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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Has my husband lost his mind?

202 replies

orangesky1 · 30/04/2025 13:23

My husband has decided he wants to go and be a holiday tour leader overseas. With tips, his view is that this would be reasonably well paid.

we have a child in a school. I have a good job. He is deeply unhappy with the day to day life as a parent. We have a really good life but he doesn’t see it that way. This proposal is the only way he can see himself happy.

he wants us to go out there with him. I have said he can do this but he has to go there first by himself and show that it will work. I don’t believe it will, and will not disrupt my child’s life and my career for this whim. The job will involve stints of him being away on tours. I am not averse to moving for a positive financial situation and lifestyle change but to me this is madness. Fine if single, not compatible with being a responsible parent.

I think he is really fundamentally depressed, this depression will not magically disappear once the novelty has worn off

am I being unreasonable?

OP posts:

Atarin · 30/04/2025 17:30

I think your response was a lot more polite than mine would have been.

TheignT · 30/04/2025 17:35

orangesky1 · 30/04/2025 15:48

Agreed with all comments. It blows my mind to be honest that he thinks this is a reasonable way to behave.

he is adamant that it is impossible for him to be happy living a normal life in the 9-5 and that he is made for adventuring not a typical life. He has been miserable for a long time and it is dragging us all down which is I why I’m happy for him to go try this on his own. Whether he leaves me or not, it will be an improvement as the status quo is also not an option as he insists on only seeing negatives in our current life, and will not consider anything other than this extreme change.

I think you are very wise. Let him go and see the reality, it might not be the dream he thinks it will be but if it is wonderful maybe you would want to join him. Some marriages seem to work with one partner away working, think of the military. Living with someone that depressed doesn't sound great.

PollyCreo · 30/04/2025 17:38

OP are you sure this isn't some kind of scam? I remember a woman posting on here years ago about her husband being offered a football coaching job in Africa.

BountifulPantry · 30/04/2025 17:39

Tell him to go and use it as a trial separation for you. How are you without him? How does life look without him?

Planesmistakenforstars · 30/04/2025 17:44

If you think he is serious about staying with you and wants to be a family unit, AND you do want to entertain his idea (and assuming he hasn't actually gone mad,) then can you suggest to him: 1. That he does something about his mental health first - see his GP, go to a counsellor etc. 2. That he looks at something equivalent in the UK, or at least training courses in the UK to see if he would actually enjoy this type of thing. For example he can do a series of kayaking instructor courses and then become an instructor at a local club (or whatever the comparable things are for the activities he wants to lead.) Give it a set time period and go from there. If he does fuck all about it then he isn't serious anyway.

On the one hand it does look as though he wants to waft around without being a responsible adult/parent, on the other I have a lot of sympathy for being deeply unhappy with a 9-5 "regular" job and the feeling of being trapped. A few people I know, including me and DP, have made a dramatic change to a different way of life and it's transformed our/my mental well being. BUT in all cases both partners have been on board and had a clear plan, including financial, to work towards it.

bigkahunaburger · 30/04/2025 17:49

My best friends husband did a similar thing. They were both respected and experienced sensible teachers and he - on a whim- gave up and lugged them all to the snow to be a ski instructor (this is in oz). She resented him bitterly and they ended up divorcing a few years later. It was the start of a string of bonkers things he did. He went from that, to getting massively into meditation and buggering off on long silent retreats, to becoming a yogi and hes now unemployed but deeply into christianity and spouting shite about that constantly. This is like 10 years later - it really was the beginning of quite the midlife crisis. Ex wife and kids (who are now young adults) have zero respect for him.

Peaceandquietandacuppa · 30/04/2025 17:50

You are right to be responsible and not upend your child’s whole life on a whim. How does he propose to cover his share of the parenting?

IamwhoIsayIam · 30/04/2025 17:50

It's not impossible to be a Tour guide and be a parent. Both myself and my partner work as Tour Guides which means for 1-2 weeks stretches one of us is away working and the other person single-parents. It absolutely can be done if you are open minded to it.

However, in our situation we were guides before we had kids and both of us do it. I personally love my two weeks of guiding when all I have to do is look after a group of reasonably responsible adults, spend time outside, see new places and eat dinner in good restaurants :-)

But I recognise that is not your situation.

I just wanted to say that a lot of guides I work with are 40-60 years old, its not a young persons game. And many do have families.

KarmaKameelion · 30/04/2025 18:05

Where is it? Would you be based in one place? Would you be able to access school/ childcare? What would be the tax implications for your job, pension ect? Do you own a house? Where would you live? Would you have health insurance or access to healthcare?

if he doesn’t have an answer for the above, than yes he is mad!

MumWifeOther · 30/04/2025 18:14

I think what you’ve suggested is really well considered and fair, and that he should be very grateful for a wife as reasonable as you are!

hotpotlover · 30/04/2025 18:34

I think he needs to grow up and be an adult.

I don't know anyone who's 100 % happy all the time with the daily grind.

Tittibits · 30/04/2025 18:49

Dick.

TheignT · 30/04/2025 18:52

When my husband was early 40s he had the opportunity to go off and do something different for 2 years. He was lucky as he could be seconded with his job waiting at the end but I'm sure some people wouldn't have liked it but off he went to work in another city. Some weekends he came home, sometimes I visited him either alone or with kids. Was it perfect? No it had its drawbacks. Does he regret it? No he has some happy memories. Did it ruin our marriage? No it was an interesting time and soon over. He had the opportunity to continue after the two years but he was ready to come back home.

EdithBond · 30/04/2025 18:54

Is he currently employed? Could he ask for sabbatical leave (unpaid leave from work for a year). Does he have enough savings to cover his share of household expenses if he doesn’t earn enough from the tour guiding. An unpaid career break would be less risk. Gives him the chance to see if he could make a go of being a tour guide, with a backstop if not.

The job market’s really tough in UK right now. Depending on what job he does, if he gave up a secure job, it could be very hard to get back in if he needed to.

I wouldn’t give up your job as well and go with him. Unless you have a lot of savings. If it didn’t work out, you could both end up unemployed and unable to pay essential bills. If you’ve been out of the country for a certain amount of time you may fail the habitual residence test for universal credit, so not even qualify for that.

Gonners · 30/04/2025 18:58

I used to tootle off from time to time and live/work elsewhere for a year or two and it was fine, but I was single and in my 20s with no responsibilities. But even I drew the line at working as a tour guide! He is just being a prat and I think your response ... "Off you tootle then, have fun!" ... is perfect. If he goes (and subsequently comes back) it will be interesting to see if you even want him back.

Notjustabrunette · 30/04/2025 19:15

My husband did something similar. He went to see if he liked it and I stayed at home with the kids. It almost ended my marriage. It turns out he was going through a massive mental health crises. I managed to get him home and put him in therapy. I shouldn’t have agreed to him going and should have looked more into what was going on him him mentally. Obviously, I had no clue at the time.

tommyhoundmum · 30/04/2025 19:46

No, not unreasonable at all

Itwasallyellow2 · 30/04/2025 19:57

Absolutely do NOT move OP. This sounds like his depression talking: “Everything would be alright if…” You are not uprooting yourself and your child for his whims. Stay rational.

CharlotteCChapel · 30/04/2025 20:20

dogcatkitten · 30/04/2025 13:36

If he's depressed he's not going to be the cheerful helpful tour rep that he will need to be. Actually leading a tour is hard work, you are expected to know everything about everything (learn up all the history scenery etc in advance) and be able to solve everyone's problems big and small, from I left my book on a bus to I've lost all my papers, passport visas and everything, usually for very little thanks. While the guests are relaxing after a busy day you are sorting out all the problems that have come up that day.

Don't forget someone's died

Iamnotalemming · 30/04/2025 20:31

A professional mountain leader once told me the following joke:

What's difference between an extra large pepperoni pizza and a mountain leader?
The pizza can feed a family of 5.

Time to get your ducks I'm a row OP. Sorry.

Hospworker · 30/04/2025 20:49

My ex husband was depressed and this is as far from the behaviour of a depressed person as I can imagine. Someone with depression usually feels hopeless and can't even envision these sorts of wild dreams. Not saying he doesn't have trouble with his mental health but doesn't sound like depression - it's more like a manic phase.

It's a ridiculous idea anyway. He's got no experience and frankly no clue. If this is truly something he wanted to do he would start by working in the UK as a tour guide to gain experience, and then potentially look to do one season abroad as a trial, then look to get things set up abroad for you both to join assuming it all went well and was actually financially viable.

It sounds more like he wants to simply escape the life you have - or is hoping you'll refuse so that can be the catalyst for a break up. But seems like he probably does still want to see his children - when convenient - so doesn't hate the idea of you coming along to run the house for when he returns from each adventure.

I couldn't live with someone so flighty and this would spell the end for me.

ArminTamzerian · 30/04/2025 21:05

BarbaricYawp · 30/04/2025 14:44

Yanbu to think he's out of his mind. Yabu to believe this is depression speaking. I've lost count of the number of women I know in RL and also on MN who put a flaky DH's behaviour down to depression. It never really is. People with depression don't generally have the energy to come up with grand schemes for lifestyle change. It's more likely to be boredom and a sense of entitlement to something more thrilling than being a committed dad and partner.

Actually those of us with ADHD and depression totally have the ability to dream up grand plans of escape.
But we have zero ability to follow through with it 🤷‍♀️

Scentedjasmin · 30/04/2025 21:07

Oh dear, I've very sorry to hear that you have got yourself a man child! He cannot man up and accept that he is now a father. I don't doubt that he's depressed. But that doesn't mean that he has to be a selfish arsehole and that you all have to bow down to his ridiculous demands. He should instead go to the drs. And then if he is unhappy he could try making sensible tweaks to his life such as getting a hobby that he enjoys or planning a family holiday.

SheridansPortSalut · 30/04/2025 21:10

He wants to split up. He doesn't have the guts to admit it so he wants to make it your fault by coming up with something outlandish that you'd never agree to. Now it's you that is splitting up the family, not him.

MadBlack · 30/04/2025 21:17

There's a reason the neilson / mark warner holiday guides for cycling etc are all under grads and young people recently graduated. It's not great pay. It's a summer in the sun with other kids.
I'm sorry, get your paperwork sorted and see a solicitor.

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