When will he understand that I ONLY work part time and cannot contribute HALF of everything!!!

[Needtonamechange]

Am soooo fed up today, not just about this but lots of reasons, but this is a re-curring theme in our relationship.

When DS came along we agreed I would go back p/t which has obviously significantly reduced my income (not to mention career prospects).

I am happy enough with this state of affairs as I want to be with ds as much as possible and am willing to give up my financial independence at least temporarily.

Discussed finances with Dp when pregnant and agreed that he would continue paying the mortgage (its his house in any case, not mine) and I would pay the bills, half the childcare, half the grocery, my car expenses, half of leisure/holiday stuff.

Basically once this is done I have nil left for myself /to save etc.

Dp earns a really good wage (higher taxbracket earner) but is a self confessed tight arse. He had a tantrum last weekend as we had a rare night without ds and i wanted to go out for a meal. DP completely ruined it by starting a row in the car beforehand which he then admitted was due to not wanting to 'spend all his money on eating out!!' This is a recurring theme in our relationship and erodes any enjoyment we could have.

To top it off this morning dp asked me to increase the amount I give him for bills as they have gone up. I said no, because I literally do not have it and you do. I then suggested to go back full time as am so bloody fed up with this same old conversation. He said no way too me going back f/t and the only reason for that is beacause he would have to fork out more on his half of childcare.

Sorry for rant, just needed to get it all out!

[FabioTheLiterateCat]

Would it help for your bill paying to reflect your earnings?

Also (and I sense I knwo the answer to this one) does he do half the childcare, cooking, cleaning etc? Because by his logic, he should.

[RubySlippers]

i don't get this splitting everything in half - you live together, and have a child together and yet your DP wants to work out to the last penny how much you should be contributing!

the simple answer is that you CAN'T give more, because you don't have it

he is a tight arse, and is happy for you to not have savings or money to spend on yourself

he sounds like he sucked all the enjoyment out of your night out

[DrNortherner]

OMG I would hate this.

I agree wityh MMJ. It should be all in 1 pot regardless of who earn more.

[FabioTheLiterateCat]

I agree with tmmj, have to say, but a disturbing number of couples still go down the my wage/your wage route.

What I meant was, if your earnings are 30% of the household income, that's the percentage of outgoings you should pay.

[bellavita]

As him to reverse the roles and then see how he manages to pay half of everything with only half the earnings. He won't like it then.

He is being very unreasonable.

[Pennies]

Write a list of all your incomings and outgoings and present it to him in black and white and tell him to put that in his pipe and smoke it when you've done it.

He can't argue with facts.

[Uriel]

Agree with tmmj.

I don't work and the money dh earns is OUR money.

[nkf]

Why is it his house not yours? You need to sort that one out as well.

[ginnny]

NTNC - are you living with my ex fiance by any chance?
He never saw our income as joint, I worked part time but had to buy all ds's clothes, all my clothes, half the shopping etc.
Every month he would work out a bill of what I owed him and I'd have to pay up.
No wonder we split up !!!

[madamez]

If you are not actually married then you should consult CAB or something to find out what your rights are and how to safeguard them as much as possible. Your DP sounds like the sort of bloke who will suddenly dump you for a younger woman and refuse to pay maintenance and refuse to acknowledge your contribution to the household. Men who are this mean and controlling over money are men who will be mean and controlling over everything else.

[Threadwworm]

Work out a reasonable hourly rate for your work as carer and household manager, and invoice him for half of that.

Crazy set-up. Makes me appreciate my DH's financial reasonableness more. He earns way more than I do, and we just have a joint account, each putting in what we earn.

[laidbackinengland]

He is being a twonk. My partner and I both work 2 days a week, but he earns 3 or 4 times what I earn . All our money goes into a joint account and the bills etc are paid from that. Any individual spending (over and above what is normal for us day to day) is discussed upfront. It feels fair.

[Tommy]

it's not his money and your money - if you are a partnership (which with a child you are) then it is both of your money. Whatever you both earn goes into a pot and all the household expenses should come out of it and you both have the same amount of "pocket money" to spend how you want.

And why is it "his" house?

[cmotdibbler]

We've always done it that we work out how much the joint account needs each month to pay all the bills, food, mortgage etc, and then what the relative income of each of us is - we then pay that proportion of the money in. No arguing, whoever has the larger income still gets more personal money staying in their account. We do pay for meals etc out of 'personal' money, but you could factor that into the joint pot too if you wanted.

We did this as then I don't get stressed about DH frittering money on DVDs etc, and its been fair through the ups and downs of income

[Needtonamechange]

Thank yu all so much for your posts. Am feeling a bit tearful now as this issue has really worn me down and makes me feel shit about myself. I was always self- sufficient and worked full time for all of my adult life before becoming a mum.

I have made a detailed list of all my outgoings, he knows exactly what I earn and I don't have much opportunity to increase this as I work in the public sector (no bonuses or anything). Our pay rise this year as for many is well below inflation.
I have a massive overdraft he has none, not one penny.

There is a lot of resentment from his side about me not paying towardas the mortgage, its a very very long story and i wont bore you all with it but basically he owned the house before we met and he isn't willing to put me on the deeds (he would say he is but when I say well get the documents drwn up they never materialise) We are unable to sell the house and buy together at the moment, due to no buyers basically. But even if we bought together he has made it clear he wants half the mortgage which I don;t have.

Half of me thinks I have made my bed, now I must lay on it, in the sense that I have had a child with someone who doesn't 'believe' in marriage and we just have very different views on money. He gets very angry about me not being able to help towards repairs etc for the house as well, we have talked about it loads but the bottom line is he just thinks I am abit of a free loader or something.

What a mess!!

[FabioTheLiterateCat]

So he wants you to contribute more but doesn't want you to go back to work full time?
Honestly, I think I'd go on strike.

[Needtonamechange]

Yes he is a twat, I wuld almost prefer him to earn the same as me, we would be worse off overall but it would be an equal footing.

TBH I have never lived with anyone before DP and I am not enjoying it much .

I think we have brought out the worst in each other.

[DaisyM]

I'm in similar situation, used to work 4 days a week after having dd but have now gone down to 3- couldnt cope physically with the commute over 4 days (total of almost 4 hrs per day) and was coming home knackered every night. I love spending more time with dd but of course have less money, infact a lot less money, was amazed the difference one less day a week has over a month. I'm struggling to pay half of everything- mortgage, childcare, bills etc and my husband is also on higher tax band so earns good wage but seems to have no more, paying back debt from years ago I think. It is hard, am going to tell him I'm going to have to reduce my payments as literally am using my overdraft to survive. I feel for you NeedtoNamecharge, hope everything works out...

[Dropdeadfred]

Have to admit you have not detailed one thing about him that would make him desirable as a partner

Tell him you are seriously thinking of leaving as his obsession with money is killing you....and mention how much he will be paying you via the csa and he will still have ALL HIS mortgage to pay and all the bills....

[RubySlippers]

DDF - i think you are right

[hunkermunker]

Go to Relate.

This won't get to be a smaller issue. It will fester and seethe and be a pus-filled angry boil in your relationship - and it will inform the way your DS treats women in the future.

He is being utterly unreasonable - relationship contribution is about more than money.