husband hides in bathroom

There are few words to describe how drastically a marriage changes after the first child has arrived. Any faults or weaknesses you may not have noticed in your relationship become clear as day.

With a new child comes a host of responsibilities to be divided up among the couple. According to a study from Journal of Marriage and Family, 95% of heterosexual couples want egalitarian marriages where duties are shared. But research shows more often than not, the women in the relationship are forced to put in a lot more effort.

According to the study, before the child, each parent worked about 15 hours a week in the house. After the child reached the age of nine months, the women continued to do 15 hours of housework but added 22 hours of childcare.

The men added 14 hours of childcare and did five fewer hours of housework a week. So the women's' workload doubled that of the men.

via PixaBay

Reddit user FinalWintersEve couldn't handle that her husband was shirking his parental duties, she found a practical way to get him to do his share.

She told the story on the subreddit Am I The Asshole? and Redditors unanimously agreed that she's totally in the right.

"My husband and I are the parents of twins who are less than a year old," the story begins. "Anytime my husband SHOULD be doing something with the children ( it's his turn for a diaper, a bottle, even just soothing a fussy newborn) he ALWAYS goes to the bathroom first."

The constant trips may seem like he's ducking out of his responsibilities. But he has a health condition that means he has to frequently use the bathroom. So he makes sure to go before starting any major tasks like rocking the baby to sleep or changing a diaper.

But it's pretty obvious that he's taking advantage of the stituaiton,

"Over the past couple months he has been spending more and more time in there," the mother wrote. "He always takes his phone. He is always watching youtube. His average session is 25 minutes in there, often longer, rarely shorter."

She started keeping track of his time on the pot, and realized that "only twice in 10 days, not ditched me to go camp out in the bathroom and let me finish 80% of the childcare."

In addition, she says her husband spends about eight hours a day on a PC in his office playing the video game Diablo. The couple is currently on parental leave from work.

She's not alone in being angry over her hubby's video game habits. A recent study by Divorce Online found that of wives who "cite unreasonable behavior for ending their marriage, 15% believe their partners put gaming before them."

To stop her husband from ditching his daddy duties by hiding in the bathroom and watching YouTube, his wife came up with a brilliant solution: turn off the home's Wi-Fi.

"Today I started a new rule. If he is in the bathroom for more than 10 minutes, I flip the wifi off," she wrote. "He has not spent more than 15 minutes in the bathroom at a stretch today, but is extremely upset."

The fact that this poor woman has had to go to these lengths to get her husband to pull his weight around the house shows that their relationship has some major flaws. But countless people on Reddit applauded her efforts and admitted their husband does the same thing, too.

This commenter hit the nail on the head.