Older boyfriend wants to retire early...??!!

[foxyfi111]

Hi all. I have no kids currently but hoping there are some nice people out there with more experience than me that can advise me. Essentially - I am 29, my partner is 40, we both currently work fulll time. I love my job (in pharmaceuticals), he hates working (teacher - gets lovely holidays off). He dropped a bombshell recently that he wants to retire at 55, ie 15 years time. We were thinking of starting a family in a few years. I think his plan is that I will continue to work (ie for another 20 years until Im 65, whilst he is retired). I hadnt thought that I would stop work as I enjoy it at the moment but I didnt see myself being the breadwinner

Am I being unreasonable to think he is being really selfish? He has money which he has made on property (about 80 grand) so its not like he's not going to be contributing to our relationship financially. His idea is that he will be a house-husband and keep things running at home. Does anyone else have such an arrangement, and does it cause loads of arguments? Its probably not right for me to say he cant retire early, as without me he could afford to do so, but Im just thinking - with a young family, someone has to pay the bills and I feel a bit forced into it being me

I feel I cant really make a big deal out of this yet as we dont have kids yet but it is something that keeps me awake at night. I'm worried that if we got married we'd end up arguing over it later in life. I know its a price you pay for going out with an older man but I just dont know whether I should put my foot down or not, help!!

Mumsyblouse - how do men get "ready to settle down"? Is it possible some never do?! He thinks he will be ready in a year, am I being an idiot to wait for his terms? Or should I wait because if I don't his heart wont really be in it?

Do you know what "ready in a year" means to him? Ready to move in? To get married? To TTC?

Admittedly we might be missing a bit of respect (him of me), communication, and shared ambition.

Those things are in my Top Five essentials in a long term partner and potential father of my children

Oh deary me

"Admittedly we might be missing a bit of respect (him of me)"

You mention that like it is a tiny drawback rather than an enormous flashing sign telling you the relationship isn't a healthy one.

You can't compromise on respect without compromising yourself.

Also, IME men tend to get ready to settle down almost the instant they meet a woman they want to settle down with.

They are socialised to get what they want in their own terms, so in general are far less likely to agonise for years about whether a relationship can be made to work.

"Men" don't need to be tempted away from their precious freedom to be tied down with a little wifey. People choose to move in together because they want to share their lives together. I don't recall having to lasso my partner into our living arrangements, we came together willingly.

I think there are many issues and red flags in this relationship which say it isn't right for either of you. But I suspect you'll plough on regardless.

OP isn't listening to a damn thing

I think OP likes a "project man".

Good luck OP, probably a better bet doing this with a younger specimen, but you can only live and learn.

Oh sweetheart

If you have 'yet to find that man' then keep looking

Don't settle. Don't persuade, don't tame, don't put up with less than you deserve.

How can you know a better man isn't out there? It sounds like you have spent the last eight years with two men who had to be pushed into things. Of course you're not going to find anything better if you're not looking.

It took me years and years to find the right guy. But so what? In the end, I did find him. You are still so young, too young to give up and settle for someone who, I'm sorry, doesn't respect you??? Why on earth would you put up with this?

If he is putting off moving in with you, he is just not that into you. Sorry. You only see each-other twice a week, and a couple of holidays and he does not want to change that. He thinks he will be ready in a year?
I dont mean to sound harsh but if he was really in love with you, and keen to spend his life with you, he would not hedge his bets like this and keep you on the hook with promises of a future together while still remaining uncommitted.

But I must say, dreamily talking about your future together and make plans for how committed you will be at some point in future, is a very good way of hiding cracks in a relationship, and bond, while you hide how little you have in common and how little you otherwise talk about.... What else do you have in common?

To be honest, I would not waste my fertile years where I could have found a real relationship, on a 40 year old commitment-phobe who has never lived with a woman and does not seem keen to do so any time soon. Not if I could feel my biological clock ticking.

'we might be missing a bit of respect (him of me), communication, and shared ambition'

ouch.

these are the most important things!

but you're determined to keep on. doesn't seem to be anything anyone can say...

Well, some women cant be helped.

My mum has been a MHnurse all her life, and is allowed to start her work pension (complete with lump sum) at 55. She is counting down the days - restraining people, being punched and scratched and dealng with incident reviews, staffing, budgets etc is literally killing her. Her doctor keeps telling her to quit now and she is only 51.

Both my husbands were as keen to move in together and get married as I was. I think if you want kids there comes a time when you either get on with getting married and being a proper couple or split up.
Now I'm in my 40s I suspect if I end up single again I wouldn't want to move in with a bloke and get married again. I also wouldn't want anyone else telling me when to retire, but then I wouldn't plan to retire when I still had kids at school or college.
This older man who isn't that into you thing seems to have alot of disadvantages.

A lot of women who get with commitment phobic men are actually scared of commitment themselves and I wonder if you might be one of them OP.

By spending all this time focussing on getting him to commit you can happily ignore your own issues. I would suggest you read both these books. I suspect you'll recognise him from the first and both of you from the second:

www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/0871319993/ref=redir_mdp_mobile

www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/0440506255/ref=mp_s_a_1?qid=1360746867&sr=8-2&pi=SL75

I think the OP is sadly a lost cause.

Totally agree with anyfucker and claudedebussy- 'we might be missing a bit of respect (him of me), communication, and shared ambition' seems to sum up your acceptance of this ill-balanced relationship.

These are not things you can manage with out in a relationship. So you've trained him to buy to things and take you out but not respect you or communicate with you. Can't you see that your priorities are screwy.

Your example of smug couples who break up after a few years isn't the best example either. You said it took you 4 years to persuade your last boyfriend to move in yet it was only a 6 year relationship, so it doesn't seem that hanging around always works either.

On the subject if the house, I'm sure a £600k house is a 'fair family home', I'm sure we'd all love to live in a £600k house but on a joint income of £95k with a deposit of £80k, you can't afford it. Your £20k savings will disappear in stamp duty and fees, in fact it will probably be more than that as the stamp duty alone would be £18k.

Have you really thought about anything in this relationship? Is all this some kind of fairy tale dream where you look at your goal and don't see, or more likely dont want to see, any of the very real obstacles in your way.

Bearbehind: your final paragraph has summed up why I think the OP has commitment issues as well as her DP. The whole relationship seems more like a fantasy than real life.

I don't think anything anyone says it going to sink in. You are going to learn the hard way I fear.

I don't know where to begin with your posts but what I will say is I don't understand your infantilisation of men, this Hollywood perpetuated idea that you and your friends seem to have that men are some wild, free spirits, which need some fun sucking, mother knows best, type training, it'll be better for them in the long run etc. The men also seem to be buying into it too, giving them permission to behave as if they are such a catch that a woman needs to jump thru hoops to get them. Why don't you ALL try treating each other with a bit more adult respect?

As above really - I just despair at 29 you sound like a 50's agony aunt

Foxy in your OP you said you were hoping that some people with more experience than you could advise you.

They have- and not one person, who has read all your posts, sees your relationship in the same way you do.

Does that not show you that you boyfriend probably doesn't see it the way you do either?

All your talk of £600k houses, children and early retirements are pie in the sky.

The reality is that a £3k a month mortgage plus about £1k a month child care, per child, before all other living expenses and in London, is not even close to being within your grasp on your salaries, after pension contributions, even if you were both 100% committed to it.

I have a friend who has spent 5 years with a man who won't commit to her and now she is getting to an age where TTC may be difficult. (thats why this thread struck a chord with me) He just doesn't want to change his life. He's not a bad person, they just want different things. A few people tried telling her years ago but she thought she knew him well enough to know better and she wasn't as deluded about her relationship as you appear to be.

Do you want this to be like your last relationship, where in 4 years from now you split up and are back at square 1 after convincing him that living together was the next step even against his better judgement?

No one knows what will happen in the future but a look at what is happening in the present is a good indicator.

Take your rose coloured glasses off, look at the reality of your situation- the actual facts- not what you want things to look like, and decide if this relationship is going to give you want you want before you waste any more time on it.

You are trying to co-erce someone into living with you and wanting to spend time with you, and you think this is normal.

It most definately isn't.

Looks like you're going to find out the hard way

I would not want to marry someone who I had to tempt, and catch and persuade and change until they wanted to.

DH decided he wanted to marry me the day he met me. A week later he told me that.

When you meet the right person, a relationship is very very easy, at least until you bring children into the equation - but that is more to do with lack of sleep than anything else.

It is not normal to have to approach things in the way that you are.

Be careful, OP, that you do not end up on your own again in a few years time, having wasted the best years of your fertility on this man.

When you move in together, and it is his house - will you be helping to pay the mortgage? And what when you split - will you take some equity with you, or will he be left with a nice increase on his £80k to help him on his way to his retirement dream.

"Well I was kind of hoping his delay to moving in etc are just because he wanted to make sure I am right before leaping into it."

If he's not sure you are right after two years that means you're not, surely? Moving in after two months is leaping in. Two years isn't leaping into anything, yet he's still not ready?

Time to move on.

OP, I think you need to listen to the warning signs the MNetters are flashing up at you.

I'm 30, so not much older than you. I got married last year, having been with (now) DH for nearly 7 years. A relationship shouldn't be this much work!

If you know you're ready to move in/have kids/whatever it is, then you know. If he doesn't, then he doesn't. You can't put a timescale on being ready. It sounds like he is stringing you along a bit as he likes his girlfriend and he likes his alone time. This would be fine if he weren't letting you hang by saying he might be ready in a year or so!

Cut him loose OP. He is not ready to commit, you are. You will spend the best years of your life trying to change him. Find someone with some common ground.

(And PS - I think the age thing is a HUGE red herring. If you are right for one another, you are right no matter the age difference. I don't think you are right for one another. Sorry.)