Sometimes something that feels like a small, practical decision in the moment can end up meaning something completely different to someone else.

So, what would you do if you made a quick choice while traveling, thinking it was no big deal, only for the other person to bring it up long after as proof you were in the wrong? Would you stand by your reasoning? Or would you leave you questioning how you come across to people?

In the following story, one man finds himself in this predicament and wants advice. Here’s his story.

AITA for turning off power for the night in our hotel room?

Last year, I travelled in a foreign country with a girl (call her Ann). One of the hotels we stayed at was set up so you had to insert a keycard into a slot by the door to turn on the room’s power (I’ve seen this in many hotels in Asia).

The first night in the hotel, Ann fell asleep first. When I went to bed later, I couldn’t figure out how to turn off one of the lamps in the room (I couldn’t find the switch), so I just pulled the keycard out of the slot to kill all power to the room.

I was tired and wanted to go to sleep, and didn’t want to wake her up by making a bunch of noise while trying to find another solution, so just pulling the card seemed the best move at the time. Next morning I plugged the keycard back in. I didn’t think it was a big deal.

Ann cannot explain why she was so bothered by it.

Since then, Ann has cited this event many times as an example of why I’m a bad guy. She says that electricity is a basic human need, and that by turning it off for the room, I was treating her as less than human, like an accessory.

I understand that her feelings, as feelings, are valid. But I cannot for the life of me understand how those feelings are rational, or how I could have predicted this response.

I’ve asked her how having the electricity off for one night hurt her, and she refuses to give a response. The weather was nice, so the room didn’t get hot, and I think she was charging her phone via battery.

As such, I can only guess that the event triggered something deeply emotional, maybe something from her past. But should I have been able to predict this?

Now, he’s questioning everything.

Is she right that my doing this indicates a bad/dismissive attitude towards her? When she explained how hurt it made her feel, I apologized and tried to explain that I didn’t intend to hurt her. But that doesn’t help and seems to make it worse.

This sort of thing seems to happen a lot to me – I’ll do something that to me seems reasonable or innocuous, and it will cause significant pain that I didn’t predict or intend.

I’m worried that there’s something fundamentally wrong with me that prevents me from predicting these kinds of responses. I hope that someone can provide perspective and advice on this.

AITA?

Eek! It does seem like a simple misunderstanding, but you never know what people have gone through.

Let’s see how the readers over at Reddit think he should’ve handled it.

This reader would’ve been made, too.

Here’s an answer to his bigger question.

For this reader, no one is the winner.

Yet another person who thinks they were both wrong.

They both need to change.

He needs to let it go and just try harder from now on. And it sounds like his girlfriend needs better communication skills.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check out what happened when a family gave their in-laws a free place to stay in exchange for babysitting, but things changed when they don’t hold up their end of the bargain.