Husband thinks I owe him money for maternity leave?

[LemonadeShadeParade]

I am so confused! So pleased advice me!

I took 10 months mat leave, and my work did not provide any enhanced mat pay because I had been there less than two years. So I've been living off SMP only which isn't very much! My husband and I discussed this would be the case before getting pregnant and agreed we could manage as we both had allocated baby savings and my husband has a fairly decent salary (though I am the higher earner of the two of us).

I tried my best to contribute but as the months went on and I ran out of savings I had to contribute less and less. Again, this was all discussed before we got pregnant.

I'm about to return to work.

My husband has now sprung on me, that he's been calculating how much I've been short every month, adding it all up and now thinks I owe him the total 🫤

E.g. (not the real numbers) If I usually paid him £800 a month towards bills etc and in March actually paid him £300, he put down that I owe him £500 for the month of March. If I paid him £600 in April, he thinks I owe him £200 for April. Etc. and he's totalled it all up for 10 months and said that's what I owe him for being on mat leave.

AIBU to be a bit ??? by this? Firstly it's not what we agreed but more importantly we're a married couple and this is OUR baby not MY baby. AIBU to think his role here was to support his family whereas mine was to keep the baby alive? I was too shell shocked to say anything before we were interrupted and didn't finish the conversation.

I'm so confused, am I wrong? I mean if he suddenly lost his job or got sick, I would support our family, is that not how families work? Doesn't the working parent support the other parent who's off work looking after the baby? I thought that's how this works?! ☹️

murasaki · Today 13:42

Who on earth thinks you are being unreasonable?

Mr. LemonadeShadeParade, I suspect!

I really need to know how you reacted in the immediate time after he said it!

100% agree with pp saying to work out how many hours you've provided childcare while he's worked. Multiply it by say £5 an hour as the going rate for childminders, half it and bill him that.

I guarantee it'll be a lot more than he's billing you.

What a fucking idiot.

Absolutely. Are you paying for childcare when you return to work? If so, have you had the conversation about how it's being funded? I wouldn't be surprised if he expected your salary to cover it.

There is so much wrong about this it's hard to know where to start. As you're married, I would assume finances were shared and therefore there is no argument for his money, your money. Not sure if you have a prenuptual agreement in place that states otherwise but it doesn't appear so from your message. What is his relationship like with money?

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 who dies he thinks been looking after his child? I’ve honestly heard it all now

Don't forget pension contributions too.

Bill him 50% of all costs.So:

1. the cost of a night nanny that does all wakings ( unless he did them all), plus the cost of your lack of pension payments that you missed due to caring for his child.
2. the cost of a day time nanny
3. the cost of a housekeeper that did all washing of babies things, cleaning and cooking. Unless he does 50% of all housework.

becuae If you had died, he would need to find all those things, or take parental leave at statutory pay!

Oh my god well I have to say your responses are a relief because I was having a serious panic that I'd got the wrong idea entirely.

For those of you asking why I'm with him, this is totally completely out of character for him. A bit of background, when we first met his finances were a total mess, he had zero good influences in his life to guide him into adulthood and money management. (His family are all really weird) Id like to take some credit for helping him sort out his debts (I've never paid anything off for him though), and helping him learn to manage his money. I am somewhat wondering if he has suddenly realised how nice it is to not be thousands of pounds in his overdraft and to have savings and had a panic that it's eaten into his savings.

I am really hoping this is him having a bit of a wobble about his savings or it's a really really bloody awful joke.

Agree with previous posters - tell him to get fucked

If someone spoke to me like that they would be getting divorce papers in the post.

If he thinks everything about having a baby is equally divided, ask him how he plans to compensate you for carrying and delivering his child.

Yeah this!

What a prick he is.

Holy Mary, Mother of God 😲.

Actually, I'm sure you misheard him. There isn't a man this low - nope 😔.

Another one saying you should bill him for childcare during his working hours...don't forget to include his commute.

His response to this will be very telling.

And when you go back to work, will he be expecting you to pay all of the childcare costs while you contribute also 50:50 to the bills? I bet he will. He’ll see the childcare as a cost of YOU working,

Just as well he’s let slip his views OP, you can sit down and have a serious discussion about marriage and finances and the responsibilities of parenting now, before you go back to work.

Idk if he's just winding me up but he seems serious about it.

I think it's safe to say this isn't a tedious prank. The man's being an idiot and you need to point this out to him.

Produce an invoice for childcare, and ask for significant compensation for the distress and inconvenience pregnancy and childbirth has caused you. That should even things out, financially at least.

Be careful, some men become abusive after you've had a child. Could this be abuse?

Forget maternity leave, you've got lifelong problems with this man. He seems to think that babies are free, raising a child takes no time or labour and just happens invisibly at no cost to anybody, and that he's a free agent with no responsibilities or duties to his wife and child.

You need to have a serious conversation now, before nursery fees and whatnot kick in. This is one of the more shocking Scrooge-threads I've read in my years on MN.

FFS.

Ok. Benefit of the doubt. He needs a serious education. 😠

If find him some suitable you tube videos or articles or something that spells this out really bloody simple and clear.

Tell him he has to watch/read and then, and only then, you'll discuss because he is so way off beam he owes you an enormous apology

I was going to say the same. Sorry OP, you definitely deserve better.

Surely you just laughed in his face?

What the Actual Fuck???
Your "D"H is being financially abusive and seems not to be aware that marriage is a partnership and parenting is a team effort. So what if his salary has contributed more to the team financially. You have contributed way more in other ways and for non-abusive couples, it is accepted that you are both working very hard in your respective spheres and you both reap the rewards equally.

You do not "owe" him a penny.

But if he really wants to get nasty and nit-picky, calculate what hours of childcare you have put in over the past year in excess of the fair 50% (being equally 50%of daytimes and 50% of night-times) that should be each parent's responsibility if you are going to be legalistic. I bet you have been doing at least 80% if not more. So work out what a reasonable wage would have been for the extra hours you have put in that should have been "his" 50% and deduct that from his nasty vindictive calculation of amount "owed" - it will probably show that he owes you

🤯

Bill him for surrogacy and then childcare, including a night nurse!

Actually I would go and get some couples therapy. This is a truly weird way to think about raising a family and needs some careful unpicking.

Where have these peculiar ideas come from, what does he think a marriage and raising a family actually means?

It is worth straightening out properly now as you have a lot of child raising ahead of you.