“I Don’t Care if We’re in Here for Two Hours or Three Days” — Dad Wakes up Sleeping Baby in Car

A mom recorded the moment her husband woke their sleeping infant daughter up after they returned home from a car ride, despite her requests that they stay in the vehicle. TikTok user Kiarra Hillman's (@kiarra.hillman) video sparked a social media debate on mother/father dynamics and sharing childcare responsibilities. Throngs of folks who replied to her post urged her to leave the man after watching the footage.

Kiarra begins her clip with a recording of herself riding in the car with her husband, who's driving. She informs him that their baby is "still asleep." Following this, she rattles off a list of protocols he should follow to ensure that their daughter stays snoozing.

"OK, she's still asleep. If we pull into that driveway and her eyes are still closed, everybody listen, no doors are opening, nope, no doors are opening, no barking, there will be, we will eat our food in here, I don't care if we're in here for two hours or three days," she tells her significant other.

He can be heard off camera telling her that he's not going to stay in the car for two hours. To which Kiarra replies: "After what she's done to us for four days she's finally asleep."

He tells her: "I get it," before she continues with her rules: "No one's moving. Nobody breathes. Everyone sits still."

Dad then replies, "I will take her if she wakes up." He then parks the car and takes off his seatbelt, resulting in a shocked reaction from the mom after he clearly disobeyed her orders. "Unbuckle quieter," she whispers to him.

"Let's just eat in here it won't be that bad," she tells him prompting him to reply that they won't be doing that. "It'll be like a picnic," she tells him, looking at the bright side of dining inside of a car. Following this, he can be heard exiting the vehicle, causing Kiarra to wince and look down at their child to ensure she's still resting.

He then shuts the car door and the video jump cuts to her looking at him off camera, apparently speaking to him while he's now outside the car. "I will live here now." This elicits soft laughter from her husband, who then shuts the other car door.

After he does so, Kiarra looks down at her baby and sighs, then pans the camera over to the child who is now visibly awake. The mom grimaces at first with her hand on her forehead, which she then turns into a smile, "Hi! I love you!" she says to her infant daughter.

Afterwards, her video cuts yet again to her baby crying. Kiarra says, "Hey! What about being happy?" to her child. The sound of the rear car door can be heard opening, prompting Kiarra to shoot an unamused stare in the direction of her husband.

"You woke her up?" he says at the end of the clip.

Commenters who reacted to the video said that they sympathized with Kiarra's situation, with many of them expressing that they thought the father clearly slammed the car doors intentionally.

"1. Said 'no' to unbuckling quietly 2. He said 'no' to eating in the car 3. He slammed that door twice. He doesn’t care," one remarked.

"Bring me back when she divorces him," another stated.

Someone else said that the look on Kiarra's face indicates that she was the one who was spending the most time with their baby. "You can clearly tell which one of you has spent the last 374 nights awake with her," the TikTok user wrote.

And there was another person in the comments section who speculated as to the rejoinder Kiarra would have to anyone criticizing her husband's behavior in the clip she posted. "Let me guess. He’s really a good guy, and no one can tell your relationship off a 39 sec clip and he’s the best dad and it was a joke," they penned.

The National Library of Medicine published a study that states happiness in marriages decline after childbirth. In the analysis, "an eight-year prospective study" was conducted that shows how spousal satisfaction rates fall sharply.

218 separate couples took part in this experiment, and the results displayed that both "mothers and fathers showed similar amounts of change after birth."

The research group also included couples that didn't have kids. Childless couples displayed slower levels of degradation with one another, ultimately "suggesting that the results seen in the parent sample may be due to birth."

This research seemingly confirms anecdotal phenomena reported by others who've opined on this same topic online. One Reddit user asked in the r/ask sub: "Why are so many married couples divorced after they have kids?" They said that they personally knew 5 separate married couples who, after having two or more children, ended up parting ways.