DH is expecting us to live seperately in the future

[soshockedandhurt]

I thought we were pretty happy. We have 3 DCs between 4 and 10.

We've been discussing moving for ages and considering moving the 'family home' to somewhere far from DH's work and he'd then do a weekly commute. So far we've decided against it as DH wants to see the DCs more than that (he also sacrificed career progression so he could be around more - if he went 'hardcore' and worked for a big hitter in the industry he could double his salary but at the cost of family life).

At the moment I am a SAHM and DH takes the DCs to school every morning and is home for dinner almost every evening, and is the 'main' parent on the weekends.

But it's on the table for when they're all in secondary school for example, which is the 'natural' time to make such a move as DC1 could do A-levels in the new location as the younger ones started secondary.

So every now and again I'll look on property sites for what's available in the areas we're vaguely considering as longterm prospects and send DH the links - "wow look at this place", sort of thing.

For example we're considering Holmfirth and St Ives with DH's work in London.

Last night we'd been watching some property programme where they ended up in the middle of nowhere, and I said how beautiful it would be but what a nightmare to get back to from London, and DH basically said that he sees that move as a step on the path to seperating, and he's expecting us to have totally seperate households by the time the DCs leave school, and "all we have in common is the DCs" and basically he sees our longterm future as being apart.

I am reeling. How can he have this planned now?! We are a young family!

He sort of made it sound like this plan is all that's getting him through the day, and that he doesn't want to be with me (but he does want to be with the DCs), and is biding his time! Like posts I sometimes see on here where the woman is playing the 'long game'!

He doesn't want to seperate now, he was horrified when I asked that.

What the?!

What a strange reaction from the OP
Asks for advice, gets a range of comments on both "sides", and hides thread. Enough time has passed for her to have a further conversation with the DH to find out what exactly he meant by it all, but looks like she prefers to assume the worst.

Op clearly
Doesn't give a sit about how her husband actually feels about the situation and has hidden the thread now.

I can't believe she is still blaming him. You are the one pushing and sending
Links. Grow up if you want to save Your relationship.

Your husband probably does
Feel like your cash cow

Relationships can survive the 'one parent working a way in the week' set up, but they have to be rock solid - it doesn't sound like yours is so that idea has to be scrapped.

Personally, I'd be selling the London flat and buying a non-dream home in Kent with a short commute to London where you could see each other every night and be a team (even if he can't do the school run and the evening child care).

Surely not every school within a daily commute from London has a knife crime problem?

I mean Yorkshire and Cornwall?! Poor bloke! As if there are no better schools closer to London. A big house won't cure
Your Cfs either and you might end up resenting him or he you?

This thread has now made
Me
So

The issue here isn't whether living separately in the week is a good idea per se, but that you have different ideas about what it means. I live separately from my husband in the week due to their being no work for him where we live. You need to have a very frank conversation about what the future is for both of you. I also don't see what him doing childcare on the weekend has to do with anything, good, so he should. I think the more important issue is that one of you loves and wants a future with the other, the other is seeing a long-term future of separation.

I don't feel sorry for the OP's husband, if he doesn't want them to live separately in the week as he fears it will lead to separation, he needs to say that. I am not hearing that though, I'm hearing someone who perhaps thought you were all on the same page about the marriage being on its way out. Talking is the only way to know what he is thinking

My dad is in greater London and no knife crime in his area. It sounds as though they currently have 2 properties between them anyway his flat and the current family home, so selling both and buying one with a 35min rail commute from London shouldn't be difficult, There are still reasonably priced parts of greater London with good rail or Tube access.
I've lived in city, town and country, and was loneliest in the country as there is less to do there and it's harder to find people you click with. Great for holidays and days out. If you have a chronic illness urban areas are usually better as better transport links and nearer medical facilities.

I get the feeling he was testing the waters to see whether you agreed with him or not. If you want to save your marriage, you need to emphasize that you really want to spend the rest of your life with him, that you love him and that living in a nice area does not take priority over you living together. Have a serious chat with him and hear him out on the reasons why he thinks you don't have much in common beyond the children. If he's being perfectly serious, then you have some fairly difficult decisions ahead of you. Best wishes.

What an odd response from the OP. There may be trouble ahead.....

I'd go with Lydia Wickham's advice btw.

Leave him and file for custody, move far far away and have a nice life, he is a fuckwit

Is that a carefully considered opinion based on reading the thread?

The worrying thing is the OP could probably achieve her aims by doing just this.

I don't know about that, WMW. If I've understood correctly, they live in his mother's property and the only place they own is the husband's former flat, which they rent out. If they separated now, the only money the OP would have to buy a home anywhere would be a percentage of the selling price of the flat. It might buy a small house in the country, it might not.

I'm not sure how nice a life anyone would have. The kids would miss their father. The father would miss seeing his kids every day, even if he didn't miss his by-now-ex wife (and he might not, if he felt she's cut him out of her life). The OP would be trying to cope with living in the country, ferrying kids around, possibly driving miles to shop, running the house on her own, all while still quite possibly suffering from ill health. Can't see any winners here.

I'd missed the rent free at his mums' house bit, but would still have thought living there until he wants to go full time/ concentrate on career and then sell his flat and buy somewhere within an easy daily commute with his higher salary and proceeds for the sale would be possible. For most people chronic fatigue isn't life long so the OP may be able to work herself in a few years.

One of the oddest things about this thread is that the OP is planning the big rural move for when her DC are aged 11 to 16 or thereabouts. They may want to 'play out' now at primary school age but they certainly won't want to six years in the future; instead they'll be obsessed with texting their friends, checking Facebook, going shopping and trying to get into dodgy gigs. It's just really bizarre timing.

Is there some big black hole of sink estates and rotten schools between London and the supposed 'rural idylls' of Yorkshire and Cornwall that no-one has told me about?

And I'm especially intrigued that OP is a city-girl, yet feels confident that moving to 'the countryside' will be a good thing for her kids - because of course all country folk are of the in-and-out of each others houses, borrow a cup of sugar, it takes a village to raise a child types!

Very true what MooncupGoddess says! Whilst young children may love the countryside, most teenagers will thoroughly resent being stuck in it. Their friends will be scattered around in various different villages and they can't meet up without having to use Mum & Dad's Taxi Service.

I grew up in a very rural area and hated it once I got to about 13. Had to beg lifts off my parents to go anywhere as there was no public transport, couldn't bike after dark as the roads were really terrible and traffic just whizzed by. Hated the fact I couldn't just walk round and knock on my friends doors and hang out with them. If the OP moves when the children are older I doubt they'd particularly enjoy it and may resent the fact they left London to go to a sleepy village where there is not as much going on.

IMO OP you need to sit down and really talk to your DH about what you both want and why. If he really sees you separating in the future you need to decide if you want to wait around for that to happen and if you can stand to live like that.

I live in easy commute of London, no knife crime at DCs schools. Housing is expensive, but you could buy a less desirable home (ex-council or big flat over shops) in a very good school catchment.

Also kids are looking forward to moving to the countryside? Well maybe now, but by the time they are teens, shops and friends will hold a stronger pull (in my experience). Also moving when the oldest is about to do A'levels, sounds rather late.

But of course OP doesn't want to tell us what DH said, or what is really going on.

I do know people who do this - work in London and family live in the sticks. They are usually very high earners (work in the legal field)

I would hate this sort of life (from all sides) - it seems very cliched and there is alot of guff spoken about how London is so bad - couldn't raise children there when all they are doing is not thinking for themselves just following a well worn pattern (usually middle class but not exclusively)

I have to say we're kind of in this situation. We moved from Bham to small town on welsh borders when kids were baby / pregant with dc2. My husband's work is now primarily based in the South East but our lives are settled and happy here.
He can work Tues - Thurs at the office and, most weeks, Mondays and Fridays at home. I think if you're going to try the weekly stay away you have to a)keep in touch and talk lots b) make time together at weekends (all of you) and c) make sure you build in nice family holidays to get those concentrated periods of time when you're all together. It's not easy but it can be done.

I read this in the Guardian.

It's from Top five regrets of the dying

m.guardian.co.uk/ms/p/gnm/op/sylE8SNIeMrKCN7UW24NA7A/view.m?id=15&gid=lifeandstyle/2012/feb/01/top-five-regrets-of-the-dying&cat=most-read

1. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.

"This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children's youth and their partner's companionship. Women also spoke of this regret, but as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence."

Ooh, those are good Truckulent - thanks for the link

• not completely convinced by the interpretation, but the actual 5 regrets give much food for thought

Keep in touch with friends ... Allow yourself to be happy .. Don't work too hard

< ponders, rubs chin thoughtfully ... >

My cousin and his wife did this sort of. He is a very high earner and works in the city but she wanted to be a SAHM in the country so they live in Oxford and he commutes to London when he can. But to do this he has to get up at 5am and get home at 8pm so mostly he stays in London and sees her at the weekend. Not only this but he wanted their children to go to boarding school so now she is completely on her own in an isolated village with nothing to do all week! Don't know if they're happy or not though. Seems to me they would have been better off living on edge of London, her working too possibly and I wouldn't have my kids to be at boarding school even if I could have afforded it.

Anyway, I agree with the posters - it doesn't make any sense - the OP is obviously reliant on her husband for childcare, he obviously enjoys spending time with the children and they do with him and yet she wants to relocate miles and miles away. There are plenty of good schools near London and the rural house isn't worth the marriage breaking up. He would be exhausted working all week long hours and they travelling for 5 hours or more each weekend. Plus she wouldn't be able to cope. Plus, planning it for 6 years down the line is mad - the kids will want to be in a city when they are teenagers!

I think he is reacting to her saying she wants to move away and that is why is 'bemused' by her reaction.

You don't need a 'big house' anyway!

Take the 'big house' out of the equation and you'll have no problem, unless that is, your DH isn't that into you anymore.

I'd have thought in these changing times, with increases in the price of energy, the drain on the environment, taxes and so on, 'big houses' were a bit Jurassic these days.

Going to reply to the OP in case she changes her mind about returning to the thread...

I'm puzzled by your second post where you say 'Perhaps 'rural idyll' is how you feel about it. I think I'll be lonely, but it's worth it for the DCs to go to good schools, get to play out, etc.' To start with it sounded like you were all for it! If you weren't sure, why did you keep sending your DH details of houses in these places?

So given your statement above, it now seems as if neither you nor your DH actually wants to do this dream plan anymore. In that case, you don't have to! It's actually a more positive situation if that's how it is, as you can have a discussion about how you both want your future to be. That may or may not be together, but it is particularly ironic that you might wreck your marriage for some notion that in reality nobody actually wants to come true.