Other half refuses to work...

[pocketpairs]

I would appreciate some genuine advice, so if just going to write "finish relationship", please don't comment.

Both mid 40s, married 18 yrs, 2 DCs. When we got together, DW was very career driven. I grew up in poor family, before we got married , I said in no uncertain terms that "I won't marry someone who won't work (in some form)"

After DC1, she dropped to part time. After DC2 to 1 day w/p, then we mutually agreed she'd stop work until DC was started primary school full time.

Last few years, I've broached the subject about her restarting work, but she's proposed counter-arguments (i.e. who's going to pick DC from school, etc).

Now DC2 is starting secondary school next year, tried to have a serious conversation, and she's said in no uncertain terms she "won't work". She feels we have enough enough to live a comfortable life.

I'm at my wits end, as we don't have enough, and certainly don't have enough for future. Mortgage paid off, I earn £56k (approx), some savings, & £80k pension pot (not much I know!). She has 3 years in DB pension.

So what next?!

You're right. I've never met a teenager, I've never been a teenager, I'm not closely related to any teenagers, and I certainly don't have good friends who have parented kids into teen years and beyond.

Oh, come on. You're grasping at straws. Are you seriously suggesting that a parent should SAH the entire way through a child's school career just in case their teenagers struggle? What about adult kids? They can get into even bigger difficulties, after all - criminal convictions, divorces, debts. Better not work again, ever, just in case.

I know you're not proposing that, because it's utterly ludicrous. You're arguing in bad faith, and you know you are, because you're shifting the goalposts. First it's all "if someone doesn't SAH then you have to outsource parenting to nursery, you're saying nursery workers are worthless", and when it's pointed out that OP's youngest is a good six years past needing nursery, it's "don't you know what trouble teens can get into". The age of my oldest child was relevant because my DC still require more physical presence and active care than OP's do. OP already has a teen who is evidently doing just fine, or OP's DW would have cited them in her list of excuses not to work.

None of my friends or siblings with teen and adult children have been required to be not working - not just available after school, but not working - while raising teens. I have worked with a few people whose teens had serious issues - cancer, or a serious health crisis. Those people... took leaves of absence, as was their legal right, and then returned to work, having preserved their salary and employability. They were in a much better place to be there for their teens, both short and long term, because they were working already. If OP's children get involved in county lines or develop a serious eating disorder in their teen years, a parent can quit or take a leave of absence to be there.

This is not being frugal😂We earn many times your salary, but we do not eat once a week. We are actually quite frugal and main focus is to save for a pension and pay for our children through university.

Great suggestion. We just have join credit card that I pay off each month. Maybe need a different approach, but how would it work in practical terms - standing order of my salary to her every month?

Yes, you would think...

The truth is that there are many men out there who have absolutely no idea the domestic workload even exists, let alone where to start tackling it.

He has answered several times. Considering he has a full time job, he easily does his share of the household management. There is nothing to say OP doesn't want to do his share.

9 years vs 10 is getting into semantics given her point blank refusal to countenance even part time work.

This is a woman who has got her blinkers on and not seeing the frog coming up to simmering point right in front of her. OP may not want to leave now, but if she continues to ignore his pleas here, he will jump. And then she will have no choice but to work. Those threads are all over MN. We just very rarely get to hear a man's perspective on how he begins to feel taken for granted.

No one should ever allow themselves to be financially dependent on anyone else. Whether they are male or female.

OP, your wife should be earning entitlement to state pension through claiming child benefit (even if you then pay some of it back through your tax return). Has she been doing that?

I would cut up the credit cards and do a standing order every month to her account. When it's gone, it's gone.

Sit down and look at past credit card statements to come up for a reasonable budget for necessities. Frills like coffees out and restaurant dining will have to end until your pension pot is more robust.

Do you know where these people live and where the school is? Easy walking distance, is it?

What's the female equivalent?

@mathanxiety if she was still having to do school runs her argument for not working would be school runs when the kids are in secondary but the OP has said it's not, that was the argument for primary.

Yes, financial abuse will do wonders for her self confidence.

@mathanxiety the op has said that the secondary school is a single bus journey away.

This isn't unusual and isn't particularly difficult for NT secondary aged children to do.

Supply teaching can be good.

She'll need to register with an agency, possibly several. Obviously there is no work in the school holidays and it can be thin on the ground in September and in June/July as well.

You can get long term supply but if she's signed up for short term supply then she needs to be up and ready to go at 7:30 in case a phone call comes. Basically she'll be rung at between 7 and 8 and she needs to he ready to get in the car and drive.

If you're saying she can only do this on the days you work from home, then unless they are regular days (eg Tuesday and Thursday) the agency are a lot less likely to ring her.

She also won't get any long term supply either - where a teacher is off for anything between a week and a term and the school get in a supply to cover. They'll want someone available for five days for that.

So if you want her to do supply realistically she'll need to be available every school day not just when you work from home otherwise she'll get very little work.

Do you and your ilk really think it’s financial abuse not to just give money to a woman who can work and chooses not to? That’s shameful. Google financial abuse. It’s financial abuse if he stops her working it’s not financial abuse to make a grown bloody adult work.

My middle son went to university near home there is no reduction on tuition fees.

As a head of school I can tell you that it would be incredibly easy to get a part time position or tuition.

We keep a spreadsheet and budget for everything. We have an idea of how much we want to save for things (such as University and house improvements) and this goes on the spreadsheet too. I go through the account noting down expenditure in the applicable column every few days or so. Everything goes in and out a joint account. Sounds labour intensive but it isn't. Also keeps you aware of all household bills. Credit card is used for large purchases only in our case.

Considering he has a full time job, he easily does his share of the household management. There is nothing to say OP doesn't want to do his share.

I don't see how you have arrived at the conclusion that he "easily does his share of the household management." There is nothing about having a full-time job that indicates anyone spends even ten minutes a year on household management.

There is nothing in what the OP said to indicate he has any idea that doing his fair share to facilitate his wife's return to work would be a good idea. He even posted here looking for ideas, as if it were a complete mystery, despite the broad hint his wife has given him that there are elements of family life that she currently takes care of.

Only on mn does the man who can’t do laundry, wipe a worktop and take out a bin exist.To extent he need ft help with his chores and ADL. That help is inevitably a woman who simply can’t work because of the scale of tasks he and a family generate.

nonsense but a tired trope on mn. Wifework in a post industrial society it’s so onerous it need a ft adult who will have time for nowt else

how do folk think families who both work cope? Or single mums

It's absolutely NOT "worth the financial sacrifice"!!! And nobody spends all day every day on household chores! Believe it or not, even those of us who work full-time manage to keep on top of the housework!

Who pays to bring those kids up? What about a pension? Plus when they are in secondary school, they're not home that long before you, if even - they could be doing after school activities.

@pocketpairs I think your wife is being selfish and lazy. What if you decided that you didn't want to work either? Why should you have to carry the full financial load? I also don't understand why she needs to collect the kids when one of them is 17!! She could work as a TA as they're always in demand, and that could be a way for her to get back into teaching. Plus she would only be working term-time as well.

I've always worked full-time and we have three children. You just make it work for you. I'd feel awful actually if I left the financial load entirely on DH, and tbh I think he would (rightly) be resentful too!

Honestly I split up with my DC dad and immediately had less work to do. We had both done 50% working week (yes, very lucky) but I must have done at least 70% of the domestic chores and 90% of the childcare outside of the working week. As well as 95% of the mental load.
For example if he cooked, I washed up all the dishes and pans, and cleaned the worktops, leaving the kitchen tidy. If I cooked, he washed up the plates. If I made morning tea I emptied the dishwasher while the kettle was boiling; he never did. This was a man who maintained the house spotlessly when he lived alone, but who was perfectly prepared to let me pick up the slack. And at weekends his hobbies continued while mine were sacrificed to childcare. I also did every bedtime. So it is a real thing that women end up with all this and men tend not to.

What specifically do you mean by "very involved with the children and their education"?

Do you buy, wash, and iron their uniforms?
Do you make their lunches every day?
Do you keep track of all the school events and take time off work to attend plays, concerts, sports events?
Do you get up in the night when one of the DCs is throwing up?
Do you do the subsequent laundry?
Do you schlep them to extra curricular activities or weekdays and weekends?
Do you buy and wash and pack sports kits?
Do you choose and buy and wrap birthday gifts when they're invited to parties, and do you drip off and pick up?
How many of their friends' parents do you know?
Do you cook many meals every week?
Do you do laundry for the children?
Do you get them breakfast?

You keep making up the same comments despite the OP contradicting you.

All these threads ever do is remind me to drill into my kids the fact that they need to find an equal partner. I am happy with the chore split in our house. I don't consider myself lucky at all, just picky. I would not have stayed with a man who didn't pull his weight. Closest I got was living with a workshy leech in my early 20s, but even he was houseproud.

This is just so classic. ‘She’s working at home, if she appears lazy she’s depressed’.
It is utterly utterly unreasonable to expect an adult to work full time while you don’t. The DC are at secondary school. She clearly doesn’t plan to return to work when they leave school. It’s utterly unacceptable, go to work, be an actual adult rather than a mollusc.