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

[InLoveAndLost]

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?

@forrestgreen

Is he looking up courses to improve his employability? It sounds half assed.

He is studying the local language of the country we live in, which he hasn't needed to learn until now as the business language in the company we worked for was English. Speaking the local language would open up more opportunities for him and also enable him to consider customer-facing jobs in retail or hospitality, if he couldn't find another office-based role.

He studies the local language a couple of hours most days, he attends online classes 2 times a week and also does homework. Currently he speaks it at basic conversational level, like a A2/ B1 level.

@iljatdip

You are going to end up funding this man when he has no money left

Definitely.
Do you own your own property OP?

In any case, once his capital starts dwindling he'll be looking to save on rent. So just be careful.

I own a flat (with a mortgage and currently rented out) in my home country. Here I rent a flat that would definitely not be big enough for me, him + his DC.

Unemployment and the rest of it are significant worries, but ultimately the big thing is - do you want children of your own? or even might you want children of your own?

If the answer is yes to either, you need to break it off.

I've only just seen this thread

Run far away. Your happiness and prosperity will be ruined if you carry on with this. Don't let your love/sex hormones rule your head. He wants a younger woman who will mummy him. Ugh.

His ex must be a career driven, clever and successful woman. He was pulled along in her slipstream for decades. Now she's jettisoned him, he's looking - probably totally unconsciously- for another hardworking dynamic woman to make life interesting and successful for him.

What do you have in common? Values, goals, beliefs, sources of joy and motivation, that kind of thing. Or do you have being in love and high on sex as your common ground?

Just out of curiosity, are kids-related "extra costs" split 50/50 between you and your ex? I am referring to things like sports activities, private courses, clothes, shoes and so on?

I have never asked my bf what arrangement he has with his ex in that regard, but he mentioned a few things that hid kids do that sound expensive so I was wondering who is paying for that (I kept it to myself though!).

Depends massively on the family. But I'd put money on his ex paying for this stuff currently. Also organising it.

It sounds to me like he is trying hard to find a job but will little strategy/ vision, so his efforts are unfocused. He then gets really down when he gets rejection emails or no replies at all. I don't think he doesn't care about finding a job, I think he feels powerless and helpless and doesn't know how to fix this mess he put himself in.

Learned helplessness.......I suspect he turns on the despondency emotions to trigger your compassionate and competent capacities so you can fix his mess for him....

Codependency is a concept that attempts to characterize imbalanced relationships where one person enables another person's addiction, poor mental health, immaturity, irresponsibility, or under-achievement. Definitions of codependency vary, but typically include high self-sacrifice, a focus on others' needs, suppression of one's own emotions, and attempts to control or fix other people's problems.

Any of the above resonate with you?

He is studying the local language of the country we live in, which he hasn't needed to learn

He walked out of a job that he was gifted and can't even speak the language of the country he lives in well enough to get employed? OP he had no intention of being employed again, how could he? At best he is short sighted and feckless, irresponsible when it comes to providing for his kids, at worst a cocklodger and repeat user of women.

The cognitive dissonance is strong in you, OP. Honestly wake up! He is wasting your time and you're letting him do it. He's a loser. He doesn't want any more kids. You can click with any number of people who don't jack in their employment and have a 'spotty' work history when they have kids to support, are 45, burn through money they should be using to further support their kids (providing a home for them when they're with him), use cocaine, half-arsed look for work (FFS, all that fluff about his feeling powerless and unfocused, down and dejected, he's FORTY FIVE! He's been carried his whole life).

He will waste your life if you let him. You'll wind up supporting him and his kids with none of your own whilst he rides his motorbike in the sunset and snorts coke.

He is studying the local language of the country we live in, which he hasn't needed to learn until now as the business language in the company we worked for was English. Speaking the local language would open up more opportunities for him and also enable him to consider customer-facing jobs in retail or hospitality, if he couldn't find another office-based role.
He studies the local language a couple of hours most days, he attends online classes 2 times a week and also does homework. Currently he speaks it at basic conversational level, like a A2/ B1 level.

Oh dear. With every post it just gets worse.
I live in another country and my cocklodging ex was learning the local language and going to classes which in his opinion, justified him doing absolutely nothing else for well over a year. He gave up his part-time job in a kitchen in a restaurant as he was too tired after "studying" during the day....

Anyway, back to your DP. He is going to have to reach a much higher level of the language to get a job in an office and depending on which country he is in, he will need a qualification in office admin. The European country I am in requires very specific apprenticeships to have been completed for office work.
Retail and hospitality jobs here also require qualifications. I don't know where you are but it could be similar.
The sort of jobs he might be able to get are things he probably doesn't want to do and for anything else he will need to retrain.

It's not a great situation OP... the employment prospects are not great. It was foolhardy and reckless to give up the other job an shows something about his character.

You are in a great financial situation as presumably the rent you earn on your UK property goes towards rent on your property abroad so you're able to save more from your salary than you would otherwise. Don't let him endanger this.

He's 45 and it sounds like he's coasting along to retirement. He's living on past glories of partying and all the rest but doesn't seem to have any get-up-and-go.
Wonder what provisions he's made for his retirement?
I'll probably get flamed for this but you also need to be wary of someone who hasn't got any kind of sensible pension provision or substantial savings in place (and I don't mean his money from the half of the house as he would need that for accommodation in the future). There was a poster on here a while back with a partner who was 15 years older than her and he was wanting to give up work early while she would continue working and provide for his retirement for which he'd not planned at all.

It just gets worse with every post...giving up a job in a foreign non english speaking country when he doesn't apeak the language. 🤦‍♀️

Unbelievable.

OP please read back all your posts on here and make a list of pros and cons about this guy.

From what I can see the pros would have: “but I love him!” And the cons a massive list that detail a feckless manchild who can’t provide for himself, his children or his future with the added difficulties of a big age gap and him not wanting any more children when you’re not sure if you do or you don’t. Please think with your head and not your heart.

I think he feels powerless and helpless

I wonder if this is a projection from you on to him - how YOU would feel in his situation - because you are a highly organised, acquisitive, aspirational, productive person - in this situation you would feel powerless and helpless ...... but really does he?

He sounds footloose and fancy free - he has been this was his whole “spotty” life - he has actively chosen to live this way for the last 25 years - so he is living his dream.

He is more likely to feel empowered, autonomous and liberated.

And it’s been an easy ride for him with his highly competent successful x wife indulging him in return for some “charm” ..... so he needs another gravy train and has targeted you.

I think he feels powerless and helpless

Or even how you feel about your RS with him. As PP said - so much cognitive dissonance - that you are in turmoil.

If all of this sat squarely with you you would not have needed to post - you would be 100% of he is what he is - it works for me - happy to carry him financially and not have children ....

@billy1966

It just gets worse with every post...giving up a job in a foreign non english speaking country when he doesn't apeak the language. 🤦‍♀️

Unbelievable.

But thought he was such a hotshot he'd be hired by someone else immediately, probably thought headhunters would be at his door. LOL. Totally delusional.

I fell for a man like this, although we are a bit closer in age. He's no longer unemployed, but for his age he's no where near his peers in terms of career and life experience. His ex also runs her own business and is extremely driven...

So glad I'm shot of him. He now has an older, much more naive (than I am) victim to groom and leech off. I would have stayed lifelong friends with him had he not revealed himself to be a knobhead. (Long story short).

My advice: run.

In the field of psychology, cognitive dissonance occurs when a person holds contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values, and is typically experienced as psychological stress when they participate in an action that goes against one or more of them. According to this theory, when two actions or ideas are not psychologically consistent with each other, people do all in their power to change them until they become consistent. The discomfort is triggered by the person's belief clashing with new information perceived, wherein they try to find a way to resolve the contradiction to reduce their discomfort.

Could this be what’s going on - you don’t share the same values, outlook, goals, but you are trying to resolve this by JADE ing your own values, outlook and goals ? You know this isn’t your core truth but are trying to tolerate it / square it.

No need to live like this.

You can have all the same love AND a mutually supportive partner who shares the same values to build a life with.

Don't do it. You're still young, you don't want to stay with him for 10years and then realise you want children and it's too late.

It's nice to have the option to start a family if you wanted to. And if he definitely doesn't then the ball is in your court as to what you do with that information.

Leave! Run!

I bet his ex got with him when she was really young and it's taken her this long to finally get free of the human limpet. So he's been floating around, looking for another rock to cling onto and BLAM, there you are. He can pull out his old charm, regale you with stories of the Ibiza years and tell himself he's still got it. You're social currency.

You know, apart from all the other very well reasoned posts on this thread about why this bloke is a disaster, more than anything, the fact that he has children to support and just quit his job tells you everything you need to know about him. That is not what a decent person does. A man who deliberately impoverishes his children (and however much his wife earns is irrelevant) is utter scum.

Tell me, do you feel a bit sorry for him for having been married to a tough ballbreaker? Im getting the feeling you do.

He is studying the local language of the country we live in, which he hasn't needed to learn until now as the business language in the company we worked for was English

Aside from all his other fuckwittery this, for me, shows his utter lack of drive or interest. How can you be employed, then unemployed for over a year, living in a foreign country, and not have learnt the language?! It's all very well and good trying to learn it now, but it's too little, too late.

I bet he couldn't believe his luck when you became interested in him. No wonder he love bombed you. A sorted thirty year old, with a career and career prospects, who owns her own property back home, and is willing to a) look after his children and b) not have her own? He's like a pig in clover.

@Sssloou What does JADE stand for?

At B1 level someone could absolutely get a job, even if it was a fairly crappy job potwashing in a restaurant or working in KFC. It would be annoying work, particularly as when you are the foreigner who doesnt speak the language well you automatically get thought of as a bit stupid, low down etc so it can be very humbling, However, it is work, it brings in money and is one of the best ways to improve your language skills. (I speak from personal experience by the way). But I bet he wouldnt consider work like that, or would find it humiliating if he did try it.

[quote category12]@Sssloou What does JADE stand for?[/quote]
Justify, argue, defend, explain

[quote category12]@Sssloou What does JADE stand for?[/quote]
Justify, argue, defend, explain

It’s when we try hard to “talk ourselves into something” - in this case I see the OP JADEing his behaviours - so that her own authentic feelings are suppressed.