To tell my husband never to bring up how much money I make ever again?

[dellacucina]

Between us, my husband and I earn a very good living. I make about £60k before tax and I have a very flexible job. He makes over £100k.

My husband seems to believe that I have a duty to make as much money as possible and he loves to throw this in my face when it suits him - he basically suggests he has more say over our family financial decisions than I do because he makes more.

This morning we had a terrible row about childcare. We currently only do a 4 day nursery week and the nursery is very annoying to get to, plus this creates stress because I work a 5 day week and we fill the gap with help from his elderly mother (who tires easily and probably allows us to take advantage of her a bit) and an au pair (though we don't currently have one). I would prefer to move to a closer nursery for 5 days a week. This would cost about £400 more net per month. This would basically have no bearing on our quality of life.

I have forbidden him from bringing up my salary, which he considers to be absolutely paltry. But he again brought this up today - not in the context of 'well, we need to consider our finances in the round', but 'if you're going to demand such unreasonable childcare arrangements, then YOU need to make more money!'

Am I being unreasonable about childcare?

Is it unreasonable to expect to be treated as an equal partner even though I make less money? Even with our extra help, I am the main caregiver for our DD (whom i adore - so I don't want a higher paid stressful job), so i offer noneconomic value to the relationship.

Btw I am completely aware that we are very fortunate and I would never say otherwise! I just find it frustrating to live with someone who seems to believe we are in the poorhouse and can't spend some extra money to improve our lives

Are you sure he loves you? This isn’t the behaviour of a loving man. He sounds like a complete git.

I would call his bluff. Tell him yes you would like to earn more but that means he needs to do step it up in the parenting department. Basically swap roles at home. Give it a week and he will shut up about your income and be begging you to return to doing all the stuff you normally do.

£100k a year isn't a huge income. I put it in the same bracket as £60k a year. It's also a lot more than what others make. Let's face it. He doesn't earn enough for you to have the option to stay home.

How much longer does it take to get to the current nursery? In terms of his 'hourly financial worth' what is the difference in time to get to the nearby nursery compared to current one? He thinks in terms of money, make it more worthwhile. Also often nurseries require you to take the 15 hours over five days rather than 4 so he will be wasting a free session. Could your MIL/au pair do two mornings then drop at nursery for the afternoon so still only equivalent of 4 sessions but spread out.

Obviously there are larger cracks in the relationship but if you want to get through the next year ...

Kalinka: what is love? Serious question. I am sure he would say he does.

I am always staggered to read about these kind of men in MN. Unbelievable!

OP, you have all my sympathy and I don’t know how you can cope. Put it this way, most of the men I know in our area earn many multiples of what your DH earns and guess what? Their wives don’t work at all or very part-time if they do. These DHs are not perfect, but I have never heard of one who belittles his wife for her earning potential, or lack of it. Nobody thinks like this. It’s unheard of.

I would tell your DH to zip it, He’s very lucky to have you. Earning potential means nothing - your job sounds more worthy than his anyway. Ask him if he thinks a doctor is more worthy to society than a banker. Then tell him to shut up. He clearly has a very high opinion of himself. He sounds delusional tbh and needs help to adjust his warped perspective.

I hope the counselling works. In the meantime, I would just stay calm as you can and repeat clearly and calmly that you couldn’t give a toss how much his salary is as opposed to yours. Does he see you as a partnership or not? One day he might not be able to earn the salary he seems to define himself by - what then? He may need to rely on you. I’ve been a SAHM for 15 years and my DH has never once thrown the money issue in my face. Sorry but he’s being a w**r and he needs to wake up to himself.

To my knowledge, skilled workers from outside EU need to earn 35,000 a year to settle permanently. You make almost double that. Get yourself a good lawyer and let them fix it. There is no way that you would be turned away making 60,000/year.

I am a SAHM. I never get moaned at about that and have full input into all decisions.

Actually before we had kids I did get moaned at (I quit my job because they were not paying me properly) when I tried to convince my husband to put more money in the "house deposit" pot and less in the "new guitars" pot :P (and if he'd listened to me then we'd have a house now...) But since we had kids he never begrudges anything - the money belongs to the family and we all do our bit. Earning money is not the only valuable work - and 60k is a damn fine income (more than my husband earns so more than our household income in total).

OP, could you answer my question about the comparative costs of the nursery you want and an au pair?

I have a similar situation so can understand. DH earns more than double my income and I work part time. My income is still a good income though yet he thinks not. He always says it’s his house, his car etc because he paid for it. He’s half joking but actually not joking. I have sacrificed a lot career wise to get the right family balance- that’s not taken into account. I pick up the slack when the kids are ill etc and do all childcare sorting etc. Its depressing isn’t it. I’ve tried to change his thinking but it doesn’t work. Sorry not really helping your situation but only to say you’re not alone and I understand

Gah, some high earners have no idea what life is like in the real world and OP your DH is clearly one of them.

My DP is a consultant who on a good job can earn £80 an hour, but it's very hit and miss, so the good times are used to fund the bad times. The other guys he work with are so out of touch with reality that they think shop workers earn £40k a year, and can't understand why my DP takes temporary fill in jobs at £25 an hour, when he could just go and work in a supermarket. And they're not joking.

Visa problems aside, if you were to split and he had your DD 1 - 2 nights a week, the CMS calculations indicate he should be paying you maintenance of at least £730 per month (which given he earns around £5,500 per month still seems ridiculously low to me). That plus your £3,500 per month still gives you £4,230 per month to live on, which is a figure that most working families with both parents working would be more than happy with!

Your DP is a knob, full stop. If it didn't cause WW3 I'd be tempted to show him this thread. Or hope the DM pick it up and leave it anonymous enough so that it's not obviously about him, and let him read the news article on it!

He is a childlike pain in the arse.

He could possibly be attempting to motivate you to your full potential via the crude financial worth but such primitive attempts ignore your true future worth.

Ignore his childish behaviour whilst understanding that he may have a rough time at work due to his limited understandings of the needs of others around him.

Good luck with that.

I think your life will be a lot easier without him.

I admit I haven't RFTF yet but just want to reiterate others. Your 'D'H is a materialistic twat.

My DH used to earn more than me (although we were both low earners) and when I said I'd get a second job he argued my value was looking after our children. We moved and we switched to me earning everything and Dh doing all the childcare and the money was still family money. Wed always check in with each other for big purchases but that was because we've always agreed big purchases are joint ones as they affect the whole family.

Hes back at work now but I still earn more. It's still the same! No focus on who brings the money in because there are other values we both bring. Your husbands views would be a deal breaker for me and I'd walk.

Shouldwestay: his mother lives an hour away so we are already asking too much now! The other nursery is a 2 minute walk away and our nursery is at least 15 minutes, plus you have to walk by the station and double back (making it a 25 minute side trip)

Our daughter is not old enough to get free hours

The reason I want this arrangement is so we don't have to to rely so heavily on anyone else. It is exhausting and he recently suggested that I had abused his mother's generosity when i spent some of the time she was watching DD to go shopping and have lunch with my mother (who was visiting and set to return to her country two days later)

@dellacucina I don't think he really cares how much you earn, he just wants to use anything he can to try and control your actions and "I earn the real money" is as good of an excuse as any.

How do you split finances at the moment? Who pays for childcare

To be fair, going shopping and having lunch while his mum provides child care is taking the piss a bit.

I think the issue isn’t the money as surely the household would miss the 60k if you gave up work but the fact he clearly wants to belittle you & hurt you. Why?

It might be worth reminding him that were you to choose to divorce him then in the eyes of the law you would be entitled to 50% of all assets regardless of how much you earn relative to him, and, given his greater earning, he would be required to maintain you. Much better to reach a more equitable approach to joint finances now than almost inevitably end up in that scenario.

To be fair, going shopping and having lunch while his mum provides child care is taking the piss a bit.

Is it? My MIL came to look after our kids even though I don't have a job so that me and my husband could get a break, go out to dinner, go on a bike ride etc.

It's a damn sight harder to go shopping with kids in tow.

Bluelady: it was an awkward situation and I felt a bit bad. My mother REALLY wanted to spend the afternoon alone with me

Honestly OP I know you say he loves you but from your posts it sounds very much as though he doesn’t even like you.

He won’t change his attitude and behaviour as he doesn’t think he is doing/saying/acting in anyway which is wrong. You can berate him until you are blue in the face but unless he really wants to understand why you’re annoyed and that his whole attitude is completely unacceptable he won’t ever change his tune.

You can’t change people you can only change how you allow yourself to be treated and having a row isn’t going to suddenly make him see the light.

And I want to avoid this happening again. While he criticised me for this, he thought nothing of trying to guilt her into offering to look after DC several times in two weeks when her nursery is shut later this month so he/we can preserve our holiday for when it's cheaper to travel

He is treating your desire to work and earn money as some kind of privilege which you have to earn & justify......very odd. He's not viewing your income contribution as a big part of the family pot.
If you were to quit working, i think your DH would be very shocked at the drop in your overall feeling of wealth ability to afford nice holidays, cars etc ....there's a huge difference Post tax between £160 and £100K....is he an idiot or just thick at Maths!
What if he got demoted or lost his job? Suddenly your income would be vitally important. I'm a mum of teens..., trust me, you've not got to the expensive stage of child rearing yet ....that's still to come and goes on for years, you'll need every bloody penny soon enough.
I'm surprised your life partner has such a mismatch of values to your own, did you never talk about this stuff. You married a bloody caveman OP.

I would find things much harder as a single mom so I should not complain

Would you though?