AIBU to expect DH to pay for all meals out?

[ElphabaTheGreen]

I do all the cooking at home - all of it, unless it's cereal or toast, as DH can't/won't cook. DH and I both work full time and we have two DSs - 3yo and 16mo. This means that I do a shit-load of batch-cooking to cope, including taking annual leave from work to cook if the freezer starts running low. DH does do the washing up, but it isn't nearly as time-consuming as planning, shopping for and preparing cooked-from-scratch meals all week.

At the weekend, we eat a couple of meals out as a family - nothing outrageously fancy. Usually just Frankie and Benny's or something equally kid-friendly and unglamorous, but it gives me a welcome break and the DCs like the change of scenery and the opportunity for chips.

Now, DH earns twice as much as I do. We have a joint account that we pay bills from which we contribute to proportional to our pay, but eating out gets paid for by DH. He's been getting increasingly huffy about this, with arsey sighs when he pulls his card out, then today he said I should pay for some meals out. I've told him in the past that if he expects me to pay, I really can't afford it, but I'd be happy to cook something a bit special instead so long as he keeps the DCs out of the kitchen. He thinks I'm being tight but I'm honestly not - in the past year, my new purchases have amounted to three pairs of the cheapest jeans from M&S and three jumpers off Amazon. DH has bought himself a midlife crisis classic VW campervan.

Given the amount of cooking I do, and the amount he earns in comparison to me, AIBU to expect him to pay for all meals out?

We're not all on campervan salaries you know!

:o

what about both of you sharing the cooking and cleaning if you work full time? anything less makes for a resentful partnership.

OP I feel as if no one has answered your question
If he wants to eat out instead of cook, yes, he should pay. He's effectively buying his way out of not cooking. He should just cook if he doesn't want a restaurant bill or takeaway bill. I would cut him some slack though, omelettes are food after all and good food too.

Whothefuck, sorry, but the fact your husband doesn't want to pay for your DD sounds awful. I get separate finances and holidays but it sounds like you pay all of her costs which makes no sense. If you got divorced he'd be entitled to some of your inheritance money but I'm sure you've thought of that.

"Wow, I'd love to pay for dinner, but unfortunately my jeans ripped, and I had to spend MY ENTIRE MONTH'S DISPOSABLE INCOME getting a new pair from Tesco. We're not all on campervan salaries you know!"

I more or less did this actually, when he huffed at me over paying for lunch today and said I should pay more often. I looked down myself and said, 'Oh, sorry, I left all the diamonds I spend my money on at home.' then brought up my bank account on my phone app, showed him my savings (totalling £0.00) and my current account. I think he calculated a total spare of about £40 in there that he thinks I could have paid for lunch with, which would have left me with nothing else, whatsoever, for the month.

The OP is vegetarian so steak and chips isn't an option.

There are plenty of quick veggie things I'd cook myself - I'm a good cook and was vegetarian for years. I do not in all honesty think that is the point of this thread. It's about her DH's refusal to provide/fund food, not helpful ways for her to go on doing his share of the cooking. If he wants some suggestions I'd be happy to oblige.

you don't want to be financially reliant on anyone else, but you've already put yourself in that position by having children with your DH and cutting down your working hours

?

I work full time, so does DH. The annual leave I take is fully paid. I haven't cut down on working hours or compromised my earning potential. I earn as much as I possibly can in what I am trained to do, which I qualified in before meeting DH.

No I realise the op was asking re finances but personally I think a rethink of meals would have a positive impact on time and finances.

We are vegetarian too - I missed that the op was as well.

in your situation i agree he should be paying.

Too boring as vegetarians (we'd be on a rotating schedule of about three choices) and it's not healthy for the DCs.

Well growing in a household where their Mum acts and is treated like a second class citizen isnt particularly healthy for them either.

Do you know to the nearest £1k how much is in his account? Does he keep bank statements from you, or do you go through them with him and control the finances.

Yes, no and yes, we do it together.

Apologies OP - I obviously got the wrong end of the stick with that.

If you are determined to keep things separate then fine. But you still need to address the inequality. Childcare/family expenses including food and meals out should also be considered 'bills' and should come out of the joint account. Your dh should pay more than he currently does into this account. In our house we consider everyday clothes and haircuts to also be a necessary family expense so these also come out of the joint account.

He should take time off his business and take the kids out if you need time at home to do the cooking. Or maybe he should give you a days pay in lieu of giving up your annual leave!!

Because you were brought up by a single mother I guess you didn't grow up around a couple pooling their resources, paying for things for each other and that being ok.

That's a very interesting perspective.

nooka has also made some valuable points, thank you.

Well, you cannot maintain your current lifestyle on your current salary, so you are not financially independent. Either find a job that pays you more, pool your finances with your dh in a more sensible way, or accept that you set up the current situation, where a family with more than enough money to eat out can only do so if your dh is feeling generous with money you insist is his and his alone.

OP My DH and I do not share bank accounts at all but we have access to each others if need be. DH and I have discussed a joint account for bills, but it's just easier to do it the way we've got it, especially as there aren't kids (yet), and its exactly for the reason you state. If DH was buying his toys with "joint" funds then I'm sure it would irk, but as long as he covers the bills then his leftover funds are not my business.

My one comment would be that I believe the expenses for the children are a family expense and so child care should be included in the joint account expenses. As your DH isn't happy about paying for dinner with his personal funds (which is fair enough really as it's a family expense) then this is the perfect opening to evaluate it all.

By the sounds of your situation, you would benefit from tallying up ALL the bills of the house, including the dinners out, child care etc and excluding your personal expenses (such as clothes for yourself, hair etc) and after rounding that up for variance, doing the proportion of income into the account based on that figure. It would be, in my opinion, a much fairer situation, rather than either of you using your personal discretionary fund for a family expense.

Might be a good time to talk about a family (or separate) savings account as well (if you don't already have one).

When my husband earnt substantially more than me (not anymore!) we kept separate accounts and also had a joint account. We paid most of our money into the joint account for bills and joint HH spending including family meals out - these were different amounts appropriate to our wage. This then left us with 'our own' money in separate accounts to spend as we wished on stuff just for us therefore getting rid of annoyance over me spending it on something he wouldn't and vice versa.

That is fair.

Doing unpaid childcare work whilst your husband builds up a successful and profitable business that you have no legal hand in is not. If he left you you would be left in a bad position - I see this time and time again in my position at work. Women who think they have a legal right to compensation that they don't.

In what way are you being financially independent if you are expecting your dh to pay off the mortgage and you are only paying one third of the childcare costs and household expenses?

I'm not 'expecting' him to pay off the mortgage. We are currently paying off the mortgage together, but he is handling his business money, with the guidance of an accountant, in such a way that we are hopeful he will be able to pay off the balance in one hit in a couple of years. If that doesn't happen for whatever reason, we're still paying off the mortgage together.

And someone asked up thread about would he support me in a crisis (illness, redundancy etc)? Of course he would, but I have income protection insurance, reviewed regularly, to ensure as far as is reasonably possible that he wouldn't have to.

And him looking after the kids while you cook something nicer than usual is not remotely the same thing as having a meal out with the family. For one thing, it means you two spend less time together. You all benefit from the spending of the money on the meal out.

YANBU. This is pretty much how it works with me & dh, although our kids are older & are expected to pitch in a bit.
But DH does not ever complain about paying for meals out. Otherwise I would never agree to it. "You want curry? I'll make a lovely lentil dahl for supper."

By the sounds of your situation, you would benefit from tallying up ALL the bills of the house, including the dinners out, child care etc and excluding your personal expenses (such as clothes for yourself, hair etc) and after rounding that up for variance, doing the proportion of income into the account based on that figure. It would be, in my opinion, a much fairer situation, rather than either of you using your personal discretionary fund for a family expense.

This is exactly what we do now, but we haven't been factoring in meals out. We might do a bit of recalculating to see how much extra this would be for me and see if it can be factored in. It might be a small amount for me to pay each month rather than a big hit every now and again, exactly when something expensive is due like my professional registration or whatever.

And if your dh is funding a family benefit from his own personal stash, then you are breaking your financial independence rule in every possible way and expecting him to cover more than the share you agreed.

I think he calculated a total spare of about £40 in there that he thinks I could have paid for lunch with, which would have left me with nothing else, whatsoever, for the month

What the actual fuck?

If someone put an omelette on a plate for me, with or without cutlery, I'd be really happy.

Obviously not read the whole thread.

Yes, Twinklestein. WTAF, indeed. Hence me getting het up enough to brave AIBU.

And I've even had an LTB. Thank you, thank you

'I think he calculated a total spare of about £40 in there that he thinks I could have paid for lunch with, which would have left me with nothing else, whatsoever, for the month.'

That fact that he did this blows my fucking mind.