September 14, 2025 at 6:15 pm

He Asked For Five More Minutes To Finish His Video Game, So His Wife Spent The Rest Of The Night In A Bad Mood

by Benjamin Cottrell

man playing a video game

Pexels/Reddit

Everyone values their hobbies, but the timing of them can sometimes turn into a nightmare for couples with mismatched expectations.

One husband needed “just five more minutes” to finish his online game, but his wife wasn’t too happy about being told to wait.

The result was an evening simmering with frustration.

Read on for the full story.

AITA for not leaving my online game?

Yesterday, I was playing Apex while my wife was having a voice lesson for about an hour.

When she was finished, she was excited to talk to me about her lesson.

But when he asked for a couple more minutes to finish up, she wasn’t exactly understanding.

I was in the middle of an online match with about 5 minutes left. I asked her to wait until the game was over, and then we could talk.

She got upset and called her friend instead.

To her, this was a big issue.

She told me that she felt I had plenty of time to play games and that her happiness shouldn’t have to be “on hold.”

My view is that waiting a few minutes to let me finish an online match seems reasonable.

If it was a single-player game, I could just pause it.

So she spends the rest of the evening in a poor mood, and we hardly talk to each other.

And this was hardly the first time this couple has hit a wall on this.

This isn’t the first time we’ve had this issue.

A few weeks ago, she was at a choir camp for almost a week.

When she came home, I happened to be playing a game.

She wanted me to come outside right away to see her garden’s progress.

I asked her to wait until my game was done, but she said I had three seconds before she’d get mad.

He isn’t sure how to proceed.

I closed the game and went outside, but she was still in a bad mood afterward and told me a lot of things she felt I was doing wrong.

AITA for asking for a few minutes to finish my games before giving her my attention?

It seems like both parties lost in this argument.

What did Reddit think?

Maybe this most recent argument is simply a culmination of a lot of different things.

Screenshot 2025 08 12 at 12.48.08 PM He Asked For Five More Minutes To Finish His Video Game, So His Wife Spent The Rest Of The Night In A Bad Mood

It’s time to talk it out and finally get to the bottom of this.

Screenshot 2025 08 12 at 12.49.25 PM He Asked For Five More Minutes To Finish His Video Game, So His Wife Spent The Rest Of The Night In A Bad Mood

This commenter’s judgment depends on a variety of factors.

Screenshot 2025 08 12 at 12.50.00 PM He Asked For Five More Minutes To Finish His Video Game, So His Wife Spent The Rest Of The Night In A Bad Mood

How would his girlfriend feel if the tables were turned?

Screenshot 2025 08 12 at 12.50.37 PM He Asked For Five More Minutes To Finish His Video Game, So His Wife Spent The Rest Of The Night In A Bad Mood

He may have thought five more minutes wasn’t a big deal, but to his wife, it was about so much more than just a couple extra minutes.

If this couple can work on their communication, they can put an end to these stalemates once and for all.

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.

Benjamin Cottrell | Assistant Editor, Internet Culture

Benjamin Cottrell is an Assistant Editor and contributing writer at TwistedSifter, specializing in internet culture, viral social dynamics, and the moral complexities of online communities. He brings a highly analytical, editorial voice to his reporting on workplace conflicts, malicious compliance, and interpersonal drama, with a specific focus on nuanced stories that lack an obvious villain.

As a published author of rhetorical criticism, Benjamin leverages his academic background in human communication to dissect and elevate viral social media threads. Instead of simply summarizing events, he provides readers with balanced, deep-dive commentary into why the internet reacts the way it does. In addition to his cultural reporting, he is an experienced fine art photography essayist and video game reviewer.

When he isn’t analyzing the latest viral debates, Benjamin is usually chipping away at his extensive video game backlog, hunting down the best new restaurants, or out exploring the city with a camera in hand.

Connect with Benjamin on Instagram and read more of his essays on Substack.