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?! ☹️

This doesn't bode well for the future. If his stinginess is coming out now what's it going to be like as your child gets older? What if you get ill and can't work? What happens if you have another baby? Marriage is 2 people working together and supporting each other. As others have said tell him to f!@k off and if he wants to be like that you will have to re assess the relationship. I wonder if he's always been stingy but it's just coming out now because he thinks you're vulnerable and agree to it. If his family are stingy he might be too but he's hidden it well. Tell him you'll pay him back when he gives birth to the next baby and then start charging him every time he wants sex ,about £500 a month sounds fair.

Exactly. Invoice him for pregnancy, labour, delivery and postpartum and any breast milk you may have fed the baby plus any sexual activity ever done. Plus all the household chores, shopping errands, and fuel you may have spent while doing all of it.

Good luck mate.
If you don't fight it Tit for Tat right NOW, he'll continue.

I guess this is what 50/50 independent woman life looks like.
He wants your half. He's been keeping account.

Omg, this is really weird for me. I got maternity leave payments from work for 4 months. After 4 months, my husband paid all bills before I started working again. Your husband needs to provide for you and all his children. As a mother, you have so many sleepless nights caring for his child. Our body and our hormones need to recover from pregnanacy,birth and breastfeeding, and it takes years to recover. It's ridiculous that he is asking you for money instead of supporting you and the baby- physically, mentally, and financially! If I were you I wouldn't pay him a cent..

I would leave.

This has to be THE WORST THING I have ever read on mumsnet. I feel so bad for you.
But absolutely stand up for yourself and bill the bo*locks out of him.

Sorry to hear he's being a total dick but honestly this is beyond the pale!

How embarrassing for him.

I hope he was joking, although if he was I'd assume you'd know.

If he was genuinely asking you to pay him back, I'd calmly calculate and give him bill for everything you've ever done for him:

• childcare
• financial advice
• grocery shopping

Although at this point your relationship doesn't sound like a partnership.

I'd be quite upset if my DH thought so little of my contribution to our family life and billed me for taking care of OUR child.

What would happen if he lost his job or got ill?
He sounds selfish and I hope you'll stand your ground on this.

I would ask him if he offered to take shared parental leave, if he didn't tell him to f off

Do you split absolutely everything? If not, tell him how much he owes you too,

Tell him how much it has cost you your career to take time off, then tell him he actually owes you money!

Suggest you google "coercive control", sounds like you are being abused.

Ltb. Totally unacceptable

This ^^

Has he lost the plot?

I agree with DenmarkStreet and would definitely be sitting down and calculating my loss of earnings for the time taken off to care for his baby and charging him half. I would then think about my costs and losses during pregnancy and bill him for half of those too, with added costs for the physical trauma of growing and then giving birth to his child.

I'm sorry, but there is a stream of names for your husband running through my mind, none of them are very nice. I'm truly flabbergasted and sorry that he's trying this on

Bill him for childcare and loss of earnings over the past 10 months. Maybe extra for ‘damages’ for the physical impact pregnancy and childbirth had on your body.

WOW. I cannot believe what I just read. Please don’t tell him about your child benefit payment!

Surely by his logic if you are the higher earner and haven't been splitting bills 50/50, he should pay you back the 20% extra or whatever it is that you've been subsidising him by over the years?

I’ve been off work for 11 months looking after our grandson who lives with us and not once has my husband said to me that I owe him for the time I wasn’t working and not contributing. Your husband is being a major asshole in doing this. You should add up the time you spend looking after the baby when you get home, washing, cooking, cleaning etc and invoice him according to what your hourly rate would be. He’ll soon change his mind

Send him a childcare bill for the 24/7 care since baby was bkrn

I wouldn't invoice him. Id just tell him you aren't paying it - and he can like it or lump it. You don't owe him anything. It's not your fault you've been on a reduced income. Think carefully if you want to stay with someone who treats you like this

You took a financial hit for your child! If anything, he owes you but that's not how parenting should work!

1. tell him to fuck off
2. add up all the hours you have spent feeding, rocking to sleep, changing nappies, night feeds, done loads of laundry, blah blah blah and send him a bill for that
3. tell him to fuck off again.

It takes 2 to make a baby, you can always offer him to look after the baby whilst you return to work as you earn more. I’m currently on Mat leave and hubby is taking care of everything whilst I’m off as SMP is crap.

oh, and tell him to fuck off.

YES.

And the 24/7 childcare.

I would seriously make some calculations and write an invoice.

Thats actually disgusting that he thinks that and said it! I couldn’t stay with anyone that foul. My ex H was a lot of things, but would never have pulled this stunt!

Presumably he wanted children before you got pregnant?! What is his reasoning for this? Not that I can think of anything! Totally bizarre and a major red flag. I’d be planning to leave, or rather, kick the fool out.

I don't think youbare unreasonable, I got nudged and pressed the wrong button 🙄

Just read your first post to my husband and he was speechless for a minute too. He said he's either a massive knob or he's lost his mind

@1stTimeMummy2021 wtf?!?

If he is serious, then I guess you bill him back.

Womb rental: 9 months x 30 days x 24 hours x £30 (your hourly rate) = £194,400. So his share is £97,200.

Booby time: 6 feeds a day for 20 mins x 4 months at £30/hour = £3600 so his share is £1800.

Stretch mark tax (from carrying a baby): £100 per stretch mark.