Should we leave London after burnout, or stay for my husband's career?

[ChickenChitty]

Help me with my life dilemma.

DH and I have been together for 15 years, we are late 30s with 2 kids at primary school. I work in a stressful job in the City, requiring extremely long hours (60-70hr weeks, weekend work most weekends and most holidays too). DH is in a creative career - his passion. I earn c.6x what he does. He is self-employed so does more with the kids and more around the house (I’d say he does 60% of the childcare and maybe 70% of household tasks).

I nearly died earlier this year with a ruptured appendix that was missed and negligent medical care. It came off the back of a period of very intense work - about 9 months of hell. I’m mentally traumatised from that experience and burnt out generally, and the whole thing has made me reassess my life.

Ive suddenly got clarity that I don’t want to continue doing my job anymore and I don’t even know what I’m doing it for as London is so expensive our quality of life is not great. We have enough equity in our small London terraced house that we could move back to my home town (up north) and buy somewhere large and detached and lovely mortgage free, near much better schools for the kids and near my family. DH really doesn’t want to leave London as he loves it, and his work is here (his family is up north too but nowhere near mine). He would want to continue commuting to London if we moved, which would probably involve overnight stays and impact family life.

Im starting to feel a bit of resentment as I increasingly feel like I’m killing myself and sacrificing my quality of life so that DH can live his dreams. But I love him, am proud of what he does, and would feel awful to effectively force him to move (which we would need to do if I quit my job, as he could never pay the mortgage alone). I knew when we got married that this would be his career. I’ve thought of middle grounds like downsizing in London or moving to a commuter area if I took a pay cut, but that would feel like a much worse outcome for the kids, to leave everything they know for something materially worse, and/or both parents travelling more than we do now . I don’t know whether I’m being unfair in wanting to do this or not, or what the right balance is, so thoughts from other people would be welcome!

Looks like you can get a 3 bed semi for £600k in Charlton - with a garden, so can extend or add a garden office. I have only ever lived in the "undesirable" areas of london (think catford etc) and had to laugh at people who had gone to school locally thinking they were from absolute ends when they had been offered Latin lessons in the state sector.

I can't believe I'm wanging on about staying in London! I feel I have betrayed myself. I absolutely love Leeds and Sheffield and can imagine settling down around there myself in the future. But it sounds like moving back there (in my head you are from Leeds) might be quite a shock to the system in various ways, especially if your mum isn't in the best position to help out and you have a reluctant husband in tow.

Anyway, you sounds great, OP. I'm rooting for you. I hope you can find a solution that puts you in a better situation and on the road to recovery 💐

I’d be very surprised if she was a City lawyer because she has said no scope for hybrid or flexible work, or in-house or sideways moves. Law offers all of those things, no matter what your practice specialism, and it is also relatively easy to change practice area. There are in-house jobs, knowledge and risk lawyer jobs, “lawyer on demand” contract arrangements, learning & development, and business development roles. Even new jobs emerging now around AI prompt engineering legal roles. Mid -sized firms in London that do not demand 70 hour weeks and still pay perfectly well. Trust me, I know a lot about this career!

Could you move back to the North and your DH reduce his hours so that he can commute to London for part of the week and be at home for the rest of it?
We’re in the SouthWest close to transport links and quite a few families that go to our children’s schools have a parent that commute to London for part of the week.
It seems like that may be the only middle ground to keep everyone happy, you shouldn’t be staying in a job you hate because your DH wants to continue in a job he loves that pays far less.
There has to be some flexibility, if he is happy to commute that seems the most logical solution.
It doesn’t sound like he’s refusing to move, he wants to be able to continue doing a job he loves. You have said yourself that his job is only really available in London so if he can commute in on a Monday Morning and head home on a Wednesday/Thursday it will give you family time on the days he’s not at work/weekend.
You’ll end up hating him if you continue as you are because resentment is already creeping in, I would pick a better location for most family members rather then pick a location that one person wants to stay in and everyone else would rather move.

Find a new husband

Sounds like a similar financial situation to me 2 years ago. My salary is 4x DH and we had a massive mortgage that he could not afford on his own. I was tied to the job as a result and it was not fair on me.
I had to restructure our lives completely also due to burn out.
We quit London and moved to where I grew up. Very close to mortgage free. We still commute to London but only 2 days a week for me and once a week for him.
I stay overnight.
If you burnout or die, he would have to restructure everything anyway as he wouldn’t be able to afford the mortgage and it would take a while for life insurance and death admin to sort itself.
IMO you both need to afford the cost of life individually so neither is dependent on the other - that is part of the stress.
I can honestly say I’m much less stressed having sorted out personal finances out like this, even if the daily stress of work remains because now I know I can quit any time and also if anything were to happen to me, DH and DC will be ok financially and nothing needs to change.

Isn’t the usual rule on MN that it’s all one pot so it doesn’t matter who earns what? Or is that another double standard that only applies when a man is a high earner?

There is a way to make it work - move to a cheaper, less desirable area in London which it sounds like DH would be happy to do - but OP won’t do that because it would feel like a failure to her to live in a smaller house. If both of them were in agreement about wanting to leave London I’d say crack on, but if DH’s job genuinely doesn’t exist anywhere else it is unfair to unilaterally impose such a move on him purely because you won’t countenance living in a cheaper area.

It’s not about the house, it’s about the schools @thesealion. Cheaper less desirable areas have bad schools - that’s why they are cheap and less desirable. It’s about prioritising the kids/trying not to make them pay too heavy a price for their parents choices.

No, she doesnt want to do that because the schools arent very good, which is why they less desirable and therefore cheaper.

Ha, I grew up there. Pretty architecturally but wouldn’t recommend it. Boring af, and the locals are like the cast of the Jeremy Kyle show (although I think it’s gentrified a lot with all the people moving up from London). The cost of the train more than cancels out the cheap house prices though, last time I checked the season ticket was nearly 10k a year!

@thesealion

What rubbish!

If OP was a man we would be giving the same advice:

Your health is top priority, you need to change jobs, move to somewhere more affordable, and make your other half understand that they have to shoulder more of the burden.

You honestly believe we'd be telling them to carry on with this unsustainable, unfair and harmful set up? Really?

That’s still a choice and a refusal to compromise.

There is currently another thread on the go by a male poster whose wife has always been a SAHM and now the kids are nearing adulthood and she is refusing to work despite them being financially stretched. While many posters are supportive of the OP, there is a vocal minority on there telling him he’s being unreasonable to expect her to work after years out of the workplace, he’s selfish and unappreciative of everything she’s done, so yes, there are people around that think that. If you read my responses I have agreed OP needs a different job with realistic hours! Nowhere have I said she should suck it up and carry on.

There's a big difference between usual rule and some people said this but they were in a minority.

The reality is that in threads where a woman wants a man to keep paying for most of the lifestyle when he's not up for it, someone invariably points out to her that you can't force someone to fund you if they don't want to.

@thesealion

I haven't seen the thread you mentioned.

The vocal minority may be expressing that unfair opinion, but it appears that the majority are not.

So you'll agree that it's not "the usual rule".

You absolutely could buy a flat or a small house in an area with good schools in London. You prefer not to because the house or area would be a major compromise, but you should not obfuscate that preference. If you do it will make having an honest conversation with your DH very difficult.

Do they? Most London schools are pretty decent. https://www.google.com/search?ie=UTF-8&client=ms-android-samsung-rvo1&source=android-browser&q=are+schools+in+london+good#lfId=ChxjMe

You can't assume he will get a job somewhere like that. Are they hiring?

@pleuo and @Arran2024 please help me on the schools front then - can you name some actual schools with high academic attainment in an affordable area? I’ve been researching this extensively for the past year and all of the ones that look good to me are in more expensive areas. The exceptions tend to be schools with a “no excuses” high discipline approach which my kids do not need and I do not want. (See for example Mossbourne in Hackney where the teachers have been accused of abuse).

Yes @thesealion I am absolutely refusing to compromise on the quality of my children’s education: you are correct.

Could you buy a less large house in the north and get a one bed flat in London ( doesn’t have to be a good area or good schools) for your husband to stay in for 2-3 days per week?

Grey court in Ham.

OP, families who want excellent secondary schools in London but don't earn a fortune move to Sutton. Look around Carsharlton. You could easily get a house within your budget there, and you wouldn't have a massive commute because (a) trains to Victoria take 30 minutes, and (b) you would be able to take a massive paycut and so could work part time. Here's your villa: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/90567102#/?channel=RES_BUY

I agree with the posters who have said that your idea of moving north is a pipe dream. You want both (both!) of you to quit your jobs at the same time and find new ones in an area where there are no jobs in his field, and nothing in the whole of London that has met your requirements. It's madness. Although not as mad as the idea of handing in your notice before you've sold your current house if your ability to pay the mortgage requires you to have that job.