It’s funny how something as simple as giving a gift can make you question your own judgment as a parent.

So, what would you do if you bought your toddler the perfect Christmas present but realized you might miss the joy of giving it because a new baby is on the way? Would you take your chances and wait until Christmas? Or would you give it to her early, even if your spouse wouldn’t agree?

In the following story, one mother does this very thing, but feels bad because she didn’t tell her husband. Here’s the full story.

AITA for giving my daughter her Christmas present early

My husband (28M) and I (28F) have a 20-month-old toddler. We have a second baby on the way who is due between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

For some context, my daughter is still too young to understand what Christmas is, what Santa is, etc.

For Christmas this year, I got my daughter a Toniebox, which is basically like a kid-friendly CD player except instead of putting in different CDs, they have characters that they put on top and then the box plays a track of like 10-20 things (some stories, some songs, etc) related to the character.

Her mother gave her a good idea.

My husband had basically no input on this and wasn’t interested in picking any of the characters or the box color, etc.

He said if I thought our daughter would like it, then to get it. He is most likely going to go out sometime right before Christmas and pick out some gifts for her himself (no idea if they will be from “Santa” or from him, but again, it doesn’t really matter bc our daughter is clueless).

I was talking to my mom and was telling her about it, and in the conversation, I mentioned that I was disappointed bc with the new baby, I don’t think I’ll really get to enjoy watching my daughter getting her gift, since I will be preoccupied with the new baby and how I wish I could just give it to her early.

My mom said I should just give it to her early, then, since it doesn’t really matter, and said she feels the same way, which is why she gets my daughter a small gift every few months, and will get her another small gift for Christmas.

Knowing her husband would disagree, she avoided telling him.

I ended up taking out the Toniebox and letting my daughter pick one of the characters (saving the other 4 I picked out for Christmas). We use it pretty sparingly (maybe 1-2 times per week for half an hour, and then it goes away, so it can keep the novelty).

I haven’t told my husband that I’ve been giving it to her bc I know he would say I should have waited until Christmas and would be annoyed.

I feel kind of guilty and like I’m wrong bc I’m purposely not telling him, but at the same time, it’s my gift to our daughter, and it’s not like she isn’t going to get anything new (she will still get the other characters for the box from me, as well as the gifts from my husband).

AITA?

Eek! It’s easy to see why she kept this a secret, but it could backfire on her.

Let’s check out what the readers over at Reddit think about this whole situation.

This reader has a lot of questions.

According to this comment, this could cause trust issues in her marriage.

For this reader, there’s a communication error.

This person thinks her decision was wrong.

Keeping this secret from her husband is making her miserable, so it’s time to come clean.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.