AIBU to feel undervalued when my husband keeps score financially?

[PinkCatStripes]

I remarried a couple of years ago, have 2 lovely children from 1st marriage, finally bought a house with OH that is ours together. We bought as tenants in common as I had bigger share of deposit.
OH is paying majority of household bills and mortgage. OH has an income 6x larger than me.
OH is getting p*ssy because I asked him to check on the dinner when I went to pick up DS for 10 mins. I asked OH if he could pick up kids from clubs one day next week- to which he has stated is a chore.
I work part time, spend all of my income on groceries/ petrol/ things for children/ my own bills eg phone/ car/ activities etc I have non left at the end of the month. My contributions appear to be of no value, because they are not as financial as those made by the OH. I’m always being reminded of the financial contributions that he makes. I am thankful for this, but I have made a very significant financial contribution already which seems to be forgotten.
I hate the way I am being treated in this respect, AIBU? My DC are not his and he plays a big part in their life, I feel like I cannot expect everything from him, and as he says, they are not his responsibility. Is it even possible to be appreciated fully by the man I married? I often feel that I have a teenager rather than a partner.

The op has said she works four days a week so she isn't very part time and no doubt does the majority of the life admin and household chores.

She did put the majority of the deposit down for the house and her husband's stake increases with each mortgage payment.

Op you must have a calm and frank conversation with your man about his attitude, each must listen to the other and take everything on board.

Make notes in advance with bullet points.

Where there's a will there's a way. If there isn't, ditch him.

He shouldn't be being pissy with you for being asked to occasionally support the kids, and he knew you came with kids when he married you. This is a marriage and a family and it shouldn't come down to the numbers of who contributes what, whether financial or non-financial. If he's going to be living with you and the kids then he needs to be treating the unit as a family which means things don't always balance out - if it's constantly him thinking that you are solely responsible for the kids that's a pretty horrible relationship in my view. I would prefer to live separately personally. I could also completely understand it if someone in your husband's position didn't want to take this on himself, but at the end of the day he married you!

However, I am not clear that the contributions here are as equal as you are making them out and actually think he has a point. You not recognizing quite how unbalanced this actually is that might be making this issue worse. Yes you paid more financially into the house, but in doing that you got a higher ownership share. He's building his ownership share back up by paying 100% of the mortgage [hopefully your deal means that it stops when it gets to 50:50 ownership or it's a very bad deal for you!]. You and your two kids are living mortgage/rent free and presumably expect to even when the amount he has paid in mortgage exceeds the amount you paid in deposit. To me that easily balances out the bigger deposit you paid, and plus presumably if he had been buying on his own the big deposit wouldn't have been needed in the first place because it would have been a smaller house.

You're working part time because of your children. He's covering the household bills. I don't know how that balances out, but I would assume that means he's paying at least 50% of bills plus groceries, and there's one of him and three of you. Everything else you talk about having to cover is all costs that are either directly your costs or related to your kids. Who pays for the luxuries in life? Holidays, meals out etc?

If he doesn't consider this a true family unit and therefore doesn't count contributions made to the kids when he's considering whether contributions are balanced or not (and see above that I personally wouldn't be ok with that), how is he not contributing massively more than you are? What non-financial contributions are you making that benefit him? I assume you're picking up more of the domestic stuff and cooking, but how much are you doing for him as opposed to for you and the kids.

In my view your issue isn't that he's unfairly not taking into account your true contributions (including non-financial) but that he doesn't see contributions that you make that relate to the kids as part of the package. The contributions you are making to the relationship are massively unbalanced and objectively this relationship almost certainly benefits you much more than him.

But all that said, it shouldn't be about that. This is part and parcel of being in a relationship with someone who has resident children. Relationships shouldn't be about totting up who contributes what providing that there's a reasonable balance of free time and personal spending money whatsoever. Imagine if you didn't have kids, both worked similar hours but he was in a much higher paying job. It would be the same point - there almost certainly wouldn't be enough of a non-financial contribution you would be making to balance out his financial one (say he hires a cleaner and cook!), but that happens all the time because relationships shouldn't be about a balance sheet of who gets what.

I've actually got a friend in a similar situation and this point is one of the big reasons that they're not living together. There's a huge disparity in income, to the extent that there's basically nothing she could contribute (financially or not) that would balance things out. She would lose income if they moved in together (see it as like your benefits point but more significant and longer term impact), but whilst he is completely happy to cover all of her costs and support her (because he loves her and the value to him of being with her is massive), he's not keen on taking on financial or other responsibility for her children because he doesn't see them as his children. He of course wouldn't let them starve, but he wouldn't be financially investing in their future, things she would pay for now happily for the kids (eg after school activities) would likely become a battleground and if the relationship were to breakdown he wouldn't guarantee continuing to support the kids until she was back where she is now. It's not this, but look at it as her needing to relocate to somewhere with extremely limited employment prospects. She's be willing to do it, and sacrifice her career, but not without rock solid commitments to financial support for the kids long term.

Neither are wrong - for him they're not his kids, and for her the benefits she would get from living him don't outweigh the risk to her kids. They love each other and the solution they've found is to continue living apart.

Blending families is hard.

It’s all very well to say you’d never do what he did. I wouldn’t either. But he did do it! He fell in love with a woman with children, married her, and took on a mortgage.

If you choose to do that, taking an active role in ensuring the inhabitants of the household are fed, young people are picked up and dropped off to places occasionally, well…surely that’s a given? You married someone with children for goodness sake. All my friends who are step parents (ok, there’s only two) operate their households as a family unit.

Yet when women come on here to complain they have to financially contribute to theit step children they are told to stop they are his kids, it seems it is considered family money when the man earns it and he knew what he was taking on

I didn't say I'd never do what he did, I said I'd never accept him doing what he's doing myself. I wouldn't live with someone who wasn't willing to take an active role in family life, and who would not take into account time (or money) I was spending on my children as contributions to the relationship. One of the reasons for that is I'm perfectly able to provide a comfortable life for me and my children on my own. In this situation I wouldn't value the extra money her DH is bringing in that much - sure more money is always nice, but my lifestyle would be just fine without it. More money would be money I'd want to be saving for or spending on the kids primarily!

I don't think it is a given at all that he should be "taking an active role in ensuring the inhabitants of the household are fed, young people are picked up and dropped off to places" when there's a massive income disparity. I know you said "dropped off occasionally" and I do think that that should be a given.

But OP's actual post isn't that he was pissy that she asks him to help occasionally. She's saying that he doesn't recognize their contributions as equal and she thinks they are. She says he's undervaluing what she brings to the table. My point is she's wrong there - he's objectively contributing much more unless he considers the contributions she makes to her kids as contributions to their relationship. He's not undervaluing what she bring to the table for him. That's the real issue. There's no arguing that she's not getting a great deal here in terms of how much she gets from him, it's just because she also has the kids to manage she's still struggling and tired and needs more. The issue is she's looking at what she brings to the table for the family unit, and he's looking at what she brings to the table for the couple relationship.

(I'm assuming that 6x her income makes him a very high earner (she mentions she has a professional role so presumably isn't on minimum wage and she works 4 days a week), and so he more than makes up for what she's lost in benefits in terms of his additional financial contributions).

If I had 2 kids with another man and my new husbands salary allowed me to continue to work part time no I wouldn’t feel undervalued. If you had to house yourself and your kids and pay all bills you’d be paying a lot more than you do now

No, it’s evidently not a given. He married someone with children, sure, but that didn’t and doesn’t make him responsible for those children.

It doesn’t sound like he gave OP the impression that this he would be taking that on either, so she’s getting precisely what she signed up for.

OH is getting p*ssy because I asked him to check on the dinner when I went to pick up DS for 10 mins.

I feel like I cannot expect everything from him.

Finances and childcare are one thing.

But you should expect him to check on food he’s going to eat, when you have a child to collect.

You’re in paid work 4 days a week. Just because he earns more than you, doesn’t mean you should be his personal chef in your spare time.

Tell him to get his own dinner in future.

The agreement OP and her DH have on the house is another example where I disagree with her. Where there are unequal deposits I'd completely expect them to have agreed that they both get their deposit back in full before any equity is split, and if there isn't enough equity to cover both deposits then they get back in proportion to the deposit they've put in. But why does he get a smaller percentage of the remaining equity until he's paid in enough mortgage? Why is it not already 50/50 after that, with the impact of his mortgage payments being to bring it closer to 50/50 overall? OP is undervaluing what she is getting here. Yes she provided the deposit, but presumably his income was needed to get the mortgage and she couldn't afford to pay even 50% of it herself. Until they are actually in an even position this is an excellent deal for OP. If I was her DH I wouldn't have agreed to that!

If the deal allows him to get more than 50% equity over time then she shouldn't have signed it, and I can see why he might have been willing to take the short term risk for a better overall deal i.e. it might be in his interests to structure it this way. If it does top out at 50/50 then he's actually been very generous here.

Oh come off it. Taking a role in meals and transport of minors you have chosen to cohabitate with is hardly unusual and does not render him ‘responsible’. The children have two parents and one step parent. Where would you draw the line at responsibility? When he empties the dishwasher, should he only put away his dishes? Should he never touch an item of clothing that isn’t his? Should he divide up the contents of the pantry per head?

Refusing to check in on a meal because it isn’t being prepared for him is just petty.

I don’t know about all your bills but if you’re saying him pating the mortgage increases his share in your dhared property, it seems unfair that he doesn’t contribute to the food bills, unless he pays all utilities or similar.
The issue isn’t the money for me in this relationship but the fact that he doesn’t seem to like your children.

So effectively, the point is that OP is completely justified in thinking he shouldn't be pissy with her about her asking him to check on dinner. She is also completely justified in not wanting to be in a relationship where she feels it's constantly pointed out to her she doesn't bring as much to the table as him.

However, where I disagree is her position that he is actually undervaluing her contribution. He isn't. His contribution is bigger than hers.

But it shouldn't matter that his contribution is bigger than hers. Objectively in my relationship my contribution (if you try to somehow tot it up) is bigger than my husband's. Significantly. But I have no issue with that because I want to be with him and I don't think a relationship should be about keeping score.

Objectively, what the OP is describing is a business relationship, not an emotional partnership

I’m not saying it is unusual. I‘m saying that other stepparents choosing to do it, doesn’t oblige him to follow suit. It’s very apparent that he didn’t sign up for that, and isn’t going to do it.

If OP wanted a husband that would wholeheartedly coparent with her, then this wasn’t the man to marry.

How old are the kids and how long have you been with your partner?
Did you live together before buying the house?
It seems you are both now discovering little niggles about each other.
People are right - if stepmums are being asked to collect SC then people argue it's not their responsibility and their dad should make sure he is available for his children, so this is the same as you wanting him to pick up the children who aren't his and it's fine for him to say no if this is a problem for him.

Did you not discuss the house location either?

I feel like you have not really considered the bigger picture and were happy to have found a man to marry after a failed relationship, especially a man with a good salary, but the finer details such as taking the kids to a school that is further away and arrangements for them has been neglected.

knob with a job ?

I have 2 step kids.

we don’t live together because his kids are younger than mine and im not up for doing running after kids anymore. I wouldn’t do a pick up or a drop off. Not even once.

The dinner I’d expect him to keep an eye on.

and I wouldn’t take into account what you do for your kids as part of split of household chores.

I do recognise that most women are different to me, and people on here think that’s a weird way to work but it’s my oh responsibility to see to his own kids.

I'd be pretty disgusted with a stepmother who wouldn't step up on the occasional basis to help. Yes we do make comments about nannies with fannys but the difference is father's who are expecting the woman to do everything.

This isn't about stepchildren this is about a man who has no respect or care for his wife at all.

Yes and I wouldn't be in that relationship. She'd be completely justified in not wanting to be in that relationship. But it sounds like this is the relationship she agreed to and she's not talking about her issue being him seeing it as a business relationship. She's saying 'I pay for all of this, and I paid the larger part of the house deposit, he is undervaluing my financial contribution'. She's treating the relationship the same way.

If there is equity (above the deposit and sale costs) in the house, if she leaves him now I think it's likely she will come out of this relationship financially up, and he will be significantly financially down. So unless there isn't equity, I'd just cut my losses and go. I wouldn't live like this. But I suspect the reality is that she wouldn't be able to get close to replicating her current lifestyle if they divorced.

He knew what he was signing up for when he married a woman with children and presumably a difficult ex.
I may have missed it, but does he have any children?
I do think getting with a childless man can be very complicated. Having said that, one of my closest friends married a childfree man and she had 2 primary aged children. He has been wonderful with them and treated them better than their own father ever did.
I think you need to let your dh do more around the house whilst you concentrate on your dc. If he moans then tough, tell him you can’t cook dinner as you are picking up your dc, he will have to make dinner.
This us the reality when you get with someone who is a parent.

I do not do any picking up and dropping off ever for my step kids.

if I am Making dinner I make for all of us. If there’s washing to be done I bung à whole load in and shout has anyone got any washing. I’ll ask if there’s anything anyone wants for the Tesco order.

but. I don’t do any pick ups or drop offs ever. I don’t do make sure you have xyz for school and don’t forget your lunchbox.

He explicitly didn’t sign up for that at all.

OP however did sign up to marry him knowing that he wasn’t going to take on her children as his responsibility, financial or otherwise. That’s on her.

If he moans then tough, tell him you can’t cook dinner as you are picking up your dc, he will have to make dinner.

He's got money, so his response is 'sure' and he goes on to order takeout for just himself. Or he bungs something in the oven just for him. The cooking of dinner is an activity that benefits him, OP and both of her children. Maybe he places an unusually high value on OP's cooking / having a home cooked meal and so saying 'you have to make dinner' will make him immediately go 'oh I understand now - I'll go pick up the child', but I don't think it will play out that way. Far more likely OP ends up with having to pick up her child, cook dinner for herself and her kids and have a husband who highlights even more that he brings more to the table than her.

The thing is most men are ok with financially supporting a woman because she's contributing by being at home with his kids.

These kids aren't his kids, so he's supporting you financially to raise another man's kids.

I can see why that would irritate him. How many hours a week are you able to work?