AITA for finally telling my husband to STFU about the damn knife?

A Redditor (45M) is frustrated after an argument with their husband (42M) over a kitchen incident involving a high-end knife. The Redditor, who is a professional baker and has always done the cooking in their relationship, accidentally placed a Wüsthof 8-inch chef knife in the dishwasher, a mistake they have never made before.

When their husband scolded them repeatedly for it, the Redditor lost their temper and responded sharply, comparing the situation to past accidents their husband has had. Now, they are questioning whether their reaction was justified. Read the full story below to see how the tension escalated over a simple kitchen accident.

‘ AITA for finally telling my husband to STFU about the damn knife?’

When I (45/M) met my husband (42/M), I used to do all the cooking in our home. I enjoyed it very much and I was quite good at it, having been a professional baker for a number of years.

My husband is from China, and had never cooked American style food in an American kitchen, so when we met 16 years ago, he didn’t do any of the cooking, and he had no clue what a dishwasher was.

I had to teach him the ins and out of all that, including the importance of understanding how to know what is safe to put in and leave out of a dishwasher, etc. As a baker, chef and cook I’ve collected a lof sets of high-end knives over the years and I also made it a point differentiate which knives are OK for the dishwasher and which aren’t.

Fast forward to tonight. These days my husband has learned how to cook quite well, and his dream is to open his own restaurant. He cooks dinner now nearly every night, and our deal is that whoever cooks, the other person cleans and washes down the kitchen.

As my husband and I are in the kitchen beginning to prepare dinner, he can’t find one of our most used high-end knives: Wüsthof 8-Inch Chef. It’s not in any of the blocks along the counter. So I say “I hope I didn’t accidentally put it in the dishwasher”.

But I did. Sure enough, after all these years of owning all my knives, I slipped up and absent mindlessly stuck the Wüsthof in the top rack of the dishwasher. Now…I know that ONE cycle isn’t going to do a damn thing to the knife, and that its more about repeated abuse.

So my reaction was more like “Ah…damn, I can’t believe I did that I’ve never done that before.” My husband was pissed. He gave me a very s**tty look, holding the knife up “You don’t put this in a dishwasher” he admonished me like a child, “don’t ever do that again”. I let that one go. I just ignored it.

Swallowed it back and moved on. But my husband has this quality about him that I like to call “just can’t f**king let s**t go”. So as I’m trying to move on, and I say again “I’m just really surprised I did that I never put those in the dishwasher I must have been out of it.” He replied again, sternly: “Well, just don’t ever do it again.”

I said “Well…it was an accident, so I can’t promise you it will never happen again.” He scoffed at me. “Well, I’m happy to know that you’re admitting you’re likely to do something stupid like this again, thank you for telling me that.” Needless to say, this is where I LOST. MY. S**T.

I said “You’re right. I am telling you that. It’s called a F**KING ACCIDENT. You’ve crashed more than 1 car since you’ve lived here. Have a I ever scolded you and said ‘don’t ever do that again’? No…because you didn’t actively choose to do anything wrong to create that accident….that’s why its an accident.

By telling me not to do it again, you’re framing it as a decision. So don’t f**king admonish me like a child, I’m not 6 years old and I don’t you to tell me to not do something that I haven’t done in the many years that I’ve owned something just because I slipped up and did it accidentally 1 time.

That’s not looking out for me and asking me to be careful, that’s just being a controlling d**k.” We haven’t spoken since for the rest of the night. I’m more than happy about that.

Check out how the community responded:

Pretzelmamma −  my husband has this quality about him that I like to call “just can’t f**king let s**t go”. This sounds exhausting. 

RumiDupsie −  NTA. It was an accident, and he overreacted big time. You’re adults, not kids, and his constant scolding isn’t helpful or necessary. You had every right to call him out.

Electronic_Ladder398 −  NTA, your husband is annoying as hell. I’m sure he has other good qualities that outweight this extremely annoying quality, or else you wouldn’t last 16 years with him. But damn, this would drive me off the wall.

FallOdd5098 −  So you were a little sharp with him?

MajorAd2679 −  NTA. It was an accident but let’s be clear, those are your knives, not his. Maybe it’s time for him to pay for his own set of knives instead of using yours.

electric_uncle_trash −  NTAH. These are *your* knives? Then you do with them whatever the f**k you want, pal. That’s fucked up. Husband is an a**hole.

Fornamessits1a −  It’s one thing to point out a mistake, but it’s another to harp on it repeatedly. NTA

Fast_Leg8135 −  you’re not the ah. accidents happen, and it’s not fair for him to blow it out of proportion or act controlling about it.

Square-Minimum-6042 −  INFO: Who owned the cars he crashed?

RedneckDebutante −  NTA He was intentionally trying to degrade you. Not cool and I’d have chewed his ass, too. Some men love to do this s**t.

Was the Redditor justified in losing their temper over their husband’s repeated scolding, or did they overreact? How would you handle a situation like this in your own relationship? Share your thoughts below!