After 17 years of supporting my wife's career, am I wrong to expect the same?

[joshkenn]

I'm in a situation where I genuinely don't know if I'm being unreasonable, so I'd appreciate some outside perspectives.

For context, I'm 44 year old, my wife is also 44, and we've been married for 17 years. We have three kids two teenagers and an 8 year old. We live in Madrid. I'm Dutch, my wife is Spanish. After we got married, I moved from the Netherlands to Madrid because her career was already established here, all of her family was here, and her work depends heavily on networking and long l term relationships. Over the years, I learned Spanish, built my life here, and our kids all have Spanish citizenship.

Our marriage is genuinely good. My wife is a wonderful mother, and I love her very much. This isn't a post about an unhappy marriage. It's about something that has made me question whether we've been approaching each other's careers equally.

My wife works in the art world, so travel is a regular part of her job. Every year she spends about two weeks in Switzerland for a summit she founded, and throughout the year she travels for gallery openings, events, and galas in different cities and countries.

My job is much more stable. I only travel a couple of times a year, so whenever she's away, I'm the one looking after the kids and keeping everything running at home. I've never complained because I understood that her career required it.

Recently, my company offered me a one year assignment in Los Angeles. Financially, it's a huge opportunity. I currently earn around €300k, and this role would pay around $500k plus a $700k completion bonus if the project is successfully finished.

The interesting part is that money isn't really the reason I want to go. Between us, we're already very comfortable. My wife earns around €500k herself, and she's actually been the primary breadwinner for most of our marriage.

The problem is that she doesn't want me to accept it. Her reasons are understandable. She says a year is too long, the kids need both parents at home, and she doesn't want our family living apart. I completely understand why she feels that way.

But what hurts is that I've spent 17 years supporting her career whenever it required sacrifices from me. I moved countries, adapted to a new life, took on parenting whenever she traveled, and never questioned the travel because it was important to her work.

Now that my career is asking for something significant just once, the answer seems to be "no."

I think this situation has also brought up feelings I've ignored for years. I often prioritize her family's events because they're important to her, while she rarely comes to mine if work conflicts. Last month I attended my older sister's 50th birthday alone because she had an event. My parents sometimes tell me they wish they saw the grandkids more, but most of our family time naturally ends up with my wife's side because we live here.

To be clear, I don't dislike my in laws. They're good people, and I don't resent my wife. I know she's made sacrifices too, and I know raising three kids is a team effort.

Probably I'm writing here just to vent but also, I'd really appreciate honest opinions because I can see both sides, and that's exactly why I'm conflicted

YANBU - it's a tremendous amount of money to turn down. On the plus side - that proves your DW must really love you.

Can you do any of the following to reassure her?

Negotiate working back in Spain for part of the project (either the set up or hand over). Even if you agree to work US timezone hours - 1 month WFH during set up and 1 month during handover would at least reduce it from 12 to 10 months.

Negotiate generous holiday allowance to fly home and see your family. Ie - once every 2 months you get 1 week off (1 day travel there, 5 days home, 1 day travel back).

You'll pay for a propper nanny whilst youre away

The contract gaurentees you'll get the completion bonus after 12 months, regardless if the project has to be continued from your home office in Spain.

I understand, and I agree with you. But it's not just those two weeks. She travels every month and is away twice a month. Altogether, she's outside the home for around 2–3 months every year.

Honestly, I'm not trying to keep score or compare who's away more. My point is that this is such a good opportunity. I would visit once every month for 3 -4 days.

They could also visit me during the holidays, which I think would be good for everyone.

I didn't originally thought this plan. My first thought was to move to LA as a whole family so the kids could get international experience and we could stay together. But that would hurt my wife's career, so I thought going alone made more sense.

MN isn't british only.

Many EU and Australian users enjoy English languaged based environment which isn't culturally predominantly American.

With the ease of travel, technology and the resources your family has available, I think this could be made to work.

A year isn’t so bad. Military families are often separated for long periods of time; doubly so if both spouses are serving.

If your relationship is strong, balanced and equal then I think your wife is being selfish and wrong to just dismiss the idea out of hand.

Not only shojld you accept the one year appointment to US. But you should expect that all three kids and your wife also go for at least six months.

Suggest that it would be fair that your wife took a sabatical and that the whole family would benefit from time living in a new place.

Once the year is over you should then insist on it being fair for you to all live another year away from Spain, living in the same town as yiur aging parents.

Be serious about your children spending time with your family.

For me the answer would be simple; once you have children, it's not about you, or your wife - it's about what should come first for them. Additionally, if you expected the 'career sharing' to be equal, perhaps you should have had this discussion a long time ago.

This
how would you feel if she proposed moving to the US for a year and leaving you with the kids?

what things would worry you about that arrangement? Now put yourself in her shoes. You’re making it sound transactional (“now it’s my turn to be prioritised”) but perhaps she is saying no based on what is best for your whole family, not just herself

I really dislike the tit for tat mentality that the OP and some PPs are using to justify spending a year away from the family. I don't blame you for wanting to take the opportunity OP but your wife doesn't owe you anything. My DH travels for his work. I knew this when we met and I also relocated once we married. His job couldn't move where mine could. It made sense. In the future we will look at any relocation decisions together and discuss what benefits us all, on balance, as a family. No score sheet and manipulation, that makes for a shit relationship.

Honestly I think you’re unreasonable OP, a year is a long time to be away from your family, especially the 8 year old, and the comparison to your wife travelling isn’t really fair.

Presumably she has always asked if these trips, relocating etc is okay with you and you have said yes? You have asked and she has said no- she’s allowed to say no. My husband travels similarly to your wife for work and I’m okay with that, but if he turned round tomorrow and said he had plans to disappear for a year the answer would be no, regardless of how much money he would earn, the answer would be no. There is a vast difference between the two things and it goes far beyond your “but it’s my turn now” thinking especially when you have a family. It sounds like you as a family are already wealthy with a great income- your kids don’t need more money or more stuff, they need present parents.

But you should expect that all three kids and your wife also go for at least six months.

I would not pull a 13 and 15 yo kids out of school for 6 months. 8 indeed will probably manage, but I believe it's the most significant school year in Spain for the 15yo, really not the optinal time for 6 months out of the system.

@joshkenn I’m going to buck the trend here… GO!

it’s a year, not forever. We don’t tell members of the armed services, oil rig workers, pilots, or film stars that they can’t have kids or should change their roles. We make it work.

I also have kids, and am the main breadwinner and DH has had to follow me places too. if he asked me to do the reverse I would do it in a heartbeat (and take a sabbatical from work too if needed).

Your wife is established in her career, as long as the kids are well settled / no issues from them, then it’s an adventure… indeed I’d be taking the kids with me in your scenario.

Your parents fulfilment is also important, even if they don’t have to financially, this seems to be an important move for OP. A year is a bleep in time.

I think you are being unreasonable. If you go, you will leave her in the lurch with her job and the kids and it will affect your marriage. Many relationships won't survive being apart for a year especially if one party doesn't want it.

It isn't clear if you wife's job will work the same if she is unable to travel. I know she has been travelling regularly for years and you have helped make this possible, but presumably this is what you agreed, as was you moving to Spain to settle. You cannot continue to hold those things over her when they were decisions you made together.

You are already both very big earners, you really don't need to do this. I am frankly amazed you want to be away from your wife and kids for a year (and so much further away rom your elderly parents).

So I'm the only have to scarfice everything just because i agreed?

First two sentences especially, but post absolutely nails it.

Still, I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel that our relationship is unfair.

It is not unfair. This is how many families operate; and it is usually the other way round. Either is fine. It is about sharing tasks as needed.

The worrying aspect is your bitterness and resentment that has built up and is now focused on your job offer which makes it difficult for the two of you to take rational decisions about this.

I do not think you have anything to be resentful about. What you have done is not special in any way. It is no more than most parents (more usually the mother) do to share out the tasks to make sure their children are properly supported.

I think you need to stop feeling hard done by ... you are not ... and start reframing the whole thing. Two people who have managed family and work in one way have now been presented with the possibility of doing things differently. Neither comes to the table with greater advantage than the other ... neither has anything to be resentful about ... both have done their bit in their different ways.

Unless you can ditch the bitterness this is going to break up your family.

You have used the word "smaller" in reference to both your careers (yours as you think it is and hers as you think it might become) and this is very telling. It is a very loaded word. Your role in the home is equally valuable to any outside career. There is nothing smaller about it, whoever does it.

There are pros and cons to all of you in accepting your job offer and the outcome from this will only be positive if you jettison your resentment. If you come to the table unable to have a reasoned discussion of the pros and cons, it is doomed to failure and it will be your children who will suffer. You have to find a way of pulling together on this and properly listening to both sides of the argument.

And you cannot expect your wife to instantly leap at the status quo being turned on its head. She needs time to process this and a husband who is not seething with resentment.

If not doing this one year job is sacrificing everything then just fucking drop them all like hot potatoes and go. You sound like a sulky petulant child.

stay. Make time to see your parents more, go to therapy and get over this sulk.

If this is all it takes to ruin a marriage, it is not a good one.

Tell that to the kids. A year is not a bleep in time.

You seem to be missing that you agreed, that is the crucial point. If you weren’t happy, you could and should have said no long before now. She doesn’t owe you anything here.

You're missing the point. I'm not permanently moving away, it's just for one year.

Again, you're missing another important point. Marriage isn't an agreement where everything has to be negotiated equally. Sometimes one person has to make sacrifices. I did that for the last 18 years.

Now I'm asking her to support me. Is that really wrong?

You keep doing this. You keep saying how you feel then trying to add something to make it sound like you care how this works out for your wife’s career. This ‘I thought if we all moved it would hurt my wife’s career and I really don’t want to do that’ is just bullshit in the same paragraph as what can be paraphrased as ‘you don’t understand!! She’s away for months a year in total!! Months!! I do it all! She owes me!!’

friends at school are moving because he took a job where he could get one, 6 hours flight away, they’ve done seeing him weekends and on the odd week up there and down there and it’s not fair to the family, they are upping sticks and moving. They make decisions together for the family. Unlike you.

I think you should go OP. My only caveat being that (with your wife’s blessing) you ask your kids how they’d feel about a new arrangement for one year. They may leap at the chance to visit you in LA or they may not. But I would at least try to involve them in the decision making and neither you nor your wife should sway them either way.

Just because you agree with something 17 years ago, does not mean you can never reevaluate your agreement. A decision made may no longer serve you and it is perfectly valid to do want to change things.

Plenty of women take the foot off the pedal of their careers while kids are young and then want to switch it up later and realise their full career potential. This is really no different. The OP is only getting so much stick for it because a) he is a man and b) a high earner.

Going away for a year is very different to going away on a conference for two weeks and occasional work trips here and there though isn’t it?