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Original poster

DP mocking my job applications

157 replies

SpottedGurnard · 28/08/2012 23:10

We have moved to Devon for DPs job, great for him but bad for me as the overall majority of jobs down here are minimum wage.

One minute he's telling me that I need to apply for every job available right now, the next he's mocking an application that I'm doing that is a little better paid than most but is effectively customer service on an information desk at a university.

I have spent a lot of time on the application as I was excited to have found a job that isn't minimum wage and that will mean that I can meet lots of new people and be in a young environment (I am not too many years out of university myself so would fit into a university environment).

Now I just feel a little bit shit and like I can't win. By moving down here I have given up any chance of getting a good job for the next few years- there just aren't the same kind of jobs here as you get in the South East.

AIBU to feel very fed up with him right now?

OP posts:
gettingeasier · 29/08/2012 07:27

Revolting.

My XH was like this looking down on what I did and constantly slyly knocking it /telling me I could do better then in the next breath calling me a dunce ot taking the piss

My old crone advice would be to think carefully about what this behaviour over something as fundamental as your work says about him given you left the SE etc and dont shy away from what you see

Proudnscary · 29/08/2012 07:42

I'm sorry OP but your 'D'P is a cunt.

Seriously.

You relocate for his job and all he does is belittle and mock you when you are trying to find a fulfilling and relatively well paid job?

I'm not sure what to say really. What's the rest of your relationship like. Honestly?

fuzzpig · 29/08/2012 07:52

That's really nasty. It'd be one thing to say "this job is not good enough for you, why not wait for something better?" (however impractical that might be) but it's quite another to criticise something that you are planning to do, not least because you're only doing it due to supporting his new job!

I had to get a job when DH had to give up work due to an injury. Just like you I applied for everything, including one that we both knew was quite a way 'beneath me' in terms of my capabilities/academic level. DH never dreamed of criticising it and although I didn't get it (I got something I really love but via the same scheme) he still said he was really grateful and proud of me for applying, and working really hard to get money coming in even if it meant doing a job I hated, for the sake of the family. That's a normal loving reaction, IMO. Slagging off the job you're going for is not normal, it sounds like he's criticising you TBH even if it's not his intent.

Anyway this job sounds good for you especially socially and it could have great future prospects as universities are so huge. DH started as a Christmas temp in a store once (despite being 'above' it) and within 5 years was managing his own successful branch. Starting 'low' doesn't have to mean staying there!

Catsmamma · 29/08/2012 07:55

he sounds like a complete pillock tbh.

Does he often find humour in putting people down, or is it just you he torments?

zookeeper · 29/08/2012 08:10

I don't like the sound of him at all. I don't understand him suggesting you move abroad. Does he mean you go alone?

Either he doesn't care enough about you to want you to stay in Devon with him and make things work or he just wants to make you miserable . I agree he sounds potentially abusive.

OneHandFlapping · 29/08/2012 08:16

I'm not sure why you have scuppered your own career chances to move with this man if you have no DCs. As you are not married, there is no financial protection for you if you split up.

CogitoErgoSometimes · 29/08/2012 08:48

YANBU and he sounds like a complete arse. When you have to ask if someone mocking your choices and belittling your ambition is OK - especially when that someone is supposed to love you and treat you as an equal - then there is something fundamentally wrong with the relationship. Undermining behaviour is not only unpleasant it is often used by abusive men as a way to keep a partner under control. If he keeps it up your self-esteem will be all over the carpet before long. So, if he laughs at you again, tell him in no uncertain terms to bugger off.

TheDoctrineOfEnnis · 29/08/2012 08:53

OP, I am similarly concerned as others on this thread. Is any of this ringing any bells with you?

AndieMatrix · 29/08/2012 09:00

OP I'm also concerned by the behaviour your DP is showing. If he can't support you in the way you have supported him then he does not deserve you. It is classic beginnings of emotional abuse. On one hand he's saying "yes,apply for everything" and the next minute belittling you for making an effort (fully agree that it's jealousy and fear that you may make new friends and rebuild a support network that will all say the same as us....leave!!)

ChaoticismyLife · 29/08/2012 10:27

What a nasty bastard.

You've given up the chance of a good career for his job and all he can do is belittle and mock every attempt you make to get a job. I think you should consider moving back the to SE.

Yokel · 29/08/2012 10:31

There are sod all jobs in Devon, OP.

Go back to the South East!

BeeBee12 · 29/08/2012 10:38

The vast majority of jobs in devon and cornwall are around minimum wage regardless of qualfications and experience.I would go for the job your going for public sectors probably your only chance of earning anymore.Hes being an idiot its like that for everyone in those areas.

FergusSingsTheBlues · 29/08/2012 10:38

Go! Go abroad! Travel and so something brilliant - you don´t need to be stuck somewhere struggling to find work with somebody like that on your back! One day you´ll have kids and you WILL be limited to what you can do and where you can go. I swanned off to USA in a fit of pique when I was 20 and had a great old time. Came back, dumped the boyfriend and moved on.

Margerykemp · 29/08/2012 10:52

I'd never move to the sticks for a man's job. Look what happened to Sylvia Plath after she moved to Devon...

Original poster
SpottedGurnard · 29/08/2012 11:04

In answer to a lot of questions, yes there are lots of red flags :-(

He told me that he would help to support me if I couldn't find a job (obviously I want to work but it may take a while or it may not pay enough to pay for rent and much else). Now that we have moved down here he has said that he will only help me out if I am "trying hard enough" to get a job- so presumably he gets to decide.

He went and spent £300 on a jacket over the weekend while I am wondering how I am going to be able to afford to eat this month. He is a Dr and so has a good career path ahead of him and has no fucking idea what its like to not be able to get a job.

I moved to Devon because the plan was only for me to stay a year and hopefully get into medical school in that time (something I really want to do, nothing tk do with him). But I have just bombed an entry exam so its looking more and more unlikely this year.

This travelling thing, I have no idea where its come from! I am the least likely person to go travelling- I hate heat!

OP posts:
Yokel · 29/08/2012 11:07

So...let me get this straight. You are living together in Devon, but you are each paying for your own rent/food etc? And you ditched your job to follow him?

Have they recruited into your old job yet OP? Do you think they would have you back?

FairPhyllis · 29/08/2012 11:53

You are not married, sounds like you don't have DC, you've got ambitions for the future, you've been recently employed. Sounds like you would thrive without him, and if I were you I would seriously consider going back to the SE.

He'll only help you out if you "try hard enough"? WTF? OP, he doesn't see you as a family unit. He sees you as something to amuse himself with by exerting control over you and seeing how high you'll jump.

AndieMatrix · 29/08/2012 12:07

SpottedGurnard He sounds very selfish and, as FairPhyllis said, it seems you're a plaything for him, not an equal partner.
Leave him and follow your ambitions. You sound very capable and intelligent. Don't let him take that away!

fuzzpig · 29/08/2012 12:10

SG, I remember your recent thread now. I posted on it but under a different name. You'd mentioned that upcoming exam, has that happened yet?

GetOrfAKAMrsUsainBolt · 29/08/2012 12:13

He sounds absolutely awful, I wouldn't be pissed off with him, I would be furious.

You have moved to the arse end of nowhere where there are no jobs, or the jobs that are available the salary is pathetic (and I know - I used to live there and moved away for precisely that reason) and he is belittling you.

He sounds like a ghastly control freak.

I would bugger off back to the SE and leave him in Devon on his own, the arse.

CogitoErgoSometimes · 29/08/2012 12:16

So you left a situation where you were relatively equal status to move hundreds of miles west where you are now very much the inferior partner, reliant on him for money and suddenly he's being very condescending about what he will allow you to do and not do? What happened on the trip down the M3? Someone make him God Almighty?

As you are technically single and don't seem to have kids I only have one word for you. RUN

Middy86 · 29/08/2012 12:23

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

FergusSingsTheBlues · 29/08/2012 12:26

I didnt mean just travelling, I meant working - i thought you were discussing going abroad for an internsip?

Middy86 · 29/08/2012 12:27

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

WhereYouLeftIt · 29/08/2012 13:26

"He told me that he would help to support me if I couldn't find a job ... Now that we have moved down here he has said that he will only help me out if I am "trying hard enough" to get a job- so presumably he gets to decide. He went and spent £300 on a jacket over the weekend while I am wondering how I am going to be able to afford to eat this month."

Do yourself a favour, and take the advice that you would give to a friend who came to you saying that. He doesn't care about you. Moving to Devon was a mistake, but one that is easily rectified. Move back to the SE and get your life back on track. Chalk it up to experience and be grateful he showed his true colours before you were irredeemably linked to him for life through children and probably a nervous breakdown, certainly a demolished self-esteem.