AIBU to think my husband loves his job more than us?

[HappyMum4]

Basically, DH has had this job for the last 5 nearly 6 years now, where he travels quite a bit, leaves early, back late, that kind of thing, sometimes weekends, his mobile never stops, and he never seems to be able to stop answering it or checking emails, which he even checks and replies to when he goes to the loo which I find repulsive. He goes abroad a few times a year, sometimes overnight, sometimes 5 days, sometimes longer. He has become significantly more "into" his job, and spends the majority of his time doing it, even when I think he should be giving us his time, it seems to be all he can think about, even to the point where he forgets things that mean a lot to us, his family - when the children have exams, he forgets to ask how they went, forgets names of their friends, forgets what they're doing and when, forgets when school finishes, or after school clubs which have been on the same night for many months, he forgets birthdays, Valentine's, Mother's Day, and now I discover he's forgotten our wedding anniversary which we had planned to celebrate, and he's booked a works event for that evening, he'll be back about midnight. He's away currently for 5 days, flew to the US, for a big sales event, at a huge luxury hotel, could have taken us but claimed it would have cost too much. He couldn't wait to go. And it's clear from the few conversations we've had he's having a ball. No sooner does he fly back from there, three days later he's away again, overnight, on a "team building" go karting-with-the-boys exercise, with a couple of meetings thrown in.
And it's things like he seems to come to life with work, especially when he's away, he just seems so happy and having such a good time, and when he's with us he's a grumpy bastard, total shitbag sometimes, shouts at us, a couple of weeks ago he lied to me about something, which I found out and approached him about, apologies profusely then the next day yells at me and says it's my fault he lied as I make such a fuss.
I'm thinking work means more to him than we do, but he says I'm not understanding, that he is spinning plates and can't remember everything and it's important to remember stuff re his job coz he doesn't want to lose it, says that I should be happy he's having a good time with his colleagues and if I went out with friends he would want me to have a good time. I gave up my job to raise the children and we've moved around so much because of his job, I don't have many friends. Am I being unfair and unreasonable like he says?

Sorry OP but I think you need to move heaven and earth to go back to work. He's not going to change and that doesn't bode well for your marriage. He doesn't sound like the type to play fair in a divorce so I'd get cracking on protecting the interests of you and the kids.

Thank you everyone for your posts, it has really helped me to face up to what I know I have to do. Today he had pretty much most of the day off with his colleagues, I barely heard from him, he went to lunch with them and then walked around for a bit, chatting. Then he came back to hotel, and got changed for dinner. That's when he texted me, and expected an immediate reply. But I ignored it. He went out for a three hour dinner and again, nothing. Then he got back and expected me to be available to FaceTime him immediately. I'm sick of being at his beck and call whilst he's off having fun, meals, drinks, sightseeing etc
A job is my first priority, I am ashamed I have let this go on as long as it has. It's clear he's never going to change. For all his faults, and I know I must sound naive here, but I genuinely don't think there's the OW in this case.
I'm sad to hear other fathers who work actually make their family a priority. I'm glad for their families, but sad for my own. I wish he had s backbone and stood up to his company, stood up for us. 😔

Oh, and he's flying back tomorrow and all of a sudden I'm getting texts saying "I love you so much and I've missed you tonnes", which I never had all the days he was there, and it feels like I came well down the list of priorities, whilst he's with his colleagues, I don't seem to exist, when he's not, he's wanting me to text him etc. Now he'll be all pretend gushy coz he's coming back, I've seen it so many times, I used to buy into it but I'm more aware now. It's just lip service.

Tell him it is time for your lives to balance a bit more, you want a job, and he will have to work out childcare (god forbid he do it himself) while you are at work. Gently suggesthe may wish to look for a more balanced job. I'm sure he will reject this completely and you will need to remind him in strong language that you're his wife not his housekeeper and that your children have two parents.

I can't see him changing unless perhaps you are very very strong. E.g. Get a job, Disappear on holiday solo for a week , report him to social services if you are at work and he hasn't turned up for the children, tell him he is pathetic , any averagely functioning adult could manage this if they wanted to do you think he doesn't care and if he wants to be single could he have the guts to tell you eg if he doesn't appear, get them properly fed / clothes/ do washing, remember basic stuff.

I was in a similar situation to you although I always worked as well. I'm not sure that getting a job though will be the answer as it will make your life more stressful.

You won't get anymore involvement from your DH but will add to your own burden of organisation and childcare. Think carefully if that's something you can cope with or might it make matters worse.

It also isn't true that your DH would have to see more of the children if you split, unless he gives up his job that's just not going to happen, if he doesn't have time to see them he's unlikely to be able to commit to any kind of regular pattern of contact and I don't think that would be fair to your DC.

It's a hard slog being a single parent but I wish I'd bitten the bullet sooner.

Good luck with coming to the right decision for you and your DC

Indeed, from being a 50% father (we both worked full time in the 19 years we were together but both did as much with the children as each other) after our divorce my children's father chose not to haev them even one night a year (although that is if course not the case for most men). However they are given a choice by the courts. You cannot force them to have the children at all or make them turn up.

I would just try to work on letting him know how unhappy you are with all this. Iti s not that you want more help (he could pay for more domestic help, childcare so you can have nights out alone etc) but that you want more of him.

Thanks SandyDenny, you're absolutely right, the responsibility of childcare would still fall on me, if I was working, it would be totally expected for me to drop everything if the kids are ill or have an accident etc. I can hear him now. His job would be more important, his bosses wouldn't understand if he needed time off to look after s sick child. My daughter broke her collar bone in PE at school in March, I got the call, took her to a&e, he was local and really could have left the person he was with to meet us at the hospital, kept watching the door hoping he would walk through it but no. It's just stuff like that that happens so often that makes me think he loves his job more. If we were the priority he says we are, surely he'd treat us differently?
I'm going to try and have at least an overnight away somewhere, even if I have to do it alone. I have a pal who lives away, she's invited me to have a few drinks one night and a girly indulgence day the next day. Normally I would have declined, felt guilty. Not now.

I don't think there's necessarily an OW. I do think he loves the buzz of being 'important' and 'indispensable' that the constant calls give him and the freedom of getting away from family responsibilities while not needing to feel guilty for it because it's 'work', and that he takes out the stress of being 'on' all the time at work (because even though a lot of it is positive it will be stressful now and again) on you at home. I expect he buys into a long-hours and 'passion' culture (as someone says above) a bit more than he need, his bosses love him for it (the caveat being what a PP pointed out - are his earnings indicative of this?) and encourage it, and on the virtuous (in his eyes)/vicious (for your family life) circle goes.

Tbh, I do think a couple of your expectations are a little unrealistic - time off for something like a (non-'big') wedding anniversary isn't always feasible; my dh wouldn't necessarily leave work if our child had had a non-life-threatening accident and he knew I was there dealing with it (neither would I expect him to); and I do think it's fairly normal for the parent whose work life is less impacted by time off to be the one who deals with child illness most of the time, so if and when you do return to work I wouldn't necessarily be expecting 50/50 child sick days IIWY. But I think these are things you would feel differently about if you felt there was more balance overall.

Talk to him. Separate the issue of your career from how his absence makes you feel. Say you want to retrain as XXX (would be a good idea to have done some research into courses etc first) and that will have YYY consequences for him - nothing that jeopardises his core job, but something that would mean a degree of accommodation around getting home/travelling etc. As a distinct issue, talk about how detached you feel he is and ask him for his perspective - not to allow him to brush it off, but to gain an insight into how he sees it.

I don't think this is really about his work. Work allows him to justify his opting in and out of family life as he sees fit but I reckon that even if his job wasn't so 'full on', he would just find something else (a sport, socialising with friends, a time consuming hobby) to throw himself into. It's about believing he can (and has the right to) have the best of both worlds, the comfort and security of a wife and family but all the freedom of single life. The problem is, this comes at your expense because the more freedom he has, the less you have. You can't go out and socialise regularly or earn your own money because he's off doing his own thing and not sharing the domestic/childcare load.

Obviously someone needs to provide financially, but working shouldn't prevent him from showing basic consideration or being a proper Husband and Father to his children. Letting you know his travel plans in advance, putting important family events on his calendar so he doesn't forget and not being a grumpy twat on his rare days off- these things are not much to ask! It's common courtesy. But clearly he thinks that because he earns the money, he's doing his bit and doesn't need to make anymore effort than that.

In your shoes, I would prioritise getting back into paid employment. It will do him good to see that your life does not have to revolve around him and his plans. It will also protect you financially in the event that he continues to be a selfish cockwomble and you finally decide you've had enough.

Yorks last paragraph in spades

You've had lots of great advice already, but I just wanted to pick this up from one of your early posts:

whenever I try to discuss stuff with him about this, he makes me feel it's not normal for me to be feeling this way

This is a really shitty thing to do. It shouldn't matter what he thinks is normal. He should care that you're unhappy and want to change things, not claim that you're not normal and should just conform

You're his wife, a real person, and if you're unhappy about something (anything) then he should be happy to talk about it and see how the two of you can work together to make you more happy. IME I am often 'more happy' simply because I've been listened to and we've jointly discussed whether changes are possible or not, regardless of whether anything then changes.

whenever I try to discuss stuff with him about this, he makes me feel it's not normal for me to be feeling this way

I expect it's also because he doesn't want anything to change, he has a lovely life, why would he want it to change in any way? Which just proves how selfish he is. His happiness is at the detriment of yours.

My DH works and he has starting saying no to extra work, because it impacts on family time. So no, your DH's behaviour is not normal, however he tries to convince you otherwise.

Normally I would have declined, felt guilty. Not now
Why on earth would you feel guilty?
He most certainly feels not guilt at all when he swans off all the time.
Take that offer.
Get out there and enjoy it.
You 'D'H sounds like an arse by the way!

I'm so sorry you're going through this. It isn't reasonable or fair.

I think that this happens to a lot of marriages, only too many wives rationalise it as "He's doing it for the family!". Actually, it's absolutely blindingly obvious that the man in question is quite selfish, doesn't really enjoy the hard work of being a parent, doesn't find family life that fulfilling, yet doesn't want a divorce either, because it's convenient to have a bunch of people who love you unconditionally whenever you do feel like tuning in to that.

I know several women with husbands like this, often SAHPs who try to claw back some dignity and sense of self by having lunch with the girls, shopping, and keeping a beautiful house. Ultimately, though, it's not really an equal bargain because they don't have the status, or the economic power, or the chance to opt out of the hard graft when it does hit. Life can be far, far better than this, OP.

Why would you feel guilty about going out with a friend? You are still a person outside of being a mum. Does he make you feel guilty?

I suppose I feel guilt because the children don't want me to go away, they say their dad is away a lot and they don't want their mum disappearing off too (also I suspect it's not much fun when dad looks after them, because he is so quick tempered it often ends badly, they do something or say something that winds him up and the whole thing blows).
I totally get the hospital thing, it was non life threatening, I guess I just hoped being not far away and being able to (in my head) leave the person he was with, I just thought it would be a nice thing to do, to come be with us, see her, but you're right, I was being unfair to expect it. Also I didn't necessarily want him to take time off for the anniversary, it was more that he forgot it, and booked a world event for that evening when the event could have easily been booked for a different evening and we could have gone out that night or done something. He's at work during the day, so didn't expect him to take that day off, but he was free in the evening until he booked the event, and it just hurts that he forgot, it feels like there's no room in his head for us.
I do agree I think work gives him something we can't provide. We obviously don't make him feel important enough, or special, this 5 days away, the company has made a tonne of money at this sales convention, and his team particularly has done really well, so there'll be lots of back slapping and high fiving and being told he's awesome. It's a buzz he can't get at home. For a start, I don't think he's awesome any more. He's a shitty person quite often. He's quite an explosive temper and I don't feel like I can talk to him anymore as it always ends badly. Then it's the same pattern. He apologises profusely, says "it's not ok" that he's been like that, says a bunch of nice stuff, he loves me etc, last week he said he wants to grow old and decrepit together. That he'll change. But his actions betray him. I think he found it hard to confirm to family life, he was always one of the lads, you know the ones who are part of a band of brothers who are each other's best men and ushers, every weekend the same, down the pub, nightclubbing, pizza or kebab on way home, weeknights in the local playing darts or snooker, he said he didn't want to be the sad old man at the end of the bar in the local who had no-one, he wanted to have someone, he was never one of these men who pushed for kids, I think he could have quite happily not bothered, the family was more me wanting it, I know he could have said no, I was the one who asked if we could try for kids, for each one (we have four), but I think now he finds it stifling, because we've moved around a lot, he's left his gang of mates, they're getting on with their lives as normal, just not including him, and that hurts him, I know, so I think he relishes these weekends away as it's a very male-dominated company, so lots of time at the bar massaging each other's ego, like I mentioned, no sooner will he land he's off for an overnight with go karting, I've seen the snails sent by his team to each other about it and to be honest, it does give a real insight into the pysche of the grown male, lots of "you're gonna eat my dust", "I'm gonna tap you on the shoulder when I lap you", "I'm going to practice on whatever racing video game he mentioned, and Wear my racing shoes", and I just think these are grown adult men with families (well, some are), supposed professionals, and they're acting like teenagers, but again, am I being unreasonable? They're just having a bit of fun, letting off steam. I guess I'm just sick of always feeling left behind, excluded.

You see the family as your life
He sees it as part of his life
Until you get more going on in your life, ithe will feel imbalanced and you will be unhappy

I agree with PPs in that he has totally checked out of family life. I doubt he is much of a 'family man' in that, while he loves his kids in an abstract/cerebral way, he just can't be arsed with the day to day grind of child rearing and has successfully offloaded it all on you. You may find that he reverts to being a better husband once the kids have left home, but that may be too late...

I'd prioritise yourself. Get a job if you want to. Do a course etc. Focus on your kids and yourself and take your time weighing up what you want to do about the bigger picture.

Beachykean sums it up perfectly.

Trouble is, because you've both fallen into these established patterns of polarised roles- he's the big shot high earner, you're at home- it's going to take a lot of adjustment to rebalance things.

And- being totally honest Here, HappyMummy, because it you seem very receptive to changing things, the adjustment will be hard for both of you

You're talking about finding work, but your automatic assumption is it needs to fit round the kids. That will immediately wipe out an awful lot of opportunities. I think you need to be looking at the whole package- paying for childcare, getting your dh on board more responsibility at home and starting to look at yourselves as equal partners.

This will no doubt be a massive shock to him because he's got used to pretty much ignoring his family. But there will also be times when it's a shock to you... the kids might gripe about you not always being the one to drop them off, or be at home straight after school. You may have mornings when you'd rather potter round at home than get yourself off to work and have to meet deadlines.

I'm not saying this to put you off- just being realistic about recalibrating a relationship which has been stuck in a cycle of very prescribed roles. But you clearly are determined to change the status quo- quite rightly imo because I think it's important for children to see both parents invested in family life rather than one 'raising' them and the other effectively absent

BeachyKeen that's a really interesting perspective for me, you're totally right, I have nothing else in my life, so him, the kids, they are my life, and I've let that happen, my own mother did exactly that, made her kids her life and couldn't cope in the slightest when we moved on, flew the nest as it were, and now, the grandkids are her life. I never wanted to be like that, I always felt I'd be happy to let them go, but I'm going to end up the same way at this rate. And I think if I had something else going on, it might make him feel like he has to make more effort, perhaps see me as more independent and not so reliant on him. Thank you for that.

And BabbityWabbit, again, I never realised, but even thinking about s job, I'm thinking about one that will make his life easier, working it around the kids so I still have to be there to do that side of things. I'll just be told though I know what his job entails, lots of early mornings and late evenings, lots of travelling, so why have I decided now to make it impossible for him. circumstance led us to this position, where I took the maternity leave, then we decided I'd leave work to raise the children as it worked out I would be working to pay a childminder, and that made no sense, so he kept on with his job, and years have passed where I should have been getting back out there, getting my own life back on track instead of just watching him develop his and feeling resentful. I've effectively handed it to him on a plate, made it acceptable that those roles would be established as the status quo, and never made him responsible from the start for sharing the parenting duties, I've taken that side totally on board and he's dipped in and out, more out now than in, because the job fulfils him in a way we don't and so he's given himself over to it, the job is like a mistress, he gives it his attention and affection, thinks about it all the time, spends as much time with it as possible, coz that's where he wants to be.

"circumstance led us to this position, where I took the maternity leave, then we decided I'd leave work to raise the children as it worked out I would be working to pay a childminder, and that made no sense, so he kept on with his job, and years have passed where I should have been getting back out there, getting my own life back on track instead of just watching him develop his and feeling resentful."

HappyMummy- I wish all women could read your very honest insightful post when weighing up whether to return to work. This discussion happens so often on MN, and it's always pointed out that many women do return to work even if in the short term they don't make any money, precisely to avoid the kind of scenario you're now facing. It's so so easy to just realise several years in that you've let a situation develop which you never wanted and don't enjoy.

Anyway, you can't rewrite the past, but clearly you have great insight, you know what you need to do and you also have the example of your mother which you know you don't want for you and your kids.

You're right- you shouldn't be thinking in terms of just trying to find whatever work will fit round the kids and not impinge on your dh in any way. Any work that fits that bill is likely to be menial and minimum wage... so your dh will persist in thinking that your needs are less important and that you will always be around to do all the childcare and domestic grind.

What are you passionate about? Where do you see yourself in 3/5/10 years time?

Start from that, not from what will fit round him and the kids

I think you've hit the nail on the head with the comment about asking to have children - four times. I suspect he's never been bothered about the whole family/kids thing but as it was you doing all the work it didn't make any difference to him to go along with it. Sadly going out and getting anything other than a very part time job seems pretty much impossible for you to do. Your options are (1) suck it up and spend his money whilst finding hobbies/work/friends/interests to improve your life or (2) leave him

Thank you BabbityWabbit, I appreciate everything you've said, I'm really starting to see things differently now, and thank you jelliebellie, I thought my options were limited but I'm feeling more and more like I have every right to make a go of something that's mine, try and feel successful, in some way, a sense of achievement, I have been thinking so much about this, and I think there was a real psychological aspect that I never realised before about having the kids, the fact that it came from me, almost like the child that asks for a pet and promises they'll look after it, like I asked for a family and felt because I'd done that, somehow it was more my responsibility than his, I never realised this before. But he did agree, so therefore he does need to bear some of the burden, which sounds an awful way to describe raising a family, and so many times I've sat and gone over that phrase from the Croods movie where she says "this isn't living, it's just not dying", that sums up exactly how I feel, and I want to start living, not just existing to service everyone's else's needs. I want/need to have something to think about other than my family, and I need to push myself to see what I can achieve, feel that sense of satisfaction, or dare I say feel important and like I matter.