Man Says He Introduced Stepfather to ASMR to Help Him Sleep. Now It’s Causing Marital Strife

Mar. 15, 2025

A man sleeping beside his phone.Photo:Getty

Getty

A Reddit user is conflicted about his role in his mother’s now-troubled marriage.

In a post shared to Reddit’s popular"Am I the A******" forum, a 20-year-old man explained the predicament he found himself in after trying to help improve his stepfather’s sleep.

The man said he usesASMR(autonomous sensory meridian response) to get to sleep every night, and when his stepfather complained of the same problem, the man suggested he try ASMR too. (The term often refers to videos of people speaking in soft voices or making small noises to soothe the ears.)

His mother found out about her husband using ASMR to sleep and thought it was “weird,” the man wrote. She didn’t like the idea of him going to sleep to other women whispering in his ear.

“They fight about it pretty often because she considers it strange and ‘borderline cheating,’ " the man wrote. “I get where she’s coming from and how it’s weird if you don’t know much about ASMR, but it’s all wholesome ASMR that he watches.”

The man has assured his mother that the ASMR isn’t sexual in any way and the stepfather has since stopped using it, but she continues to argue about it and get upset.

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“If your parent’s marriage is that fragile that ASMR is breaking them apart, then their marriage wasn’t that strong in the first place,” one commenter wrote.

“Whatever the issue is it’s likely bigger than ASMR. This is just the ‘last straw,' " another wrote. “Believing ASMR is basically cheating or weird because it’s a woman’s voice is ludicrous.”

source: people.com