To be peed off with DH regarding work situation?

[GreenFishYellowFish]

Sorry, this is going to be long!

Every so often DH will make a new friend through one of his hobbies and will be totally taken in by that friend and will talk about them loads, look up to them and do lots of favours for them, often at the detriment to family life.

DH is self employed. He met a new friend about 6 months ago who owns his own business in DH's field.

For the past 3 months DH has been 'helping this friend out' with a job, for about a quarter of the daily rate he would usually earn. He has made no effort to find anymore work of his own and seems to think that this work will lead to bigger things, when it is evident that that is not the case. The current project was meant to finish this Friday and DH has announced to me that it's been extended for another month now. It's also very long days so DH is getting home late and knackered every night, leaving at 5am every day, all for a stupid amount of money, and thus is too tired to take part in family life or do anything in the house.

I work, but don't earn anywhere near the level that DH earns and we are struggling financially and having to use savings. DH also announced yesterday that we can't afford a holiday this year. All because he's allowing himself to be exploited by his friend.

AIBU to be pissed off with DH? With a little bit of effort he could easily secure some far better paid work, but all he wants to do is help this bloody friend out!

That's really unfair OP. He can't bury his head in the sand. I think if he wouldn't discuss it with me I would be tempted to have it out with the friend 'you do realise you are paying h a quarter of what he usually earns.....?' I bet he would have something to say about it then. That may be the nuclear option but honestly I think I would be furious particularly given the non-communication and sacrifice of family life and wouldn't care!

in terms of using your savings, what about if you take £200 and put it in the bin? I mean, fish it out obviously, but if you said "hey DH, guess what I'm about to do with this £200..."

sometimes a visual demo is good. I'm losing weight and have a food tub marked as 1kg...when I think of that as 1kg and look at it in 3D, it seems much more real than on the scales.

make sure there's nothing in the bin before you do this you want to fish it out nice and clean and useable!!

Even if this does lead to something big, what's to say that it won't be at this 3/4 discount?

Your DH needs to realise the detriment this is having to family life, if you are having to live off your savings you are not coping and he simply isn't bringing in enough money.

I would do as PP's have suggested and tell him you need to talk about this and try and pin him down. He needs to man up and ask his friend for his professional rate, if said "friend" can't provide that, I would leave.

Funnily enough, that friend would probably find someone else and pay them their full rate if he wasn't their "friend".

There is a difference between being a friend and being a mug. Yanbu.

It isn't so much about you getting as much earning capacity as him as you getting an earning capacity that gives you power. If he isn't prepared to look at his earning capacity as a shared family resource, it doesn't matter if you can't match it, you survive at his largess. You need your own source of finance that you would be comfortable living on without him - so you aren't at his mercy in this regard. If your current line of work doesn't have that potential, look for one that does. You don't need to be stuck in low paying work.

Can you back him almost literally into a corner where he can't walk off to talk about this? He needs to understand that, by making the family use savings, he is paying his friend for the privilege of working for him. If the project is almost at an end and he thinks it will lead on to greater things, then those greater things should be evident now. If they aren't, it's highly unlikely to happen.

If the project has already overrun and his friend has a contract with someone else, your DH is in a strong bargaining position because friend really needs him if he's going to get paid at all. He really ought to go back and negotiate a sensible rate for the work already done and a bonus to finish off the job.

Why are you living off savings? Are you in a if we don't we literally won't eat anything/pay utility bills/mortgage etc stage?

Or are you both using savings to sustain your usual lifestyle? I don't mean it in a critical fashion but perhaps a week of baked beans on toast for dinner to get to the end of the month is what may be required?

What are you going to do when the savings run out if he is still being a mug?

The friends initials aren't DE are they? Pm me if they are. My ex did this for a "friend" who eventually cost us over £40k in lost wages, paying for materials he was never paid back for and advances in wages for other people. He's an ex because the stress of "waking up" and seeing How he was scammed brought on depression, alcoholism and EA.

OP some good advice on here already, don't let this continue.

I do agree op if your h isn't listening to you it's not a good sign - he ought not to have done this without your buy in and that he didn't is very odd - we would both discuss big things at work with each other before agreeing a big change