Wondering … would you stay with someone who is a brilliant parent but struggles with money?

[Broccolicelery]

Someone who is a brilliant parent to two year old but contributes nothing really in the way of finances.

Ok, but that might mean your partner taking one of your childcare days, at the loss of a whole day of their nice salary. Look if you want to earn more money, go for it - always a good idea if you can at no extra health or other sacrifice, but it doesn't seem like you need to? You guys combined earn almost 100k. That's much more than double what my partner and I earn, on a very very similar family set up (except we work the same hours and do the same childcare days, and split house jobs evenly).

Are you worried your partner will leave you, and so you will need to match that 75,000k to mantain your lifestyle ? Otherwise I think you're fine.

@neverbeenskiing you are on MN, and on this thread, so assuming you get some pleasure or entertainment or enjoyment from it.

It is peculiar to me that so many people have taken umbrage with me anonymously writing out some things that are niggling and troubling me.

Ever since I have been very young, if I want to address something I write it down. Writing it down here, given it concerns a young child and is Mumsnet when all is said and done points out things I may not have thought of from both sides, clarifies my thoughts, allows me to get to the root of what the problem really is.

It’s possible that I am just really strange and normal people wouldn’t do this, but in that case I have to question how normal it is to get so cross about a peculiar person just doing something peculiar but harmless …

in other words

any chance the people

sniping at me
bitching at me
criticising me
doing the 🤣🤣at me

could please fuck off and let me have a helpful thread?

@@DarkShade i do worry about it sometimes. I worry that I am taking more than I am giving, this troubles me I suppose.

I think you’ve misunderstood @KhaleesiDothraki , I am a woman, I am the lesser earner.

This post it weird. You don't normally make a decision to stay with someone based on their financial contribution to the household. You're not assessing a joint business venture. How about whether they are a loving and committed partner whose company you enjoy?!?

This is one reason that SAH is tricky. Self-worth is a complicated thing.

OP when I was a SAHM we had a joint account and all the bills, groceries, any childcare came out of that. It is unsurprising you don't have a handle on your finances if you are the comparatively low earner and yet you pay for the child care and 'occasional groceries'. You are being kept in the dark about what money goes where so how would you know whether or not your financial contribution is enough? You might be living hand to mouth. You might be swimming in extra cash that you never get to see or spend. I'm not saying it's your H keeping you in the dark - it could well be you.

I completely get that things were more equal when you and DH were working full time. Now I am back at work full time my relationship is much more equal too because I feel like I can say 'your turn to do the laundry' or 'can you pick up DD1 at a time' (obviously the mental load still falls to me because I'm not a fucking genius man-wrangler) and I am not taking the piss. I don't intellectually think I was taking the piss before either but I would feel it and beat myself up about it. If I could go back in time I would just give myself a break about the whole thing.

Ok parent b is definitely not a leach.

That's an awful way to phrase the mother of a child. ..

What does parent b have left over after nursery?

Fwiw I was a sahm for ten years, I always bought the weekly food shop as a regular main cost .

Now I'm working i add to all our pots at what I feel I can afford eg I give DH 100 a month to go where he wants it to go .. savings or a fund we have for our childrens clothes, school cost.

I also give a further 150 again to go where he wants plus small overpayment on mortgage.

I give 75 towards Xmas per m. 75 to holiday's, and I have my own children's fund for tutors which I also pay into.

( Not exact figures but as a rough guide)

I pay for my own car costs, insurance etc and still pay for food. .

It's not set down as a % of what I earn it's more like what we both, every penny is assigned.

DH definitely cooks and will if I ask him but I do 75 % of meal planning, buying and Cooking, as well as the majority of washing and house work and 99% child admin, hospital appts and so on.
It's solely me who notices problems with house and gets them sorted out etc etc.

I earn nmw and earn around 940 p m.

I was trying to help. You're obviously worrying about this so I'm simply pointing out that talking to your DP, who is the only one who knows how he really feels, about your family finances is likely to be more reassuring than a bunch of strangers who can only guess. You have asked for advice and opinions and my advice is that if you're worried about the inequality in your household then communicating with your partner about it is a good idea. Starting a thread to get others perspectives is fine, but if you're concerned about how your DP perceives the situation then nothing anyone says here can give you any clarity on that.

I don’t think it’s happened intentionally. I’m certainly not married to someone abusive or controlling.

But what has happened is we’ve fallen into roles for all sorts of reasons. These reasons are good but I think it would be good to address them. But I need to work out myself what I want addressing and before I accuse dh of being unfair have to consider myself if I might be being so.

I’ve read all the OPs messages but not the whole thread so apologies if I’ve missed something- if you earn 24k and pay for no bills other than £600 nursery and occasional grocery shop, where does the rest of your money go?

I know a lot of women and some men like parent b. You are contributing financially and via childcare so I wouldn’t worry about that. I do think it’s an issue that you don’t know how much the mortgage is etc. that indicates to me that you are not taking equal responsibility for finances - you should know how much your outgoings are and manage your money

It wasn’t just your post @neverbeenskiing and I will be talking to DH. I’d just like to work things out for myself first. But it would be good if bitching at me for not writing a thread to the exacting standards of MN could stop (I don’t mean you but even so, when I want to stop writing and talk to DH I will.)

@riotlady well there are things like my own phone, petrol and so on.

Then I do have credit cards, I clear them every month but like the phoenix they return …

All in all I am not very good with money, if I have it I spend it. And I do need to sort this.

Person b, the op, doesn’t understand the economics of pregnancy and child rearing. The financial implications of being the primary parent can never be ignored.

I don't think you have to address it as him being unfair. In fact I would be very careful not to if you want to have a good conversation about it, not a defensive one (I think it vanishingly unlikely that you are being unfair either).

If you want things to change, that's OK. I think you're right that you have to know what it is that you want to change. If I were you I could not possibly endure being so financially blocked out. The income may not arrive in the account in your name but that does not mean that you have not contributed to the earning of it. Your H wants to live as a family, presumably, so he needs to recognise that you are now a type of financial unit and as adults you are both in charge of the decisions around that. The risk when you try to break everything down to every last contribution and spend is that you end up putting financial tags on things which shouldn't have them, like 'well I love you, and that's worth 20k a year, and then there's the blowjobs when I don't really feel like it' - I'm joking. Kind of.

It is very easy to fall into those traditional roles, I know. Feels a bit like a trap doesn't it. But there is a way out and it certainly doesn't have to mean the end of your marriage. It may mean more honesty and probably a few arguments as a result, but that's OK.

No I don’t think he is being unfair or certainly if he is I also am. I was just struck how different things were once. Part of that is just having a child but also I think we’ve fallen into roles of carer (me) provider (him) and more of a mix would be good perhaps.

Parent A should pay half of the childcare costs though

Why when B pays for fuck all else?

All in all I am not very good with money, if I have it I spend it. And I do need to sort this

Well this is the crux for me.
£24k for 3 days work you must be a professional capable person.
I think on that amount you should contribute more. Especially if the other option is you just pissing it away, which, if you were my partner and I was paying almost everything, would really start to annoy me after a while.

If you can't control yourself when it comes to spending, perhaps you should ask you DH for help. Maybe transfer money into a joint savings account or something that you can't easily access or be tempted to spend, and lay off the credit cards.

Not sure about the capable part but quite, this is what I worry about DH feeling.

The problem with the CCs is that by the time I have paid them I literally have no money so I need them to live, vicious circle. Not sure what to do about that really.

I think you have given too little information initially.
When you say they aren't good with money I assume you don't mean because they earn too little - I am guessing as you have confirmed it's due to poor credit. Do you spend your money on yourself OP after paying for nursery for the days your child attends when you are working?

I got the feeling you said you pay for groceries sometimes - why not all the time?
Even if you earn less surely you should know what your monthly outgoing are - a budget maybe together?

Some people do things differently but we pay everything into the same pot, then pay bills, save some and have the same personal allowances despite large differences in our income.

If you are saying you pay for nursery then buy groceries sometimes, I can see why you feel you are depending on your other half. Unless we have agreed I would hate it if my DH just spends all his income on what he wants, paid a couple of bills and left me to pay for everything else.

The other thing is whether you feel you could contribute more? i.e. more from your current earnings or earn more . . . Someone mentioned self worth . .

I have around £1000 left so in theory it should be plenty, in practice it does get eaten up rather. So this month I am getting my hair done - which I know very much counts as money on me - then my car is being serviced and will need a new tyre which won’t be cheap. I do pay for toddler groups on the days I am off work as well as childcare and for things like clothes for dc. But you are right and should probably be looking at how to contribute to the family as a whole. How much would people say is reasonable?

you have a similar set up to us but we have a joint account so all finances are together.

I contribute a lot less financially as I earn less and until recently was part time.

This was a decision we made jointly when we have children as we both wanted a parent to be at home with them so I worked part time in the evenings. There were many reasons for this, partly due to our own childhoods that meant it was really important to us.
its fully accepted that fair isnt 'equal' I contribute less financially but more in other ways such as emotionally, mentally, childcare when they were smaller, housework, cooking etc etc. Now they are teens the split of chores etc is more equal and sometimes more from DH as he WFH but I will never be able to catch up with him financially as before we had kids we were earning equal amounts but his income and career have surged upwards and mine stalled. I am making strides and building a career but DH rceognises that I made a big sacrifice for the kids so income is something we view as joint not seperate as otherwise I would be penalised for taking time out for the kids.

I suspect you are spending on child and parent A isn’t contributing 50% eg what do you do on days you don’t work - activities, buying nappies or clothes etc.
Definitely read up on gender pay gap. Common scenario you and dh both earn £40,000 in professional job. Have child. You take a year maternity off. You go pt and do childcare. You earn £24,000. So you lose £16,000. But Other parent can work more overtime be more dedicated as they haven’t been off a year and don’t rush off for nursery. In 5 years they are on £50,000 you are on £24,000. As years go on their pay skyrockets yours is stagnant - you are stuck as pt advertised professional roles are pretty none existent. Years of reduced pension meaning you are potentially significantly worse off.