This is long - apologies. But it is terribly important for everyone who self-righteously declares that any woman who allows herself to become financially dependent is unambitious, lazy or anti-feminist to read this.
I am going to swallow my pride and join this conversation to serve as a "terrible warning". Like so many of the women on this thread, I took great pride in being financially independent and, when I divorced (short marriage, no children) I did not even consider seeking spousal support (my career was going very well but ex-husband was extremely high earner so I was told I had a claim - which seemed ridiculous and unjust). My current partner is also divorced, but with 2 children. His divorce was very acrimonious and remains so, despite the split having occurred 12 years ago (DP and I have been together for 10). When we decided to have a child, we agreed not to marry at that time but would do so at some point. DP's divorce was awful. So, in light of the huge amount of "baggage" marriage carried at the time for DP - and given that being unmarried made securing my assets for my child easy (rather than putting them into the matrimonial pot whereby they would be split 3-ways without a lot of complex legal wrangling), it seemed like the easy option for us both. I had no intention of leaving my career, which I had spent years building and even less intention of giving up the financial independence that had been my core value for my entire adult life. I was 39 when I had my son and was at the time earning more money than DP.
However, life does not go the way we plan.
DS is severely and profoundly disabled. He has massive learning difficulties, is severely autistic, non-verbal and dyspraxic. As I type, DP has taken him out to give me some quiet time after I have spent the night up with him (he woke at 1:30 a.m.). I kept working for as long as I could after his diagnosis and threw my bonuses and share portfolio into a full-time home therapy program for him (plus nanny) from when he was 2 until he was 6 1/2. I also held down a demanding full-time job that involved international travel. Eventually it became clear that DS was suffering extreme anxiety and distress (and by this I mean daily meltdowns, no sleep, severe self-harming behaviours) as the result of my travel and the uncertainty of his world and routine - and my work performance was deteriorating due to the extreme childcare demands (and years of 4-hours a night sleep). When the corporation I worked for offered redundancies, I took one, with a view to sorting out school for DS, establishing a healthy routine for him and then returning to work at least part-time. If you have not had fight for an effective education plan for a child with disabilities you will have no idea of the amount of work, energy and "blood, sweat and tears" required. It took a year of full-on battles (tribunals, endless assessments, multiple communications every single day) in order to secure DS a spot in a school that could meet his needs. Naturally, it is out of bureau and part of the agreement I made with our LA was that if they would agree to the school placement, we would not seek transport.
My life now looks like this (sharing so that I don't get smug exhortations to just "get a job"):
Anytime between 1:30 a.m. and 5:00 a.m. - wake-up with DS
From wake-up to 6:30 - therapy, interaction to keep him happy and quiet so that he doesn't disturb DP, DSDs (when they are with us), and the entire neighborhood
6:30-8:00 - Get ready for school
8:00-9:15 - Travel to school
9:15-9:25 - School handover
9:25-10:30 - Travel home
10:30-2:15 - Everything that needs to get done (laundry, shopping, meal prep, therapy admin for home program, work for school parent forum, household admin, a bit of exercise sometimes and the occasional shower that is longer than 3 minutes)
2:15-3:15 - Travel to school
3:15-4:30 - Travel home
4:30-5:15 - Work with DS
5:15-5:45 - Cook DS dinner (prep done during day as DS requires constant vigilance and focus as part of his disability is a total absence of impulse control or awareness of danger)
5:45-6:15 - DS eating
6:25-6:45 - Evening walk with DS to regulate him before bed
6:45-7:45 - DS bath, stories, warm almond milk with melatonin
7:45 - DS bed
7:45 - 8:15 - DS lunch prep, cooking our dinner
8:15-10:00 - Eating dinner with DP, relaxing
Rinse and repeat. For the rest of my life.
DP still has his career. He still travels around the world. And he is a great dad to DS. But - he gets to the parts he CHOOSES to do. The responsibility is mine. Everything he chooses not to do is mine.
And because of this, he is continuing to build his assets and his career. I dissolved my hard-earned assets for DS's desperately needed therapy (what is offered by the NHS to these children is a joke). There is no question that one of us had to take on this role. It is what DS needs and deserves. But the fact remains that I am now financially dependent on a man (something I never in my wildest dreams imagined I would be). And that man has zero legal obligation to me.
We own our home jointly. But I have no leverage to force a sale should I want to leave the relationship in order to put 50% of the responsibility for DS's care on him so that I could re-start my career. If we were married, I could. I have gone from someone who has navigated life in 4 countries as an adult, who has managed teams of 20+ and budgets in excess of £70 million annually to an unpaid housekeeper, childcare provider and mistress.
And I hate myself for having allowed this to happen.
And OF COURSE any discussion of marriage now is stalled, with excuses made and oh-so-sincere promises of "I will give you anything you want if we split" - until I say that actually, yes, I want to split and am then stonewalled on selling the house so that I could liquefy my only remaining asset from 25 years of 60-hours per week of work.
I am trapped.
I do not regret having DS - he is a wonderful, inspiring human being, who deals with tremendous obstacles and challenges with tenacity and courage. I am a better person because of him.
I deeply regret my hubris and arrogance in thinking that I could see the future and that life would unfold as I thought it should.
I would have thought that I was smarter than that. I wasn't. My father can barely speak to me as he feels that he failed utterly in his efforts to teach me how to be independent and self-sufficient - and smart enough to protect myself.
And I hate DP for his smallness of character that puts his feelings about his past above any sense of care or responsibility for me and DS.
If I could do it all again, I would do everything differently.
If you have the chance to do it differently, do so. Because if you are building a life with someone you need a contract. I would never have taken a job, bought a house or employed someone without a contract. And yet, here I am, no longer an equal partner, a bit player in my own life.
Again, apologies for the length of this - I really want anyone who thinks (as I did) that "it will all be okay because I am independent" to remember that contracts are there for when things happen that we didn't plan or expect and that life is all about the unexpected.