New Mom Says Her Husband Signed up for an Ironman Right After She Gave Birth and She’s Left ‘Picking Up His Slack’

The woman says that even when she approached him about how it was affecting her, “he still went ahead with his project”

A new mom says she and her husband are “fighting daily” after he signed up to compete in an Ironman that requires constant training right after she gave birth.

In a post shared anonymously to Reddit, the woman writes that she and her husband have both a newborn and a 2-year-old.

“Since I was pregnant he started training for his marathon+half ironman+full ironman and now that the baby is here we are fighting daily because of this,” she writes. “When he registered for all this (without consulting me first) I told him I thought the timing was not good. I believe that to be able to enjoy this hard but beautiful period of our life (toddler +newborn) we have to make family a priority to keep it a balanced life.”

She continues: “I also think this is my time to receive some sort of support, given that I just gave birth, that I’m breastfeeding and caring for a baby night and day. So having to support him and [pick] up his slack during training [is] something I was not willing to do right now.”

She adds that her husband is training for more than an hour a day and that, even though she approached him about how it was affecting her, “he still went ahead with his project.”

“Since then, I feel shut out of his life. All he thinks about is his ironman. If he is not training, he is taking care of responsibilities (house work, work, taking care of the kids) or he is on his phone chatting to his friends about the training or tracking his progress on apps.”

She writes that they no longer “spend time together as a couple” and she feels no “affection or sweet attention” towards her.

“I feel so alone in this adventure and it hurts,” she adds.

Others on Reddit are weighing in with their own stories of triathletes, with one writing, “I lived with a wonderful triathlete in Hawaii. We were just roommates, not married or in a relationship. There is no such thing as not signing up for next year. Next year you train to beat your personal best this year. It is an ever-present way of life…you may as well leave now because he’s not going to change. He wants this more than he wants his relationship with you or your children.”

But others are offering advice, with one suggesting, “You need to talk to him and say ‘I feel like you have checked out of our relationship and marriage, and that you don’t want to be around me or support our children. You spend all this time training instead of being a father and a husband. You knew we were having a kid, and that I would need help, but you are doing this anyway, leaving me to carry the load alone. We need to fix this now, because this is not sustainable.’ “