Should she earn more??

[blueeeapples]

Appreciate your thoughts on this situation. Both mid 40s, together nearly 20 years, 2 DCs (late teens). Mid 40s, mortgage paid off (3-bed semi), with joint savings of £18k.

Me: Salary: £65k, savings / investments: £137k & pension: £125k

DW: Salary: £12k, savings: £16k & pension: £10k

DW wasn't working while DCs were in primary school. Now they are in in secondary & college, re -entered workforce 2 years ago, working part time earning approx £200 p/w. I think it's DW should work more than the average 8-10 hours she does each week, especially as our pensions aren't great.

DW thinks we're in a good financial situation, and doesn't want to increase hours, especially as we have a large amount of savings.

Am I being unreasonable?

Whenisitsummer

we’re both full time and we’re both exhausted, irritable and hanging on by a thread. Family life is not good, house not great, not bad but only because we’ve forgone having any form of a life- everything is about organising planning and running! The kids don’t get the time they did when dh wasn’t so senior and back when I was pt. Most people I talk to are the same- we regularly have chats on how we’re all on the floor, how do you do it all etc. And I laugh that people assume that teenagers don’t need help/ support/ present parents:/ lifts etc. Try being ft when your teen is depressed and school refusing, we had the most horrifying year ever which ended in dh in a and e with heart issues.

I’m on the other side of this, I stopped work in 1999 and have only done bits and bobs over the years, mostly nothing. We have 3 DDs living at home, in their 20s now with a variety of SEN, I earn around £18k pa as a carer and DH continues to work full time earning £75k

We are ok financially now and for the future but if I earned more it would be helpful I’m sure, and I know DH is resentful that he has had to bear all the financial pressure over the years.

But here is the other side of it - I am there when parents or in-laws are sick, have an appointment, have errands to run; I do everything in the house and all our admin, I do admin for parents and in-laws too. DH makes social plans whenever he wants because he knows I will be at home if anyone is needed for the girls. I take care of the dog, house repairs etc, deliveries, tradesmen, carer issues and I get up in the night for DD2.

So I enable him to live his life outside of work, and my reward for not working is lots of hours to myself sat at home, not doing anything or spending money, being available for whatever is needed.

I couldn’t go back to my professional career, so realistically I could get myself a low paid job that I would hate for a little more money and be miserable, and he would have to change his life completely to pick up everything else I do. It makes no sense, even though I think everyone would see the current situation as unfair on him.

Thinking the same. I must be doing something very wrong somewhere. I cook everything from scratch and still couldn't stretch cooking and cleaning out to 30 hours per week as another poster suggested

This multiplies by the number of kids you have, and also depends on their ages, additional needs etc.

You're own so.

If she's not lazy, she's a busy fool.

I can't help you.

Yes, fine, if it is genuinely split 50-50. But so often this work isn't noticed or accounted for, as is clear just reading this thread.

Your situation is so different to the OP wife. You are a carer to 3 SEN DC plus taking on responsibilities for in-laws that should be your DH responsibility. Your DH is unfair on you, not the otherway around. He should be facilitating you to get a break too, to just be you the person. Not you the mother, carer and wife.

It's very different with the OPs wife who is wanting to continue a life of leasure now the DC are old enough to require little care. She needs to share some of the financial load now as her situation allows for that.

Who would have opted in then to take her place with the children/ house etc ? A full time paid housekeeper ? Did you offer to go 50/50 on the child care / house work/ mental load . Maybe she opted out because she didn’t want two full time jobs with little support .

Some of us have been doing it all as single parents though, with noone to kid into how much free work we are doing each week. All the things you have listed dont amount to a weekly full time roll. A birthday card for a few people a few times a year, insurance once a year that takes me a couple of minutes on a comparison site. Booking a dentist appointment a couple of times a year. None of this is totaling up to the equivalent of getting out and working full time.

I work full time and do it all and still have time to slob in front of the TV for a bit each night and spend my whole weekend days out and about. I do a deep clean every Friday night after work. Cook each night. Lunch is always just easy things. Keep on top of things as and when needed for a short while. Use my work breaks to do things like you mentioned with booking appointments or insurance a couple of times a year. You think making a long list of everything you do throughout a whole year sounds like a lot, but forget other people are doing that all too while working full time with noone to help them and can see it doesn't total what you are making out

The cooking and extra meal for a DC friend thing doesn't take anymore time whatsoever, just more expense. Maybe washing an extra plate, you ain't cooking everyone's meals then doing theirs at the end are you?

@ImaginationDragon Thank you for your comment.

I think the sadness for me is that nobody really ascribes any value to the sort of work that a SAHM might be doing even once the kids are older.

On paper it looks black and white, kids don’t need you therefore wife should earn her keep and stop spongeing off the husband. But all that other stuff needs to be weighed up and shared if the wife is going out to work more.

I think I must be a shit mum because I don’t do all this stuff for my teens.

There will likely be some ego involved if your DW can afford to volunteer currently and work less hours, for her to ask for more hours and give up the volunteering. I think talking about the tangible benefits, and how you frame conversations with third parties around the change, may help. Perhaps look at some statistics around the possibility of something impacting your earnings, and run through some calculations on what the benefit of increasing work hours would be. I'd also be prepared to agree to take on more of the household responsibilities such as shopping, organising birthdays and Christmas. You may also see expenses go up and quality of life go down if your wife is currently a frugal shopper, someone who mends things and makes food from scratch and now needs to double her professional wardrobe, shops for convenience and becomes stressed by work pressure. I know I was a happier and more reasonable person before I had to work full time and juggle everything else.

I'm a lone parent and I do all of this myself. It's not that I don't think it would be nice to have someone do all that, but it has to be agreed between the couple.

I don't send birthday cards, though only messages, and buy my late-teens stuff as I go, treat them, get boxes of chocs for everyone else. I don't iron, I shop online. I must be missing out some of this house admin stuff, I do have quite a flexible job though which makes this easier to do alongside working (which I do six days a week).

It would be lovely to have essentially a housekeeper, but that's surely a luxury with children on the verge of leaving home for uni, and it has to feel fair and be what everyone wants in terms of their choices and personal goals.

But they are in secondary and college now. She needs to work more.

What's her plan when they leave education? Still sit round all day waiting for you to come home?

Get her arse to work and secure her own future. How can you say she's not lazy when she's choosing not to work and contribute more.

You could both retire early. You could reduce your hours. You can top up pensions. You could help your children financially or even holiday more. Sitting at home when children are 15 and 17 is an excuse for someone that doesn't want to work.

Also ages of kids and they should be helping with chores too.

100% if both are able to work full time, then both need to be putting in 50/50 at home. I know many couples who do this perfectly. They are more modern minded men though and the women have kept their careers from the start, so maybe my sample size doesnt accont for ingrained stereotypes. I have heard comments from their elderly relatives saying can you believe she has xxxx doing all the cooking, or can you believe she makes xxxx iron his own shirts, xxxx didnt get his mum a birthday gift, where was DP to not sort this. Shocking when they know full well they both work full time.

This stereotyping doesn't help women with extra pressure, if they are able with DC without extra care needs then they should both be able to relieve the burden to eachother by sharing the financial and domestic load. It has to be give and take.

Again though, there is an exemption where there are additional care needs. That is very much a full time job and you are the 1 needing some extra help there

I've got two DC similar ages to OP and work full time and still manage all life admin for 4 of us

DP helps with the chores, as do DC.

I'm not a lazy arse waiting DP to cover our bills though.

I also squeeze in some voluntary work too.

I appreciate that more children = more work/admin but not so much to take up so much time when older teens with no SEN/additional issues.

@blueeeapples What was she doing in terms of working hours before you had children?

My point is that in most homes there is a large mental load with lots of little things that have to be remembered, planned and executed. I didn't want to assume in OPs case but this is often seen as the woman's work in a heterosexual relationship. Or more accurately, it is often not seen at all by men and doesn't get done unless the woman does it. Surely you have read countless posts on MN about how tiring, irksome and time consuming this can be?!

These sorts of threads get on my nerves.

A husband inviting (wanting) other women to pile on his wife for not doing what he wants in terms of generating income. Posts jumping onboard to accuse the wife of ‘living off’ the op also get on my nerves given both the abundance of research and my anecdotal experience of how far too many men take all the exhaustive and exhausting household and child rearing work for granted. If a man had to pay for that work, it’d run into tens/hundreds of thousands over the child’s lifetime. I also know that late teen children can need as much and sometimes more parental support than when they’re younger. Just so annoying how little the ‘free’ work of raising children and running a household is invisible to so many men. Seemingly to women as well.

Plus, there is no ‘me’ vs ‘her’ savings or pension, it’s "ours".

Because he's been subsidising the lazy sod he lives with I imagine!!!

He'll be subsidising her even more when they retire......

I wfh so do most ‘admin’ - I still don’t understand how tiresome or time consuming it is. Maybe I am a lazy cow…

@Frillysweetpea So as a woman don't accept that you should do it all! It certainly doesn't justify only being able to work 11 hours a week or whatever it is OP's wife does.

YABU to say that you have £65k, savings / investments: £137k & pension: £125k and your wife has £12k, savings: £16k & pension: £10k.
What i think you meant to say was you have 77k savings/ investments together and a combined pension bot of 135k. She is your wife and the reason she has less in those funds is because she earnt less whilst raising your children.

YANBU to think that she should now be increasing her hours, possibly not to full time as teens still need support and perimenopause can be brutal and is presumably happening or on the horizon for her.