A husband has taken to popular Sub-Reddit AmITheAsshole to ask whether he is an arsehole for asking his wife to rehome their cats while she is pregnant with their 4^th child. His wife is a SAHM and has been since COVID lockdowns, while the husband works outside of the home. In addition to being a stay at home mum, his wife takes care of and home-schools their triplets, grows the vegetables that they eat in their garden, as well as taking care of the cleaning duties all whilst while 20 weeks pregnant with their 4^th child. Both parties are happy with this dynamic and say it works for them as it’s less stressful.

In his post, the husband makes it clear that he’s made an effort to befriend his wife’s cats and, while they’re standoff-ish, they’ve definitely warmed up to him more. He also notes that his wife doesn’t seem to be making that same effort with his dog and, in the heat of an argument, once made the comment that he should re-home his dog. He admits that the dog requires a lot of patience and tolerance, whereas his wife expects perfect listening skills from the dog at all times which is the main reason that his wife dislikes the dog.

Due to her pregnancy, the wife is unable to change the cat litter for safety reasons. (Please, if you’re pregnant, do NOT change cat litter! Cat faeces can carry a parasite that can cause toxoplasmosis which can affect an unborn child). Unfortunately the triplet are too young to change the litter tray so the responsibility has fallen to him. The issue is that after getting home from work, he’s exhausted and often forgets. This can leave the house a bit stinky when it hasn’t been changed for a couple of days, which gives his wife migraines. So in order to remedy the situation he suggested to his wife that they rehome the cats for the duration of her pregnancy. She was understandably very upset about this, and noted that her and the children are incredibly attached to the three cats, whereas none of the rest of the family really care too much about his dog.

Please note that the Toxoplasma gondii parasite can also live in soil, and so it’s best to be careful when gardening as well while pregnant as that also poses a risk to your unborn child. To avoid this risk, avoid gardening if you’re pregnant and, if you end up having to dig around in the garden, make sure you wash your hands after digging around in the soil and that vegetables grown at home or unwashed vegetables are washed prior to eating.

Although the post has been deleted by bots since it was posted, the comments are still there to read and the husband later conceded that he indeed might be the arsehole,

“I feel like an AH because truly this does boil down to me forgetting to clean the cat box for her and I take full responsibility for that. I have ADHD and I have set reminders for myself (alarms) but after working 10-14 hours a day, I usually dismiss the alarm with intentions of doing it but then space it soon after dismissing the alarm. I’m not asking for permanent rehoming. Just temporary.”

Commenters were very passionatewith their responses, posting comments such as:

“YTA but according to my fiancée (biologist), gardening is much more dangerous for a pregnant woman than cleaning up after the cats. In general, you’d pretty much need to eat the poop or lick your poopy hand to get toxoplasmosis, and you’re much more likely to get it when digging in the ground or from unwashed fruit and veg.

So you should actually be gardening and cleaning up the cat tray to keep her safe” – ohforgottensky

“I feel like an AH because truly this does boil down to me forgetting to clean the cat box for her and I take full responsibility for that. I have ADHD and I have set reminders for myself (alarms) but after working 10-14hours a day, I usually dismiss the alarm with intentions of doing it but then space it soon after dismissing the alarm. I’m not asking for permanent rehoming. Just temporary.” – K_Bee_12

“I would love to be a genie and make OP swap places with his wife for one day, so he actually understands how massively exhausting her day really is. At the very, very, very least, OP could spring for a few automatic cat boxes, which he could then pay attention to every other day rather than every day. Yes, they are expensive, yes he still needs to clean them.

YTA – It really seems like OP is “forgetting” on purpose to force the wife to get rid of the cats.” – KaijuAlert

We tend to agree with commenters, the wife is taking on so many responsibilities around the home by taking care of triplets, gardening, keeping the home clean and home schooling their children and taking care of the dog and cats (aside from changing the litter box). The husband only has to change the cat litter tray. Yes, working 10 – 14 hours a day is exhausting, however an extra 5 minutes on top of that really isn’t too much to ask when everything else is done for you.

What do you think? Is rehoming the cats for the rest of her pregnancy an appropriate solution?