DH wants to spend £4000

[amblers]

DH works, I'm a stay at home mom. Last month we sat and looked through the accounts etc and apparently I need to get a job to cover the weekly shopping. I've found a temporary part time job but will be looking for more hours.

Today DH insists he needs to replace something he uses for a hobby (cost £800) with a more expensive £4000 version! Apparently it's fine as it's a one off cost and he earned the money to pay for it. He recently spent £2k straightening his teeth but didn't discuss that with me. He feels entitled to spend 'our' savings as he wants. He points out that he acknowledges legally yes half of the money is mine but doesn't agree with it as I didn't earn it. AIBU to think this is a waste of 'our' money and that I should have a say about how it's spent? Nobody goes without, we live comfortably but I'm always reminded of the struggle it's been on one wage. It does feel he changes his mind about our finances to fit him. He's offered me £4000 of 'our' savings to do with as I like. It's all feeling very reckless and childish. We are having relationship issues and part of me feels he's trying to spend money so that I get less when/if we split.

You sound so sad OP.

I often read posts about getting all your paperwork and evidence together. I think you should consider that. No matter how hard and make plans to leave. You deserve so much better.

It does sound grim, but I would separate the dentistry, personally.

Different to spending on the other shit, but with 50k in savings I would do my teeth if I could.

I have just thought. Spend the £4k on gold jewellery. It will hold a lot of its value and you can sell it later. A chunky gold neck chain or bracelet. Gold is expensive now and actually the gold prices are rising week by week. You really need to do that then file for divorce.

What a horrible man. Tell him to take on all childcare and get a job. Family money is family money

There's another thread on here, saying how sad it is that women, who in the past would have stayed home with children, are now more likely to work outside the home

Sadly, tales like this show the risks of one partner giving up work

OP, I hope your situation imoroves

The comments on pre school childcare not costing that much and that she should still work. A) how do you know her earning potential? If it's minimum wage and multiple pre schoolers it's a loss
B) some families like one parent at home as it's easier than the juggle of pick ups etc
C) he's controlling her! Saying she now needs to work (that's fine if he's now no longer happy to take the financial burden) but he have her doing any work that inconveniences his schedule. Which actually makes it difficult for her to find a permanent job (not fine)

This problem op has isn't about being a sahm. It's about her being in a controlling unhappy relationship. A bit of solidarity between women would be lovely to see rather than blaming someone when they are down.

If I’m honest op the first post reads like you’re pissed off you need to work and so object to him spending money as he pleases.

The abuse thing is harder to quantify as you’re not answering any questions on it. But if you’re being abused then you need to seek help and get out. You also need to really focus on working and earning so you can be financially independent.

I would take the £4000 he is offering and use it for legal help if I was you! He is keeping you short of money for a reason.

The £4k and the teeth are red herrings.
The OP is unhappy. Whether the DH is financially abusive and/or abusive in other ways is acutely important in the context of leaving safely. However, life is too short to be deeply unhappy and unfulfilled and the op needs to ensure her own potential for happiness moving forwards.

All of us organise our financial and emotional input in different ways and have varying levels of resilience and compromise. We can't expect every relationship to mirror our own modus operandi. However, each and every one of us us entitled to feel equal within a relationship, to be happy or at least content and to feel safe. There should never be a sinking feeling as someone turns the key in the lock.

@SpringtimeSummertime

He's offered me £4000 of 'our' savings to do with as I like. Put it in your account and every time he helps himself to savings, you match it and do the same.

People assume I have access to his accounts. I do not. Until last month I had no idea what savings he has. I've always been told I'm never interested in the money side of things, look what happens when I do! It's always been a way for him to attack me, telling me I don't understand it all and makes it all over complicated. Also pointing out how tight things are and how desperately I need to get a job to help out. Totally ignoring the fact I'm 100% responsible for child care and how he doesn't want to be cooking when he comes home. He has gone through spells of travel at short notice and has been free to go. It's really used as a stick to beat me with. I can't even be sure he's shown me everything. He has access to my accounts and sees everything I spend.

Op I think you have posted before about your situation.

I woukd take the 4k, and use it to see a solicitor and start the ball rolling with divorce proceedings. Especially if I think you are the poster who posted before. No one is going to rescue you from your situation, you need to do it yourself. Your dcs are old enough to not need childcare, you can get a job now and tbh should have been working since they were in secondary. You put obstacles in front of yourself that are pretty straightforward to resolve. See a solicitor, sell the house and use the share of the divorce settlement to set yourself up.

Take the £4K get a lawyer and put it on your account with them. Make sure his £4K purchase is listed as well one of his assets on the Form E. Do you have access to the £50,000? If so, move half into your own account after seeing the lawyer (don't tell him before you do this). Work out if with a part time job, universal credit top up and child support if you can make ends meet. Do this before he burns through your savings. Good luck.

@MuchTooTired

I’d take the 6k, spend it on anything that’ll hold some form of value then once I could I’d leave the abusive bastard. Once we’d split, I’d sell it to release the cash, probably for essentials.

I’m sorry you’re going through this.

This. Or rent upfront.

So sorry OP. You said you didn't want to detail the abuse here but you've actually said enough to make it clear that you need to go. Yes, it's going to cost money to divorce, solicitor's fees etc but that's something the savings can absorb.

And you mentioned uni fees. Would any of your children feel good to know that the cost of them going to uni was their mother being abused? Because they'll realise at some point.

There no easy route here but there is one that stops abuse.

And btw YADNBU about the £4000!

I always find it curious when people talk about how difficult/impossible it is to work around children. How on earth do you think working mums do it? We use childcare .
And as the children get to school age, we use breakfast club and after school club.
And as they get a bit older again- they have a door key.

All that is by the by in this thread though...your DH sounds very unpleasant, and you sound unhappy OP. Chat to a friend for moral support, and start looking at the logistics around leaving.
You will continue to get the same responses each time you start a thread on this subject.

He is an arse. You need to consider whether you want to spend the rest of your life with this man.
My DH is similar and I live every day knowing that one day I will divorce him. If only I had the guts to start the conversation.

I think there's a lot of speculation and catastrophising going on in this thread! It's quite a jump to go from 'he wants to spend a large sum on his hobby' to 'he's devaluing our joint assets so I get less in a divorce.'!

I know people who at a similar age did start thinking 'Life is for living, I'm saving all this money but don't know if I'll live long enough to benefit from it - why not spend and enjoy the now' This is especially the case if there has been a recent bereavement that brings mortality into focus.

It sounds like he resents you not having a job and contributing more financially OP, is that fair? Like others, I agree, that's possibly related to children's age - it's one thing if they're very young, probably another thing if they're teenagers.

I think a lot of people would resent being the default sole earner when that's not really been agreed as on ongoing way forward, and then being told they can't spend money on a hobby, even though they've proposed their partner spends an equal amount on whatever they like.

All caveats here obviously, as you may have had an understanding, or he may genuinely have made it hard for you to get a job if his job had strange hours, expectations of childcare etc.

When my friend discovered that her husband was spending a lot of money on his hobby, she started taking equivalent amounts out and depositing it in another bank account.....

Oh, and take that £4000 and put it in your bank account.

Well, you enabled him to earn half that money- or it would have gone on childcare or him staying home half the time, so that’s that.

To be honest if you have 50k I can’t see the harm in him spending 4K in something he will use and enjoy because you will still have savings. Life is also for living as well as being careful. I’d also take the 4K too and put it in my personal bank.

I couldn't live like that - scrimping and saving in my mid forties and not buying nice things as if I was still a student. I bought myself an exirnsive bike (women cycle too) and I'd tell any partner who told me I couldn't send money 8ve earned to take a running jump.

You sound so resentful, not only of your husband but of the possibly of working. The world is full of women with children who work, but you've made it much harder for yourself to he independent by being out of work for so long.

Ask him for half of your joint savings to put in your name only account and then get a job so you can add to it. He will have to understand that he will have to do more to help with kids and housework.

In that case he can have the 4K bike when the 50k is transferred into a joint savings account.

Simple.

There might have been a time when you genuinely 'couldn't' work (although plenty of people do manage to work around their kids), but now the kids are surely secondary school age at least? The fact you won't tell us the ages makes me think you know it would look bad.

Get yourself back in to work as soon as possible. I was you. Always been a sahm to facilitate his job and enable him to get to his nice 6 figure salary. I believed had a husband who respected that and would be fair if things ever ended. Now they have and he has basically told me he doesn't care if I’m homeless as long as he can house our kids (the kids I raised). He is determined I’ll get as little as possible in the settlement and doesn't recognise at all that I have sacrificed my career for he and the childrens sakes. Im financially crippled. Its a shit place to be.