Has my husband lost his mind?

[orangesky1]

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?

Apart from anything else it's really hard to do this work now in Europe without falling foul of tax laws

Could he join army reserves or learn to sail and get a cheap boat? There is a brilliant youtube series about a Norwegian man who has a small boat and goes off on random weekend adventures across the North Sea and ended up on one occasion in Greenland. Obviously he is pretty nifty at sailing so obviously not one for beginners. But plenty of compromise adventures on his doorstep
. Could he take up an adventurous hobby and post content about it? There is another good series about a total beginner sailer - a young guy who has taken a few lessons, bought a second hand boat and does some short trips at sea. That’s hardly Robin Knox Johnson but it is very relatable, funny and in its own way exciting to watch! He also has a good following and now sponsorships.
Just a thought about an alternative that might make a little cash and also appeal!

I’m afraid that I have so little patience for bullshit these days, so I’d be telling him not to bother coming back if he chose to pursue this little venture.

Oh god op just focus on the divorce and then he can do whatever the fuck he wants.

And who is going to do the tedious work of raising the kids, keeping the house and making enough money to pay the gas bill and the mortgage while he goes off having fun and finding himself?

"Could he join army reserves or learn to sail and get a cheap boat? ..."

This whole business is reminding me of The Lumberjack Song ... OP's husband never wanted to be an accountant/dentist/whatever, he wanted to be A Tour Leader in Kazakhstan!

Maybe he's been watching too many Ralnulph Fiennes, Ben Fogle or Bear Grylls vids. I really don't envy their DWs being left to hold the fort at home raising a family whilst their DHs head off on long expeditions to find themselves.

This sounds to me like the first of many hare-brained schemes. Is he having a mid-life crisis?

No,

don’t quit your job for his. He needs to find something within the frame he has. I am sure he can find tours without being « overseas ».
honestly, I think he feels unhappy and try to have you as unhappy as he is…and if you become unhappy, he will probably see it as being unsupportive and… might even leave you.

stay put. Don’t go. Let him go though, he wants to.

good luck 🌺

I strongly suspect that being a tour guide isn't much fun. For the first couple of trips it might be interesting, but the novelty would wear off pretty quickly unless you were really passionate about the area, and people on tours can be "difficult". I'd get a power of attorney so you can deal with stuff while he's away, then sell up and move without leaving a forwarding address.

Stick to your guns in keeping your child settled and your job, he sounds fickle and is being completely unreasonable to expect you to just upend your life on an idea that in the long run will still have its challenges .
I'd let him go but if he does dont be so good as to welcome him back.

No you are not.

Your husband is crazy. Don't even consider it.

It may be on interest to read this book. The writer recounted her growing up with her parents who took her on a voyage.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/mar/25/suzanne-heywood-round-the-world-sailing-trip-stolen-childhood

Does he know that he’ll actually get a job in this industry. ? I’ve done a number of these adventure holidays and they usually employ a local person who speaks the language and know the area. I wouldn’t worry until he presents you with a genuine job offer.

Honestly start thinking of yourself as separated and act accordingly - let him get on with this nonsense solo.

You have a child to raise.
I feel incredibly sorry for you because essentially you've been lied to and he isnt who you thought he was but someone has to be the adult in the room and it's clearly not going to be him...

Thanks for that link @ScotYasmin - horrifyingly bad parents!

You got two children. Probably the one in school has more common sense than the bigger one.

Thank you for all the replies.

for the questions on what it is, I don’t want to say exactly what it is but it is a skilled outdoor activity - think Diving, sailing, climbing. He doesn’t have any of the qualifications he needs yet, and has stated planning on getting these. He’s about to go on a week course doing - the course is essentially a holiday- I did these types of things when I was young for fun. The visa he can get once he has the quals.

today I am just overwhelmed with how extremely selfish this all is. This money for the week long course could go a long way for a holiday for the whole family. If he put even a tenth of the energy into thinking about how he can make life better for us as a family where we are now rather than living in his head and thinking about himself, our lives would be so different. But of course he is prioritising himself over us. He justifies it as it is ‘for his career’ and in his view ‘a better life’.

I completely agree there are lots of middle ground approaches to this mid life crisis. He is all or nothing, and any suggestion that he consider other ways to approach this, is me killing his dream.

he is behaving like an entitled toddler with no real thought about his children. Access to decent healthcare, a good education, their support network.

I am the main earner. I could theoretically do this remotely but it would be a step back for my career and I don’t want to be fully remote. I also would need to be full time and so our child would have to be with some kind of nanny while he is on his tours a lot of the time - I can’t see our financial situation improving enough to allow me to drop hours.

He sees any suggestion of reality as me being fearful and stuck in my ways

if this goes ahead i can’t see anything other than divorce, I’ve lost respect for him already so perhaps for the best.

You sound sensible.

Are you funding his course?

I'm off to do an adventure course in a few weeks but very different circumstances.

I agree with the previous comments that he seems to be forcing your hand to end the marriage by insisting that you jump in with something he knows you won’t be happy with. That could be so that he can claim the “she left me” card and get sympathy from his family, friends (and future partners?)

He clearly only cares about himself and seems determined to press on with his “dreams” regardless of how you feel about it. I would stop arguing with him about your reasons for not going and start talking in terms of him leaving. Something like : “Well you seem very determined to leave your job/family/home and go overseas indefinitely to live out your personal dreams, so I won’t stop you as you obviously want this very badly.”

He sounds bonkers. I’ve had similar thoughts of leaving my senior job, and the shit weather, and moving to a hot country and joining the circus, but you just… don’t!

Make sure you put the equivalent ££££ from the joint into a private account. For that course you'll be doing and definitely not a divorce lawyer.

Honestly, Divorce is where this is going. There's nothing you can do about this.
do not reduce your earning power by going anywhere... you are going to need the £££

Hie selfishness is breathtaking...

He wants to follow his "passion" of being an abseiling instructor/ scuba diver etc despite having NEVER done it before and it not being a hobby and him having no experience of it..

He is going on a jolly holiday to play at being "Mr. Holiday instructor" and escape his real life.
I couldn't respect this.

This.

I'm sorry this is happening to you op. I think you should start separating your finances out - keep your money separate from his and make it clear what you expect him to contribute to his family.
Is the house in your name? Can you afford to keep it (rent or mortgage) without him?
If he leaves the country will you be able to collect child support?

I think this is a job younger people do tbh.. it sounds like he's having a midlife crisis. I know because I've had thoughts like this but it's just not realistic really. I'd let him go and realise it's not for him at his age, he'll feel like he's not being controlled and hopefully snap back to a bit of reality

OP - if it is indeed diving, I can 100% guarantee he’s onto a hiding to nothing. It’s a fantastic lifestyle if you are very highly qualified to technical status and can train high paying people accordingly. This takes years to achieve.
Assuming he’s 30+ and can’t already do whatever this skill is, then he won’t be competent enough to instruct or guide in a meaningful or well enough paid way for a number of years. He just won’t. He’ll be up against people who have done it for a decade or more and are younger than him. He’ll be up against course directors and people who have dived for 30 years. Specifically with diving - zero to hero bullshit courses exist where someone can go from a non-diver to a dive leader in about 3 months. Then they end up leading dives with people who have an order of magnitude or more dives than them and will take them to bits. Somehow it sounds like this is the kind of thing he’s signed up to.

Like I say, let him bugger off, secure any joint assets/joint money and wait for it to crash down.