he woke her up late.

It was a particularly difficult morning with cranky kids and she snapped about how it was just too late to get up with not enough time to get everyone ready.

I reached my breaking point and snapped back that moving forward I absolutely refuse to wake her up in the morning and that she’s a big girl who can be responsible for herself.

Since then she’s made a few snide comments about random little things “apparently being too much to ask” and says I’m being unreasonable by refusing to get her up and then make sure she’s actually awake after she inevitably falls back asleep.

Let’s see how he responded to her snippy remarks!

I told her if it’s not that much to ask then it should be simple enough for her to do it herself.

I can understand infrequent critical moments like “please make sure I’m awake so I don’t miss my flight” but making me responsible for her daily wakeup times is absolutely unreasonable at best, even if kids and sleep deprivation are in the mix.

AITA?

This woman is a grown adult with three kids. She should absolutely be able to wake herself up.

Under normal circumstances, anyway.

However, she has just had a baby, and is nursing through the night.

Let’s see what Reddit said about this.

One commenter suggested that the only problem here was the husband, for his lack of empathy when he’s the one getting a full night’s sleep.

And this person gave an even more compassionate perspective.

While another Redditor – in the same position as the mom – encouraged the husband to show his wife some extra love.

Raising three young kids is no walk in the park for anyone.

But for a sleep deprived mom, who is nursing through the night whilst caring for her kids in the day, waking up can be a challenge to say the least.

That’s not to say it’s not tough for the father too – he will certainly be a little more tired and snappier, but he needs to remember who is getting a full night’s sleep.

He needs to step up here.

If you liked that post, check out this story about a guy who was forced to sleep on the couch at his wife’s family’s house, so he went to a hotel instead.