Worried DD is going to end up with an unequal relationship

[andthatsaswan]

My DD is 25, last summer (age 24!) she married a man 20 years older than her. I’ll be honest the relationship has always made me uncomfortable but I’ve been supportive for DDs sake. This man is well off, tbh I’m not sure how to measure how well off he is, DD has never given me a figure, but very comfortable, he works in finance, in a C-Suite role and has a good chunk of inheritance from his family behind him. He is nice enough, he worships DD and I do believe he’d never want to see her come to harm.

DD is 16 weeks pregnant, they currently live in a flat in west London, DD is working in a prep school as a teacher (entirely by choice rather than need, part-time with small class sizes), they are mortgage free.

I had dinner with DD last night and she told me the plan is to buy somewhere rural, a large house in either Berkshire, Buckinghamshire or Surrey. Sell the current flat and get a smaller 1 bed in London. Then her partner will stay in the flat Monday night - Thursday morning, he works from home Monday and Friday so he could come home for that. She won’t work at all.
Now this seems like a terrible idea to me! The house she showed me is up for 2 mil!!! Now I don’t know if any of that will be mortgage or not but I somewhat doubt it. Surely with the 2 million + a 1 bed flat they could find something in London that would mean he was home every night.
When DD was showing the house it sounded like she was planning at least 1 if not 2 more children and I just worry about her being out in the middle of nowhere with the baby/children alone while he is living his best life. It feels very unequal and as though he’s not really prepared to give up his freedom for his family.

AIBU to be worried about this and think it’s an awful idea? Should I try talk DD out of it?

100% agree.

Most decent men in their 40s are not dating women barely out of their teens.

@IpsyUpsyDaisyDoos

Would you choose to work if you simply didn't have to

Yes a million times yes. I would really hate not working. I know there are masses of ways to live a fulfilling life without it though.

Its less the fact she doesn’t want to work for me, it’s more the thought of a relationship with such a massive power imbalance though. It just makes me uncomfortable.

Commuter belt Surrey or Berkshire are not really rural.

There will be plenty of facilities and plenty of people with small kids to make friends with.

Really rural is the middle of Lincolnshire.

@Thepeopleversuswork but would you choose to work doing what you currently do, or something else?

For example, the role I had prior to the one I'm in now, I absolutely hated. And if I'd fallen pregnant when in that job, I'd not have gone back from mat leave. I'd have waited til she was older, at school etc, and retrained doing something else. Because while I need to be doing something, I also can't bear the thought of setting the example that you have to work regardless of way you're treated at work (it was really bad).

If we won the big bucks on the lottery I'd jack in what I'm doing now and volunteer. Spend more time with DD and DH. Maybe set up a business doing one of the things I love doing but have no time for.

We don't know her intentions beyond moving into this house, having the baby and looking after it and subsequent children. It may be that she has plans to become a community volunteer. Or to study and train in something she loves to do while the kids are at school. One of those things that those of us with bills to pay couldn't consider, because most of the things I really want to do, don't pay enough for us to live right now.

He wouldn’t be my choice of dh due to the age difference but I can see why for other people it would work if age is not important to them and otherwise they get on well. Your dd is bringing youth, energy and fertility to the relationship while her dh is financially solvent, has life experience and stability.

Pragmatically I think that’s a pretty good exchange of attributes so I don’t think she is in an unequal relationship. This sort of living/ working arrangement is very common amongst finance workers in the city and the wife is usually had a nanny & cleaner to help out so hardly ever on her own. As others have said she is married to him so that brings legal and financial protection and what I would advise if she was my dd, is if possible she should keep her hand in her profession even if doing one day a week in teaching as no one knows what might happen in the future and no matter how good things are now it’s always useful for a woman to be able to earn her own money. Also it’ll give her a break from domestic stuff and she’ll most likely appreciate it once her baby is a bit older.

I wouldn’t be thrilled with her life choices either, but as PP’s have said, she’s an adult and they’re married so she has legal protections.

You need to tread carefully so you don’t alienate her. I’d suggest saying something along the lines of it’s always a good idea to think longterm, so where does she see herself in 10 years, 20 years, for example, when her children are grown, abd what does she need to do to achieve that?

She’ll only be in her mid-40’s when her children are late teens/young adults so it’s likely that she’ll want a fulfilling career then. It makes sense to prepare for that while she’s bringing up her children- working p-t, getting additional qualifications, etc., and they have the money to easily facilitate that.

Otherwise her DH will retire and she’ll be bored witless by 50 with nothing to do.

Also, if things don’t work out and she becomes a single Mum, she’ll have some up-to-date skills. Don’t say that, of course, but it can happen.

She’s married so she’s protected to a great extent. So many women on here don’t look at this.

Sound like she’s happy and she’s got a decent husband. It makes sense if they’re to have 2/3 kids that they locate somewhere family friendly and she’s the lower earner. I would though say that she ought to maintain a level of financial independence, but seriously women who don’t work and aren’t married are the ones who are making a grave mistake. Sounds like she knows what she is doing.

The point is that women are capable of being high earners themselves. Why are only women ‘wage slaves’ when they work? Men are never described that way.

@IpsyUpsyDaisyDoos

I like my job. If money was no object I would probably choose to scale it back time wise and choose projects I like but if I was a billionaire I wouldn’t stop working. I love working, it gives me a lot of my purpose. I know people will be along to tell me this is sad but it’s how I feel.

I can completely understand how people who dislike their jobs would choose no to do them however.

Its not necessarily the job vs no job thing though. It’s possible to have a marriage that is very equal with one traditional breadwinner and non working spouse if it’s set up correctly.

But this particular marriage seems to be built on inequality. The guy appears to have gone out of his way to choose a spouse with absolutely no potential to challenge him, one who can’t say no to him. This is, I think, what worries the OP and it would worry me too.

Yes they are. Lots of men would describe themselves that way. My son certainly did before he stepped off the treadmill.

@Thepeopleversuswork I do understand the worry. I'm just looking at it from the other side.

We're in a time when women can choose to do everything. It doesn't mean we have to. If what this girl wants is to be a stay at home mum, she's able to choose to do that and she's chosen her husband well to do it.

We also don't know that he's gone out of his way to choose her. She may well have chosen him for all the reasons outlined: financial stability, maturity, shared hopes for the future.

Not on here they aren’t. They are ‘providers’, they ‘work hard’ so don’t have to do any of the night feeds etc the language difference is absolutely there.

Mothers who work full time are ‘wage slaves’, ‘materialistic’, ‘selfish’ and so on.

The world’s bigger than MN. 🤷‍♀️

“while he is living his best life”

It wouldn’t be for me, but where in that set up is she not living her best life?

What pains me is that by rights, all his work and social colleagues should have made him feel so embarrassed at dating someone more half his age, that it never got off the ground. Yet it’s totally seen by so many as acceptable 🤮
Including plenty on MN who pile on to tell you about their 24 year age gaps.

If it suits them, then great. 👍

My DH regularly calls himself a wage slave. He would give up working for money in a heartbeat if he could, as would I.

Just because we're capable of doing something doesn't mean we want to. I have turned down many "promotions" into management because I can't imagine anything worse than managing the teams I've been offered. I've always been told "but you're very good at it" and my response is "I'm good at a lot of things, it doesn't mean I have to do it".

Assuming she has a degree if she's a teacher. Good grief she's not an idiot.

Why can't graduates be idiots? There's a difference between knowledge and wisdom

@IpsyUpsyDaisyDoos

We're in a time when women can choose to do everything. It doesn't mean we have to. If what this girl wants is to be a stay at home mum, she's able to choose to do that and she's chosen her husband well to do it.

Its not just about SAHM vs working mum though. That debate has been reprised so much on here. I totally get that some women don’t to work and choose to look after their children. It wouldn’t be for me but if they are financially protected I see no problem.

But on the face of it is a VERY unbalanced relationship. It looks very much as if this guy has sought to choose a woman he perceives as vulnerable.

Because she's younger?

If she was younger but neither of them had money, would the same things be being said?

It’s not something I’ve heard anyone describe themselves as, especially men. I just hear it on here, in 99% of cases it relates to a woman working.

DH and I both enjoying working and wouldn’t give it up. We get so much more out of it than just money.

I think it’s a shame when the attitude is I want something but I want someone else to provide it for me when they are perfectly capable of doing it themselves.

I enjoy being busy and doing something useful. That doesn't necessarily translate into working for someone else, to make them richer. I enjoy the job I do now, as does DH, but the reality is both of us do it because we have the bills to pay.

If those bills were not a worry, we'd both do something else because the money isn't a thing we need.

And some days, I absolutely wish I could have been home with my child instead of having to go work for someone else because the roof needs to stay over our heads

That would never be for me, but maybe it is for her? Can she drive or she’ll be very isolated?

I would be worried too, the power imbalance would concern me. All well and good when they're first married, she's young and attractive and impressed by him. But sooner or later things will get tough, as they do in any relationship, and I would worry that she'll feel trapped. People seem very casual about the idea that because they're married she'll be fine financially, but divorces can be long and painful. What happens when she's older, is this guy going to find another younger woman? And the potential for him to be financially or emotionally controlling is high. Hopefully he's a nice guy, but what if he's not? Also, what's she going to do with her brain? Can be pretty mind numbing looking after kids so she needs to make sure she has a plan to do something intellectually stimulating.

Now this seems like a terrible idea to me
Tough. She's an adult. Back off a bit if you don't want them to pull away from you.

One of us could give up working if we wanted to but we don’t. I’m on maternity leave at the moment and couldn’t imagine just doing this for the foreseeable future.