Man Blasted for Telling Wife He's Not 'Comfortable' With Her Using Tampons

A man who is barring his wife from using tampons has prompted concern online.

Coercive control can take many forms but essentially boils down to any pattern of behavior in which an individual is able to establish some form of control over the actions of a partner or ex-partner.

According to the domestic abuse charity SafeLives, its characteristics include "controlling or observing the victim's daily activities" and "preventing the victim from taking medication or accessing care."

Viewed in this context, the situation described by one woman posting to Reddit's "Am I the A**hole?" subreddit makes for alarming reading. According to the post, which has been upvoted over 22,000 times, the woman has switched from using pads to tampons while on her period.

Her husband, Ryan, "hates them," though he "never truly gave a reason" why other than to say "he doesn't feel comfortable" with her using them. "He asked that I go back to using pads but I made it clear since it's my body then I get to decide," his wife wrote on the post.

Despite her wishes, he then proceeded to throw away the tampons she had in the house and, when she purchased some more and hid them, he somehow found them and threw them away too.

"I didn't find that out til I had my period yesterday and realized I had no tampons to use," the woman wrote. "I was tired, and too stressed. I just yelled at him after he admitted to throwing away the whole box."

Her controlling husband was not bothered by her criticism though, telling his wife she was to blame as she "already knew how he felt about this stuff and yet I decided to still keep it around."

She nevertheless refused to back down, telling her husband he had "no right to do this" and urging him to "get over himself already."

After becoming upset at her response, he stormed out of the house but later returned and told his wife it was important that they "take each other's discomfort into consideration" with matters like this.

This isn't the first time a family member has voiced concern over the use of tampons. A previous viral story saw one mom flat out refuse to let her daughter use tampons until she was 18.

In that instance, her hesitation was based on her religion and the unfounded concern that use of the tampon could end up breaking her hymen—something dispelled as an urban myth by health care experts.

But while this husband's particular concerns were less clear cut, many still felt his behavior was cause for serious concern.

Crataeguz branded his response "toxic" and urged his wife to take care. "I literally can not even imagine a partner of mine having opinions about what period product I might use," she said.

GoodGirlsGrace told the woman she should be worried that her husband "values his own comfort about your periods more than yours."

Positive-Squirrel121 offered up a more alarming theory, calling the man's response something akin to "a violent style of patriarchy where NOTHING is going to be inside his wife except for HIM."

Cesar____augustus was similarly worried, warning: "This is how abuse escalates" while toss_it_out_tomorrow said: "It's control, it's control of her body. This is beyond a red flag, it's a neon sign."

Angiosperms agreed it was "scary" and urged the woman to get out "as soon as possible" as situations like this "can escalate real fast."

Fart-atronach wrote that even if it isn't deliberately abusive, "at best he's unknowingly behaving abusively as a result of extreme patriarchy-informed ignorance and misogynistic entitlement."

Newsweek has contacted the original poster for comment.