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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

In love with an unemployed single dad and worried about the future

567 replies

InLoveAndLost · 09/02/2021 07:30

Hi all, long time Mumsnet user but have NCed for this as I think some of the details might be outing if pieced together with the rest of my posting history.

I have been dating for 6 months the nicest man ever. We used to work together but he quit his job right before the pandemic hit and he has been looking for work for a year now. He is 45, separated 18 months ago, with two DC (8 and 12). He has his DC 50% of the time and an amicable relationship with the ex wife.

For context, I am 30, never married, no DC, with a decent career in HR.

He is hands on the funniest, most caring, sexiest man I have ever been with. As I have been furloughed until recently, we spent a lot of our free time together just chilling, cooking, watching movies and going for walks. I know I am falling in love with him and he said he feels the same. We are honestly on cloud 9 when we are together, I have never felt like this about anyone before.

However, now that we have been dating for a while, there are a couple of things that make me hesitant about the long-term prospects of our relationship:

  • The fact that he has DC and doesn't want anymore, whilst I am still on the fence on the topic. I have never dated anyone with DC before so I am not sure how that'd work.
  • The fact that he seems to bend over forward for his ex-wife whenever she clicks her fingers. They are good friends, which I am sure is a positive thing for the kids, but sometimes their relationship makes me feel uncomfortable and insecure about where I stand as they still seem to be so close.
  • The fact that he has now been unemployed for a year and doesn't seem to have a solid plan in place to get out of the situation, besides applying for a few jobs every week. His field is not in great demand, and his job history is spotty as he was a professional sports coach for 10 years, until he joined his ex wife's company in a admin support role (that's the job he quit last year). He is still doing ok money wise as he has a big lump sum he got upon selling the marital home last year, but I have no idea how long that will last.

I swing between feeling madly in love with this wonderful man and feeling sick with worry that I am wasting my time on an impossible relationship. I wonder what kind of future is possible with someone with such different and complex personal circumstances.

Am I worrying for nothing? Should I just just enjoy the relationship for as long as it lasts? Or should I seriously reconsider having a future with this man?

OP posts:
WhereDoMyBluebirdsFly · 10/02/2021 11:53

He is a Fredo. Useless, weak, fails at everything, needs to be supported in the smallest task, but somehow has a huge ego about it.

Let him ride off into the sunset on his motorbike!

rawalpindithelabrador · 10/02/2021 13:37

@felineflutter

He made it clear to OP from the start that he doesn't want any more children and that is perfectly fine. It might mean they are not compatible as a couple but doesn't mean there is anything wrong with him.

Totally disagree. To start a relationship with someone a lot younger than yourself who does probably want children when you have already had some is all kinds of wrong.

If he had any kind of moral compass he would leave OP alone.

100% this! And by moral compass she means, that a decent mature person who actually cares about you, OP, would have left you alone the second it became clear you don't want the same things, in fact, even before. After I became single at your age, well, I'd always been attracted to a certain man who was long divorced and had grown kids. He was the same age as this guy (except he had a bloody career, owned his own home, etc). But he never asked me out. Later, he told me why, because he knew I wanted kids and marriage and he was past that and he didn't want to mess with me because that wouldn't be fair. See the difference?

Similarly, his sister, my friend, started what was casual on both their parts with a man 10 years younger than she. She had one child quite young and then no more and had been sterilised by choice in her mid-30s. When it became clear the guy she was seeing wanted marriage and kids and was developing feelings beyond the casual, she ended things. Why? Because she's a decent person who had care and respect for others.

Let's contrast with this bloke.

He didn't care about the secure job he had during a pandemic, a job that he needs to support his kids. Puts himself first there, wwaaa, I'm stressed with office politics, burnout, etc, is entitled to start a 'new chapter'. Any mature, decent adult and parent would have thought, 'I don't like where I am in employment, but I have kids to support and bills to pay so let's look at what I can do to change things whilst in employment now so I can get something more suitable. Nope, he jacks it in and has you, muggins, polishing his CV. Similarly, I don't know anyone age 45+ who isn't concerned about age discrimination and employability who would be so conceited as to think they can just jack in their job and they'll pick up another one unless they're in some very specialised fields and even then . . . But this loser thinks he's god's gift.

He doesn't care about his kids' financial security and place to live because he's blowing the financial settlement he got rather than using it to create a safety net, nest for his kids. Again, I've got friends who are his age or older who've been divorced after many years of marriage and whose kids are grown and their first thoughts on getting a settlement is to buy their own place for security and invest in a pension, whilst keeping their jobs, because mature adults consider the future and act in their own best interests to protect themselves.

Old stories, coke and motorbike. C'mon, OP, how can you not have the ick?

He saw you coming! But anyone decent wouldn't have gone there. But then, he's shown over and over and over and not just to you, that's he's not really a mature, functioning adult but a workshy shirker and user.

SheldonesqueIsUnwell · 10/02/2021 14:10

Not burnout.

Not noble.

There is nothing noble about leaving a job with no other to go to and possibly making your spouse/partner to be solely financially responsible for your children.

Illness and stress is one thing.

Sick of office politics doesn’t count.

youvegottenminuteslynn · 10/02/2021 14:36

Noble he ain't, OP. At all!

In love with an unemployed single dad and worried about the future
iljatdip · 10/02/2021 14:49

His field is not in great demand, and his job history is spotty

Bin.
Next.
Cocklodger in waiting.

Job history is "spotty" and he randomly gave up his job without something else to go to citing burn-out or some such thing.
I had an ex like this. More fool me, I moved to another country with him. Once we'd decided to emigrate he gave up his job in the UK nearly a year before we left - manager was bullying him or something. I also believed his explanation for his one year of unemployment in the past.
When we moved abroad it soon became very clear that he was a cocklodger with little interest in working and also more details of his patchy work history were gradually revealed.... Once here, he sort of got a couple of part-time jobs - got fired from one, quit the other. Then had a year sitting around unemployed claiming benefits here until the unemployment office took them off him.
Long story - that's the short version. I kicked the fucker out and he returned to the UK where he sat around in some friends' house for months scrounging off them until he got a job of some description.

I'm afraid this experience has made me very hardline. I am not dating anyone unemployed. I've just binned one off on online dating when he said he was unemployed while taking some "time to find himself".
I'm sorry... but I've had burn-out before and I've also decided to change career but I have never given up a job until I had something else to go to.

And yes, yes, there are exceptions. Many people are unemployed through no fault of their own but I'm skeptical of people giving up jobs (and especially a father of two children!!!) and then sitting around waiting for some kind of opportunity to fall from the sky or some kind of idea as to what they might be interested in doing.

Oh and I haven't even got onto the fact that he says he doesn't want children and you might. He won't change his mind now so if you have the slightest feeling that you might want them you should get rid of him for that reason alone.

FifteenToes · 10/02/2021 16:06

Dissenting opinion here. I'm not sure why everyone is being so harsh on the information available.

Lots of people have been made unemployed, or kept that way, because of the pandemic. As you say that's not his fault and not anything he could have predicted.

To the points about what might happen in 5, 10 or 20 years' time: of course. But that's true of ANY relationship. You could sit down and analyse exactly what you need for total financial safety and long term life planning, create your ideal picture of the perfect boring accountant and then even miraculously go out and find him, and get him to marry you. And then still find somewhere down the line that he's cheating on you, he completely changes once kids come along and is hopeless with them, you don't fancy him any more or you just can't stand the boredom.

There are lots of stories on here about people getting in too deep with flaky cocklodegers, but there are at least as many from people who married someone they never really had that much of a spark with, and then find themselves in the big house chained to the kids thinking "is this all there is"? You say that you've never felt the way you have with this guy in any previous relationship, so how long do you think it will be before it happens again? Relationships that really feel right and work easily are rare.

The only part I would be concerned about is the spending of the house equity. I'd be concerned that he's presented that as him being OK for money, rather than that that's something that needs to be put aside for his next house purchase and he's not really OK for spending money until he gets a job. I'd want to have a conversation about that before getting serious.

It may be the practical details of your lives can't be made to align, I don't know. But I see no reason for some of the conclusions about his motivation that people have jumped to here. I can understand your wanting to make it work, and it sounds worth a (careful) try.

unfortunateevents · 10/02/2021 16:23

Lots of people have been made unemployed, or kept that way, because of the pandemic. As you say that's not his fault and not anything he could have predicted. - indeed, but this person wasn't made unemployed because of the pandemic. He gave up a job which had been handed to him on a plate without any clear idea of what he was going to do otherwise - never a good move, and indeed proved to be so by the arrival of the pandemic. As you say and I agree, it was not then going to be easy to find another job but he isn't even trying - OP says he applies for a few jobs a week and doesn't have any clear plan. If he had been operating at a senior level, then a few jobs a week would probably be amazing and more likely to be a few a month but this guy has a patchy work history and his last role was in admin so there is no reason why there should not be lots of jobs for which he can and should be applying - or if he could apply himself to deciding what he wants to do, then volunteering or retraining. I think it's not the unemployment that most people are objecting to, it's just the lack of motivation, self-discipline or planning in someone who is approaching middle age which is off-putting.

iljatdip · 10/02/2021 16:48

I think it's not the unemployment that most people are objecting to, it's just the lack of motivation, self-discipline or planning in someone who is approaching middle age which is off-putting.

and in someone who has two DC 50% of the time.
Also his living off the proceeds of his half of the marital home is reckless in my opinion. Using some of it to tide him over for a couple of months while he finds a job, ANY job, would be fair enough but there has to be a time limit on it - if he sits around much longer without working he'll put a major dent in that money which should be invested sensibly until he can put a deposit down on a new property.

InLoveAndLost · 10/02/2021 17:31

The term "love bombing" has been mentioned by quite a few posters so I looked it up.

He is an intense person and his demonstrations of love have been rather over the top, but to be honest I put it down to the fact that he was so into me. I am now questioning that side of things too and wonder if I have been manipulated? His unbridled enthusiasm about me was probably one of things that attracted me to him initially. Now I wonder if it was actually a strategy.

Really looking at things through a different lens after reading the comments on this thread Sad

OP posts:
bourbonne · 10/02/2021 17:56

@InLoveAndLost

The term "love bombing" has been mentioned by quite a few posters so I looked it up.

He is an intense person and his demonstrations of love have been rather over the top, but to be honest I put it down to the fact that he was so into me. I am now questioning that side of things too and wonder if I have been manipulated? His unbridled enthusiasm about me was probably one of things that attracted me to him initially. Now I wonder if it was actually a strategy.

Really looking at things through a different lens after reading the comments on this thread Sad

I'm sure he is into you. We all have our own motives and incentives, which we might not even be conscious of. It's very possible that he is sincerely into you, and that if one could delve into his psyche with some magic scanner, one would find that being with you is as convenient for him as it is pleasurable, and he doesn't want to lose any of it. It doesn't have to be a big conspiracy where he's coldly manipulating you. If he's going to be an MN villain, he sounds like the feckless kind rather than the abusive kind.

The real trouble is that you want different things. If you needed nothing from him but good times and affection, this would be fine. But you're at an age where you might want a steady life partner to start a family with. I feel for you.

Circemstances · 10/02/2021 18:20

Hi OP - love bombing is only problematic in the wider context where there is a pattern of certain behaviours. If you looked up the term, I'm sure that you also saw these other red flags.

Thats all these behaviours are in isolation - red flags. Someone being into you, focused on you and romantic is fine in itself.

I wonder if some of the other info you gave re this man touched a nerve for some people that have been through relationships with abusive people. Hence the understandably strong reactions.

Your instincts are telling you something is not right, but only you can know why. Ie it may be his situation, his behaviour, neither of those.....your worries about what you want from a partner etc.

Listen to your gut to look further into what the obstacles might be.

GeordieGreigsButtButtZoom · 10/02/2021 18:47

I doubt he's entirely self aware about what he's doing and I don't think it's quite as straightforward as "ooh, the lovebomb technique, I'll use that!"

But he will be drawn, naturally, to women who are offering him what he wants, which is idleness, no questions, fun and no pressure. When he gets that, he'll be keen and he will want to try to keep her. In his own mind he's probably thinking he wants to keep you because you're great (which of course you are), but he may or may not understand himself well enough to know why he's so drawn to you.

You may not want kids but if you're unsure, you shouldn't shut that door off, especially since it's pretty clear he will expect you to be raising his.

MaeveDidIt · 10/02/2021 18:54

Why short-change yourself for him.
You would be depriving yourself of having children in the future.
Someone that's quite happy to leave a job and live on the proceeds of a house-sale - which will soon dwindle. A really stupid thing to do at his age.
Sounds like he wants to be a cock-lodger and lead a charmed life with you supporting it!!

MrsBobDylan · 10/02/2021 19:31

You have done so well taking on the points in this thread op. It must be very difficult to read some of our comments.

What do you think you'll 'do'? You are so level headed and capable while he seems the complete opposite.

iljatdip · 10/02/2021 19:32

Where's he living at the moment and do you own your own house?

No man falls in love faster than one who is looking for somewhere cheap to live...ie. a hobosexual.

SheldonesqueIsUnwell · 10/02/2021 21:40

Hobosexual? I’ll remember that one Grin

Circemstances · 10/02/2021 22:58

I bet you wish you hadn't asked the question. Just do whatever feels right.

I suspect many of the people answering your Q are coming from a place of deep, exhausting and life changing experience of partners who showed similar patterns.

Only you can decide. The answers you've received are much heavier than your Q, though all have come from a place of care and hard experience. Being on the end of a person who dumps their wife and kids and has a kid life crisis is absolutely brutal. Best friends and lovers, then the enemy.

Make your own choice and good luck to you.

Dery · 10/02/2021 23:29

OP - you sound lovely. He probably is crazy about you. And of course effusiveness, flattery and jokes are all he can offer you. There is no substance. At bottom, he is selfish, irresponsible and entitled. And I agree with PP - his attachment to you is also entirely selfish. It’s not in your best interests to form a life partnership with this man. If you were just after good sex and fun times it would be a different story but that’s not your situation.

Oldat40 · 11/02/2021 00:23

When I left my ex-husband I got a settlement of £100k. I spent around £6k on a new car, paid back around 5k to my parents for their loan for legal fees, treated myself to a new bed for around £700 and put the rest away so that I could buy a suitable property for myself and my kids who were just 3 and 6 at the time. I actually pushed up my working hours so I was able to privately rent until I could get a mortgage on a suitable property.
It wouldn't be fair on my kids if I just sat on my arse all day living off my settlement until the money had gone!

Iflyaway · 11/02/2021 02:13

the whole "she moved to another country so they gave him a job" thing. I've never seen that before.

Exactly. I worked in HRM in an international company, never once did we offer a job to a live-in partner/spouse when offering the position.

As for the coke-freak show. OMG, I could tell you horror stories of people who ended up addicts to it. Which he is if he's still doing it in middle age.

OP, you've had such consistent great posts on here, please listen and take note of these wise women.

grassisjeweled · 11/02/2021 02:21

You're 30, op. If you want kids you need to be finding someone who wants them too, sharpish.

Hope4newlife · 11/02/2021 02:43

I have a boyfriend who finds himself very difficult to express his feelings. I can see he is happy when he has a nice meal though. He once told me that I am an emotional person and emotions are a waste. Divorced after 17 years of marriage from a cheater wife, had some girlfriends before and after but never been in love with a woman but he said he doesn’t want to live alone.

He is still actively hiding me from his family, said we only introduce a woman for marriage. (I know the culture difference but it hurts)

From his reactions and how he deals with the relationship issues, he seemed quite selfish and talks very blunt so I got hurt a lot at the very beginning when we were learning to know each other but then again I feel that his selfishness is because he doesn’t know how to approach to talk about the odd situations and sudden events that could hurt me? or simply don’t think that further?

He never touches me or holds my hands ever first even in bed he just cannot show his affection at all as if he does not know anything so you do all but he really likes me being next to him, touching him, holding his hands, anything.

Other than his character, he is very successful and has an honourable job. His work is his whole life, nothing else. I honestly cannot believe that he was once in a marriage for 17 years because I have found it very difficult with him, maybe me? I don’t know. I almost broke up with him a couple of times and could have left his house straight away but I didn’t and he hugged me so hard next morning ( this means “ thank you for staying/bearing with me, omg, I want to cry😭)

I have kept telling him what I want him to do and how I want to be treated with clear instructions but I know it may be impossible for him to change especially in his age. and I feel that he won’t be happy to hear it all the time. He told me that too much negativity isn’t good but he didn’t say any further. So I know he still wants me.

I love him so much. I am now kind of getting used to him and learned to understand and ignore but still very hard.

Are some men too difficult to express their feelings? Anyone has this problem? I guess if someone’s character is like my boyfriend, they won’t be here because they can’t express anyway.

Hope4newlife · 11/02/2021 02:45

Ahhkk sorry. Posted on a wrong place

User45643 · 11/02/2021 03:17

My initial thought was move on, he's right for someone just not you. You've realised you want kids, he doesn't, you realised you are on different paths. I appreciate it's gutting as you say he is lovely but if you are not on the same page on kids or priorities then trust your senses.

GreyGoose1980 · 11/02/2021 03:24

Hi OP
For me the fact he doesn’t currently work isn’t as much of a red flag as it would have been pre Covid. Like many people at the moment he may be trying really hard to find work and just be putting on a brave face to you about seeming not bothered about being out of work. I’d review that aspect again in six months time and give him the benefit of the doubt. I’d also be flexible in relation to his friendship with his ex giving myself time to understand how that all worked and get to know her myself before deciding if it was ‘too close’ as he may just be trying to keep things positive for his kids which I respect. The key issue is whether you want to stay with someone who has openly told you he doesn’t want children. I’d decide this sooner rather than later to avoid getting hurt and leave him if you know deep down you want kids.

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