To be annoyed about DH changing career?

[3ormoredogs]

I know I probably sound selfish here but I had to ask anyway.

DH is a teacher. He is quite high up band wise. While training I supported him and have done the bulk of the childcare and running of the household while he worked himself up and trained, went on multiple courses and stayed up late working etc.

My career suffered through being a parent but I still work almost full time and contribute £25k/year to the family pot as well as doing most of the drop offs and pick ups and usual child related activities! I am also mid qualification to try and increase my own income but I don’t work in a high paid sector so DH is the main earner.

DH obviously does the childcare during school holidays which saves us a small fortune and means he can spend time with the DC. He is also home early enough to help and the job is pretty stable so we don’t tend to worry as some people have had to during corona etc.

We have finally started to pull ourselves around financially. Not rich but can afford to buy the odd nice thing without worrying and go on camping holidays that type of thing. We have just got out of debt. We have also just bought a new house that requires a lot of work, top of our budget but a family home in a rural area with good schools which we were planning on doing up bit by bit.

DH has hated his job for a while, moved around a bit to different roles in different schools and has now declared he wants to leave teaching and retrain. Apparently he can’t cope with the job any more and it’s causing him to be miserable and lockdown has made him see just how miserable. He has also said he’s been having anxiety at work for a while and does not want to cope with that amount of stress and pressure for the next 30 years.

I feel bad that he hates his job but don’t know how I can pretend I’m not very annoyed when he is talking about a drop in income of at least £20k which would mean an end to being able to afford anything for the next 5 years. We do not have any luxuries we can cut back on and very much live comfortably but not enough to loose £1k per month or whatever it would be.

He said his mental health is more important than money and his family think I’m selfish for saying this is not something we can look into with small children having just bought a house and that he needs to stick it out a while longer.
Not only that but the lack of job security really worries me in these uncertain times, he hasn’t even decided what he wants to do yet! He said a trade of some description or maybe police force as he thinks as a teacher he would have a good chance of getting in? Plus the shift work and childcare issues it’s going to create.

So, am I a selfish person thinking about my own happiness or should I be supporting my husband and thinking we could make this work?

Anybody dropped massively in income who can tell me it would be okay in the end?

I understand he feels it's causing MH issues, but before doing anything I think you need to sit down with a spreadsheet and understand the plans for all of you for the future. Leaving is one thing - but what will he retrain to, how does he know he likes it and what's the likely salary and is a job possible? Teaching may be getting him down, but not enough money is also a massive strain and obviously there is no point in swapping one problem for a bigger one.

The police or any professional public sector job will be as stressful as teaching and he'll be starting from the bottom. Your husband needs to find a way of dealing with stress, therapy, mindfulness, yoga etc. Its difficult to go back to work after a break and this has been a long one.

I think you are being supportive and frankly saintly... Most jobs with good salaries are very stressful.. Why do teachers have such a monopoly on stressful working conditions?
I would be fuming.. He hadn't spoken up before, he hasn't sought help like councelling or seen his gp, he hasnt talked to anyone at work... And out of the blue announces a vague "I am not happy at work so I am going to do something else"
Incredibly selfish...
Why should the op have to support this?
What about the impact on her mental health or wellbeing or that of the dc?

It sounds as if her dh has been on the elusive search for being happy in his job for yrs... The mention of keep moving schools, jobs etc was a red flag to me.

Well suck it up buttercup.. Currently life is really tough for many people and you cannot afford to follow another dream. Get some help, go supply, or drop to less than ft. But stay in a job until the poor op has had time to boost her career.

You can get this selfish man will happily let the op work more hours, still do majority of child care and wife work while he swans about trying out different jobs... Until that gets too stressful for him too.

And the posters saying sell your big house and you can't have luxury lifestyle while the poor dh is so stressed.. The op says they have no luxuries.. No men the house is big.. Bloody hell she just wants to buy an ice-cream now and again...

I was in the same place as your husband. I taught for over 20 years, TLR plus other responsibilities. Three years ago I developed really bad headaches and had 2 days off. This led to 3 months off with stress and anxiety I simply couldn't do it any more, exactly as your DH says, pressure, deadlines, inspections, marking etc etc etc.

I needed to leave but didnt because I didnt know what to do instead. The following academic year I struggled so badly worrying, developed physical health problems, triggered by stress and eventually handed in my resignation.

It was the best thing I could have done. The stress levels went, I had a life again. I was happier, and gradually my health improved. I took 3 months out and started a minimum wage job. Yes financially it's been very different but the difference in me and my health and life is phenomenal.

Even now 2 years after leaving I still struggle with reading or hearing the news on case education is mentioned. I cant drive past a school and I cant cope with what I perceive as too many children of any age (3 or 4 is too many). I know I could never have coped with Covid and all the stuff associated with this in schools.

I wouldn't wish these last 3 years on anyone and I'm coming out the other side.

If you're on £25k and he drops to the same you'd still have a good joint income. It sounds like you're downplaying your lifestyle a bit as 75k is a very good joint income.

Having left a job due to work related stress, depression and anxiety you need to accept his need to change his job. That doesn't mean he gets to resign tomorrow and put his feet up for a while while he thinks of what to do next. He needs to plan and this must take into account that part of his responsibility is to do some school drop offs etc.

Just to add I know I never want to do anything to do with education, tutoring etc ever ever again. The relief that I have knowing this is so strong. I know I made the right decision

I think he should have mentioned this before you bought a 'doer upper' house.

I have a MH issue and dislike my job, although it is much less stressful than teaching. Have managed so far to retain the job, for financial / family security reasons, by seeking help for MH, trEatment and other things that help like exercise, watching working hours, not drinking alcohol etc. Has your H tried similar?

I think that if MH is a factor it’s simplistic to assume that a change of job/huge pay cut is the answer, and/or that keeping the job will necessarily lead to MH catastrophe.

Besides, the police will be at least as risky for mental health, and probably worse for physical health.

I agree with you.

I get a little frustrated at the ‘teaching is much more stressful than any other job’ idea that lots of people seem to have. Lots and lots of jobs are stressful, and will be even more so as the recession bites. I get that teaching is up there with one of the most stressful jobs, but it has a lot of benefits. For example, I’ve just been made redundant, something that my teacher friends don’t need to worry about at all.

If he is stressed in teaching, it’s likely he will be stressed elsewhere.

You've just moved house. If he's been thinking about this a while, it's a pity he couldn't have at least broached the subject with you before, rather than after, the move.

If it's making him ill then he can quit and find another job. He doesn't get to jump straight into retraining, though. It's your turn for that.

op

I feel uniquely able to comment:

Wife of teacher. Dh left IT sales to retrain. 70% pay cut. He was working away, ridiculous hours. V v stressed, his mum being killed in accident forced a mid life crisis. Retrained, I supported us by returning early from maternity leave into existing role, then took big jump up to next role with two under 2.

After 20 years as an HR manager, doing lots of career counselling & conflict management, I'm retraining as a Mental Health nurse now. I have left a job because it was so toxic my mh was at risk.

Lots of good advice from pp but also a few observations:

Re your DH: the way you have described his frustrations with office/org politics are not specific to teaching. They are in every job. Naivety on his part perhaps.

Police highly unlikely to be suitable, and tbh, doubt he'd make it through selection. Likewise 'having a trade'. It's v tough for the self employed & contractors at the moment.

Re how hard teaching is. Yep, I'll give you that, as pp have said. That's because it is a job you can't do if you're not on top form. You can't coast.

But really, from all mine, and my DHexperience, very rare to find a job that is stressfree (I think I outsourced all the ones in my old job, .) Pp said be careful, 'grass is always greener' .

Understand he's dropped his tlr & spoken to current SLT. To be clear, has he reverted to classroom teaching completely? I ask because friend of ours, destined fasttrack SLT had burnout. He requested a yr on 0.8, just classroom teaching only, no form tutor role, no tlr, not even bus duty! Got his teaching mojo reignited, iyswim.

Re you. This is not just your problem. Please don't feel it is. He comes across as 'needing an urgent fix right now' and you 'as a needing to fix it right now'. This is a typical mh presentation, don't worry - it's an anxiety build up. But he didn't get to the level he is at work thinking or behaving like that, so don't enable him to do so at home. Calm, and slow things down. Break things down into a step by step process, rather than trying to fix his whole life with everything. That's his panic & anxiety, the lies it tells: 'I hate teaching, I'm no good, I must stop, it's all I know, I hate it, therefore my whole adult life is wrong, I must stop, the only thing I know is I must stop, I know I'll open a soft play centre because kids go to school and kids go to soft play but kids need discipline and police are good at discipline so if I'm a teacher I'll be a good policeman yeah thatssortedfixedmadedecisionresigned....'

As pp said, plan, plan, plan. Just as he needs to show his yp at school, dealing with challenging situations. Just as you need to show your children.

Talk of 'what if he kills himself' is premature. Don't be afraid to ask those very direct questions 'are things so bad you have plans to end your life or hurt yourself?' (www.zerosuicidealliance.com have excellent advice and a free short video how to start the conversation).

For you both, marriage counselling seems appropriate, and perhaps individual counselling. You seem most angry at being taken for granted and your own need for support from him neglected and overlooked. Perhaps some help for you both in understanding how and why you communicate as you do would be a good starting point.

Either way, good luck.

I notice you say you are retraining. How long have you got left? Will it open up more earning power for you? Could a compromise be that he sticks it out long enough for you to finish retraining and then he leaves?

I left teaching some years ago after deciding I didn’t want that kind of life for the next 30 years but I did it well before children so built up another career.
Definitely look at private schools. As others have said could he transfer to primary? Men get promoted very quickly to primarily heads and male teachers are very popular in primary. Are there any teacher training colleges where he could lecture? Could he transfer to fe ( it is still quite stressful) or university lecturing? Prison education?
As others have said all jobs that have a decent salary are stressful.
He needs to explore where he wants to go and how to get there before he quits?
It wasn’t fair for him to drop this on you after moving to the bigger house etc.

We both hate our jobs. We work in thankless roles but we go to work to feed our child and pay a mortgage. It is a means to an end.....no idea why his family have an opinion. It is frankly none of their business.

He needs to prioritize his mental health but it's a shame he didn't mention how he was feeling before you committed yourselves to a new house.

@Andromache77

You're not selfish, he should be a little more grown-up about it. Your career has suffered to support him and now he's not happy? Well, now it's his turn to support you, not to prioritise himself again. Once you've had your turn at working on your career he can change again if he wants to.

His mental health is important but so is yours. What will your mental health be like when you have to sell your house and move, relocate the children and find new childcare, friends, groups, etc.? Can what you earn pay all the bills or will you build up an overdraft? He doesn't know what he wants to do or how long it will take him to train for the mythical new career? He needs to keep working until he knows what he wants to do and the two of you need to sit down together and plan your future.

As others have said could he transfer to primary?

Primary teaching is just as stressful as secondary.

You talk about you having to support the DC as though that's intractable. It's not. He could pick that up if your re-ordered your job priority.

I understand your point that you can't easily find a better paid role. But, if the double shift of childcare provider and co-ordinator was taken from you, by him, while he downgrades his paid role, then you might find unexpected opportunities to step up and progress.

It sounds like he wants you to suport him through re-training, again, and just assumes you'll cover everything else. You need to put all your cards on the table and say 'look at all these responsibilities we have as a family, how do we reorganise these to work for both of us'. Do not just assume, or let him assume that you will carry him in every way except financially (and possibly adding that to the list too).

Oh OP you have my sympathy. DH has literally just done this to retrain as a teacher! He's left his well paid project manager role to take a job at a third of his previous salary as a teaching assistant (who are paid next to nothing for what they are expected to do!) and enrolled at the Ou on a full undergraduate degree in primary education. We will be tightly budgeting for at least six years! We bought a big old house last year that needs lots of bits doing and I have a baby who's eight months old.
When he told me how desperately he wanted out and he was offered redundancy I just didn't know what to do. I wanted him to realise his dreams and he happy but I also didn't want a significant drop in our standard of living, or to return to work full time or cut my maternity leave short.
It took me a while to come round, first I got comfortable with him leaving and taking a similar paid job, then I tried to convince him to take a lower grade but still well paid role and study part time and I even tried to get him to take on a finance role in a a school which paid only a third lower than his current salary, but in the end it was all in or nothing and here we are. I'm partly terrified but I can't tell you the difference in him, he's so happy and confident and excited about the future. And he has spent the three most amazing months at home with us whilst he waited for his new job and his course to start. I can happily say that was worth the trade off of my ending mat leave early. I kinda faked it til it became true and now I'm really grateful that I did.
However we do have some healthy savings behind us to subsidize our income if necessary and we have no other debt other than the house. And the work we want to do can wait.
It's a really hard one OP and you're entitled to struggle with it. What will life be like with your DH if you don't support him?

How is he still on that much money if he’s given up his TLR? I need to find that school..,

Work might be stressful, but not being able to pay the mortgage or feed the kids is worse.

What are his plans for supporting himself and his DC in the short term? Can he hold on for another year while you bank some cash?

But @chairbear, they could still be earning £50k between them. If I was married to someone who wouldn't support me to leave a job I hated, I'd divorce them rather than keep at it until I had a breakdown.

I’d ask him to make a practical plan plan (with professional help). He can save the cash he needs to make a career change. He can make a career change once he’s got the funds in the bank