To think this is unfair or should I just accept it as I’m an adult too?

[Shortslothdancing]

I had some time out of work when my children were little as a sahm (biggest regret ever) and I’ve gone back to work in the last couple of years, 25 hours a week. I pick up about £1100 a month. Not great.
DH picks up (after tax) approx £5500 a month, he has a company car, a petrol card and a work mobile phone. Although he pays tax on those benefits. We don’t have a mortgage but he does cover the bills from his wages - around £1800 a month, including some of the food bill.
From my £1100 I pay for my phone, my petrol (I still do all the schools runs and taking the kids to clubs etc), my road tax / insurance, about £250 a month of food, kids’ clothes, birthday / Christmas presents (obviously an annual cost, but I try and save a bit each month) and the childcare bill for wrap around - it’s not that much, usually about £60 a month.
phone - £45
petrol - £200
tax / insurance - £50
food - £250
saving for birthdays and Christmas - £50
childcare - £60
clothes for children - varies but I usually allow approx £50 a month as one child is now a teenager and there are three of them.

pocket money for all three dc - £80
This comes to around £800 leaving me about £300 a month. DH is now refusing to pay for school lunches for oldest dc. Two younger ones have sandwiches. The oldest likes to get lunch with his mates at school. This is about £15 a week, so it’ll be another £60 a month.

this will leave me with about £240. I’m sure that is loads to a lot of people at the moment and I probably shouldn’t be complaining but it feels unfair that I am tracking every leftover penny vs DH with his £3.5k left after household bills.
I do all the housework and childcare even though I work 25 hours.
yanbu - yes it’s unfair
yabu - you’re an adult and responsible for yourself and should increase your hours / work harder / take a second job and count yourself lucky that you are overall in a fortunate financial situation.

He has more disposable income each month than you have per year,

Someone who loves you doesn't treat you this way.

Can you see how much money he has ?

Why don't you share finances?

Why don't you tell him it's not acceptable to live like that ?

So many questions !

We are in a similar financial position.. my fb let's me have what I want because he isn't an arse and we are a family unit !!

Hon this is financial abuse. I know you probably won't believe it but trust me, it is. Do some reading, make some changes, lot's of people here can help x

I voted YABU, @Shortslothdancing, for the sole reason that neither you nor your husband seems to understand what marriage actually means - namely that money is shared. If you left him, he'd have to share it at least 50:50 (more likely 60:40 in your favour). It absolutely beats me that there is post after post on MN about married couples who have separate money.

This is sad to read OP.

We have a separate accounts but a joint credit card so anything related to home and children expenses is put on that by both of us. He pays for all the bills through his account. Whatever I save from my pay goes into our joint savings account.

This is not a healthy marriage OP, he is financially abusing you.

Do you know where his extra money is going OP?

it’s not on and I think you should be thinking about talking to a lawyer

This. Why are you even ok with this in the first place? He is a piece of shit and you need to wake up to that. Pretty sure you run around after him too.

YANBU I have never understood seperate budgets with married couples. We have a joint account, everthing goes in there. We pay bills etc, have £250 a month each and the rest goes into savings in individual accounts but the balance on these savings is the same as we split it equally.

This in spades. If he won't share family money then don't do anything for him.
He expects you to live in poverty because you've taken time out to raise HIS children and he won't share what he earns?
He is a world class prick.
What does he do with all the money?

What. The. Actual. Fuck?

DH has always massively out earned me - but all his money is also mine.

Your DH is a twat.

I'm full time carer for our DS17 and my only income is carers allowance.

DH has a similar income to yours and pays ALL bills then whatever is left over is shared equally, allowing me to have disposable income to save, add to my pension or piss up the wall.

Then again my DH values my contribution allowing him to progress in his career which has enabled him be able to retire in 5 years at 55.

Your DH is a selfish prize prick.

WTF is he doing with all his money that he can’t spare a few extra quid for his kid to have hot meals? Genuinely have never said this before but LTB and you’ll get a lot more! 💐

WTAF?

Even if you don’t want to have shared finances, there is absolutely no way this is reasonable. Your earnings are lower because you saved all that money in childcare costs by being at home.

I think you need to work out all the things which should be shared, including the cost of things for the children and pay proportionately according to take home salary. You will pay 17% and he will pay 83%.

Alternatively, you could calculate the salary you are owed by him from all the 24/7 childcare you have done over the years and ask him when he’d like to pay that bill…

Genuinely seething on your behalf OP. Why are you forking out all that for food etc in the first place? Seriously where is his money going?!

This is madness. My DH earns nearly 10x what I do but all our money is shared.

You will be financially better divorcing him. Probably emotionally better too given that he thinks the current situation is OK.

What a poor excuse for a man.

Divorce him. Then he will realise that it's family money and he'll have to ish for his dc in full

I think what a lot of people commenting here seem to forget is not every marriage is the same. Me and my husband don’t have a joint account HOWEVER we do split bills equally. I used to earn more than him and so I paid for more, since cutting back having our baby he now earns more so he pays for more. He doesn’t moan or complain he just pays for it, he earns what your husband does OP. If I ever ask him to pay for something he’ll just do it. We have separate savings accounts but if either of us ever needs to borrow from the other we just do it.
While we do our finances different to other people (this is mainly due to the fact we both own separate businesses) we still act as one team and would never let the other go short on money. Your partner being the higher earner and expecting you to pay for more seems unfair. Ask if you can pay a percentage to be fair? We both pay 40% of our wages to things like bills/kids clothes etc. 40% of his obviously works out as more than mine but the fact we’re both paying the same amount of what we earn makes it fair.
You definitely need a conversation with him!

Yet another example of mine & yours finances.

Tell him that all the money goes into one pot. List all the outgoings for you, him and the family and the rest is family money. My guess is you will never have been better off.

Otherwise, weigh up how much he actually loves you and his kids because last time i looked, loving your own family does not come down to mine & yours. Whats he gonna do, let one of his kids go hungry?

He's a tight bastard and I couldn't live like that. IMO if you don't /can't just pool all income as family money the fairest way is sit down and do a spreadsheet of all household expenses (& this includes everything related to the DC) and you each pay your share as a percentage of your earnings. What you have left is for you to use as you wish but absolutely no way should you be paying for all the Dc expenses and being left with nothing whilst he enjoys ££££. And yes of course he will be paying more, but he earns more and that's how it works in a partnership.

I do all the housework and childcare even though I work 25 hours.

• You took a career break to look after the kids
• You do all the housework and childcare
• He made promises he didn’t keep - presumably financial ones
• He’s not paying his way proportionate to his income
• Now he’s refusing to pay for lunches for his son

Why are you accepting this inequality?

@honeylulu, divorcing an abusive man is about so much more than how much money you get. And if necessary houses can be sold and whole new lives begun.

No I know that's not at all easy, but many many mothers do it, with appropriate support and legal advice.

Totally unacceptable.

Your husband is a world class prick!

I was a child of a similar (although much worse) situation. My Dad was a very successful business owner, and my mum a SAHM with a 4 kids.

She got her family allowance and £100 a week ‘housekeeping’ from Dad to cover everything apart from the big bills which my dad covered. I vividly remember her very carefully trying to put a few quids petrol in the car without going over because that’s all she had in her purse, or her burning embarrassment at not having enough money to pay for the groceries at the checkout. If she asked for more money, she had to justify every penny she had spent.

Looking back I see that she went without so we didn’t have to, I remember her having clothes and shoes with holes in.

Please don’t allow this to continue, for your sake and for your childrens sake. I grew up to have some very messed up beliefs around money, spending and relationships.