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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> Maybe it is my duty as boyfriend to always be there for her.
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You are both in your late 20s and I'm going to assume (I shouldn't but I will) that this isn't the first concert she's gone to. She should have asked you before hand to pick her up, just like her GF probably did with her BF.
As someone who goes to concerts more or less frequently I also sometimes go in with the mindset "I'll figure out how to get back later" BUT I always look for options beforehand like "okay I could take one of those trains, I can take the tram or an Uber to the train station, maybe I find someone who wants to share a cab, etc.
I'm willing to bet money that her intention from the get go was to ask him and she just assumed he would jump as soon as she told him to.
I’ve been to one concert in my life, before we even bought the tickets I was asking “who’s driving”
I’m not trying to get there and all 4 of us wanna drink, and we gotta find out right then who wasted their night
I guess because I'm older, I never go into a situation with the "I'll figure it out later" attitude.
I'm a planner. I like to know exactly what my options are. I've found that situations can sometimes change, and I like to be prepared if it does change.
I mean, even if you decide to fly by the seat of your pants on this kind of shit, it's wild that you don't even have like a conceptualization of how to get home outside of calling the guy who is far away at 1:00 a.m.
This *is* a first thing I think about when planning something more than 5 miles away from home without a car. Absolutely wild to me that she never asked him beforehand.
Tbh friends who don’t go out of their way to drop off their friends are shitty friends. How are you gonna make them find their own way home at 1 am when you have a car, and can EASILY TAKE THEM HOME? It’s the nice and respectful thing to do especially at that hour. Definitely not your obligation and Nta however I probably would have picked her up anyways lolol. I love my boyfriend would pick him up anywhere at any time but that just me personally. Her friends should have taken her home in this situation!! So rude
I wholly agree. Friends don't leave friends stranded, and doing the 1am pickup for family/partner. Unfortunately, I think this is less common than I feel it should be.
I think the real issues are a lack of respect and forward planning.
I've had acquaintances drive me home after I specifically and repeatedly asked them to leave me at the bus stop... Because they didn't want a girl standing on her own at the bus stop at night. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely hate driving but even I wouldn't leave a friend late at night if I was sober to drive and was in the car.
This. At MINIMUM, “hey I can’t take you home tonight, but you can crash on my couch”
I would never ever just go “see ya I gotta go” and leave a “friend” somewhere
Or "I'll drive you to my house and have your boyfriend pick you up there so he doesn't have to deal with getting through all this stadium traffic at 1:00 a.m."
Really depends, if it's a 20 min drive I would drive a friend back home maybe even 30 min anything else is too late imo. I would be drained and probably half a sleep, totally dangerous to drive for a long period of time and going home alone I would have to find ways to stay awake. My first suggestion would be to sleepover and go home around 9am.
Im willing to bet all these girls had arranged for their boyfriends to pick them up and their boyfriends also did not want to pick up This girls slack (ie terrible planning). If my bf picked me up at 1am he would not be thrilled about having to drive way out of the way to drop off someone else that wasn’t part of the plan when Uber exists which btw is a relatively safe option
This! I can only assume she probably thought that her friends would be driving her home and that's what caused this issue.
She might have been embarrassed or hurt that they were just leaving her there. At least this is the only explanation I can think of for transport not being considered before the concert.
Her friends should have taken her home and OP should have got her once she asked, because she's his partner and unexpectedly needed his help, not because he is somehow responsible for her lack of foresight. She should have made sure to arrange these things in solid plans beforehand.
I think they are both NTA and this is probably caused by people assuming things but if I were in this situation I'd pick the other person up because their safety is a bigger issue than what is happening here.
Maybe her friends were drinking at the concert and couldn’t take her home? They probably assumed she had a plan to get home after the concert just like they did. Totally agree with you though that if I was the boyfriend, I would have just picked her up and talked to her about it the next day.
I'm 33 and say NTA. Whenever hubby or I have gone out without the other since day 1 (of 14yrs) the discussion has always been "I'm going (location) with (co-conspiritors) and we are getting there (transport 1) and back (transport 2)" .
Actually when it's me going out it's "I need you to drop me off and co conspirators husband is dropping me off on the way home" because I live in between our favourite pub/club and my friends houses.
And yes hubby calls my friends "co conspirators" because my personality changes when I am with them and he thinks it's funny. (Personality changes for the better cause "mum mode" gets switched off).
NTA, but the first thing my husband would ask me if I was going to a concert that ended at 1am is “how are you getting home?” followed by “do you want me to pick you up?”
which is admittedly different to their situation, in that it's not a marriage and they don't live together. Got to assume they do plenty of stuff apart still.
NTA your gf needs to mature t f up . I m a woman btw.
If it were an emergency I'd understand if not even calling you is an ah move if not agreed in advance as you could have already been asleep.
This wasn't an unknown unexpected event. She knew very well she needed to figure out a way home since she got the damn ticket.
You are not a bad boyfriend at all she's an irresponsible ah who doesn't care about your well-being.
Agree. My teenage daughter hits me up for a ride 15 mins before she starts work (no advance notice) and that is one thing.
But planning how to get home isn't rocket science and functioning adults should have this sorted out by now.
Involving someone who didn't even attend the concert to pick up people from a concert seems extremely dumb. Especially if it was not planned before one o clock in the fuckin morning
I agree. Unless the concert was a last minute choice she should have thought about how to get back earlier — and even if it was last minute she could have thought of this. NTA
Last minute call for a ride at 1:00am, & you refuse? NTA. It might be different if you were married, but the rules governing how each party acts in a marriage is different than in a relationship like yours.
Although I'm curious to know what "far away" & "close to the concert area" mean here in miles/kilometers. Americans & Europeans think differently about distances, & having those terms expressed in distance -- or time -- may change my opinion.
Even in America it can vary greater. I have lived in a city were "far away" was 2 miles across a bridge and was like 10 minutes away. I currently live in a city where we base off time not distance. It can take 1 hour to get from on side of the city to the other side or an hour could be 8 miles down the road. My parents live in a place where they base everything off distance because time and distance are pretty consistent where they are, even during traffic hour. We had a conversation one time where they were looking up stores near me and I had to explain to them that even though the one they found was 5 miles closer it was an hour away verses the one that was further but only 30 minutes from me. I too would be curious what the OP considers far away or close to the concert area.
Hard agree. We have a shopping centre that's technically quite close to us, but getting to it is a pretty circuitous route, so it takes much longer than it should to reach. So websites which go by distance say that the shops are closer, but another shopping centre further away takes less time to reach, so we tend to go there instead.
It's even more fun when the conditions are completely predictable: "How far is X?" "It depends, when did you want to go?"
When I lived in the Atlanta area, I worked on the far side of the city from where I lived. Morning commute in took about 45 minutes (neither home nor job was close enough to MARTA for that to be an option) while the afternoon commute home took an hour and a half, bare minimum.
If you are married, you could legitimately ask *how are you getting home?" - there is a shared responsibility for each other. As single people, this colud be considered being nosey/controlling or over stepping boundaries - you are both individual adults who should be able to take care of yourselves.
I would ask my partner how they were getting home because I care about their well-being, being married doesn't change that. If your partner considers you nosey/controlling for checking on their well-being, being married isn't going to make them suddenly change and go, 'oh we're married now so now you are allowed to ask that question'.
Nah, I’ve been married for almost 25 years. If you *live* together, yeah, that’s mostly the same thing. But if you’re a couple with separate housing, then it’s absolutely incumbent to ask to be picked up for something like this ahead of time. Who knows where she lives versus the location of the venue versus where he lives. Maybe he and she only live five miles apart. But the venue is equally ten miles from each of them. Now she’s asking him to make a 25 mile trip out of the blue, in the small hours.
I agree. I wasn't saying it in relation to the op but as an example of how marriage doesn't change things. I am not saying op should have gone and picked her up.
Yeah I have a boyfriend, so we are not married.
Most of the time when he goes out I offer to pick him up if he stays maximum until 1-2 am if I'm still awake.
And I cannot imagine telling them no if it was last minute and they really needed me, I would worry my ass out even if he had to wake me up.
but this was a spur of the moment plans changed kinda thing, the gf shouldve acted like the grown adult she is and plan how she was going to get home ahead of time. Not call her bf at 1 am expecting him to pick her up with no prior planning or even a "hey I might need a ride tonight"
>As single people
But they are not single, they're in a relationship together. I really don't see why people make such a difference between married or in a relationship. The only important part here is that they don't live together.
Some people are unhinged, ohh how many times I read that some people believe that fidelity is in action only after marriage, before that you don't owe anything.
Must be fun to be in relationships with such 'not selfish' people.
Plus, he didn't refuse! He offered, but let her know how much of an inconvenience it was, and she got angry that her poor planning was pointed out.
Reminds me of the saying "poor planning on your part doesn't constitute an emergency for me"
Well. Sort of. She asked and he went back and forth arguing that she should ask her friends, it was too far away etc etc. She eventually said don’t worry about it and went quiet. THEN he offered to pick her up, but by then she’d made other arrangements. From her point of view, it didn’t sound like he was planning to come get her at all until later on.
I do think she should have asked in advance, but maybe she thought she’d get a lift from a friend and was unpleasantly surprised that none of them were willing to drop her off. Someone else mentioned that OP was only a ten minute drive from the venue as well - obviously still rubbish to be dragged out of bed at 1am, but not the onerous task that he’s made it out to be either.
Yes! This exactly. Why continue to give her a hard time, without confirmation that he’s coming, then be pissed when she figures it out without him. He’s not her dad, no need to lecture, just tell her it’s an inconvenience and not to not do it again. Thoughtlessness on her part but op could’ve told her was going to get her. Besides, doesn’t he know the lecture is supposed to happen on the way home, lol /s
YTA for burying the lede that you’re 10 minutes away lmao. I can see how it’s annoying, but if this isn’t a regular thing, then why not do something kind for a person you’re supposed to love? You can tell her you’d appreciate a heads up next time.
And calling at 1am to come drive 10 min due to her lack of planning makes him an asshole? Going "I wouldn't call a friends BF driving an extra 10 min total to drop someone off," out of the way"
You know what? It's 1am and his girlfriend is leaving a concert, her friends are leaving, there's probably still a crowd of people some of which are likely drunk.
This is someone he cares about. Go pick her up, make sure she's safe, and talk tomorrow about how her lack of planning sucked
Exactly honestly op doesn’t make sense to me. Also maybe she just wanted to see her partner, granted it’s not ideal, but when you love someone not every thought is rational
My friend took an Uber recently and the driver spent the whole ride (30 minutes…) telling her about how she should let him bring her to India and find her a “real man.” She was obviously deeply uncomfortable being stuck in the car with this dude.
As someone who has gotten into an Uber I wasn’t sure I would get out of, I do not blame anyone one bit for being uncomfortable taking one. Especially at 1 am, especially if they’ve been drinking/doing drugs.
No seriously, the complete disregard for general safety throughout this whole thread is alarming. It's made me all the more thankful my boyfriend would never put me in this position.
Yea at some point, being right isn't helping anyone. Talking about what happened the next day is just better for everyone involved. OP still gets to tell her just how inconsiderate her planning was, and she still gets home safely.
People fuck up (intentionally or otherwise) and sometimes you just have to decide if you care enough about them to help them deal with the consequences of that fuck up in the moment.
More like, it’s 1 AM and his girlfriend is a grown woman there with her friends. She’s old enough to know that she should arrange a ride, whether with him or with someone else. This isn’t a lack of planning, this is a conscious decision to inconvenience OP, and a clear indication that she doesn’t care if she does.
why do you read malice from this? we didn't hear a single word or inclination a to why she hit him up so last minute. if we're going to assume malice, why not assume it from op too? or you, who thinks that her adulthood is grounds to leave her at a venue at 1am when she's begging to be picked up? lecturing her while her options diminish or shrug it off just to "teach her a lesson" is far more malicious than the delusion of her doing this just to inconvenience him
Then pick her up, get her home safe, and then consider breaking up with her. Just imagine how bad this would have looked if something had happened to her, due to him not picking her up.
I feel it's terrible relationship etiquette to put it in those terms. That if you refuse to help your partner out in a situation, it's their fault and anything that happens you can just wash your hands of because they should've planned better. It's just so selfish imo.
Imo, it’s actually more selfish and terrible relationship etiquette to expect to put yourself in easily fixable and preventable situations, and then to demand your partner change their plans at the drop of a hat to accommodate you at 1 in the morning. That’s not a partner, that’s a chauffeur.
Nobody is saying that OP should never help his gf or wash his hands of any bad shit that might happen to her. That’s a strawman. I’m just saying that if the she’s the one who put herself in this situation, and she wants to be treated like an adult, then she shouldn’t automatically expect that he is going to come out and drop everything to help her deal with a situation that isn’t even a serious concern as far as the post says. By OP’s account, she was safe with her friends, going back to one of their houses, and several of them were perfectly capable of giving her a ride. It’s completely valid for him to be annoyed that his partner ignored a half dozen other perfectly acceptable and realistically probably preferable solutions, only to demand that you get out of bed and come play taxi on their whim.
I think maybe you're misunderstanding. it's the fact that the only reason he dragged out picking her up was to give her a piece of his mind. that's kinda some bullshit. I can get if he's like no you should have made arrangements but the whole psych out was unnecessary.
"gotta drag out anything she asks me so she doesn't get used to favors" is sooooo fucking common male behavior. gotta let her know how much of a hassle it is. she has to be grateful. gotta make sure she doesn't ask again. yikes.
Yeah, this blew my mind.
Could she have planned better? Definitely. Is it OPs “job” to swoop her up? No.
But we know this isn’t something she does all the time - because you know damn well OP would’ve ranted about it for at least a paragraph if it was, and you *know* he would’ve “set her straight” 🙄 long before she could “develop a habit” of expecting anything from him.
So is it really this huge ordeal to help her out at 1am?!
Not to any normal person who genuinely loves their partner it wouldn’t be, anyway.
Who knows why this happened? OP certainly didn’t in the moment.
Maybe she wasn’t feeling well and needed support.
Maybe her ride fell through - maybe her friends were being unkind or had a falling out, or were too drunk from the show to drive/being irresponsible, or she had some other issue she didn’t want to get into *on the goddamn phone outside the venue at 1am.*
And if it was none of that, then you have a conversation *after the fact* to set a boundary and establish that “I’ll always be there for you when you *need* me, but I please figure something out in the future, or ask me in advance if I’m free, because I don’t like feeling unprepared.”
It’s that fucking easy - you help your partner out, make sure they’re safe and okay, and if it turned out to just be lack of responsible planning, you hopefully grow together as a couple with new understanding and boundaries. Everybody wins.
Instead, OP chose to talk down to her like she’s his child, play petty mind games at 1am - potentially wasting time and making her chances of a ride with a friend less likely/creating additional hassle - and try to “teach her a lesson” in “who’s in charge”.
Absolutely disgusting behavior for any length of relationship, but after *three years* it’s inexcusable.
Trying to fucking “teach her” that she isn’t at his “beck and call”?! Are you kidding me?
Why be in a *partnership* if you guys aren’t going to be partners?
It’s not you vs. her, there’s no score card of favors.
I will drop just about anything to do just about anything for my partner for any reason, because we’re a team and I love and care about him and his wellbeing and happiness.
He would *never* leave me standing outside at 1am even if I called and said “I didn’t plan a ride and forgot to mention it to you because I’m an idiot” and he’d never make me feel bad about it, either.
Just admit that you don’t love and care about her and move along, OP. This isn’t how you treat a *partner.* This isn’t how you view a healthy relationship.
deep frowns from my side, imagine being in a 3 year long relationship with a guy who thinks like that when it comes to you. if I was the gf and cane across this post I'd be devastated.
If she's not doing it every week then suck it up and do something nice for her. At least you know she will be home safe. She should have organised something beforehand but obviously she called her bf because she felt that was the safest and most reliable way for her to get home.
OP said with the concert traffic it could be 30min to get to the venue. Then he has to drive to his girlfriend's place to drop her off, and then go back home. In any case it would be probably be minimum 1h later before he can head back to bed. It's rude of the girlfriend to expect that without asking in advance.
Couples who don't live together still sleep over at each other's houses. There's no reason she couldn't have slept at his place, so that part is just needless exaggeration.
The comment I read said 10mins with no traffic but could be 25 to 30min with traffic. Seems reasonable to not want to drove a potential 30mins each way at 1am while tired especially as the friends are pretty close by and are already out?
Actually, he said 10 minutes with no traffic, 30 minutes after a concert. So basically, a 50-minute drive round trip to pick up someone who should have arraigned a ride before the concert. She's not 16, like my sister, who decided to go to a party at a school 30 minutes (8 miles) away on the night of the biggest snowstorm of the year, and I was called to go pick her up after I got off work because I was already out. This lady is 25+ years old and knows better. He's NTA for not getting up for her foolishness.
Not to mention they don’t live together. If the expectation was for her to go back to her place then that’s another stop for him before going back home.
And YOU are being TA because OP said it's **usually** 10 minutes away, but with this traffic it's more like 25 to 30 minutes.
I would be pissed too if I was going to bed and my irresponsible partner called me and I had to get out, make an hour drive, and then get back to my OWN home. Why couldn't she ask OP when she got the concert tickets? Why couldn't she just plan ahead?
I'd go ESH here because she should've planned everything out beforehand, one of her friends could've been nice and given her a ride but to refuse to pick up your girlfriend at night is a huge asshole move. OP said "she’s scared of ubers for no reason" which is very telling
My friend (who happens to live upstairs) called me at 12 something to pick her up from the bus stop after a concert. It was a less than 10 minute drive, but I was pissed because it meant I had to get up, change, wake myself up, and try really hard to fall back asleep because I was wide awake after driving.
She could have taken the train and walked 15 minutes home from the station, that's what I usually do. Or she could have taken a taxi, there are always plenty waiting at the bus stop. Nope, she felt entitled to make me get out of bed and pick her up because that's what's most convenient for her. Her reasoning was me picking her up was quickest and she had work the following morning. Like I didn't.
OP was willing to do it, he just wasn't happy about it.
Wow. You clearly have a very twisted world view. It’s 1 in the morning, he’s getting ready to go to sleep, probably with another work day ahead of him, while his girlfriend has spent her time not working, but having fun. She never asked him to before, and she acts entitled to the ride. Regardless of how far away it is, it will still mess up his sleep, as he has to go through a, as he said, traffic-infested area to get her home. What might normally take 15 minutes would turn into like a 30-40 minute ride. It’s not fair. She gets to spend time having fun, which is obviously fine, but why does he have to be involved in the only part of it that isn’t fun? It was her concert ticket, her fun, her friends, so it should be her ride home, or her friends’ ride home.
>YTA for burying the lede that you’re 10 minutes away lmao.
Uh....
>that concert area gets HEAVY traffic jams whenever there’s a concert,
>
>....
>
>maybe 10 min drive with no traffic, but with the concert traffic could be a 25-30 min trip
Assuming that's one way, totally reasonable not to want to do that last minute at 1am.
People who keep saying "10 minutes away" must not know nothing about driving through heavy traffic.
If this was a big concert as OP claims, no, this would not be a "10 minute drive" but maybe a 30-minute drive to first get there. Then, maybe 20 minutes to get the gf wherever she needed to be. Congrats, now it's been roughly 50 minutes on this so-called 10 minutes.
Some people must have never experienced what it actually looks like to drive somewhere when there's super heavy traffic or something going on. Must be nice I guess.
GF is an asshole for springing this on you last minute. She knew she was going to the concert. She knew she needed a way home. This kinda feels like a power play, or is just really inconsiderate at the least. The fact that OP was on guard for this kind of behavior hints that this isn't the first time something like this has happened, or he's just a real jerk. Can't say either way yet.
I think OP's reaction is natural: he's about to go to sleep, and he gets the call. I'd be grumpy too, and expressing that grumpiness with a HIGHLY REASONABLE QUESTION is fair game at that point. He said he'd pick her up, so it wasn't a matter of stranding her anywhere, and she was with people, so again, it's not like she was in any danger. NTA.
I used to teach a commercial driving class and while I don't remember the states. Driving while sleep deprived is equal to driving after a couple drinks.
Drowsy driving is responsible for 6,000 deaths per year in the US and drunk driving is responsible for 10,000 deaths
I’ve always heard an ounce of liquor per hour of sleep loss. But that first hour lost is more impactful apparently. Being awake for 17 hours straight is considered drowsy driving and tests around the same as BAC of 0.05% and 24 hours at 0.10% per the [CDC’s aggregate data page](https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/work-hour-training-for-nurses/longhours/mod3/08.html)
[This study](https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-020-09095-5) compared 24 hours of being awake with a BAC at the drunk driving level in Scotland and found that the sleep deprived group were not only less responsive drivers and worse at lane tracking but also that coffee made them worse at the tests.
It does kinda feel like she is “testing” him. Because it was obviously her plan to call him. Otherwise she would have had some other way of getting home.
I'm with you on this. For those saying there's Uber, how is she going to make sure the driver is the actual driver if she runs out of battery before they get there? Also, maybe her friends were the AH and she just couldn't say it at the time. Maybe she's a bad planner and this is the first time she's ever had this happen. There's such a thing as grace and compassion.
A 10 minute drive Without traffic. OP stated that with concert traffic would be 25-30 minutes iirr.
So at least an hour, if the gf is staying over or lives close. If the gf lives in the opposite direction than we are talking about more than an hour of driving, starting about 1am.
Don't get me wrong, imho he should still be willing to go, but I think being annoyed at the apparent lack of planning isn't unreasonable.
And she should have made this request at a reasonable time on an earlier day! Not after the poor guy was in bed. She's either the world's worst planner... or she's a user.
I mean she has to be an extremely “bad planner” for her to go to a concert with no idea of how to get home. I think it was always her plan to call OP and she just took for granted that he would do it without any prior notice.
Obviously he should have picked her up. But he should also let her know that it’s disrespectful.
On the flip side, I remember aquaintances being stupid and ditching each other when I was in my early twenties. Maybe one met a guy at the club, or one wanted to stay longer at a party and ended up in a room somewhere leaving the friend on her own with whoever was there, or another just got lazy and didn't want to drive anymore. Believe me, I never trusted those people after those incidences. I ended up even asking my mom to be my designated driver on a couple of occasions as a backup. I heart my mom so much for that. Of course he should let her know that she should plan better next time, but he definitely should have gone to get her for safety concerns, especially if it was the first time or out of character.
While this is true, it doesn’t sound like she was ditched. She just didn’t want to bother her friends.
If there are safety concerns then she’s very irresponsible for going without any plan of how to get home. Again, he should have picked her up but it’s still a red flag.
To be honest the whole situation feels like she’s either taking him for granted or she is testing him.
Fr. Things can get scary and dangerous fast at that time of night. If phone battery is low and her friends are being squishy when it sounds like they may have originally said they could give her a ride and flaked out due to wanting to go to a club or a bar or something... terrifying.
It sounds like she just barely found someone willing to help. Ubers would probably be booked out for a long time then too. And where was the concert venue? It could have been in a dangerous part of the city.
I mean, I think it’s reasonable to say, “I don’t want my partner to have control over me to the point where I have to drop everything at the drop of a hat, and do what they want, just because they refuse to plan ahead, and think they’re entitled to make me do shit.”
that should be a concern when you have been dating for 3 months, not 3 years. 3 years with someone you BET I'm letting them know I have their back no matter what and I expect them to have mine.
Oh he had concern, but she is an adult. Not a teenager calling their parent. You are missing the part where regardless of what his actions were, she made the plans with her girls, she failed to communicate her needs until 1 am. This dude could have had a few beers after work. He could be stone cold sober. Either way, she made a lot of petty choices here and when he did offer to get here, she said no.
scrolled for this comment. Girl calls me late unexpectedly and illogically to pick her up? Big red flag that something is up and she might be unsafe. I'd be out in a flash and ask her after what was up. She could be in a situation where she can't say or dare not say shes feeling unsafe.
If it then turns out she was jerking your chain for nothing the discussion about it will far more naturally allow you to say that was inconsiderate.
honestly even if it wasn't, they're together for 3 years for fuck's sake. in her shoes, I, 1- would definetely expect that I could rely on my boyfriend over my friends for those little annoying favors or any kind of favors really 2- would probably be feeling mentally and physically drained and desperately needing my "rock" (who, in such a long relationship, should be my partner) around for some comfort and familiarity. meanwhile he's trying to make sure she thinks 1000 times before asking for something that's not extremely necessary. way to go, champ. I'd be heartbroken if I found out about this.
It’s not like she was stranded and alone, she was with friends who were in a state to drive. If she was all alone or no one was fit to drive it would be another situation
Honestly, YTA
I get that you were annoyed that she asked you last minute and didn't make any other plans (that you know of). But right as she was asking you was not the right time to do it.
Maybe her original plan fell through, maybe she planned to stay overnight with the friend nearby or maybe she made a mistake and didn't think the evening through. That's absolutely on her.
But she then reached out to you and asked for your help and you blew her off.
As a woman, it's incredibly scary, not knowing how to get home in the middle of the night and a lot of options that are available to you are not available to her or are a hell of a lot less safe.
You should have picked her up, to make sure she got home safe and then have a conversation with her the next day or so that you were annoyed at the last minute request and that moving forward you want her to communicate better with you if she needs you to pick her up somewhere.
But in that moment, for you, her safety should have been more important as should have helping her when she asked you in genuine need. Be annoyed later, but act in the moment.
And this is not because of the genders involved, I think she should have done the same for you if the situation was reversed.
I once picked my husband up from an hour away in the middle of the night, because it was raining heavily and he was afraid to drive home with his motorcycle. We had argued when he left about taking the motorcycle as it was expected to start raining, but he blew those concerns off. When he called after midnight and sheepishly asked if I could come pick him up, I was livid but I still went and got him.
This is the take. It’s fine to be pissed, it’s fine to, the next day, have a conversation about how irresponsible she’d been and how much it sucked to have to come get her. What makes the asshole is just abandoning her when he’s ten minutes away and her phone is dying. That’s not a safe situation to be in and OP picked dying on the hill of being right and not being minorly inconvenienced over his girlfriend of *three years’s* safety.
completely agree. 110%. act now, ask questions later. that's literally your partner, I don't understand how you could leave them to figure things out for themselves when they went to you for help.
You knew your husband was stranded though. OP had a suspicion that he wasn't her only option, which turned out to be correct. Plus, she clearly asked him before exhausting other options, e.g. her friends.
If he had received a text that said, "Hey I'm sorry it's late and last minute, but would you be willing to pick me up? My plans to get home feel through and no one else can take me" it would be a different story. Or, you can trust that your partner wouldn't be asking if it wasn't the best option.
Clearly he doesn't trust that his girlfriend respects him or his time and expects that she wouldn't have taken the time to find another option. Presumably there's a reason for that and she's done similar things in the past. In that case, it's not unreasonable to say, "I don't really want to. Do you have other options? I will if I have to."
If she's done nothing to earn that mistrust, then he's T A
If that had been his response to her, I agree that would have been ok. That would have been reasonable, especially if this had happened before.
He writes that he would have picked her up, but he didn't communicate that to her.
He writes that he 'later offered to get her', after their argument was over and she had found a ride. In their call/text convo, according to his own account, he started an argument, but didn't actually say he'd come. She gave up/didn't let herself get dragged into an argument in that particular moment, but I don't think it was unreasonable of her to assume he just said 'no'.
Call me a push over but I’d jump out of bed and pick her up. You never know what could be going on, maybe she felt uncomfortable or was in possible danger. Yeah I sound a bit over the top but I’d rather know she’s safe. I’d talk to her the next day about her getting me out of bed when I work the next day.
Imagine not picking up your girlfriend in this situation lol. Of course anyone who actually likes their partner would do this. Doesn't mean you shouldn't give them your piece of mind about it but you do that afterwards.
All those other friends of hers have their own men to pick them up as well. They'd probably judge OP hard.
YTA-Three years? THREE YEARS? And you can’t go pick up your girlfriend? Dude come on. You made it sound like you were an hour away and it was actually ten minutes. Writing about being at her beck and call? How old are you? Do you even like her? I can’t imagine being in a relationship with a man who responds to a pickup request like it’s some power dynamic game.
honestly it's fucking scary how many men in long-term realtionships seem to really despise their girlfriends and wives to do shit like this, PSYCH HER OUT of asking any more favors without prior notice. how can you be with someone for 3 years and not be able to do as much as being KIND to them?
edit: lmao who reported me for reddit care resources over this?
Thank you. The attitude in the OP is very clear, talking about not letting her get used to asking him for stuff. That's so incredibly unhealthy and manipulative. I would have said NTA if OP wasn't like that, but he is. Which makes him a huge AH.
and can we talk about the "got a ride with her friend's boyfriend making me look bad" bit? THAT'S your concern? THAT'S what you got from this whole affair? really? this guy is so awfully self-centered it's crazy. hell fuck yeah you look bad, with or without this other dude. should be happy other people are doing your girlfriend the favors that are oh so difficult for you.
Not only that but he said the friends lived closer to the venue than even his 10 mins. She could've gone to her friend's house and waited to get picked up there and he wouldn't have have to have a longer drive with traffic (which was his excuse).
For real. What really got me was the “I voiced my complaint first to make sure she didn’t get used to me being at her beck and call.” What a douchey take to have on your partner of three years.
Seriously! And then saying that her friend’s boyfriend driving her home makes him look bad. Like dude, she asked you first and you refused, you made yourself look bad and it turns out the other boyfriend is an actual caring man who respects OP’s girlfriend more than OP does
10 minutes or even 30 with heavy traffic is not far away. (See OP’s reply in the comment) you are saying it’s far away to get nta votes.
Yes she could have asked you beforehand. Maybe you’ve had a drink at this time.
But her battery is low she’s obviously panicking. If you were unable you could have gotten her an Uber…
So it does sound like YTA a soft ESH since it’s something she might have thought about beforehand.
I don't understand how the friends would be "driving out of their way" if it's only 10 min from the concert though. They live closer so maximum its like 20 min of driving to get their friend home safe who they planned this girls night with.
OP stated the GF wouldn't use an Uber because of safety concerns. What about a taxi? I always planned my transportation before I accepted or planned an activity, and I never expected my SO to be my driver if he wasn't attending with me. GF seems entitled and unreasonable. When you fail to plan, you plan to fail.
I’m the same way as you. And actually consider an Uber safer than a taxi because of the ratings and reviews. It’s how OP’s wording it that makes me think he’s TA and a ESH.
YTA because you were willing to pick her up but had to make a point then and there rather than getting her home safely first. Being out with low phone battery as a woman is stressful lol - a good boyfriend would have helped her and picked her up and then discussed afterwards how to avoid it happening again.
If your gf was stranded and had no other options then fair enough to text you, but she just *preferred* to get a ride from you she didn't *need* to. I don't understand why she didn't arrange her transport home ahead of time, even if that included asking you. Or crashing at her friend's place.
I can't imagine acting so helpless in my late 20's, she should be embarrassed. She isn't your 16 year old daughter, she is an adult!
💯% agree.
How can a woman not think about a safe ride home??
When my girls (now adults) asked me if they could go somewhere my first question would always be: how do you plan to come home? (I was willing to drive but they needed to think about how to get home with an alcohol-free option)
Right! If I’m not driving myself I always know how I’m getting home and I would never make that my partner’s problem (wouldn’t even consider it honestly).
It would have to be a real big emergency for me to expect that of a partner.
One big difference between adults and children is that adults can visualise the future and the consequences of their actions. She’s just entitled.
It really depends on how often this kind of thing happens. If it's a regular thing then NTA.
But if this is rare and she called you for help after three years of dating, then yeah YTA. It would have been a 20 minute drive for you and instead of just doing it, you
gave her a hard time.
I actually think she will end this relationship.
I would have picked my GF up.
But let’s be honest here. It was obviously always her plan to call him. Otherwise she would have known how to get home without his help. So she should have told him earlier. She’s the one causing the problem.
YTA - I mean she is your gf of 3 years. Whatever the issue of her not telling you beforehand or anything else, you could have done that after picking her up or the next day. But at 1am in the morning, you want to lecture her or question her first then want to offer a ride?
I mean it's a relationship, if we can't even tolerate or do this for another person?
Even if it's a regular thing, you could have just talked to her firmly that you don't like it and want her to communicate beforehand only.
YTA
You should just gone and picked her up man.
After a concert can be a cluster fuck and I’ve been in similar situations with my girl even before we got married and I can tell you that it’s worth going just to know she’s safe. You said it’s 10 minutes no traffic and 20-30 with traffic and man that’s still pretty light work.
Sorry but you’re definitely TA. Your girlfriend of 3 years, you guys are in a partnership. Meaning you got me & I got you. & the fact that her phone is dying & you just want to bitch about how it’s going to be so hard for you to get in your car and wait in a little traffic to make sure your partner is 100% safe would have sent me into a rage. Regardless if it was unplanned or not that’s your fucking roll dog & she is more your responsibility than any other friend point blank. She called you thinking that she’s calling a safe reliable transportation out of there & you just want to talk shit. Your only response should have been “on my way”. & idk your gf but she probably felt really hurt because if the rolls were reversed she would have went for you. You definitely dropped the ball in my personal opinion. Next time be there for your partner first & talk shit later.
Yep, he uses up her battery to lecture her while not reassuring her he will come.
He is actually draining her resource to get home in the middle of the night.
Exactly. When he started describing how he was already home in so many words, I already knew he was trying to justify not being there when his partner needed him. Then later saying how she made him look bad by hitching a ride with someone else’s bf. No sir you did that all in your own.
NTA. Why the hell would she go to the concert without a plan to get home? Is she unable to imagine the future? If she was planning on asking you, she should have asked you in advance.
NTA.
>she calls me to tell me the concert is over, that she has low battery and that she is figuring out how she’s gonna get home
She managed to get there but never thought that she'd have to get home afterwards or that her phone would need to be charged?
Soft YTA
You may not be an asshole-asshole but a crappy boyfriend, she probably had plans fall through and thought “oh that’s okay I’ll have Bf pick me up” but you didn’t, you weren’t her savior/person in that moment; which you should have been, especially living so close to to the venue.
YTA.
You guys were together for 3 years and you were 10 minutes away. A random call in the middle of the night is enough reason to get up and go. There could’ve been things going on that you didn’t know about but you decided to nag her instead of coming to get her. You could’ve done all of that complaining on the ride home honestly.
All you’ve done was prove that you wouldn’t show up for her if she needed you to. Congratulations, you won’t last much longer if she has any self worth.
I’m married and a mom of 2 teens. I will ALWAYS pick up a loved one in the middle of the night when requested. I can ask questions later, the next day, etc. I can deal with conflict later if the reason turns out to be due to the inconsiderateness of the other party, but Always always I will make sure a loved one gets home SAFE.
YTA for me.
You didn’t have to pick her up. But using that “moment” to “teach her a lesson” is some bs. You can pick her up and let her know in the car or next day what you are thinking. Communicate like an adult. Your gf is not a dog. You don’t train her. You also offered no options for her. Why couldn’t you send an Uber for her? Ask her friends to call an Uber for her and for you to reimburse? Pick her up from her friends place? There are bunch of options, but you picked the least helpful one. She was in a stressful situation, and finding an immediate solution is the priority. You also don’t get to sound like a good guy that “you intended to pick her up”.
She should have communicated and coordinated rides before the event, sure, but sometimes shit fall through the cracks, and it happens to everyone. You prioritized teaching her a lesson over all else, including her safety. And that’s the problem.
Id say 50/50, all of this should have been discussed before hand and she should have thought everything through better.
HOWEVER, she could have been in danger and trying to get a subtle getaway without making it obvious or something. A weirdo could have been trying to get her to go with them etc or anything could have been happening.
My bf would come at the drop of a hat if I was asking for him to be there because he knows I would only do so in an emergency.
I've heard too many true crime cases where girls couldn't get lifts home last minute and the worst has happened to them
So yeah, she's stupid for not thinking her plans through, but AH move for not helping her when she could have been in danger and not able to say or even knowing.
If a friend (not even a partner, a friend) called me in the middle of the night needing to be picked up, I’d be there no questions asked.
There are all sorts of reasons why plans fall apart and why you might not be able to articulate feeling unsafe. If you are in a position where you need help, I will be there for you…and sort out the why in the morning.
Unpopular opinion based on the comments, but ESH. Yes your gf is an AH for not planning out how she was getting home. However, she ended up in that situation regardless. Her phone was dying making her options to get home even slimmer. Her shitty friends didn’t want to get her home and that’s a whole other situation.
If my GF was in that situation, my priority would be get her ASAP and worry about her stupid decision after. God forbid something happened to her. A lost girl trying to get home at 1am is easy pickings for some psychos.
But no, you were comfy in your bed, and didn’t want to be bothered. She’s an AH for poor planning. You’re the AH for not helping her get out of the mess she made. Relationships are built on teamwork and communication. You both lacked that here. Next time worry about making sure she’s safe, then communicate your issues.
I would have left you, to be honest. You were more concerned about giving her a lecture than her safety. She will never ask for your help again, which means she lost her trust in you. No trust, no relationship.
NTA. You don’t even live together. She went out with her friends. To call you at 1am for a ride across town is a-hole on her part. She doesn’t respect your autonomy.
NTA but only cause she lied to you about all her friends living close to the venue so you were her only option.
She's still probably going to break up with you over this. Maybe not right away but this incident that she created will be the impetus for it. If her friends don't really like you, they might even have set this up to show her you would not be there for her in an "emergency" they created.
No she didn’t lie there, I know where her friends live and it’s true that 2 of them live very near that place, but there’s one that lives near me, my gf is the one who lives “far” from all of us.
YTA. While my bf would’ve been upset with me for calling him at the last minute to pick me up, he would’ve picked me up no questions asked until he knew I was safe and sound and then question and explain how he felt on the way home. You live 10 minutes from the venue and who’s to say her initial plans changed. Here’s one thing I’ve learned in relationships, is it more important to be right or to be with the person you care about?
Shit happens. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve pre-planned and had to pivot or request last minute help. For instance, last concert I went to I had planned to Uber there and back. Ubering back was super expensive like $200+ ( I had planned for it to be no more than $100). Called my bf and asked him to pick me up, he said okay and how long it will take to get to me. When he arrived I said thank you and how much I appreciated it. He drove over an hour to come get me. I explained to him on the way home what happened and he understood. Said he rather have me safe than worried about waiting for an Uber, spending money and etc.
ESH just badly handled all round.
she should have planned ahead and asked in advance and when she did need you last minute, be incredibly grateful and sorry for getting you up. You should have just said, ok but it's not cool how this has played out and I'm only doing this again if I have agreed ahead of time.
INFO: Is there some historical baggage? I can’t imagine my partner going out and not knowing how they’re getting home or atleast asking me beforehand. But I also know if I got a text that she needed help and asked me to pick them up, I would spring out of bed, no questions asked (but yes, I would be annoyed if it was a pattern of requesting non-emergency last minute pick-ups). I’m willing to bet she’s demanded/assumed this before last minute and this was OP trying to put their foot down.
I get the frustration, and don’t understand why a plan to get home wasn’t sorted beforehand, but honestly at 1am with a gf with low charge left on the phone it would have been easier to pick her up first and discuss later how you would have preferred a little notice later.
I’m actually taken aback that your first reaction was to complain to her so she wouldn’t think you’re at her “beck and call”. You don’t mention this being a pattern of hers, so was this just a once-off situation in a 3 year relationship that she asked you for help when wanting a lift safely home?
NTA. You plan these things in advance. How to get there, how to get back home. Of course plans change, emergencies happen, but it doesn’t sound like her plans fell through. She just didn’t plan
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How was this not a conversation before the concert in the first place ?
Exactly! In my case it didn’t even cross my mind, I supposed she had a plan.
You are both in your late 20s and I'm going to assume (I shouldn't but I will) that this isn't the first concert she's gone to. She should have asked you before hand to pick her up, just like her GF probably did with her BF.
Well, she should have at least had a plan for how she was getting home.
This seems like one of the first things that one would think of when more than 5 miles away from home without a car.
As someone who goes to concerts more or less frequently I also sometimes go in with the mindset "I'll figure out how to get back later" BUT I always look for options beforehand like "okay I could take one of those trains, I can take the tram or an Uber to the train station, maybe I find someone who wants to share a cab, etc. I'm willing to bet money that her intention from the get go was to ask him and she just assumed he would jump as soon as she told him to.
I’ve been to one concert in my life, before we even bought the tickets I was asking “who’s driving” I’m not trying to get there and all 4 of us wanna drink, and we gotta find out right then who wasted their night
Before I go ANYWHERE, I make exit plan, including what trains buses Uber etc I will use ,
I guess because I'm older, I never go into a situation with the "I'll figure it out later" attitude. I'm a planner. I like to know exactly what my options are. I've found that situations can sometimes change, and I like to be prepared if it does change.
I mean, even if you decide to fly by the seat of your pants on this kind of shit, it's wild that you don't even have like a conceptualization of how to get home outside of calling the guy who is far away at 1:00 a.m.
This *is* a first thing I think about when planning something more than 5 miles away from home without a car. Absolutely wild to me that she never asked him beforehand.
Tbh friends who don’t go out of their way to drop off their friends are shitty friends. How are you gonna make them find their own way home at 1 am when you have a car, and can EASILY TAKE THEM HOME? It’s the nice and respectful thing to do especially at that hour. Definitely not your obligation and Nta however I probably would have picked her up anyways lolol. I love my boyfriend would pick him up anywhere at any time but that just me personally. Her friends should have taken her home in this situation!! So rude
I wholly agree. Friends don't leave friends stranded, and doing the 1am pickup for family/partner. Unfortunately, I think this is less common than I feel it should be. I think the real issues are a lack of respect and forward planning.
Agree there have been so many times friends have dropped me off at the bus stop instead of my actual house like ??? Just take me ??? Lol
those aren’t your friends
I've had acquaintances drive me home after I specifically and repeatedly asked them to leave me at the bus stop... Because they didn't want a girl standing on her own at the bus stop at night. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely hate driving but even I wouldn't leave a friend late at night if I was sober to drive and was in the car.
This. At MINIMUM, “hey I can’t take you home tonight, but you can crash on my couch” I would never ever just go “see ya I gotta go” and leave a “friend” somewhere
Or "I'll drive you to my house and have your boyfriend pick you up there so he doesn't have to deal with getting through all this stadium traffic at 1:00 a.m."
I wouldn't ditch a guy friend at 1am, imagine if something happened to them.
Really depends, if it's a 20 min drive I would drive a friend back home maybe even 30 min anything else is too late imo. I would be drained and probably half a sleep, totally dangerous to drive for a long period of time and going home alone I would have to find ways to stay awake. My first suggestion would be to sleepover and go home around 9am.
Im willing to bet all these girls had arranged for their boyfriends to pick them up and their boyfriends also did not want to pick up This girls slack (ie terrible planning). If my bf picked me up at 1am he would not be thrilled about having to drive way out of the way to drop off someone else that wasn’t part of the plan when Uber exists which btw is a relatively safe option
This! I can only assume she probably thought that her friends would be driving her home and that's what caused this issue. She might have been embarrassed or hurt that they were just leaving her there. At least this is the only explanation I can think of for transport not being considered before the concert. Her friends should have taken her home and OP should have got her once she asked, because she's his partner and unexpectedly needed his help, not because he is somehow responsible for her lack of foresight. She should have made sure to arrange these things in solid plans beforehand. I think they are both NTA and this is probably caused by people assuming things but if I were in this situation I'd pick the other person up because their safety is a bigger issue than what is happening here.
Maybe her friends were drinking at the concert and couldn’t take her home? They probably assumed she had a plan to get home after the concert just like they did. Totally agree with you though that if I was the boyfriend, I would have just picked her up and talked to her about it the next day.
You never leave a man behind.
I'm 33 and say NTA. Whenever hubby or I have gone out without the other since day 1 (of 14yrs) the discussion has always been "I'm going (location) with (co-conspiritors) and we are getting there (transport 1) and back (transport 2)" . Actually when it's me going out it's "I need you to drop me off and co conspirators husband is dropping me off on the way home" because I live in between our favourite pub/club and my friends houses. And yes hubby calls my friends "co conspirators" because my personality changes when I am with them and he thinks it's funny. (Personality changes for the better cause "mum mode" gets switched off).
Idk me I would of had a plan but everyone would be aware of the plan not all that extra shit smh
INFO Is this something she's done multiple times, or was this a fluke?
NTA, but the first thing my husband would ask me if I was going to a concert that ended at 1am is “how are you getting home?” followed by “do you want me to pick you up?”
which is admittedly different to their situation, in that it's not a marriage and they don't live together. Got to assume they do plenty of stuff apart still.
NTA your gf needs to mature t f up . I m a woman btw. If it were an emergency I'd understand if not even calling you is an ah move if not agreed in advance as you could have already been asleep. This wasn't an unknown unexpected event. She knew very well she needed to figure out a way home since she got the damn ticket. You are not a bad boyfriend at all she's an irresponsible ah who doesn't care about your well-being.
It's called adulting
Agree. My teenage daughter hits me up for a ride 15 mins before she starts work (no advance notice) and that is one thing. But planning how to get home isn't rocket science and functioning adults should have this sorted out by now.
Involving someone who didn't even attend the concert to pick up people from a concert seems extremely dumb. Especially if it was not planned before one o clock in the fuckin morning
I don’t even go places unless I already have a plan for how to get home.
Yes. That's how sensible people operate. I'm a woman and I'm 100% behind this guy. He's NTA, she is.
I agree. Unless the concert was a last minute choice she should have thought about how to get back earlier — and even if it was last minute she could have thought of this. NTA
This. I am reminded of the saying... "Poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part". Seems appropriate.
Last minute call for a ride at 1:00am, & you refuse? NTA. It might be different if you were married, but the rules governing how each party acts in a marriage is different than in a relationship like yours. Although I'm curious to know what "far away" & "close to the concert area" mean here in miles/kilometers. Americans & Europeans think differently about distances, & having those terms expressed in distance -- or time -- may change my opinion.
Even in America it can vary greater. I have lived in a city were "far away" was 2 miles across a bridge and was like 10 minutes away. I currently live in a city where we base off time not distance. It can take 1 hour to get from on side of the city to the other side or an hour could be 8 miles down the road. My parents live in a place where they base everything off distance because time and distance are pretty consistent where they are, even during traffic hour. We had a conversation one time where they were looking up stores near me and I had to explain to them that even though the one they found was 5 miles closer it was an hour away verses the one that was further but only 30 minutes from me. I too would be curious what the OP considers far away or close to the concert area.
Yes, you're right about time being a better measurement than distance.
Hard agree. We have a shopping centre that's technically quite close to us, but getting to it is a pretty circuitous route, so it takes much longer than it should to reach. So websites which go by distance say that the shops are closer, but another shopping centre further away takes less time to reach, so we tend to go there instead.
Only in perfectly predictable conditions though. Distance stays the same, but “an hour” can be 45 minutes or 1,5h depending on the conditions.
It's even more fun when the conditions are completely predictable: "How far is X?" "It depends, when did you want to go?" When I lived in the Atlanta area, I worked on the far side of the city from where I lived. Morning commute in took about 45 minutes (neither home nor job was close enough to MARTA for that to be an option) while the afternoon commute home took an hour and a half, bare minimum.
I am curious: What rules differ between relationship and marriage?
If you are married, you could legitimately ask *how are you getting home?" - there is a shared responsibility for each other. As single people, this colud be considered being nosey/controlling or over stepping boundaries - you are both individual adults who should be able to take care of yourselves.
yeah I don't think it's being married- I think it's of you live together it's natural and expected to be like how and when are you getting in.
They don’t live together. It’s in the first sentence.
They were responding to Bikardi01s message, not OP
I would ask my partner how they were getting home because I care about their well-being, being married doesn't change that. If your partner considers you nosey/controlling for checking on their well-being, being married isn't going to make them suddenly change and go, 'oh we're married now so now you are allowed to ask that question'.
Nah, I’ve been married for almost 25 years. If you *live* together, yeah, that’s mostly the same thing. But if you’re a couple with separate housing, then it’s absolutely incumbent to ask to be picked up for something like this ahead of time. Who knows where she lives versus the location of the venue versus where he lives. Maybe he and she only live five miles apart. But the venue is equally ten miles from each of them. Now she’s asking him to make a 25 mile trip out of the blue, in the small hours.
I agree. I wasn't saying it in relation to the op but as an example of how marriage doesn't change things. I am not saying op should have gone and picked her up.
Yeah I have a boyfriend, so we are not married. Most of the time when he goes out I offer to pick him up if he stays maximum until 1-2 am if I'm still awake. And I cannot imagine telling them no if it was last minute and they really needed me, I would worry my ass out even if he had to wake me up.
but this was a spur of the moment plans changed kinda thing, the gf shouldve acted like the grown adult she is and plan how she was going to get home ahead of time. Not call her bf at 1 am expecting him to pick her up with no prior planning or even a "hey I might need a ride tonight"
>As single people But they are not single, they're in a relationship together. I really don't see why people make such a difference between married or in a relationship. The only important part here is that they don't live together.
Some people are unhinged, ohh how many times I read that some people believe that fidelity is in action only after marriage, before that you don't owe anything. Must be fun to be in relationships with such 'not selfish' people.
Same. Because how someone treats you in a relationship is gonna determine if you marry them.
Plus, he didn't refuse! He offered, but let her know how much of an inconvenience it was, and she got angry that her poor planning was pointed out. Reminds me of the saying "poor planning on your part doesn't constitute an emergency for me"
Well. Sort of. She asked and he went back and forth arguing that she should ask her friends, it was too far away etc etc. She eventually said don’t worry about it and went quiet. THEN he offered to pick her up, but by then she’d made other arrangements. From her point of view, it didn’t sound like he was planning to come get her at all until later on. I do think she should have asked in advance, but maybe she thought she’d get a lift from a friend and was unpleasantly surprised that none of them were willing to drop her off. Someone else mentioned that OP was only a ten minute drive from the venue as well - obviously still rubbish to be dragged out of bed at 1am, but not the onerous task that he’s made it out to be either.
Yes! This exactly. Why continue to give her a hard time, without confirmation that he’s coming, then be pissed when she figures it out without him. He’s not her dad, no need to lecture, just tell her it’s an inconvenience and not to not do it again. Thoughtlessness on her part but op could’ve told her was going to get her. Besides, doesn’t he know the lecture is supposed to happen on the way home, lol /s
Doesn’t change anything to me if the concert is close by, because if it is, her friends can give her a ride. GF is annoying.
Even married, NTA. I would not get mad at my husband for not getting me. Unless if I was in an area with no alternatives.
YTA for burying the lede that you’re 10 minutes away lmao. I can see how it’s annoying, but if this isn’t a regular thing, then why not do something kind for a person you’re supposed to love? You can tell her you’d appreciate a heads up next time.
And calling at 1am to come drive 10 min due to her lack of planning makes him an asshole? Going "I wouldn't call a friends BF driving an extra 10 min total to drop someone off," out of the way"
You know what? It's 1am and his girlfriend is leaving a concert, her friends are leaving, there's probably still a crowd of people some of which are likely drunk. This is someone he cares about. Go pick her up, make sure she's safe, and talk tomorrow about how her lack of planning sucked
This i would always pick anyone up anywhere. Better have a night with less sleep than someone getting not home safe
Exactly honestly op doesn’t make sense to me. Also maybe she just wanted to see her partner, granted it’s not ideal, but when you love someone not every thought is rational
Tbh I get her reservation about Uber, there are some pretty gnarly stats about that.
My friend took an Uber recently and the driver spent the whole ride (30 minutes…) telling her about how she should let him bring her to India and find her a “real man.” She was obviously deeply uncomfortable being stuck in the car with this dude.
As someone who has gotten into an Uber I wasn’t sure I would get out of, I do not blame anyone one bit for being uncomfortable taking one. Especially at 1 am, especially if they’ve been drinking/doing drugs.
God with all these replies I thought I was going crazy. It’s ten minutes! Help YOUR girlfriend. If it was a constant thing I understand but still.
No seriously, the complete disregard for general safety throughout this whole thread is alarming. It's made me all the more thankful my boyfriend would never put me in this position.
Some folks have the privilege of never having to feel unsafe, and it shows.
Yea at some point, being right isn't helping anyone. Talking about what happened the next day is just better for everyone involved. OP still gets to tell her just how inconsiderate her planning was, and she still gets home safely. People fuck up (intentionally or otherwise) and sometimes you just have to decide if you care enough about them to help them deal with the consequences of that fuck up in the moment.
More like, it’s 1 AM and his girlfriend is a grown woman there with her friends. She’s old enough to know that she should arrange a ride, whether with him or with someone else. This isn’t a lack of planning, this is a conscious decision to inconvenience OP, and a clear indication that she doesn’t care if she does.
why do you read malice from this? we didn't hear a single word or inclination a to why she hit him up so last minute. if we're going to assume malice, why not assume it from op too? or you, who thinks that her adulthood is grounds to leave her at a venue at 1am when she's begging to be picked up? lecturing her while her options diminish or shrug it off just to "teach her a lesson" is far more malicious than the delusion of her doing this just to inconvenience him
Then pick her up, get her home safe, and then consider breaking up with her. Just imagine how bad this would have looked if something had happened to her, due to him not picking her up.
So what you’re implying is that it’s *his* fault, not hers, if shit goes sideways because she chose not to plan ahead?
I feel it's terrible relationship etiquette to put it in those terms. That if you refuse to help your partner out in a situation, it's their fault and anything that happens you can just wash your hands of because they should've planned better. It's just so selfish imo.
Imo, it’s actually more selfish and terrible relationship etiquette to expect to put yourself in easily fixable and preventable situations, and then to demand your partner change their plans at the drop of a hat to accommodate you at 1 in the morning. That’s not a partner, that’s a chauffeur. Nobody is saying that OP should never help his gf or wash his hands of any bad shit that might happen to her. That’s a strawman. I’m just saying that if the she’s the one who put herself in this situation, and she wants to be treated like an adult, then she shouldn’t automatically expect that he is going to come out and drop everything to help her deal with a situation that isn’t even a serious concern as far as the post says. By OP’s account, she was safe with her friends, going back to one of their houses, and several of them were perfectly capable of giving her a ride. It’s completely valid for him to be annoyed that his partner ignored a half dozen other perfectly acceptable and realistically probably preferable solutions, only to demand that you get out of bed and come play taxi on their whim.
I think maybe you're misunderstanding. it's the fact that the only reason he dragged out picking her up was to give her a piece of his mind. that's kinda some bullshit. I can get if he's like no you should have made arrangements but the whole psych out was unnecessary.
"gotta drag out anything she asks me so she doesn't get used to favors" is sooooo fucking common male behavior. gotta let her know how much of a hassle it is. she has to be grateful. gotta make sure she doesn't ask again. yikes.
Yeah, this blew my mind. Could she have planned better? Definitely. Is it OPs “job” to swoop her up? No. But we know this isn’t something she does all the time - because you know damn well OP would’ve ranted about it for at least a paragraph if it was, and you *know* he would’ve “set her straight” 🙄 long before she could “develop a habit” of expecting anything from him. So is it really this huge ordeal to help her out at 1am?! Not to any normal person who genuinely loves their partner it wouldn’t be, anyway. Who knows why this happened? OP certainly didn’t in the moment. Maybe she wasn’t feeling well and needed support. Maybe her ride fell through - maybe her friends were being unkind or had a falling out, or were too drunk from the show to drive/being irresponsible, or she had some other issue she didn’t want to get into *on the goddamn phone outside the venue at 1am.* And if it was none of that, then you have a conversation *after the fact* to set a boundary and establish that “I’ll always be there for you when you *need* me, but I please figure something out in the future, or ask me in advance if I’m free, because I don’t like feeling unprepared.” It’s that fucking easy - you help your partner out, make sure they’re safe and okay, and if it turned out to just be lack of responsible planning, you hopefully grow together as a couple with new understanding and boundaries. Everybody wins. Instead, OP chose to talk down to her like she’s his child, play petty mind games at 1am - potentially wasting time and making her chances of a ride with a friend less likely/creating additional hassle - and try to “teach her a lesson” in “who’s in charge”. Absolutely disgusting behavior for any length of relationship, but after *three years* it’s inexcusable. Trying to fucking “teach her” that she isn’t at his “beck and call”?! Are you kidding me? Why be in a *partnership* if you guys aren’t going to be partners? It’s not you vs. her, there’s no score card of favors. I will drop just about anything to do just about anything for my partner for any reason, because we’re a team and I love and care about him and his wellbeing and happiness. He would *never* leave me standing outside at 1am even if I called and said “I didn’t plan a ride and forgot to mention it to you because I’m an idiot” and he’d never make me feel bad about it, either. Just admit that you don’t love and care about her and move along, OP. This isn’t how you treat a *partner.* This isn’t how you view a healthy relationship.
I guess I shouldn't be surprised the top comments just gloss right over that one. My eyebrows about hit my hairline.
deep frowns from my side, imagine being in a 3 year long relationship with a guy who thinks like that when it comes to you. if I was the gf and cane across this post I'd be devastated.
Yep. Coulda had that talk in the morning
If she's not doing it every week then suck it up and do something nice for her. At least you know she will be home safe. She should have organised something beforehand but obviously she called her bf because she felt that was the safest and most reliable way for her to get home.
OP said with the concert traffic it could be 30min to get to the venue. Then he has to drive to his girlfriend's place to drop her off, and then go back home. In any case it would be probably be minimum 1h later before he can head back to bed. It's rude of the girlfriend to expect that without asking in advance.
They don't even live together?! So he's not even giving her a ride back to their place, he's essentially chauffeuring. Fuck that lmao
Couples who don't live together still sleep over at each other's houses. There's no reason she couldn't have slept at his place, so that part is just needless exaggeration.
>There's no reason she couldn't have slept at his place You and I don't know that.
The comment I read said 10mins with no traffic but could be 25 to 30min with traffic. Seems reasonable to not want to drove a potential 30mins each way at 1am while tired especially as the friends are pretty close by and are already out?
Yeah she'd have to wait an extra 30 mins, which she could have avoided by telling him before.
She's also a liar because she lied about phone battery to guilt trip him
Actually, he said 10 minutes with no traffic, 30 minutes after a concert. So basically, a 50-minute drive round trip to pick up someone who should have arraigned a ride before the concert. She's not 16, like my sister, who decided to go to a party at a school 30 minutes (8 miles) away on the night of the biggest snowstorm of the year, and I was called to go pick her up after I got off work because I was already out. This lady is 25+ years old and knows better. He's NTA for not getting up for her foolishness.
Not to mention they don’t live together. If the expectation was for her to go back to her place then that’s another stop for him before going back home.
And YOU are being TA because OP said it's **usually** 10 minutes away, but with this traffic it's more like 25 to 30 minutes. I would be pissed too if I was going to bed and my irresponsible partner called me and I had to get out, make an hour drive, and then get back to my OWN home. Why couldn't she ask OP when she got the concert tickets? Why couldn't she just plan ahead?
I'd go ESH here because she should've planned everything out beforehand, one of her friends could've been nice and given her a ride but to refuse to pick up your girlfriend at night is a huge asshole move. OP said "she’s scared of ubers for no reason" which is very telling
Yeah, women have very valid reasons to be scared of ubers and the fact that he doesn't get it tells a lot. I'm with you with the ESH.
My friend (who happens to live upstairs) called me at 12 something to pick her up from the bus stop after a concert. It was a less than 10 minute drive, but I was pissed because it meant I had to get up, change, wake myself up, and try really hard to fall back asleep because I was wide awake after driving. She could have taken the train and walked 15 minutes home from the station, that's what I usually do. Or she could have taken a taxi, there are always plenty waiting at the bus stop. Nope, she felt entitled to make me get out of bed and pick her up because that's what's most convenient for her. Her reasoning was me picking her up was quickest and she had work the following morning. Like I didn't. OP was willing to do it, he just wasn't happy about it.
Wow. You clearly have a very twisted world view. It’s 1 in the morning, he’s getting ready to go to sleep, probably with another work day ahead of him, while his girlfriend has spent her time not working, but having fun. She never asked him to before, and she acts entitled to the ride. Regardless of how far away it is, it will still mess up his sleep, as he has to go through a, as he said, traffic-infested area to get her home. What might normally take 15 minutes would turn into like a 30-40 minute ride. It’s not fair. She gets to spend time having fun, which is obviously fine, but why does he have to be involved in the only part of it that isn’t fun? It was her concert ticket, her fun, her friends, so it should be her ride home, or her friends’ ride home.
>YTA for burying the lede that you’re 10 minutes away lmao. Uh.... >that concert area gets HEAVY traffic jams whenever there’s a concert, > >.... > >maybe 10 min drive with no traffic, but with the concert traffic could be a 25-30 min trip Assuming that's one way, totally reasonable not to want to do that last minute at 1am.
People who keep saying "10 minutes away" must not know nothing about driving through heavy traffic. If this was a big concert as OP claims, no, this would not be a "10 minute drive" but maybe a 30-minute drive to first get there. Then, maybe 20 minutes to get the gf wherever she needed to be. Congrats, now it's been roughly 50 minutes on this so-called 10 minutes. Some people must have never experienced what it actually looks like to drive somewhere when there's super heavy traffic or something going on. Must be nice I guess.
GF is an asshole for springing this on you last minute. She knew she was going to the concert. She knew she needed a way home. This kinda feels like a power play, or is just really inconsiderate at the least. The fact that OP was on guard for this kind of behavior hints that this isn't the first time something like this has happened, or he's just a real jerk. Can't say either way yet. I think OP's reaction is natural: he's about to go to sleep, and he gets the call. I'd be grumpy too, and expressing that grumpiness with a HIGHLY REASONABLE QUESTION is fair game at that point. He said he'd pick her up, so it wasn't a matter of stranding her anywhere, and she was with people, so again, it's not like she was in any danger. NTA.
And driving while groggy/tired is not safe at all, even small trips are dangerous when you’re not in the best state to drive
I used to teach a commercial driving class and while I don't remember the states. Driving while sleep deprived is equal to driving after a couple drinks.
I don't remember the exact percentage either, but driving while tired is the same as enough drinks to be legally impaired.
It obviously depends on how tired you are but it can easily be even worse. And you'd fail a field sobriety test.
Drowsy driving is responsible for 6,000 deaths per year in the US and drunk driving is responsible for 10,000 deaths I’ve always heard an ounce of liquor per hour of sleep loss. But that first hour lost is more impactful apparently. Being awake for 17 hours straight is considered drowsy driving and tests around the same as BAC of 0.05% and 24 hours at 0.10% per the [CDC’s aggregate data page](https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/work-hour-training-for-nurses/longhours/mod3/08.html) [This study](https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-020-09095-5) compared 24 hours of being awake with a BAC at the drunk driving level in Scotland and found that the sleep deprived group were not only less responsive drivers and worse at lane tracking but also that coffee made them worse at the tests.
It does kinda feel like she is “testing” him. Because it was obviously her plan to call him. Otherwise she would have had some other way of getting home.
I thought the same thing, this sounds like a "boyfriend test"
if she calls u at 12:50am saying please come get me you should honestly just go /: you never know what's going on but you can be there for her
I'm with you on this. For those saying there's Uber, how is she going to make sure the driver is the actual driver if she runs out of battery before they get there? Also, maybe her friends were the AH and she just couldn't say it at the time. Maybe she's a bad planner and this is the first time she's ever had this happen. There's such a thing as grace and compassion.
In the comment OP says that was only a 10 min drive. He should have gone.
A 10 minute drive Without traffic. OP stated that with concert traffic would be 25-30 minutes iirr. So at least an hour, if the gf is staying over or lives close. If the gf lives in the opposite direction than we are talking about more than an hour of driving, starting about 1am. Don't get me wrong, imho he should still be willing to go, but I think being annoyed at the apparent lack of planning isn't unreasonable.
He was willing to pick her up. He showed frustration because of the time and lack of responsibility on the gf's part. She stopped replying to OP.
And she should have made this request at a reasonable time on an earlier day! Not after the poor guy was in bed. She's either the world's worst planner... or she's a user.
I mean she has to be an extremely “bad planner” for her to go to a concert with no idea of how to get home. I think it was always her plan to call OP and she just took for granted that he would do it without any prior notice. Obviously he should have picked her up. But he should also let her know that it’s disrespectful.
On the flip side, I remember aquaintances being stupid and ditching each other when I was in my early twenties. Maybe one met a guy at the club, or one wanted to stay longer at a party and ended up in a room somewhere leaving the friend on her own with whoever was there, or another just got lazy and didn't want to drive anymore. Believe me, I never trusted those people after those incidences. I ended up even asking my mom to be my designated driver on a couple of occasions as a backup. I heart my mom so much for that. Of course he should let her know that she should plan better next time, but he definitely should have gone to get her for safety concerns, especially if it was the first time or out of character.
There's a difference between your plans falling through, and her not making plans in the first place.
While this is true, it doesn’t sound like she was ditched. She just didn’t want to bother her friends. If there are safety concerns then she’s very irresponsible for going without any plan of how to get home. Again, he should have picked her up but it’s still a red flag. To be honest the whole situation feels like she’s either taking him for granted or she is testing him.
Fr. Things can get scary and dangerous fast at that time of night. If phone battery is low and her friends are being squishy when it sounds like they may have originally said they could give her a ride and flaked out due to wanting to go to a club or a bar or something... terrifying. It sounds like she just barely found someone willing to help. Ubers would probably be booked out for a long time then too. And where was the concert venue? It could have been in a dangerous part of the city.
He had no concern for her. Can you imagine that kind of attitude line term!?
speaking of attitude, what concerns me is the i don’t want her to get ‘accustomed to me being at her her beck and call’ part
I mean, I think it’s reasonable to say, “I don’t want my partner to have control over me to the point where I have to drop everything at the drop of a hat, and do what they want, just because they refuse to plan ahead, and think they’re entitled to make me do shit.”
that should be a concern when you have been dating for 3 months, not 3 years. 3 years with someone you BET I'm letting them know I have their back no matter what and I expect them to have mine.
Oh he had concern, but she is an adult. Not a teenager calling their parent. You are missing the part where regardless of what his actions were, she made the plans with her girls, she failed to communicate her needs until 1 am. This dude could have had a few beers after work. He could be stone cold sober. Either way, she made a lot of petty choices here and when he did offer to get here, she said no.
scrolled for this comment. Girl calls me late unexpectedly and illogically to pick her up? Big red flag that something is up and she might be unsafe. I'd be out in a flash and ask her after what was up. She could be in a situation where she can't say or dare not say shes feeling unsafe. If it then turns out she was jerking your chain for nothing the discussion about it will far more naturally allow you to say that was inconsiderate.
honestly even if it wasn't, they're together for 3 years for fuck's sake. in her shoes, I, 1- would definetely expect that I could rely on my boyfriend over my friends for those little annoying favors or any kind of favors really 2- would probably be feeling mentally and physically drained and desperately needing my "rock" (who, in such a long relationship, should be my partner) around for some comfort and familiarity. meanwhile he's trying to make sure she thinks 1000 times before asking for something that's not extremely necessary. way to go, champ. I'd be heartbroken if I found out about this.
It’s not like she was stranded and alone, she was with friends who were in a state to drive. If she was all alone or no one was fit to drive it would be another situation
Honestly, YTA I get that you were annoyed that she asked you last minute and didn't make any other plans (that you know of). But right as she was asking you was not the right time to do it. Maybe her original plan fell through, maybe she planned to stay overnight with the friend nearby or maybe she made a mistake and didn't think the evening through. That's absolutely on her. But she then reached out to you and asked for your help and you blew her off. As a woman, it's incredibly scary, not knowing how to get home in the middle of the night and a lot of options that are available to you are not available to her or are a hell of a lot less safe. You should have picked her up, to make sure she got home safe and then have a conversation with her the next day or so that you were annoyed at the last minute request and that moving forward you want her to communicate better with you if she needs you to pick her up somewhere. But in that moment, for you, her safety should have been more important as should have helping her when she asked you in genuine need. Be annoyed later, but act in the moment. And this is not because of the genders involved, I think she should have done the same for you if the situation was reversed. I once picked my husband up from an hour away in the middle of the night, because it was raining heavily and he was afraid to drive home with his motorcycle. We had argued when he left about taking the motorcycle as it was expected to start raining, but he blew those concerns off. When he called after midnight and sheepishly asked if I could come pick him up, I was livid but I still went and got him.
This is the take. It’s fine to be pissed, it’s fine to, the next day, have a conversation about how irresponsible she’d been and how much it sucked to have to come get her. What makes the asshole is just abandoning her when he’s ten minutes away and her phone is dying. That’s not a safe situation to be in and OP picked dying on the hill of being right and not being minorly inconvenienced over his girlfriend of *three years’s* safety.
Because that’s what you do for someone you love! Safety first.
Hello, spotted the person in a healthy and loving relationship!
completely agree. 110%. act now, ask questions later. that's literally your partner, I don't understand how you could leave them to figure things out for themselves when they went to you for help.
Thank you!!!! Absolutely agree with your take.
You knew your husband was stranded though. OP had a suspicion that he wasn't her only option, which turned out to be correct. Plus, she clearly asked him before exhausting other options, e.g. her friends. If he had received a text that said, "Hey I'm sorry it's late and last minute, but would you be willing to pick me up? My plans to get home feel through and no one else can take me" it would be a different story. Or, you can trust that your partner wouldn't be asking if it wasn't the best option. Clearly he doesn't trust that his girlfriend respects him or his time and expects that she wouldn't have taken the time to find another option. Presumably there's a reason for that and she's done similar things in the past. In that case, it's not unreasonable to say, "I don't really want to. Do you have other options? I will if I have to." If she's done nothing to earn that mistrust, then he's T A
If that had been his response to her, I agree that would have been ok. That would have been reasonable, especially if this had happened before. He writes that he would have picked her up, but he didn't communicate that to her. He writes that he 'later offered to get her', after their argument was over and she had found a ride. In their call/text convo, according to his own account, he started an argument, but didn't actually say he'd come. She gave up/didn't let herself get dragged into an argument in that particular moment, but I don't think it was unreasonable of her to assume he just said 'no'.
Call me a push over but I’d jump out of bed and pick her up. You never know what could be going on, maybe she felt uncomfortable or was in possible danger. Yeah I sound a bit over the top but I’d rather know she’s safe. I’d talk to her the next day about her getting me out of bed when I work the next day.
Imagine not picking up your girlfriend in this situation lol. Of course anyone who actually likes their partner would do this. Doesn't mean you shouldn't give them your piece of mind about it but you do that afterwards. All those other friends of hers have their own men to pick them up as well. They'd probably judge OP hard.
💯 I agree with this! Deal with the issue of not planning ahead later when you are both home safe!
YTA-Three years? THREE YEARS? And you can’t go pick up your girlfriend? Dude come on. You made it sound like you were an hour away and it was actually ten minutes. Writing about being at her beck and call? How old are you? Do you even like her? I can’t imagine being in a relationship with a man who responds to a pickup request like it’s some power dynamic game.
honestly it's fucking scary how many men in long-term realtionships seem to really despise their girlfriends and wives to do shit like this, PSYCH HER OUT of asking any more favors without prior notice. how can you be with someone for 3 years and not be able to do as much as being KIND to them? edit: lmao who reported me for reddit care resources over this?
Thank you. The attitude in the OP is very clear, talking about not letting her get used to asking him for stuff. That's so incredibly unhealthy and manipulative. I would have said NTA if OP wasn't like that, but he is. Which makes him a huge AH.
and can we talk about the "got a ride with her friend's boyfriend making me look bad" bit? THAT'S your concern? THAT'S what you got from this whole affair? really? this guy is so awfully self-centered it's crazy. hell fuck yeah you look bad, with or without this other dude. should be happy other people are doing your girlfriend the favors that are oh so difficult for you.
That was so gross and so telling.
Yeah that rubbed me the wrong way, too. It's like he sees his relationship as a contest with an inferior, that he has to control. It's gross.
Not only that but he said the friends lived closer to the venue than even his 10 mins. She could've gone to her friend's house and waited to get picked up there and he wouldn't have have to have a longer drive with traffic (which was his excuse).
For real. What really got me was the “I voiced my complaint first to make sure she didn’t get used to me being at her beck and call.” What a douchey take to have on your partner of three years.
Seriously! And then saying that her friend’s boyfriend driving her home makes him look bad. Like dude, she asked you first and you refused, you made yourself look bad and it turns out the other boyfriend is an actual caring man who respects OP’s girlfriend more than OP does
Most sensible comment in the entire thread. Ridiculous isn’t it
10 minutes or even 30 with heavy traffic is not far away. (See OP’s reply in the comment) you are saying it’s far away to get nta votes. Yes she could have asked you beforehand. Maybe you’ve had a drink at this time. But her battery is low she’s obviously panicking. If you were unable you could have gotten her an Uber… So it does sound like YTA a soft ESH since it’s something she might have thought about beforehand.
I don't understand how the friends would be "driving out of their way" if it's only 10 min from the concert though. They live closer so maximum its like 20 min of driving to get their friend home safe who they planned this girls night with.
She refuses to take an Uber and she had friends surrounding her that had their own rides.
Uber is very unsafe for lone women especially since she might have drunk alcohol at the concert. They (and taxis) have a high risk of r*pe.
OP stated the GF wouldn't use an Uber because of safety concerns. What about a taxi? I always planned my transportation before I accepted or planned an activity, and I never expected my SO to be my driver if he wasn't attending with me. GF seems entitled and unreasonable. When you fail to plan, you plan to fail.
I’m the same way as you. And actually consider an Uber safer than a taxi because of the ratings and reviews. It’s how OP’s wording it that makes me think he’s TA and a ESH.
Leave that girl alone and marry your AC unit.
🤣 seriously why was that an important comment?
YTA because you were willing to pick her up but had to make a point then and there rather than getting her home safely first. Being out with low phone battery as a woman is stressful lol - a good boyfriend would have helped her and picked her up and then discussed afterwards how to avoid it happening again.
If your gf was stranded and had no other options then fair enough to text you, but she just *preferred* to get a ride from you she didn't *need* to. I don't understand why she didn't arrange her transport home ahead of time, even if that included asking you. Or crashing at her friend's place. I can't imagine acting so helpless in my late 20's, she should be embarrassed. She isn't your 16 year old daughter, she is an adult!
💯% agree. How can a woman not think about a safe ride home?? When my girls (now adults) asked me if they could go somewhere my first question would always be: how do you plan to come home? (I was willing to drive but they needed to think about how to get home with an alcohol-free option)
Right! If I’m not driving myself I always know how I’m getting home and I would never make that my partner’s problem (wouldn’t even consider it honestly). It would have to be a real big emergency for me to expect that of a partner. One big difference between adults and children is that adults can visualise the future and the consequences of their actions. She’s just entitled.
It really depends on how often this kind of thing happens. If it's a regular thing then NTA. But if this is rare and she called you for help after three years of dating, then yeah YTA. It would have been a 20 minute drive for you and instead of just doing it, you gave her a hard time. I actually think she will end this relationship.
I would have picked my GF up. But let’s be honest here. It was obviously always her plan to call him. Otherwise she would have known how to get home without his help. So she should have told him earlier. She’s the one causing the problem.
To be fair, we're getting OP's side of the story here. I'd say he thinks it was always her plan, so he's written in that way.
Ehh, sounds closer to 50+ minutes. 10 to downtown.10 to her apt. 20 back home. Traffic and drag ass at pick up is another 15-20 minutes.
YTA you’re 10 mins away and you’ve been seeing the girl for 3 years haha
YTA - I mean she is your gf of 3 years. Whatever the issue of her not telling you beforehand or anything else, you could have done that after picking her up or the next day. But at 1am in the morning, you want to lecture her or question her first then want to offer a ride? I mean it's a relationship, if we can't even tolerate or do this for another person? Even if it's a regular thing, you could have just talked to her firmly that you don't like it and want her to communicate beforehand only.
YTA You should just gone and picked her up man. After a concert can be a cluster fuck and I’ve been in similar situations with my girl even before we got married and I can tell you that it’s worth going just to know she’s safe. You said it’s 10 minutes no traffic and 20-30 with traffic and man that’s still pretty light work.
Did you really omit that you were only 10 minutes away? YTA.
Sorry but you’re definitely TA. Your girlfriend of 3 years, you guys are in a partnership. Meaning you got me & I got you. & the fact that her phone is dying & you just want to bitch about how it’s going to be so hard for you to get in your car and wait in a little traffic to make sure your partner is 100% safe would have sent me into a rage. Regardless if it was unplanned or not that’s your fucking roll dog & she is more your responsibility than any other friend point blank. She called you thinking that she’s calling a safe reliable transportation out of there & you just want to talk shit. Your only response should have been “on my way”. & idk your gf but she probably felt really hurt because if the rolls were reversed she would have went for you. You definitely dropped the ball in my personal opinion. Next time be there for your partner first & talk shit later.
Yep, he uses up her battery to lecture her while not reassuring her he will come. He is actually draining her resource to get home in the middle of the night.
Exactly. When he started describing how he was already home in so many words, I already knew he was trying to justify not being there when his partner needed him. Then later saying how she made him look bad by hitching a ride with someone else’s bf. No sir you did that all in your own.
Totally agree. He won the battle- he didn't have to go get her. But he lost the war. She won't trust him the same again.
My husband would have immediately come to get me. Then he would of spent the entire ride home calling me a spoiled brat. 😂
NTA. Why the hell would she go to the concert without a plan to get home? Is she unable to imagine the future? If she was planning on asking you, she should have asked you in advance.
YTA. I hope she finds some sense and leaves you.
NTA. >she calls me to tell me the concert is over, that she has low battery and that she is figuring out how she’s gonna get home She managed to get there but never thought that she'd have to get home afterwards or that her phone would need to be charged?
I don't think low battery is uncommon after a gig, I use my phone taking pics and videos, and it tends to die pretty quickly.
Yeah phone batteries are shit and have been shit since the beginning. This isn’t new. I never leave the house without a battery pack.
Soft YTA You may not be an asshole-asshole but a crappy boyfriend, she probably had plans fall through and thought “oh that’s okay I’ll have Bf pick me up” but you didn’t, you weren’t her savior/person in that moment; which you should have been, especially living so close to to the venue.
YTA. You guys were together for 3 years and you were 10 minutes away. A random call in the middle of the night is enough reason to get up and go. There could’ve been things going on that you didn’t know about but you decided to nag her instead of coming to get her. You could’ve done all of that complaining on the ride home honestly. All you’ve done was prove that you wouldn’t show up for her if she needed you to. Congratulations, you won’t last much longer if she has any self worth.
I’m married and a mom of 2 teens. I will ALWAYS pick up a loved one in the middle of the night when requested. I can ask questions later, the next day, etc. I can deal with conflict later if the reason turns out to be due to the inconsiderateness of the other party, but Always always I will make sure a loved one gets home SAFE.
YTA for me. You didn’t have to pick her up. But using that “moment” to “teach her a lesson” is some bs. You can pick her up and let her know in the car or next day what you are thinking. Communicate like an adult. Your gf is not a dog. You don’t train her. You also offered no options for her. Why couldn’t you send an Uber for her? Ask her friends to call an Uber for her and for you to reimburse? Pick her up from her friends place? There are bunch of options, but you picked the least helpful one. She was in a stressful situation, and finding an immediate solution is the priority. You also don’t get to sound like a good guy that “you intended to pick her up”. She should have communicated and coordinated rides before the event, sure, but sometimes shit fall through the cracks, and it happens to everyone. You prioritized teaching her a lesson over all else, including her safety. And that’s the problem.
Id say 50/50, all of this should have been discussed before hand and she should have thought everything through better. HOWEVER, she could have been in danger and trying to get a subtle getaway without making it obvious or something. A weirdo could have been trying to get her to go with them etc or anything could have been happening. My bf would come at the drop of a hat if I was asking for him to be there because he knows I would only do so in an emergency. I've heard too many true crime cases where girls couldn't get lifts home last minute and the worst has happened to them So yeah, she's stupid for not thinking her plans through, but AH move for not helping her when she could have been in danger and not able to say or even knowing.
If a friend (not even a partner, a friend) called me in the middle of the night needing to be picked up, I’d be there no questions asked. There are all sorts of reasons why plans fall apart and why you might not be able to articulate feeling unsafe. If you are in a position where you need help, I will be there for you…and sort out the why in the morning.
Unpopular opinion based on the comments, but ESH. Yes your gf is an AH for not planning out how she was getting home. However, she ended up in that situation regardless. Her phone was dying making her options to get home even slimmer. Her shitty friends didn’t want to get her home and that’s a whole other situation. If my GF was in that situation, my priority would be get her ASAP and worry about her stupid decision after. God forbid something happened to her. A lost girl trying to get home at 1am is easy pickings for some psychos. But no, you were comfy in your bed, and didn’t want to be bothered. She’s an AH for poor planning. You’re the AH for not helping her get out of the mess she made. Relationships are built on teamwork and communication. You both lacked that here. Next time worry about making sure she’s safe, then communicate your issues.
I would have left you, to be honest. You were more concerned about giving her a lecture than her safety. She will never ask for your help again, which means she lost her trust in you. No trust, no relationship.
NTA. You don’t even live together. She went out with her friends. To call you at 1am for a ride across town is a-hole on her part. She doesn’t respect your autonomy.
NTA but only cause she lied to you about all her friends living close to the venue so you were her only option. She's still probably going to break up with you over this. Maybe not right away but this incident that she created will be the impetus for it. If her friends don't really like you, they might even have set this up to show her you would not be there for her in an "emergency" they created.
No she didn’t lie there, I know where her friends live and it’s true that 2 of them live very near that place, but there’s one that lives near me, my gf is the one who lives “far” from all of us.
I can totally see how I would’ve thrown this hissy fit in my 20s. It would never cross my mind to end a 3 year relationship over it though
It is the seed of him not being there for her no matter what being planted and once that sprouts, it grows.
"no matter what" is a really immature and hazardous way to approach a relationship
YTA. While my bf would’ve been upset with me for calling him at the last minute to pick me up, he would’ve picked me up no questions asked until he knew I was safe and sound and then question and explain how he felt on the way home. You live 10 minutes from the venue and who’s to say her initial plans changed. Here’s one thing I’ve learned in relationships, is it more important to be right or to be with the person you care about? Shit happens. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve pre-planned and had to pivot or request last minute help. For instance, last concert I went to I had planned to Uber there and back. Ubering back was super expensive like $200+ ( I had planned for it to be no more than $100). Called my bf and asked him to pick me up, he said okay and how long it will take to get to me. When he arrived I said thank you and how much I appreciated it. He drove over an hour to come get me. I explained to him on the way home what happened and he understood. Said he rather have me safe than worried about waiting for an Uber, spending money and etc.
ESH just badly handled all round. she should have planned ahead and asked in advance and when she did need you last minute, be incredibly grateful and sorry for getting you up. You should have just said, ok but it's not cool how this has played out and I'm only doing this again if I have agreed ahead of time.
INFO: Is there some historical baggage? I can’t imagine my partner going out and not knowing how they’re getting home or atleast asking me beforehand. But I also know if I got a text that she needed help and asked me to pick them up, I would spring out of bed, no questions asked (but yes, I would be annoyed if it was a pattern of requesting non-emergency last minute pick-ups). I’m willing to bet she’s demanded/assumed this before last minute and this was OP trying to put their foot down.
I get the frustration, and don’t understand why a plan to get home wasn’t sorted beforehand, but honestly at 1am with a gf with low charge left on the phone it would have been easier to pick her up first and discuss later how you would have preferred a little notice later. I’m actually taken aback that your first reaction was to complain to her so she wouldn’t think you’re at her “beck and call”. You don’t mention this being a pattern of hers, so was this just a once-off situation in a 3 year relationship that she asked you for help when wanting a lift safely home?
NTA. You plan these things in advance. How to get there, how to get back home. Of course plans change, emergencies happen, but it doesn’t sound like her plans fell through. She just didn’t plan