To work full time to fund DHs preferred lifestyle?

[Smoothsailing9]

Bit of background first. My DH has a professional job which he trained for at university and has done ever since (20 years). He earns approx £50,000 a year. I went to university but did an arts degree, then trained as a teacher but didn’t enjoy it. Worked in various fairly low paid arts related jobs until I had DCs and took several years out. Returned to work part time when youngest was 3. My mum has always willingly provided free childcare/ after school supervision. I now have a 20 hours per week job I really enjoy but is very low paid compared to DH, I bring home around £8,000 a year.

A few days ago eldest DS was talking about a new phone he wants for Xmas. We discussed it and told him it was way too expensive. Obviously he moaned and sulked - he is 14. But DH used the opportunity to go on a massive rant about how little money he has, how he can’t afford a new car and foreign holiday every year etc and eventually, as I knew it would, it ended up being my fault for not bringing enough money in. This was in front of DCs. I was upset but left it.

Then about 3am that night DH wakes me up to say he’s really stressed about money. I said, I’m not discussing this in the middle of the night and went downstairs to make a cup of tea (I don’t sleep very well). He followed me and started a huge row about how “someone of your intelligence should be earning more” and “ if I’d married someone in my industry, I’d be fine”. Went on about how much more his friends earn, how I’ve got no savings or pension (although I actually have), how he wants me to get a full time job.

He brings all this up regularly but it’s really upset me this time. Although he’s a good dad, I do all the housework, paperwork, shopping and cooking and the ‘mental load’ stuff. I spend all my time not at work doing stuff for the house and family, whereas he just works, comes home and relaxes. If I worked full time his life would change massively. He might be able to buy a nicer car, but he’d need to take on half of the running of the house and I know he wouldn’t. I would certainly go back full time when the DCs can look after themselves more, but I just can’t see how I’d manage it now. Also, I am really low maintenance and really don’t cost him a lot. Don’t drink, no expensive hobbies, buy all my clothes off eBay. So AIBU not to look for a full time job?

It doesn’t really matter if posters here consider 58k a good household income. This man doesn’t—possibly because he’s significantly in debt, due to poor investments and overspending, and perhaps he shoulders more of the burden for those particular decisions—but either way he sounds pretty desperate in his appeal to the OP.

He needs to tell op by how much he would like the household income to increase. Would it be feasible for him to earn more, as well as the OP increasing her earning potential? Is he talking an extra 10k a year in household income, which might be doable if the OP takes on more hours, or is he expecting her from out of nowhere to earn 50k? And why? Because he wants to match the lifestyle of his colleagues, or because he’s overspent and is seriously in debt? There are so many unanswered elements here.

Oh wow. Some people on this thread actually said that it's self indulgent to work in the arts! Just wow. Go without music, books, TV, films, posters and architecture for a month - see how life feels after that!

I'm with you OP. Your title was a bit misleading, but, yes, almost full time house management is a job in itself and surely money coming into a household is just that - family income. It doesn't belong to either of you. Size of salary doesn't even necessarily reflect how hard someone works anyway. And since when do people get flak for being on a low wage?

RingtheBells

It was said upthread that if OP worked full time or got another job, they could have a gardener, cleaner and car washer.

Where? I can’t see that?

Sorrg OP but if this was a reverse and it was a man earning 8k a year part time with teenage kids he would be called a cocklodger.

Not if he was running the house and family and his partner didn’t have to lift a finger.

I think of your dh had posted this, there’d be an outcry in his favour. Mental load is massive, god knows, so sit down, discuss with him and tell him he’ll have to do minimum half, more if you go back to teaching what with Parents’ Evenings.

And if that was my husband farting about in an eight grand a year job and refusing to pull his weight financially and arguing he was needed at home, I'd be telling him to stay there as me and the kids are off.

If my husband did fuck at home for 20 years and lost 30 grand, we wouldn’t still be married.

I know he could have approached it better, but he must have been seriously anxious to have woken in the night.

OP, you come across a little entitled and you speak badly of his parents in prev post as well as defend your position despite asking for feedback.

Your kids are pretty independent and your husband has no work life balance compared to you.

Look at a compromise. I'd be annoyed if my DH had time to chill whilst I was under immense pressure. It's not all about you.

Well that thirty grand could have gone on retraining if it hadnt been used to pay off the BTL failure.

Misleading thread title as in fact your DH is funding your lifestyle and enabling you to work for 8K per year.
8K per year is not a lot in the grand scheme of things for a family of 4 we earn a lot more than that per month between my DH and I. I understand wanting to be there for your children but your children are of an age now where you can return to FT work and start to contribute to your household instead of the burden being on your husbands shoulders.
From your OP and subsequent updates this doesn’t seem like it is the first time he has mentioned it to you. Why are you so persistent in staying on a low end job? Because you enjoy it? It’s grossly unfair to put that amount of pressure on your husband because you are happy earning 8K per year.
Being the main earner for a family of 4 is a huge amount of responsibility and your husband sounds like he isn’t coping with the stress of it and more importantly is starting to feel resentment towards you. Can you not increase your hours in your present job to at least 30 hours per week?

Why does everyone keep focusing on the BTL failure? Isn’t he allowed to make mistakes? It’s a total non issue

I work term time only 30 hours and earn not much more than op I also have a degree I didn't realise so many people thought this is an awful wage.

OP £8k a year for 20 hours is what I earn as a TA for 20 hours a week and pro rata. I only get paid 44 weeks of the year.

Tbh if it's not working for him then he either needs to cut down what he spends and other ways to save money needs to be looked at.

Can you not make his lunch for him the night before (I say you because you say you do everything in the home)
Why are you allowing him to be like this when you run the home.

Manage the finances and explain and show him. You have two secondary aged kids. Sorry but I do all you do with preschool kids. It's hard, no doubt about it but either you find ways to save cash or you take on more hours

If my DH was waking up worrying about money at 3am and it was creating this kind of anxiety then I would be trying to action earning more

He woke up and whined to his wife who raised his children and does every domestic task in the house that if he had married someone in his field he'd be "fine"

He sounds like a real prize. Dick.

As for all the bleeding hearts weeping for the poor little man having to (gasp) hold down a full time job while doing minimal parenting and no domestic chores at all, and how terribly stressful it must be..... then in the next breath telling op to stop being so ridiculous, of course she can hold down a full time job as well as run a house and parent a child with serious mental health issues..... what double standards.

In my imagination the DH has thought that the OP will increase her hours or increase her rate of pay once the pressures of primary school are over and is frustrated that 12 months down the line this isn't looking like happening, ever. It would frustrate me too. It is very normal for one parent the mother to stop work or reduce hours while dcs are small. It's not quite so normal for this to continue through secondary school, ime.

As a PP said, you need to work towards an income that will make you capable of independence. Others have said things about different priorities and valuing spending time with dcs as more important than money. I hold no truck with that. Try being a single parent on an £8K income and keeping those priorities.

As an aside I have been looking for someone with a fine arts background to tutor my dd and can't get one for love nor money. There has got to be a market for that, especially with a teaching qualification.

OP

This thread has turned into the modern day equivalent to the 4 Yorkshiremen Monty python sketch. It does not always need to be a race to the bottom!

You want to prioritise supporting your family (including hospital appointments for your dc) over new cars. Your husband sounds like he may be having a midlife crisis. I can see it from both sides as I work pt but am also the higher earner (Dh does a job he loves but could earn far more). I have no idea why you are getting so much hate from other mums though. Very sad

I work term time only 30 hours and earn not much more than op I also have a degree I didn't realise so many people thought this is an awful wage

It's not in the real world

TatianaLarina

And if that was my husband farting about in an eight grand a year job and refusing to pull his weight financially and arguing he was needed at home, I'd be telling him to stay there as me and the kids are off. 😂

Also 58k a year salary. Plus child benefit is not to be sniffed at.
I think you both need to look at managing your money slightly better

Also I fully intend to increase my hours in the next few years

Why don't you just do it now then? Your DH doesn't want to be the sole provider and your kids are in secondary. There's not really a reason not to.

Slightly more than minimum wage is an awful Wage in any world. It can only be worse by being reduced to the legal minimum. How can anyone interpret that as anything but a poor wage?!

It's not a dou le standard at all. Not a single person has suggested that OP get a full time job AND continue to do run the household alone.

Close friend of mine has a fine art degree, she's a museum curator, lives in Australia now, but had similar jobs in the UK, earns very well. It isn't about the degree you have it's how you apply yourself. DH actually has a media degree (I know) his current career isn't in anyway related but he very much enjoys it having spent a decade in the film industry previously, he earns considerably more than OP and has taken on professional qualifications in his current line of work. OPs children are capable of being themselves too and from school, she's hardly looking after them full time, it's more than time she started contributing financially. DH and I earn around £70000 combined, one DC on the way, I'd be resentful and concerned in her DHs position, where are the savings coming from? What provision is there for the future? I earn more than DH but he works full time, he works hard and he's retrained to progress. I wouldn't respect him if he worked a few hours a week for minimum wage because he chose to leave the rest to me. Oh and we manage just fine with household tasks and 'mental load', I'm also six months pregnant, holding down a high pressure job and travelling nationally. It's what people do OP, you seem to live in the world of romcom novels where you do a few hours in a job you enjoy, the DC are off at school and DH is happy to keep his princess in the low stress lifestyle she is accustomed to, ugh.

Sorry but I agree with other posters - if you worked more hours you would not be subsidizing his lifestyle, more contributing to the family pot of money e.g. mortgage, bills, school uniforms, running a car and so on.
This would give me cause for concern about his mental health. I can see why he wants more cash tbh.
If you are good at art & a trained teacher can't you do some PT work for example run an art session in the school hols for local kids, sell some stuff on Etsy. It might bring in enough to help out.

Today 22:41 cookiesandchocolate

Also 58k a year salary. Plus child benefit is not to be sniffed at.
I think you both need to look at managing your money slightly better

Really?? 58K is average surely. I earn more than that and I certainly couldn’t run a house with two children on that salary.

I just think that if he’s that desperate for more money, he could look for another job. But he is very set in his ways

Uh....

So anyway. Was this failed BTL a joint decision or did he make it unilaterally? And if the latter, why?