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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

How much of a say do you allow your dh/dp to have over your work life? DH doesn't want me to work

291 replies

yoursayhissay · 18/04/2011 11:40

just interested in how much of a say you allow your dh/dp to have over your work life?

dh earns a good wage, he is also on a board as well as a ft job, so works more than an average ft job.
doesn't want to cut down on work or go part time.
he often worls late etc

and he thinks I should take his feelings into consideration when I decide what I want to do in the future, not that I should do exactley what he wants but i
I should take his feeling into consideration
and that he should have some say in things

what do you do?

OP posts:
rubyrubyruby · 19/04/2011 10:30

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Morloth · 19/04/2011 10:34

I prefer me not to work also.

Nothing to do with ought, it is quite mercenary in my situation. I like the money, I like it a lot. I like not having to worry about money and having a good solid long term plan. I also enjoy being able to spend the time with my kids while they are little without the extra stresses that a job brings, I have worked since we had DS1 and it was a PITA, why bother?

If DH and I split, I would fight for my half. It is that simple, our roles are different in our family but they are equal - there would be no rolling over.

If DH and I don't split (which is obviously to be preferred) working in a minimum wage job (that I don't want to) is very unlikely.

moodymama · 19/04/2011 10:37

DH wants me to work and I know we need the money, but I really don't want to. I love being able to pick DD up from school and wish I could continue to.
We do need the money though so I am in the middle of a degree and hoping to get a job when I qualify.
We discuss things as a couple and do what is right for our family.

ssd · 19/04/2011 10:43

I really and truly think the op is a journalist being lazy

Bonsoir · 19/04/2011 10:46

The women I know who have a very high earning DH certainly don't return to work to do dull, minimum wage jobs. When they return to work (and they nearly always do), they usually work part-time at something that they have a particular skill or talent for - often one developed precisely because they have had a enriching life and have been able to spend a lot of time researching and working at something of particular interest to them.

violethill · 19/04/2011 10:49

Ssd- it does read that way. Has s/he posted before?

ssd · 19/04/2011 10:49

"Many women do end up in dull, minimum wage jobs for the last 20 years of their working life, because they have spent years feeling they 'ought' to be propping up their husbands job!"

"working in a minimum wage job (that I don't want to) is very unlikely."

well I work in dull, minimum wage job not to prop up dh or because I want to (Hmm) work in a dull minimum wage job, but because it suits us as a family, we have no childcare support, can't afford 2 lots of childcare and dh gets a low wage, so I have to work but cannot afford a job that needs childcare

sometimes we all make choices that suit our family life ahead of what suits us, but thats life and all that goes with it

ssd · 19/04/2011 10:50

I don't know violet, but I'd better stop posting becasue I'm just playing into her hands Grin

ssd · 19/04/2011 10:52

totally agree with bonsoir there, I know a few woman like that too

go away ssd....

MsToni · 19/04/2011 10:53

He is welcome to have a say - it doesn't mean you've to let him control you or prevent you from working or having a career if you want to.

violethill · 19/04/2011 10:55

Ssd - what you describe is also true of many families where they need to work but cannot afford to pay for childcare and therefore end up doing menial minimum wage work to fit around eachother.

What I was referring to was a different (but also fairly common ) situation, where the woman isn't working in a minimum wage menial job because of childcare costs, its because she has been out of the workforce for a decade or longer.

Bonsoir · 19/04/2011 10:56

I interviewed a fascinating older woman a few weeks back who is Headmistress of an innovative and very successful international school. She wasn't trained as a teacher at all - she has a business background - but followed her engineer DH to Saudi Arabia, where she couldn't work, and got really into the different type of schooling her children received there. When she returned to Europe she got a PT job in an international school, and got on so well with the owners of the school that they backed a whole new school concept, with her as Head and entrepreneur. Her school goes from strength to strength and she knows everything there is to know about education in every country. She'd absolutely never have had that sort of opportunity if she had been a teacher moving slowly through the ranks year on year.

berrieberrie · 19/04/2011 10:56

bonsoir i meant because their husbands have left them.

BrandyAlexander · 19/04/2011 10:57

violet, yes def agree that it's a lazy journalist. Don't know why I fell for the "just interested...." start to the post and then the trying to give us different permutations as follow up questions. Hmm

dittany · 19/04/2011 11:01

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Insert1x50p · 19/04/2011 11:01

Tbh, I think Berrieberrie and Bonsoir are talking at cross purposes. The women Bonsoir are talking about would have got a good enough settlement in the case of divorce to ensure that no job was required.

I think that's the crux- if you give up your career to back your partner's, make sure they're a horse worth backing.

violethill · 19/04/2011 11:01

Novice - and now seems to have conveniently disappeared Grin

SpringchickenGoldBrass · 19/04/2011 11:02

Well, some women would prefer to stay at home and look after their DC. Thing is, some men would prefer not to have to work full time hours, either. Not everyone is particularly interested in full time careers as long as there is enough coming in to pay the bills. There is nothing natural or inherent about the SAHM/WOHF set up.

ANd no, before all the brain donors start yawping about My Taxes and flat screen TVs, I am not talking about a life on benefits, I am talking about people who do odds and ends of freelance/part time work so that they have enough income to live on, but who have no interest in career progression or indeed material wealth, because they have other priorities.
The main difficulty with the traditional SAHM role (even if you are someone who is really good with small DC and honestly wants to look after them full time) is that it is very very easy for the wage-earning man to begin to think of himself as the head of the household ie the boss/owner of the woman because he is providing the money, never mind the fact that she is providing the unpaid work that enables him to earn so well.

ssd · 19/04/2011 11:04

violet, yes I see what you mean thereSmile

sorry if my post was a bit uppity, I sound quite positive but I'm really struggling mentally with my job and low self esteem just now, I feel like I'm so out of touch with the workplace I'm being left behind, yet I need to work for financial reasons so I have to take whatevers going

I think there's no easy answer to it all

cory · 19/04/2011 11:06

We've had all sorts of different financial arrangements over the years: sharing childcare, me being a SAHM, paying for childcare, and may well be going into my being the sole breadwinner- all these things are doable.

But one thing would seriously ring alarm bells and that would be if we did not have an equal voice when it came to discussing our mutual decisions. Poverty doesn't scare me. Inequality does.

berrieberrie · 19/04/2011 11:07

Insert1x50p ha ha you are absolutely right! My first comment on here was something about 'only if you have a huge house with lots of equity that is either yours or jointly yours' The women I talk of are mainly ex wives of those with 'good' incomes. i.e. that provide quite a nice life when youre all together but enough to support and ex wife and children in the manner to which they've become accoustommed...? forget it.

These women are the ones who suffer in their 40s when husband has long buggered off and as thanks for all the hard work they put in making sure he could have his career, they get 15% of his income (minus pro rata for any days the kid stays with him) and thereofre have to go to work in a supermarket or similar to make ends meet Sad

ssd · 19/04/2011 11:09

"Poverty doesn't scare me. Inequality does."

brilliant cory, spot on

violethill · 19/04/2011 11:12

Great post cory

berrieberrie · 19/04/2011 11:28

Poverty scares me!! AND inequality. They often comehand in hand.

ssd · 19/04/2011 11:31

depends on what you class as poverty

we live on less than £25k between the 4 of us, no holidays, weekends away, nights out, pretty skint most of the time

but its doable, we're in it together (ha ha)

inequality is much harder to quantify and harder to accept and live with

with inequality you definately aren't in it together