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When talking to friends, it is common to just agree with what they are saying to try to be supportive, to keep the peace, or just to keep the conversation going.

What would you do if you were out with your husband and one of your friends, and the friend said that all men were bad partners because she was having issues with her boyfriend?

That is what happened to the couple in this story, and the wife agreed with her to be supportive. Later, the husband expressed that this upset him because it means that he is a bad partner as well, which is not at all what she meant. Now she doesn’t know what to do to convince him that she didn’t mean he was a bad partner.

While I can certainly see why he is upset, it is also clear that she didn’t mean it that way, so he should forgive her. Read through the full story below and see what you think she should do.

AITA for agreeing with my friend when she was criticizing her boyfriend’s habits in front of my husband?

Hi, I’ve had a pit in my stomach since yesterday and I want to know if I messed up here, and if so how badly.

A great relationship is a real blessing.

My husband and I will have been married two years next sunday, and our son turned a year old a couple of months ago. Our relationship has always been great, I’ve been proud of how good we’ve had it and so our argument yesterday has me bothered.

On Friday, a couple of my friends visited just to meet up and have dinner. One of them has recently moved in with her boyfriend and they’re going through a rough patch right now, so she was complaining a bit.

Finding the right roles and responsibilities in a relationship can be hard.

She was complaining about being treated like a maid, and having to repeat things multiple times and then doing it herself for it to be done and just stuff like that.

While saying that, she also on a few occasions generalized a bit, kind of projecting her issues with her boyfriend on men in general. My other friend and I were being supportive because she seemed like she was going through it, and just agreed with her and supported her. My husband was there too.

Is he upset about what happened?

He’s never been the kind to take these gendered criticisms personally, which is why I really didn’t think this would be an issue.

On Saturday he was out with some friends, when I asked about when he’ll be back for dinner, he didn’t respond for a while then said he was eating out with his friends.

What exactly did she say?

When he was back too he was cold with me and just taking care of our son. This was all weird, so I ended up asking what the problem was. He first said nothing was wrong, I pressed that he’s been cold with me all day, what happened.

He told me that if I was so unhappy in my marriage I should’ve told him honestly instead of surprising him like that in front of guests.

Oh, if she agreed that all men are bad, then I can see why he would take it this way.

I genuinely was scrambling in my mind to understand what he was saying. I never said I was unhappy in our marriage, it wouldn’t make sense to. I’m happy with where we are.

He brought up that I agreed with everything my friend was saying about how terrible partners men are, that that was me saying he was a bad husband and that I was unhappy.

Sometimes people say things in the moment that aren’t precise.

I was stunned at that insane leap of logic, and I promised that what I said had nothing to do with him, that he is not my friend’s boyfriend, that I didn’t have any of those complaints that she had, and I never meant it to be an attack on him.

He still was stuck that my agreement with her was a criticism of our marriage too and that I had joined in at parts. I might have messed up here because I said that those things were not things he does, I was just being general and said that those were just some things I’d seen before him, like with an ex.

Now he is just looking for reasons to be offended.

He felt even more attacked by that and asked how often I was thinking about my exes over these mundane things.

I clarified thats its not what I meant I don’t think like that, I just had to search in my memory for some stuff to support my friend, especially because he doesn’t.

He needs to get over it.

We dropped the argument then, but the cold shoulder is continuing today too.

I can’t believe this is happening a week before our anniversary.

AITA?

She should apologize because she wasn’t clear about what she meant in the moment, but he shouldn’t be so sensitive. This is just one of those miscommunications that can happen all the time and it shouldn’t cause conflict.

Let’s see what the people in the comments have to say about it.

This commenter thinks she was out of line.

He did take it personally, that’s for sure.

It is likely that she would be mad if the situation were reversed.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a woman whose family says she’s selfish for not wanting strangers living in her trailer.

This commenter is exactly right.

She would be upset if he did the same thing.

It is understandable why he is hurt, even if she didn’t mean it that way. She should definitely apologize for what happened, but he should also be quick to forgive.

You can’t expect people to be perfectly precise in everything they say.