AIBU to regret settling down young with an older husband?

[Agegapwoes]

Sorry, I’m not even sure what I’m asking.

I met my DH when I was 22 and he was 38. I had a fantastic first job straight out of uni in finance, and DH was much, much, much more senior in the company I worked for. I had not long broken up with my university boyfriend and he’d be very flirty with me at work. There was definitely no ‘grooming’ going on, everything was reciprocated.

He’s a very high earner and took us on some amazing holidays - we went to the Maldives, New York and the Caribbean all within a year of meeting. Lots of weekends away etc. I thought he was perfect and everything you could ever want in a partner. Which I suppose he was when compared to boys my own age!

I got pregnant at 25 and left work to become a stay at home mum.

The children are primary aged now. Our relationship never recovered after the birth of our first baby. It had already started to sour prior to the pregnancy, but the birth of our first was the thing that really made me realise that we are not right for each other. He’s a great Dad, very hands off but is great with them. We have a nice life, a nice house in a nice part of London. We rarely see each other due to his role. I don’t feel attracted to him anymore.

I definitely feel that now I’m older, we have much less in common than we did when I was younger (not sure how that works). We have different values and just very different personalities.

I feel like I’ve completely lost myself. I’m incredibly busy with three children under the age of 6. I’m no longer on the amazing career trajectory that I was on, and I’ll never get back to it now as I can’t possibly work the hours that I would be required to.

My friends are all marrying nice, successful men that are our age and I’m so jealous. They get to grow and achieve together. Where as in my relationship, DH had already ‘grew and achieved’ and I’ve not really achieved anything. DH already owned a house when we met so I’ve never had the experience of saving up and buying a house with a partner. Our salaries were obviously vastly different, so I’ve never felt equal financially. There is a slight power imbalance due to the age gap. I’ve missed out on holidays and experiences with friends and I’ve grew apart from most of my old friends.

So yeah… I have no idea what I’m asking, I’m just ranting. I can’t complain as I do have a nice life. I just wish I’d had my 20s to have fun and then settled down with someone my own age. I have three beautiful children who I wouldn’t change for the world but gosh I wish things were slightly different.

OP what are you going to do now about your pension?

Thank you. I have ordered!

And his?

I assume it will be worth him fighting for.

I think there are 2 things at play here, your lack of fulfilment as a SAHM, and your relationship with your husband. I know they’re intertwined so far as the age gap meant part of the lack of fulfilment is a feeling of ‘missing out’, but there was a thread on here by a 40 something first time mum the other day saying she longed for her freedom and excitement. I think ultimately having children is a looooooong and very very repetitive slog for a decade or so until the youngest is approaching secondary and the days of very high level care (bathing them, sorting all their stuff out) is over.

I also had my first at 26, I’m now in my mid 30s and the facts of my relationship are very very similar to yours (our age gap is smaller though). I also kept my career although juggling both has led me to the brink of insanity at times. I do something get a pang when I look at my friends who are marrying and settling down now, but a few of them have privately said they feel similarly about me as either they’re struggling with fertility or they’re jealous of the fact I will have much more freedom when I get to about 40.

Maybe you wouldn’t have met a really nice man, maybe your ‘alternative’ children in this fictional universe have SEN, maybe you would’ve found out Mr Same Age was cheating… the what ifs are useless.

In your shoes I would plough on for a few years until the youngest is at school, and spend that time seriously thinking about career options and getting myself ready to apply for things. What interests you?

This is amazing, wise advice that applies to all of us in one way or another. I hope you follow it and take heart, OP.

I mean that’s a very blunt and reductive question for a complex issue which she can’t snap her fingers and solve isn’t it?

Seconded, very well worded.

I don't mean to be rude, OP ( haven't read the full thread but it sounds like a bunch of posters have been rude), but you do sound quite passive in all this.

You talk about your amazing previous career track and where you could have been, but you did decide to get married and have children young. In my experience, the super successful corporate women don't generally do this - and not just because they didn't meet someone at the time.

And that's fine you don't have to be that way inclined! But you talk as if it's something that just happened to you, or your husband made happen, and not something that you chose.

And it feels like you feel passive about your choices now. You know you're not happy, but you cant leave or change because of external factors. But you can! You don't have to do everything at once - but you know you need to work again. So get a job. Or study. You don't want a nanny, but there is a world of childcare between a sahm and a full time nanny. You don't want to leave your husband, that's fine ,- but if it is just circumstantial, put yourself in a position where it can be a real option in 6 months or 3 years. You can volunteer, take up hobbies, start seeing friends again - you say your problem has been becoming lost in his life and world, but you can start slowly carving out yours incrementally

I totally understand. Being skint is so shit and boring, but living through that while you're building a life for yourself is a right of passage. I remember when DP and I moved to London 20 years ago, we were so skint, just starting our careers. Lived in a tiny flat, could barely afford to eat. But I really look back at those times so fondly. Especially because of where we are in lives now, and what we've worked to achieve.

It won't work... accept ... divorce and start life again there will be lots of opportunities you're still young .
Don't waste anymore time shit happens life changes .. kids are resilient start again x

OP, if you go back to work you are earning your success. I also don’t think you should be hard on yourself for picking marriage and children early on. Being a mother, running a household isn’t easy. Being a hands on mother is hard for many reasons and those who decide to take that path deserve respect.

Having young children isn’t easy, you are still postpartum with a young baby! You need to just take everything one step at a time, start volunteering for a couple hours per week, then in six months you might have a better idea of where you want to move your career.

I also suggest going to meet ups for those in various careers, meeting and talking to people and seeing if a career change sounds interesting.

Your DH is going to be a huge obstacle to the process of self-actualisation that you want to embark upon. It very much sounds like he wants you barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen.

You are going to have to spell out to him that you are the reason why he has the career that he does AND the family that he does. He may be the sole earner but your labour has economic value to your family unit. You will need to put it in these terms to make him understand. His money cannot buy him everything.

Editing to add that I hadn't seen your subsequent posts when I wrote this: you said "In no way do I feel like I’m being controlled but DH wouldn’t be up for changing this." OP, the cognitive dissonance in this single sentence is painful. Your DH has all of the power in this relationship. No wonder you are restless and dissatisfied; you are a bright, educated woman with absolutely no agency and the resentment will eat you up if you don't address this.

Get your career in progress first

I sympathise with you OP because it’s totally understandable for you to feel like you haven’t fulfilled your career potential. That said, I think to an extent you need to make peace with the idea that any choice would have entailed opportunity cost. Many women graft in paid employment and delay settling down only to not find a husband or face infertility. I got lucky with the way things are so far working for me but I would have loved an extra child and also there were some really miserable times working long (albeit well paid) jobs for my corporate overlords in my 20s. It would be a shame if you grew resentful towards your husband and/or relationship because of “what ifs”.

You just need to figure out a new career direction. Personally, I think you should ask your DH to help you get a job but I know you dont want to work at his company. I think you should anyway and then leverage that experience to move on after a year or so.

I have asked her first in a different and more wordy way and she didn’t answer. Advised her to speak to her husband etc. So I asked again in a more blunt way to see if she would reply.

Nothing you have written suggests you intend to divorce, so with that in mind you need to find ways o making your situation work. You have both clearly been neglecting your relationship and, in particular, your needs as a woman who is more than a mother. You need to talk to him. Remind him of the above, but also of say you want to invest more in yourself with the view to having your own career again.

Yes definitely. I went to university so did have some of these kind of experiences, and I also look back really fondly. But I never achieved much past this so don’t have much to be proud of.

You can be proud of your children and everything you’ve done there.
you can also start building your career again now and be proud of yourself there too, it might be hard work but it’s not too late - just don’t leave it too late.

As an intelligent woman but probably impressionable you swooned, enjoyed the lavishness and chose your path. Life doesn't have an instruction manual so we all do what we fewl is right.

You're not happy now, only you can change it. These other women probably envied you as well being swept off your feet and not having to continue the career you seem to so fondly look back upon after just a few years.

I won’t be too sad… most men are rubbish!

I would add - it also requires having zero qualms about using childcare
This really is the crux of the issue. All the women I know with a career, including myself didn't even consider for a second that there were other options but children being at nursery and clubs afterwards.

In my case, I never even thought negatively about them for a second. Because my single mum was a career woman herself and a childhood of childcare is all I knew and....loved. I only have good memories of my nannies, babysitters, clubs. I think I would have been bored with a sahm. I think my children would have been too with me.

Thinking that children are happier and grow up better with a sahm is very rarely compatible with starting an interesting and lucrative career.

Because she'd just had a baby.

That's not what she's said. She said she had her first age 25, dc1 is 6yo, op is now 31yo. So why not work age 22-25? Years 2016-2019.

Anyway as I say, it doesn't matter, she's probably anonymised the details. But the pp you quoted is right, the timeline doesn't match. That's OK though, it's an anonymous forum

OP said she'd finished a professional qualification. She didn't say undergraduate degree.

The other one was the woman who wanted to become an MP to defend family values and SAHM life, apparently without any clue that being an MP would require her to work insane hours and never see her kids 😅