Nc as other threads may be outing. Sorry if this is long!
Been with partner for several years. Both in mid-early 40s. We are getting married later next year, second marriages for both.
When I first got married, neither me nor my parents had any real money to speak of. Ex-dh and I did a low key registry wedding.
Since then, my career has taken off, I feel incredibly lucky and I am planning on paying for the kind of wedding I’ve always dreamed of.
Now the point of my post: we were having drinks with partner’s best friend and his wife this weekend and the wife made some sort of comment like “I can’t believe you (me) are willing to throw Xxx at a wedding but are ok letting (my partner’s) other child receive less money via CMS”
Partner used to work a very stressful but lucrative job. When we got together I saw the effect the job had on his MH and how truly unwell he was because of it. After looking at my salary, we decided that it would be better for him long term to retrain and become a teacher, something he has always wanted to do!
His ex is unhappy because the drop in maintenance was significant and must be sharing this with friends. In all other respects partner has maintained the same relationship with his dd as before and we intend to do so going forward.
To my point: Am I being the unreasonable one in thinking I’ve worked hard for my money and if I want to throw myself a big wedding I should be allowed to do so. I am a hurt that the wife thinks I should be contributing to partner’s dd’s maintenance to keep it at previous levels.
Partner’s thoughts on this are that he is not dodging his responsibilities, parents lose jobs, switch jobs, etc As long as he parents to the best that he can both in the financial sense from his current salary and is physically present for his dd, Ex should have no right to look at me and my salary + the lifestyle it provides us as dd is not my responsibility.
To give you a sense of figures, I make high six figures/year as did partner before switching to being a teacher.