Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

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

My(30f) husband (41m) gives his mother access to his bank accounts/finances

36 replies

Thebigquestions · 10/09/2023 07:26

I am recently married and I just learned that my husbands mother has access to his bank accounts and is monitoring his spending. We haven’t joined bank accounts yet, I merely haven’t gotten to organizing how I wanted to do it and we rarely have weekdays off together, so I never pushed it. We’re about to close on a home purchase, and I am also 9 weeks pregnant. His mother is also our realtor, so she in involved in every aspect of the home buying process as well. Last week we had to go to the furniture store with his mother so she can help him decide how we are going to decorate our home which caused an argument. He said he gave his mother access to his bank accounts so she could budget for him because he says “he’s bad with money”. I was unaware this involved literally looking at every purchase he makes and monitoring it and choosing how he spends his money for him. He believes there’s no issue with this, and I informed him I am uncomfortable with it and want it to stop. His response was “well I asked you if you wanted to combine accounts and you never did anything about it”. His mother suggested today that we don’t combine our accounts and commented how she’s going to be mad at him if she sees certain purchases she doesn’t approve of. This seems like more than “here’s a budget” as there’s an intention for continued monitoring/checking on how he spends his money. She does not know I’m pregnant as I don’t want anybody to know right now. She has his location and can view where he is at any time. I don’t have access to his bank accounts. I brought this up to him and he got mad and defended the situation and then said fine, we can get our own account to stop me from complaining. I am so extremely uncomfortable with all of this, I guess I’m wondering if these thing are normal?! He insists there is nothing wrong with it to the point that it is causing arguments.

OP posts:
AlyssaHasAChaaaaild · 10/09/2023 10:20

This is completely nuts, not normal and I'm sorry for you finding this out right now. You are buying a house you don't want to pay off his mum - just read that back!

Bank accounts is easy to fix - open a joint account but each keep single accounts too. Mum can see what he spends from his own account but your own account stays private, as does the family spending from the joint account. You can take charge of moving money between accounts.

I'm sorry you find yourself in this mess. He needs to understand that none of this is normal.

FictionalCharacter · 10/09/2023 10:47

What a mess. He's a middle aged mummy's boy and she controls him.
The first thing to do is get him to stop her tracking his phone. When you're together she's tracking you as well and it's an invasion of your privacy.
If he won't do that or gets angry, you'll know where you stand - he's more married to her than to you.

Allhailkingcharlie · 10/09/2023 11:34

This kind of happened to someone I know. His mom controlled everything and got very nasty when she was told she wouldn't be controlling it anymore. Which ended up with her continuing doing so to keep the peace. You need to set your boundaries and expectations now.

Mistressanne · 10/09/2023 12:06

This needs to stop now.
If you’re crafty ask him to give you access so you can work out a joint budget then just change the passwords so she can’t get access.
Turn off his location on his phone.
If he disagrees with any of this then leave.

SilverGlitterBaubles · 10/09/2023 12:23

So you married a guy who's mom tracks his phone and has to approve his spending Shock you knew this and you married him and bought a house with him on her instructions. None of this is ok. Now you are pregnant she will try to control this too. Time to sit you DH down and tell him that he is about to become a father and so needs to draw the line between him and his DM or your marriage will fail.

Foggyfoggyfoggy · 10/09/2023 12:28

Mind boggles what will happen when she finds out about the dc...

INeedAnotherName · 10/09/2023 12:41
  1. So you are buying a house you don't want, in a place you don't want.
  2. You can't furnish it to your taste without her input on either taste or expense.
  3. You can't have the father of your soon to be child attend prenatal classes as she will find out by tracker/phone.
  4. She has ultimate approval over his spending and can veto it (whether by guilt, or control).

You have two choices. Either succumb to living your life her way, or get marriage counselling with a view it either changes drastically or you will leave. Are you prepared to be a single mother, if not then you have another choice to make unfortunately.

SisterMichaelsHabit · 10/09/2023 12:47

Get yourself to one of the states that allows immediate no-fault divorce without needing the respondent to agree and get the fuck out of that arrangement before she starts controlling you and your baby as well. Seriously. Flee right now. The fact she was making him a budget to follow was a major red flag, but this is next level batshit and I don't think she will be happy unless you do everything she says, exactly how she says. Any man who can't manage his own money or enact healthy boundaries with his mother at 41 is not a keeper, sorry.

BlackAmericanoNoSugar · 10/09/2023 12:53

You are about to go into massive joint debt in order that the commission can pay off his debt to his mother? That's hugely illogical.

FLOrenze · 10/09/2023 13:31

Do you think that he may have had debts in the past and been bailed out by her. I have a relative who found out after marriage that his wife had over 70K debt. They never had a joint account until the debt was cleared.

I don’t think it is right that an adult has a joint account with another, but there may be a reason you are unaware of. I would be really wary of opening any joint account with him while the situation continues.

I think for the time being you can only ignore the situation and not let it spoil this time for you. Hopefully he may appreciate your mature attitude. If he continues beyond the birth of your child, I believe a line has been crossed.

EnjoythemoneyJane · 10/09/2023 13:31

Oh god. His primary role is not being your husband, it’s being her child. You’re not married to him, you’re married to them - and they outnumber you, so your chances of successfully pushing back against this bizarre enmeshment are slim.

If she’s been controlling his life for 40+ yrs I don’t fancy your chances at edging her out unless he agrees to marriage counselling, as PPs have suggested - but he’d first need to acknowledge there’s a problem, and how likely is that? Given that this batshittery is normalised for him and he gets defensive about it, it’s much more likely he’ll see you as the problem and not Mommie Dearest.

Good luck, OP - if you believe this man child is worth fighting for you’ve got a hell of a battle on your hands.

New posts on this thread. Refresh page