Husband moved to his cottage abroad - permanently?

[Francesca2020]

I’m feeling conflicted. We’ve been married 36 years, have adult children. I’m nearly 60, working part time. He’s a fit and healthy 80 year old and was visiting his cottage in his home village in Ireland before lockdown started. I’m working so have stayed in our city house in S England. We have been apart about 12 weeks now. He says he wants to stay there through the summer too, obviously sensible from a covid19 point of view. However, for ten years he has been travelling there and back regularly and recently more so. Since July 2019 he’s been with me 1/3 of the time and there 2/3, so it seems he prefers to be in an isolated place by the sea rather than being with me. I could only join him for a few days last summer because of long duration building work. I love him and miss him a lot; he says he misses me but that I will be fine here without him because I’m ‘capable’ (his word). I want to respect his wishes to be where he is, but I also feel abandoned and am thinking I should try to create a life for myself here without him. I am independent and confident and fed up with a part-time marriage, but feel very attached to him still. Has anyone experienced anything similar?

What’s wrong then with just accepting and adapting to how it is now - evolving it season by season?

Do you think he wants to come back to the UK at all or just for short visits or just for the winter?

Are you missing his company more now because you are not seeing your friends currently or working due to lockdown?

What does he do with himself in the UK when you are working, out with friends and involved in cultural events?

Why can't you afford to retire? Do you and your husband not share money? How much longer do you plan on working for?

I think Gutterton has said it well.

What does your dh do when he's in the UK and you're working?

PP saying no one's considering you in this, but your dh is 80 years old, he may well be fit and healthy, but if he's not the social type (as you've mentioned) then it can be bloody tiring doing it.

I also wonder if you can just accept and evolve with it if you definitely don't want to divorce.

Something similar occurred with my friend's parents with a 19 year age gap. Around 80, her Dad moved to a country smallholding and her Mum continued living an active life in town, travelling and doing all sorts of things. They were far away from one another and her Mum visited him periodically, but she just wasn't ready for the quieter retired life.

It might seem selfish on your DH's part, but as I've seen my parents (Dad and step-Mum) age, I've realised that there's a massive difference between 70 and 80. It's great that your DH is so fit and healthy, but he's elderly now.

I think that PP's advice to carry on living your more active life, while also seeing him as often as you want to, is probably wise. You can't turn back time, OP, and he's at a different life stage to you.

Wishing you all the best.

@Gutterton I am missing him just as I always have done, because I love him and enjoy his company. I left my full time teaching post last July and took a three day job in order to spend more time with him. Our son moved back home for lockdown and I’m still teaching three full days online and thus engaging with colleagues and pupils, so I’m anything but bored. My job is not far from home; it means that in normal circumstances I would potentially spend four days with him and three days a week would be home by late afternoon. On my working days he would go for walks around the city, look at buildings, meet up with one of the children or a friend.
He does join me for some of the arts activities (and I’m not as busy doing those as it must have appeared from what I wrote). When he’s here we spend 4/5 of our time together.

I have a 20 year age gap with my husband and quite frankly wouldnt stand for this treatment ! Age is noexcuse for a one sided decision to essentially seperate You've been together a long time divorce wouldnt leave you badly treated financially Talk to him

Feel feee to continue commenting.
In the meantime, thank you, all of you, for your considered, helpful and honest answers. They have helped me to look at the situation from different angles. I shall spend some time reflecting on various options, which will help me start a discussion about a future which works for us both.

@THEDEACON Just seen your post (!). Thanks for your input - interesting from someone in a similar relationship, age-wise.

I think it’s not about you but more about him trying to reconnect to his home place.He feels happier in Ireland by the cottage.He is nearing the end of his life and wants to reconnect with the people and places he grew up in.
I have lived in Ireland,it’s a different place to the UK.Friendlier, the people hold traditions and there is a different atmosphere I can’t explain but it’s built into the people.They never truly settle in the UK,I imagine it would be the same for you if you lived in ireland wanting to live in the UK in your 80s.
Why not compromise and live in both places

You've been married for such a long time... but why are you the one who can't afford to retire? Surely your finances and assets are shared? What would he say if you decided to join him there permanently? It might be illuminating to suggest it, and at least open up a mutually respectful discussion.

I understand your husband. I have only been living abroad (mostly in the UK) with my British husband for about 20 years and I’m only in my 40’s but as soon as my youngest leaves home I will get myself a place back home in Sweden and spend the majority of my time there. My husband won’t come with me and we will have a long distance marriage. For me UK will never be home and I miss my family and my friends back home every day. I thought Brexit was bad but this lockdown has made it a million times worse. I feel trapped and down.

I think once you have hit your 80’s (also 60’s and 40’s for that matter) you need be allowed to do what makes you happy. In your case it sounds like you have both found where you will be happy, at least for now, so go with that. It may not be the conventional thing to do as a married couple but that’s not important as long as you’re both happy. Life is too short.

I think that you have the best of both worlds

You are both currently doing what you want

However, if you live apart, do you both keep the communication flowing ? Phone calls, letters, emails, gifts in the post ?

Whats stopping you from retiring ?
Can you sell SE property & move to Ireland
Or is it a case of you don't want to ?

It does sound like there are discussions which should have been had but which have not taken place.

On the other hand, he may be fit and healthy but you’re only 59 to his 80 and they are very different phases of life. Although your DH may easily live another 10 years or more (two of my grandparents lived into their 90s), I think at 80 you are allowed to take stock and focus on living in the way and at the pace which best suits you on the assumption that you may have a fairly limited number of days left to you.

It is odd that you say you can’t afford to retire, as if finances aren’t shared. So perhaps that’s another discussion to be had.

It’s not that strange that the OP can’t afford to retire at 59. The state pension is still years away. Her DH probably retired when she was early to mid 40’s.

I am sure you will find a way that works for you both. If you are a teacher then you could go there every 6 weeks and for very long periods - even long weekends if you wanted as you are in 3 days a week or do you want to spend your leave / holidays elsewhere?

My aunt and uncle the same age as your DH moved back “permanently” in their 70’s - since moving to London to work when they were both 14. They had built a house there and were going back at least 3 times a year already for holidays. They are both from the same village and she hates it - he loves it. She has a massive family in London (9 grown children and 22 grandchildren, 6 of her own siblings and her nieces/nephews) - she is always on flight back to London for any excuse - sometimes he comes sometimes he doesn’t. It was exactly the same with my grandparents - I remember big rows as my grandad wanted to be back home but my grandmother wanted to be in the UK with her grown up children. Seems the males in my family see their home as a place where as the females as where people are. I would love to be in a cottage by the sea in Ireland right now.

I could retire if I sold the family house, but it’s the family hub and two children haven’t settled anywhere permanently, so may need to come back and live here. The youngest has only just graduated.
So I shall facilitate a discussion with DH about how we can work out a way of both being content, with and without each other. Retiring to a tiny cottage in the middle of nowhere, with no friends of mine around just wouldn’t work for me. DH doesn’t have friends there, just two siblings, and doesn’t need them. He’s happy with his own company.
As suggested by several and I’m aware of as a teacher, communication is key (but not easy for DH). That has to be the way forward now.

He is moving towards the end of his life, and wants to spend it in the place he is most at ease. He is not being unreasonable.

You are much younger, and don't want to retire to a cottage a mile from the nearest village, and live out your life with just an 80 year old for company. That's not unreasonable either.

You haven't been abandoned with a houseful of tiny children & unpaid bills, with a husband off chasing the local lovelies. This is a self-sufficient old man who wants to return home.

I would just take this month by month, and meet up when you can. Visit him as a family during the college holidays, and he can come back to your house when he wants to. Why not? Nobody's happiness takes precedence, - he shouldn't be forced to stay in the SE, and you shouldn't be forced to retire to rural ireland. It's an unusual situation, but I think it's something that it is possible to manage.

Has it always been his "dream" to retire to his cottage in the village? If he's not a great communicator, I wonder whether he thinks that because he's mentioned it over the years, you understand that this was always his intention (and have tacitly agreed to it)?

I'm not excusing him, just wondering whether he doesn't realise that you haven't really had a proper discussion about it and/or agreed!

You dismiss his need for friends as he doesn’t need them and in the UK he accompanies you to cultural outings. Perhaps he is just tired of people pleasing and living in a place that he is not particularly happy in. Of course he should have discussed this but you work, your life is full of family and friends, you are busy. It doesn’t sound as if you ever took stock of his life. He says you are self sufficient which is another way of saying he is obsolete surely?

My partner is 17 years older than me and nearing retirement, whereas I obviously have many years of working life still ahead of me, and am 8 year old child (not his). Before we got together he had always planned to retire abroad, where he has some properties. This is probably still the plan. I would continue to work here, and send my daughter to school here, and we would go out to join him in school holidays (and he would presumably come back here to see us some of the time too). I THINK it could work, though I’m not without some misgivings. I think we would just have to try it and see. The goal would probably be that I would move out there to join him eventually, providing I would find work and once DD was old enough to not be locked into the current contact arrangement with her dad, and providing she was happy to move there - that is realistically at least 8 years away, and he will retire in about 3, so we are likely looking at 5 years of living mainly in different countries.
I DO strongly feel that it would be wrong for our relationship if I put him under any pressure not to essentially move out there when he retires. I feel he could quite quickly start to resent not being able to fulfil his long-term dream, and I in turn would feel very guilty about that.

However, we do not have children together, so we are not a “unit” in the sense that you and your husband may feel you are, OP. I think that does potentially put greater responsibilities towards you on him, if that makes sense?

@Sittingontheveranda I have to respond to your post: without going into the financial details, I have always taken stock of his life, so much so that I bought his cottage for him with my inheritance, so he could visit and stay in a place he loved, without relying on family to host him. He knows he not obselete, I tell him how important he is to me.
I chose to go into teaching rather than academia to enable him to focus on his job and not worry about child care (although I unexpectedly discovered it was a vocation).
Interestingly he recently said to me that I have let him get away with a lot (referring to going away when he wants to since the children left school, and consequently leaving me to hold the fort, deal with builders, children’s problems etc). He would be the first to say a) he is not a people pleaser and b) I have always considered his wishes, often put them first.

It is quite selfish of him really. Hope you were ready for this somehow.
Another age-gap couple I know is going through something similar. Women picking up the pieces mostly.

Francesca2020 I see. That wasn’t clear. Sometimes it is hard to dig into posts.

Can I ask why you ‘let him away’ with not doing his share? Do you prefer to make decisions on your own? Is it easier?

I’m asking this because a very good friend of mine says the same thing about her husband. He is easy going. She is highly organised and a ‘doer’. She also finds it difficult to delegate. Her husband would say she lets him away with a lot too (which she does) although she isn’t happy that he does less than her either.

It is probably the age gap OP. I dated a man who was eighteen years older than me. I loved him but I wanted children and marriage and he had already passed that stage, in his head at least. For what it is worth, I think many marriages of people in their eighties, are between people who lead separate lives or are entirely dependent on each other. I’m unsure if many remain as balanced as they were, when in their fifties or sixties.

A PP said his age is giving him an excuse to behave as he wishes. I think that is true. I think equally that any compromises that can be made will probably have to be made by you precisely because you have age on your side.

Just to add, I think what your DH is doing is far from ok by the way. He probably spent the last forty years in the UK. I assume you met in the UK and built your married life there. For him to change his mind and abandon that is unfair to you and his children. In my above posts, I wasn’t condoning it, I.was just wondering if there was more to it and it seems it is just him doing his own thing. I simply don’t know what you can do about it other than telling him you expect him to return/your marriage is over if he doesn’t or agree with his chosen living arrangements or compromise by staying there for extended periods which are mutually agreed before he goes.

If you can afford to run 2 households & spent time together then why not

However, are you " allowed" to go on holidays with your friends & family without your DH. What I mean is go off & do something that you enjoy ?

Because that is exactly what he is doing. He is doing something that he enjoys

I like a bit of personal space, so I understand

How much effort is HE putting into the relationship to you & his wider family ?