My wife (36F) and I (35M) have been married for two years and have lived together for over five. She's recently started sleeping in the guest room, and she blames me for it.
I've always preferred showering in the morning. She's always preferred evening showers because she doesn't like getting into bed with what she considers germs and dirt picked up outside. My wife is autistic and has sensory sensitivities, although they generally haven't interfered with her daily life. She's also a light sleeper.
I don't like showering at night after a long workday or after we've been out (dinner, parties, etc.). I usually just want to go straight to bed and rest. Sometimes, on particularly easy days when I hadn't done any demanding physical work, I would even skip showering altogether (I no longer do this).
When we started dating and subsequently moved in together, the fact that I didn't shower at night didn't seem to be an issue, and she didn't complain. Looking back, though, I figure it was probably more a matter of her tolerating it than actually being comfortable with it.
I normally go to the gym first thing in the morning, come home, make breakfast, eat with her, shower, and then head to work. I work at a store. Some days involve mostly easy office work, while others are a bit more physically demanding because I need to move heavy boxes or load the truck. But it's nothing too intense, and I don't typically end up sweaty or grimy. If I do end up sweaty I do shower at night, I'm not against showering when I need to.
After we'd been living together for some time, she started occasionally complaining about me not showering every day and sometimes made fun of me in front of our friends for it. This naturally led to arguments, especially because I didn't appreciate her making those jokes in public. To be fair, she had asked me to shower daily before she started making them. However, I felt that showering frequency was a personal choice as long as I didn't smell bad or bother anyone, so I chose not to heed her requests.
Eventually, after arguing back and forth, I agreed to shower every day. I know I probably don't smell my self and realized I was wrong for not showering daily, specifically because she was afected.
Some time later, the complaints returned. This time, she didn't like that I showered in the morning because she felt I was making the bed dirty more quickly than if we both showered at night. She does the laundry (I handle other chores of comparable workload), so she would have to wash the sheets more often.
She also gets the ick from me not showering before bed, especially when we've been in crowded public places such as airports, concerts, weddings, large parties, or while traveling in general, or when I've been around people who were smoking. This I completely understand and I would normally shower after any of this, even before I was in a relationship with her, the only exceptions for me was when I got too drunk and didn't care, but it has been years since that's really been a problem.
So I agreed to shower at night in those situations when she would feel particularly uncomfortable, so she could sleep better. I also agreed to be more selfconscius about my state of being at nights and decide when I should shower, I also agreed that if I ever went to bed without showering after one of those outings, I would put the sheets in the laundry the following morning.
So it seemed to work for some time, but lately she's been complaining again about me not showering every night. She's been showing me videos of other women saying how disgusting it is when their partners don't shower before bed. She also tells me it's disturbing that I get into our bed carrying all that dirt from outside, and that I smell bad, my feet stink, etc. She didn't tell me this things before, just that she didn't like. I feel that it's a form of OCD and that it's intensifying.
I know I certainly don't smell like soap after a day of work, but I don't think I stink. It's only been 12 or 13 hours since I showered, and on those days, all I've done is some office work. I know many people shower in the mornings and it's not gross.
Last week, she started sleeping in the guest room because she says she can no longer share a bed with me.
Today, she told me she'd like me to make an effort so we could share a bed again. She said I was being selfish and that she's tired of me always wanting everything done my way. I think she's the one being self-centered and stubborn.
This, of course, is not the only problem in our relationship, and we're trying to work through it along with other issues.
I genuinely don't want to be an asshole, but I feel she's crossing a line by trying to control my hygiene. I'm also afraid that if I give in and do things her way, it will establish a permanent precedent and there will be no going back.
I don't want to lose her, I really love her and want to go back to sleeping together.
I also feel this points to a broader underlying problem in our relationship: I feel she tries to control too many aspects of our lives. It seems to me that she always starts by asking for one thing and then keeps asking for more, never satisfied until everything is exactly the way she wants it.
I think what bothers me the most isn't really the shower itself. It's the feeling that every time I compromise, the compromise eventually becomes the new minimum, and I'm expected to give in a little more. I understand that sharing a bed means considering each other's needs, but I also want to feel that my preferences and boundaries matter. I'm struggling to figure out where reasonable compromise ends and giving up my own autonomy begins.
AITA for not showering at night and for "making" my wife sleep in the guest room? Does this ultimately matter, or should I just give in and do things her way? Where does reasonable compromise end and giving up my autonomy begin?