AIBU to refuse sharing finances when my husband’s income is unpredictable

[OpalSnake]

This will be long so apologies. Firstly me and my husband have been struggling for 3 years since he broke my trust over something and we've not made it back, we have no relationship in that sense.

One of my biggest issues is that he is self employed and unless he's working he doesn't make money, I have told him since we had kids that this doesn't work with having a family. He has never booked a day off work to look after our kids in the holidays, he will take days off but it's sporadic and he's never actively booked time off, to the point that I've had to take a pay cut to go to term time working as I have no support in the holidays.

He most often works at home, but will often go away for work too, this can be a problem as he doesn't consider my work or the children when he books to go away and I'm left to juggle everything, sometimes having to reschedule meetings. Most recently he has gone away for several weeks following me having a health emergency and needing surgery as apparently his main work (at home) isn't making enough money. This has significantly delayed my healing and I'm feeling really disappointed and let down. I argue that if the work he's doing doesn't work for us as a family and it doesn't make money, then why is he doing it!

I work part time, term time, I can't work more than this as it is a job share and I need to fit my hours into school hours. He on the other hand has the ability to work full time but he'll often take hours out of his day to do things either for the home or himself which I think could be done outside of working hours, working more consistently during working hours would help me with the children and would probably lead to a more consistent income.

Bills wise, he pays big bills, rent, gas, water etc, I pay for everything child and animal related, vets, insurance, clubs, childcare, Christmas, birthday, days out etc, along with any big purchases for the home. We both contribute to food shopping. I do 90% of childcare and cooking, housework is pretty evenly shared.

I moaned about something money related last night and now he wants to know all my incomings and outgoings, i think with a view to share bills more equally but I really don't feel comfortable doing this when we are not doing well and I'm the only one with a steady/consistent income. How can we proportionately work out who can pay what bills if his earnings constantly fluctuate. Am I being unreasonable to refuse this, and how would I go about refusing.

I've experienced previous financial abuse so I don't know if I'm being overly cautious or rightly annoyed

Also long time lurker first time poster

I think you’re missing the big picture here OP. You don’t trust him and you don’t feel he pulls his weight, financially or at home.

In practical terms if you’re married money is effectively shared anyway so this is a moot point.

The real point is why you are remaining in a marriage with someone who you can’t trust. It doesn’t sound like a good marriage: are you better off out of it.

I think wanting to know your outgoings & incomings is fair enough if you are saying you he pays for more, and you are telling him you are unhappy about money.

How you share the bills is a different conversation & should be part of a bigger picture about the balance & sharing of the load of your marriage.

I think you can refuse to share finances, but I do think you should talk through the situation and have transparency over who brings in what, and who pays what.

are you concerned that if he sees what you are earning or paying he will use this as an excuse to work less?

i think it is fine if one person earns less, but you both need to be making equal efforts. If you are worried he will put in less effort then you have bigger issues here

He sounds like he has lodgings as opposed to being in a marriage and family.

He doesnt think of himself as married with a child, he doesnt have too. He has no responsibilities. He comes and goes as he wants. He determines his schedule, without considering you or the child.

There's no way on earth I'd share finances with him. I wonder whether you actually want to share a life with him.

To get things into perspective, enter your details (including rent) into the Entitled To calculator and see what your financial situation would be if you separated. I'm not suggesting you do separate, but it's always good to be prepared. I wouldn't trust this man at all.

This!!

Im a bit lost at some of your post, you say on the one hand that the work he does doesn’t make money, yet he pays the bigger bills?

I find threads like this often go immediately to oh you need to separate & I don’t always think that’s helpful.

Maybe he feels under a lot of financial pressure being the main earner and self employed.