Page 4 | To relocate or not…

Blankspace88 · 2024-06-13T17:49:27+00:00

Looking for some advice please… I have been with my other half for three years and we have just had our first baby together (8 weeks old ☺️). I have a child from a previous relationship who is 9 years old. We live in a lovely town and my son is settled in school. However, I only have a 2 bedroom house so we will need to move soon. My partner moved in with us a year or so ago but also has his own 3 bedroom house back in his town. He doesn’t have any connections to that town or have any friends or family living there. That town is just over 30 mins from where we currently are. My other half wants us to move back to his house which means relocating and moving my son’s school, which I feel really apprehensive about and don’t want to do. I also don’t want to have to ‘start again’ when I have friends here and family close by. His argument is that his job will be about ten minutes down the road from his house and thirty minutes down the road from here if we buy a new house here and sell both of ours. He thinks I am being selfish and is putting a lot of pressure on me to move over to his place in a different town. Opinions please - do I just have to bite the bullet and relocate the whole family and schools to a new place or put my foot down?!

CountryGirlInTheCity · 14/10/2024 10:04

This is so hard for you isn’t it? He’s basically using money as a trump card to get what he wants.

Ok so his commute-time to work is very important to him. So is the journey your son makes to school, your proximity to support networks, and how happy you both are in the house and area you eventually decide to live in. We were in a similar situation 17 years ago. DH’s firm was about to be bought out requiring a move (he’s in a specialised area of financial services and his role only tends to exist in head offices). Our eldest was in Y6 and we were thinking about secondary school. He’d already moved primary school once and we wanted to see if we could get both DC through secondary school without having to move them. This meant DH getting a job in London so that he could move jobs if needed within the same city, therefore avoiding another house move. We’d avoided London in the past, but it was the only solution we could see. I didn’t want to live in London itself so we started looking at counties around London with good train links. We ended up house hunting in three counties. Each place we looked at we assessed area, schools and commute for DH. When we finally found the house we bought we stayed in the village overnight and DH did the commute to the office to check it was doable before buying the house. It took about an hour and a quarter door to door (his previous commute had been thirty mins) but decided that all things considered it was the way forward. DH has always been the main wage earner, by some margin. I’m a primary school teacher and will never have anything like the earning potential of DH so of course, facilitating his job is really important in any move we make. My job is also found more or less anywhere so location is less important for my job than it is for his. However, the fact that his job brings in more money has never been a deciding factor other than having to make sure he can still do his job from where we live. He doesn’t accrue more ‘comfort and happiness points’ because he earns more than me, and crucially, he doesn’t expect to. If anything, he’s taken more of a hit than anyone when it comes to where we live when we’ve moved house because he wanted me and the DC to be happy and was aware that we wouldn’t have been doing it at all if it weren’t for the nature of his profession. When I said that I really didn’t want to live in London, he accepted that and we started looking at other ways to make it work.
Can you explain this to your DP do you think? Remember he is not due a more comfortable and happier life than others in the same household because he earns more. A 30 minute commute is not a lot at all, what you are asking is not at all unreasonable.

Good luck.

Original poster

Blankspace88 · 14/10/2024 10:12

CountryGirlInTheCity · 14/10/2024 10:04

This is so hard for you isn’t it? He’s basically using money as a trump card to get what he wants.

Ok so his commute-time to work is very important to him. So is the journey your son makes to school, your proximity to support networks, and how happy you both are in the house and area you eventually decide to live in. We were in a similar situation 17 years ago. DH’s firm was about to be bought out requiring a move (he’s in a specialised area of financial services and his role only tends to exist in head offices). Our eldest was in Y6 and we were thinking about secondary school. He’d already moved primary school once and we wanted to see if we could get both DC through secondary school without having to move them. This meant DH getting a job in London so that he could move jobs if needed within the same city, therefore avoiding another house move. We’d avoided London in the past, but it was the only solution we could see. I didn’t want to live in London itself so we started looking at counties around London with good train links. We ended up house hunting in three counties. Each place we looked at we assessed area, schools and commute for DH. When we finally found the house we bought we stayed in the village overnight and DH did the commute to the office to check it was doable before buying the house. It took about an hour and a quarter door to door (his previous commute had been thirty mins) but decided that all things considered it was the way forward. DH has always been the main wage earner, by some margin. I’m a primary school teacher and will never have anything like the earning potential of DH so of course, facilitating his job is really important in any move we make. My job is also found more or less anywhere so location is less important for my job than it is for his. However, the fact that his job brings in more money has never been a deciding factor other than having to make sure he can still do his job from where we live. He doesn’t accrue more ‘comfort and happiness points’ because he earns more than me, and crucially, he doesn’t expect to. If anything, he’s taken more of a hit than anyone when it comes to where we live when we’ve moved house because he wanted me and the DC to be happy and was aware that we wouldn’t have been doing it at all if it weren’t for the nature of his profession. When I said that I really didn’t want to live in London, he accepted that and we started looking at other ways to make it work.
Can you explain this to your DP do you think? Remember he is not due a more comfortable and happier life than others in the same household because he earns more. A 30 minute commute is not a lot at all, what you are asking is not at all unreasonable.

Good luck.

Yes, it’s so hard. I feel like I’m being made to make a choice that I really don’t want to. Thank you, this is really assuring and helpful to read x

OP posts:

Original poster

Blankspace88 · 14/10/2024 10:15

CountryGirlInTheCity · 14/10/2024 10:04

This is so hard for you isn’t it? He’s basically using money as a trump card to get what he wants.

Ok so his commute-time to work is very important to him. So is the journey your son makes to school, your proximity to support networks, and how happy you both are in the house and area you eventually decide to live in. We were in a similar situation 17 years ago. DH’s firm was about to be bought out requiring a move (he’s in a specialised area of financial services and his role only tends to exist in head offices). Our eldest was in Y6 and we were thinking about secondary school. He’d already moved primary school once and we wanted to see if we could get both DC through secondary school without having to move them. This meant DH getting a job in London so that he could move jobs if needed within the same city, therefore avoiding another house move. We’d avoided London in the past, but it was the only solution we could see. I didn’t want to live in London itself so we started looking at counties around London with good train links. We ended up house hunting in three counties. Each place we looked at we assessed area, schools and commute for DH. When we finally found the house we bought we stayed in the village overnight and DH did the commute to the office to check it was doable before buying the house. It took about an hour and a quarter door to door (his previous commute had been thirty mins) but decided that all things considered it was the way forward. DH has always been the main wage earner, by some margin. I’m a primary school teacher and will never have anything like the earning potential of DH so of course, facilitating his job is really important in any move we make. My job is also found more or less anywhere so location is less important for my job than it is for his. However, the fact that his job brings in more money has never been a deciding factor other than having to make sure he can still do his job from where we live. He doesn’t accrue more ‘comfort and happiness points’ because he earns more than me, and crucially, he doesn’t expect to. If anything, he’s taken more of a hit than anyone when it comes to where we live when we’ve moved house because he wanted me and the DC to be happy and was aware that we wouldn’t have been doing it at all if it weren’t for the nature of his profession. When I said that I really didn’t want to live in London, he accepted that and we started looking at other ways to make it work.
Can you explain this to your DP do you think? Remember he is not due a more comfortable and happier life than others in the same household because he earns more. A 30 minute commute is not a lot at all, what you are asking is not at all unreasonable.

Good luck.

Can I ask, if you don’t mind - as a primary school teacher with experience. Am I mad to feel like changing my son’s school and area when he’s had so much change over the past year from a place where he is settled and happy is the wrong thing to do?

OP posts:

CountryGirlInTheCity · 14/10/2024 10:40

Blankspace88 · 14/10/2024 10:15

Can I ask, if you don’t mind - as a primary school teacher with experience. Am I mad to feel like changing my son’s school and area when he’s had so much change over the past year from a place where he is settled and happy is the wrong thing to do?

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You’re definitely not mad to be thinking very hard about it. Good mums want their children to be happy and settled and it’s clear that you’re a good mum. And not all children are as resilient to change as some people say. You want him to thrive, not just survive and be ok don’t you?

It’s very hard to say whether a school
move will have a very detrimental effect on your DS or not. I’ve seen some children breeze through a move and others really struggle…and it’s not always the ones that you expect to struggle who do. Our DS coped fine with both moves and settled very quickly. Our DD on the other hand (3 years younger, v outgoing, confident and academic) found it really hard and still really missed her old friends and school three years later. It was only the move to secondary school that recalibrated it for her. If I could have made it different for her I would have done. I would say that if you end up really having to move, waiting until the big move to secondary school if possible is likely to make it a smoother transition for your son. Given that he’s only got two more years at primary I’d be doing my best to hold out until then, when all of his peers will be making a new start too so it will feel like less of an upheaval. Given that he’s already had a lot of change this year, I’d be trying to reduce the amount of further change he has to deal with for now.
Sometimes you have to move area and have no choice. We were in that position twice. In that case all you can do is make it as smooth as possible for them. It seems that you do have an element of choice and so I’d definitely be thinking hard before you make a big move like that. I think I’d want to be sitting down and talking about the pros and cons for each member of the family of moving and finding alternative solutions if needed.

cinapolada · 14/10/2024 11:35

Am I mad to feel like changing my son’s school and area when he’s had so much change over the past year from a place where he is settled and happy is the wrong thing to do?

I've moved my kids in primary and it was fine, the difference was I was relatively confident (and proven right) that the move was a one off and in their long term benefit, the reason it's mad you're considering this is because you have a really imbalanced relationship that has a high probability of failure, so you're very likely disrupting your son only to require further upheaval down the line.

OlderGlaswegianLivingInDevon · 14/10/2024 12:48

'He is financially supporting me through maternity leave,'

Of course he is !!! it's HIS baby - isn't s/he ???

and isn't Mr Wonderful he who must be obeyed living in your home ?!!!

Mitherations · 15/10/2024 11:02

If I express my opinion about something ie the house sale, then I don’t have a lot of say in it as I’m not the one earning the money at the moment.

This is not an issue that will go away. You are not an equal partner here. Your son is not getting the consideration necessary either. Why should he have to flip flop between primary schools to save a grown man 20 minutes on a commute.

Don't do it. Back track and stay put and if you're still madly in love and he's had a bang on the head and realised that you're an equal partner not a child producing liability giving him bothersome dependants this time next year, then you can reconsider.