Husband refuses to help wife pull autistic son out of neighbor's pool until they check CCTV footage — and find someone to blame
The unapologetic father blamed their daughter and said she had to face the consequences.
Parenting requires teamwork, especially when one parent cannot manage a situation alone. u/latchkeytwin's husband decided to play the blame game before helping his nonverbal autistic son out of the neighbor's pool. The author called him to help because their son weighed almost as much as her, and she found it difficult to lift him. However, instead of pulling him out of the pool, her husband wanted to review the camera footage first. The post was shared on October 5, 2026, and it received 4,500 upvotes and 3,800 comments.
AITAH for being disgusted with my partner after he refused to go into a neighbor’s pool to retrieve our eloping autistic child?
by u/latchkeytwin in AITAH
Fully-clothed rescue
In an update, the mother clarified that her son was nearly a teenager, swam several times a week, and was not in danger of drowning in the above-ground pool. She said she had followed him immediately after an alarm sounded, but needed help getting him out because he resisted leaving. The moment the author's husband arrived, he began shouting at her and defended himself right away. He said he was not to blame because he always checked the locks. "My husband insisted we review security footage to identify who left the door unlatched, stating that 'whoever left it unlocked should have to go in.'"
According to the mother, her husband had already climbed over the locked pool gate and was standing beside the water, but refused to enter on "principle." After they checked the footage, they realized their 14-year-old daughter left the door unlocked. Since it wasn't his fault, he refused to go in the pool. "I had to climb over and wade fully clothed into the neighbor’s pool to retrieve my child safely," the author explained.
Punish the daughter
The moment they got home, the husband started yelling at his teenage daughter, accusing her of ignoring her sibling's safety. The author, on the other hand, was "disgusted" by his conduct. "A real man/father would have jumped in immediately regardless of who unlocked the door," she wrote. Later, her husband apologized for blaming her, but defended his reasons for not going in. Furthermore, he blamed their daughter and said she had to face the consequences. She said this was his third pool elopement in a month and clarified that two of those incidents involved the neighbor’s pool. Now that he was bigger and taller, it was difficult for her to grab and lift him. During an earlier incident, she said she misjudged the pool’s depth, went underwater, and panicked before another adult helped her get her son out. Her husband knew about that experience.
The challenges of preventing wandering
Wandering, also called elopement, can place considerable demands on families caring for autistic children. A study published in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders on March 05, 2019, analyzed survey responses from 526 respondents. Most families reported using multiple strategies to prevent wandering, and 68% rated the overall burden of implementing those measures as "high" or "very high." In her update, the mother said their home already had alarms and that she had added more locks following the recent incidents.
'Protect your kid better'
Netizens were concerned about how the author's husband reacted in that situation, but called out the author for her lack of urgency, too. u/meowmix79 wrote, "My autistic nonverbal son has weighed more than me and has been taller than me for a while. If I had seen him in my neighbor's pool, I would have ran my a-- over there immediately and did everything in my power to get him out! I wouldn’t be arguing with my husband. You both are a-------." u/Impressive_Moment786 added, "ESH. How do you have time to check security footage before getting your kid out of the pool? You both need to do better at protecting your kid. Obviously, just locking the door isn't cutting it."
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