People Supply Us With Their "Am I The Jerk?" Stories In Exchange For Our Thoughts

"My (40F) husband (39) has misophonia. This means that certain sounds drive him crazy.

For example, he absolutely hates crunching sounds. This has affected him (us!) for as long as I can remember. My husband will yell, name call, and even take my food from me if I am crunching. He becomes a different person - like he really can’t help himself.

We have had many arguments over this - my husband says I’m rude for eating crunchy food, I tell him I should be allowed to eat in the kitchen and he should put on headphones. In the recent past, I told him that to solve our problem, I was going to grab his headphones when I wanted to eat something crunchy.

Today I was preparing to eat an açaí bowl with very crunchy granola in the kitchen when my husband went to do something on a computer in the next room over. There is no door between the rooms. After my first bite, my husband got very mad at me and told me to stop eating crunchy stuff and told me how rude I am.

I asked him nicely if I could get his headphones. He angrily said, no, I need to stop eating the crunchy food. I asked again very nicely if he needed me to find him some headphones. He said no, and came into the kitchen with a mission. He came stomping in and looked as though he was going to toss my food out, so I grabbed my bowl and moved to the other side of our kitchen island. He told me I had to leave the room and go eat my bowl in the bedroom. He told me that I was rude and disgusting.

I left the room and went to the back bedroom to eat because I was afraid after my next bite that he would come back in and throw away my food.

Eating a crunchy snack takes me about 5 minutes to finish, and I might do this a few times a day.

He is currently working from home, so he is always here when I eat. Am I supposed to leave the kitchen to eat, or should he wear headphones or leave the room? Who is the jerk?"

Another User Comments:

"NTJ. I think it’s unreasonable of the husband to want to control what you can and can’t eat when it’s within his power to control the situation.

He can wear headphones. He can go to a different room. His issue doesn’t excuse his response. He could have asked you to eat in another room. You could have discussed it. Storming into the kitchen and demanding you eat elsewhere or not eat and calling you rude for eating a normal snack while offering a solution… he’s the jerk." Whelmed29

Another User Comments:

"NTJ. I’m sorry, but he’s a complete jerk. I have the same problem. I can’t stand when people eat crunchy food. It absolutely drives me up the wall. I used to side-eye my coworker and good friend for eating almonds at her desk next to me, but we laughed about it because we are rational adults.

I know I can’t make other people change how they live. I can hear my husband chewing from two rooms away. Again, it’s a me problem. Sometimes I’ll comment if he’s eating tortilla chips right next to me, like “Good lord,” but there have only been a few times in over 20 years where I’ve made him leave the room before I lost my mind. Those times were when I was highly stressed and reacted without thinking. It’s not an anaphylactic allergy, it’s a thing that can be worked through. He should be mature enough to know that he is the one with the problem and needs to be the one to do something about it." Tmacswife

Another User Comments:

"NTJ. I have misophonia too and gotta be honest just reading all the times you said crunchy and crunching—I found myself getting hot and heated and annoyed with you. It’s a subconscious and fairly automatic thing. However — how you respond to that annoyance is completely a conscious affair.

He can’t help how annoyed he gets. He can absolutely control how he is responding to you. He’s a jerk who feels he can act out with you. Also— it’s the kitchen. Everyone in my family hates crunching and we all also know that the kitchen is fair game for anyone who needs to do it!" ResistSpecialist4826