Husbands money

[bababoy]

Hi
i just wanted some other perspectives on this issue.
Husband has been doing some overtime at work. He has decided that he wants to save this money- although our money is usually shared.
He said he was going to save it in cash and put it away so we didn’t spend it, rather than keeping it in our joint account. I went to where he said he had put the money and it wasn’t there, he had kept it in his wallet. When he got home from work I mentioned to him that I actually needed some extra money and went to use it and it wasn’t there. He apologised and said it was an oversight and said he would put it in the agreed place.

Today I went to grab £40 of the cash (the place I was goi no to only accepted cash and it was for our child) and when he got back from work, he must have counted the cash and made a comment in front of my mum about me owing him £40. He’s since gone to work to do an extra shift and it’s really pissed me off. Our children are hard work- one newborn baby, one disabled child, and it very much feels like it’s ’his’ money, even though it has meant an extra effort from me as I’ve had the children on my own much longer.

Im not sure if I’m just exhausted from lack of sleep from dealing with a newborn as well as normal life. I have a lot of things on my plate at the moment and just generally feel stressed. Last thing I want is an argument but I feel hurt.

What has that got to do with taking the money?

Steal?! Can see that your fully in favour of women knowing their place and being fully financially controlled.

IronEverything
The very fact that he wants to save this in cash and not in the joint account makes it obvious that he knows you'll spend it if it's in there, and you've proved that by constantly wanting to take from it.
He's got children and he's trying to earn and save money. If a woman was posting about a man behaving in the way that you are he would be called all sorts. Your behaviour is terrible and you need to get your spending under control.

I do think this is all dependent on how much money they have in the first place, how much op has access to for the house ( kids) and whether she is a sahm.

He isn’t saying the money isn’t family money. He’s just saying he wants it saved. If he was working overtime so he had more spending money then I’d agree with you. But it sounds like he just wants the family to have a safely net.

He hasn’t put it in their general account so she can’t spend it. She’s then gone to the place she thinks it is to get it to spend, sees it isn’t there and the next day she goes to take it again.

I would consider this my husband's money, and if the roles were reversed I would consider it my money. He's been very clear that he wanted to use it for savings (presumably which will benefit you as a family further down the line) so I absolutely cannot see the problem here.

You don’t have a choice for your male partner to have the babies which often has a. cost in terms of career. And you are fighting against a whole cultural expectation that women do the lion’s share of childcare and the domestic load. Women are in general far more socialised to feel guilty about not doing it.

Also overall traditionally male jobs are generally better paid than jobs that women traditionally do.

Whether you’re a man or not you certainly don’t seem to like women much so you’d probably find your spiritual home in Reddit where you can whinge about how awful women are without any pushback at all instead of lecturing us all on here,

If I’m correct then he’s in full time employment and you are either on mat leave or SAHM.

So at the moment he’s supporting the family financially and you’re looking after the children. He has a usual income that you live off but has decided to pick up some extra shifts to put some money into savings.

He has decided the savings should be separate from the daily money to stop it getting spent (sensible) but instead of opening a savings account, for now he’s just put the cash to one side. He’s said to you that this is savings, not for spending, and presumably you can continue to use the joint bank account for daily costs.

In this time you have dipped into the savings twice, failing once but spending £40 the next time.

YABU. Your husband sounds good with money and there may be a reason he’s felt the need to separate this cash from the daily use account. You should replace the savings you have spent, not because it’s “his” money (he’s not hidden it or kept it out of reach) but because it’s savings for your whole family.

p.s. bless that man for picking up extra shifts so his family have a financial buffer

He specifically told you he wants to save it, and you have immediately spent it - and it sounds like without any communication with him about needing cash specifically.

The nuances of the situation will depend on your overall financial relationship and habits, but for this incident taken in isolation, YABU.

He wouldn’t be able to do these extra overtime shifts without childcare for his children, i.e. you so yes the money should be shared. That’s how it works in our household anyway.

Lots of presumptions on here and the op hasn't come back to clarify, but she clearly states she took the money for convenience only, not because he keeps her short of cash. She also says he wanted to keep the money separately so that it wouldn't be frittered away, at no point does she say that the money saved is just for him. I love the way posters weave their own scenarios based on no facts, the poor man has been accused of being a financialy abusive ahole who is exploiting this poor sahm for his own gain, wtf.
When he asked about the missing money, she should simply have told him that she used some of the cash until she could get to an atm and replace it. The fact that he came straight home and checked it is very telling imo.

Shared doesn’t mean she just gets unlimited opportunities to spend it.

She could also have dropped him a text to say she had to dip into the money, or told him when he got home. The fact is if he hadn’t have checked then he wouldn’t have known it had been spent.

But that's a total moot point as she's their mother and is already caring for them. She's not doing him a favour.

And it doesn't matter what it was spent on. It shouldn't have been taken.

^ This!

was it in a sock???

I feel like I've been transported back to the 1950's reading some of the responses on this thread! There is a lot of focus on what the big man has decided the money will be used for. It is a marriage - whether he does overtime and how that extra money should be spent is not up to him - they should be JOINT decisions. He can't just decide he is doing a few extra hours without the mother of his children agreeing to also put in an extra shift. They are BOTH working the extra hours, both contributing to the household. So no, he doesn't get to decide where that money goes or how it is spent.

I think a little more info about your finances are needed. What would be the situation if he hadn't don't OT? Would you have just gone without what you needed the cash for, or gone into debt? You've dipped, or tried to dip, into this cash reserve twice already without discussing it with him (he wants to build up savings allegedly) so I can see why he's upset. Question is, why is he keeping wads of cash as savings and not putting it in the bank?

You feeling the need to look for it and take money from it makes me wonder what the situation is like with finances.

Why did you look for it when he told you it was in cash?

Why did you take cash from it when it’s meant to be in savings (though an unusual way to save)?

Do you have any income? Does all of that money go into the shared account?

Are there any debts either of you are trying to clear?

Does he really want to save it or does he actually have other plans for it? Putting it away in cash seems a really odd way to go about it.

How do your finances usually work? In general are you a spender and he's a saver or is this out of character?

"It is a marriage - whether he does overtime and how that extra money should be spent is not up to him - they should be JOINT decisions"

By the same token she turned around and said she "needed the extra" money and went and spent it without agreeing it with him either.

We don't know their financial situation; maybe it is precarious and he might not get sick pay etc and is trying to provide a financial buffer they need; she is upset he did the extra shift but happy to spend the extra money. Neither of them are working well as a team

I don't think the OP will be back on this one.

I think more information is needed.

• what was the extra money needed for?
• is there not enough money to cover bills and essentials, therefore the money is not an extra but needs to be used towards bills
• apart from childcare, is there a financial contribution from OP?
• how old is the baby and is she on mat leave or chosen to be a SAHM?
• if choosing to be a SAHM whose choice was this?
• at the end of the post OP says she is doing extra childcare because of him working, so can a discussion be made of OP getting an evening job instead so she works and he does the childcare if that is the issue?

What a stupid comment this is. Quoting yours but it's been made multiple times. The fact that they've come to this arrangement doesn't give her free reign to spend whatever she wants.

It sounds like he wants to save that money, which is very reasonable, especially if you have no savings or very little.

It's not on at all that you decided unilaterally to go and take some of it to do something that only benefited you and your son without discussing it with him first. You made it YOUR money only. I'd be really annoyed if I were him.