resentment over ultimatum

[whiningshinji]

Many years ago my wife gave me an ultimatum around having a third child. I adamantly didn't want a third, but to spare my other two children a broken home I acquiesced.

All the things I knew would happen happened. I got locked into a high pressure,high paying job I hated to cover heightened costs, free time totally evaporated and the friends I did have soon drifted due to me going from work to home and back again and never seeing anyone! My hobbies, modest though they were all withered due to lack of time/funds. My wife maintained some of her social contact and hobbies once all children were into school(less full on job with better annual leave - mine unsurprisingly was stingy and was absorbed by school holiday coverage)

The resentment I felt towards my wife over this never went away. Our third child is now approaching adulthood and all I can think about is leaving.

I got dragged to yet another (tiresome) couples thing by my wife. I normally don't drink, but I had a couple this time. We were talking to some people who were talking about how hard the baby and toddler years were and how they stopped at one, saying to us and another couple how did we manage three. I said it was a very hard slog - my wife chipped in by saying that we wouldn't change a thing.

Apparently at this point I scowled and muttered that I would. I wasn't even aware of doing this! Either way my wife is now getting an inkling that my mindset hasn't been changed by the years. He attitude has wrongly always been she was right and that I fell into line in the end and was content.

Now suddenly she is encouraging me to meet up with friends (who I haven't spoken to in 15 years) and mentioning finding a club for one of my old hobbies.
Bit late!

I am 80% sure I will leave, but this has thrown things because I was hoping to quietly arrange things and then cut the cord. I certainly wouldn't fight on the house or forking over half savings, the house is paid off and she can have it! Well worth it to break free of her.

I don't know what to do, I just feel the resentment has totally eaten away any affection I had over the years.

Jesus. The number of women posting on here blaming him for having a third child he didn't really want.

If hhis wife had posted 18 years ago, people would have been calling him selfish for not 'giving her' the third child she craved or telling her to leave and find someone else.

One of them wasn't going to get their wish and he did what he thought was best for the whole family at the time.

I can easily see how resentment has built up especially if his reasons for sticking at two were predictions that came to fruition.

Have to quickly comment just to say I feel accomplished on Mumsnet now - someone accuses me of running 'the script' and want to run off to pastures new (guessing a euphemism for another woman).

Nope, you have been misled there. Not all men leave for another woman and certainly not me. Regardless of what you think of my decision, I like to think I wouldn't have gone through all the hassle just to blow my family up with an affair.

Also long hours for more pay / not having roof over head. Yeah a tough call for sure

Would your life have been so different if you only had two DC? I have three and about half of my friends have two DC and there are no obvious differences in our lifestyles.

Who knows how life would have turned out if different choices were made.

If you'd chosen to "break up the family" maybe you'd have remarried by now and had more kids 😂.

Maybe your wife would have backed down, maybe she'd be the one resenting you and planning a divorce.

It's no good holding grudges and resentment, it hurts you as much as anyone else. You can control your present and future.

Look wanting children is instinctive, animalistic, the desire is in a persons bones and can be impossible to bury. She was honest in giving you the option, you made your decision.

Any reason you didn't have a vasectomy after no.2?

Look wanting the sleep with people outside of a relationship is instinctive, animalistic, the desire is in a persons bones and can be impossible to bury. She was honest in giving you the option, you made your decision.

What's good for the goose right?

If one holds true then so does the other. I don't think either hold true

Because a decent husband doesn't do that without a discussion with his wife?

Men can be subject to coercive control in relationships, and I do wonder if there is some of that here. Not just the third child, but the whole ongoing pattern.

You're not really making much sense. Most of us here are working supporting a family financially, emotionally and physically. You indicate that your wife was working and taking care of the children, so I'm not really feeling where this resentment is coming from.

It just doesn't fit for me with having brought up a family in a similar time period.

@Velvian I'm presuming you felt you had a choice about your situation. That makes a considerable difference

I'm amazed how many people are defending the wife here. Giving an ultimatum like that is abusive, and she was prepared to blow up the lives of her husband and two existing children just to satisfy her own wants. If a woman came on here asking if she should give an ultimatum like she'd be told absolutely not, and to be happy with the two DC she has. But some posters have to defend the woman no matter how bad her behaviour.

There is no coming back from this OP, you should start the divorce proceedings and get a fair settlement.

I would have every sympathy for someone whose partner wants another child and they don't and would absolutely encourage the wife to make the most of the children that she has.

What I struggle with is, having made the decision to have a 3rd child, hanging on to to resentment over so many years and attributing all dissatisfaction with life to the 3rd child. It is just not reasonable.

I was reticent to have DC 2, as I came to the relationship with DS1, who was over the difficult years when DH was ready for DC. Once I had decided to go for it, that was it I was committed and never looked back and had DC3 shortly after. It has obviously created a lot more work and stress for me, but that was my ultimate decision.

It sounds like the OP has a good wife, someone that works to bring in an income and has taken on the bulk of child rearing. Enjoy your family OP, this is the time to sit back and enjoy the company of the lovely children you have.

Flip the script, though. Imagine a woman came on here saying that her husband demanded a third child or he would leave. He then demanded she take a job she didn't want over a job she preferred, in order to fund a more lavish lifestyle. And that she wasn't allowed time with her own friends - that he dictated the friendships.

I don't think OP has said his wife controlled his friendships, more that he was doing "mad hours" and his social life took the hit.

I also don't think he said she made him take a job he hated, more that the circumstance of having a third child meant he had to pursue the Big Job.

I don't think it's necessarily fair to depict the wife as a controlling monster. I don't agree with what she did, but I don't think your "flip" of the situation is accurate.

But he's pretty clear that they had multiple conversations about the job that he hated over the first 10 years, and that he would have been much happier with a less expensive lifestyle.

End the marriage, life is too short to be miserable, get your freedom, find a job you can be happy in & start a new life.

I think this is a load of crap. Her baseline was give me another kid or I’m taking the two first ones away.

In fact, he still lost out on being a more present father to all his children in meeting the costs of her demands.

To be honest, I think he should tell her that he resents being put in that position and turning the children into a human shield to avoid even looking at her own actions is despicable. That children = human shield would be my entry point into her choices and manipulative nature.

All of the laundry lists of his failures doesn’t excuse her behavior… right up to the patronizing presuming to speak for both of them “oh, we wouldn’t change a thing.” She deserves to be divorced for that alone!

You would need to be convinced that OP's wife did that in the first place and I am not at all. OP has indicated that she worked and that she also wanted 'family time', so it does not add up to me that she was relentlessly pushing the OP in his career.

As soon as the OP indicated his feelings to his wife, she has been suggesting he meet up with friends and join a hobby group. She sounds like a pretty nice person to me, even in the OP's telling.

He says he spent years trying to tell her that he was unhappy, and eventually gave up.

He was working 60 hours weeks that he didn't want and what free time he did have was expected to be family time. This is what squeezed out his own personal life and in my experience you can't always just pick your old friends back up when it suits.

OP does state these things.

He does, but casting it purely as on his wife's "demand" and that she "dictated" his friendships seem to be overstating it, when it could just be the natural consequences of having a third child.

It certainly could be the consequences of coercive control, but not sure OP is suggesting that.

Hi
I don't know if you are still reading and I admit I haven't read all the replies but I can relate .
My husband was the one who really wanted a second child . I voiced all my concerns , time , cost , older child becoming independent so we could be more flexible, going through baby stages again . All our friends had only ones .

He reassured me that he was on board and I wouldn't be left to do it alone .

We had our baby and his career progressed , we bought a bigger house that he pays for but he works away .

I became the only parent home during the week , the friends I had drifted because I was with the younger at home and no babysitter . He was in the nice hotels with meals out during the week while I dealt with everything at home .

At weekends I was the one saying I needed time but he also needed time as he'd been away . It was stalemate

We went through a few years where he was miserable , we were both miserable . I resented him saying he needed time at weekend when he was away all week . I resented being on my own all week and then weekends and like your wife I wanted time with him .

Now our youngest is 10 and my husband still works away but we make time for each other and some time for friends . He has had to remake friendships , it's not impossible .

I didn't make mum friends with our second child but my other friends are still there .
Yes I still feel resentful that my life has become children and home . My husband does still want time at weekends . But we have communicated this throughout .
And despite my misgivings I did agree to having a 2nd child so I'm 50% responsible for the situation we created .

Well then we disagree. It’s about personal accountability. I never said that his wife’s behaviour was good but ultimately his choices were his own. He chose to have a third child. He could’ve said no. She might have left, she might not. It was her right to want another child just as it was his right to say no. No-one is wrong, they’re just wanted different things. And as for the job, he could’ve got a better paying job. He could’ve said, I’m not doing extra hours so you need to work more to his wife. He could’ve said, I need one day a month to myself where I socialise with my friends or do my hobby. Would she have liked it? I don’t know, perhaps not. But ultimately we are all responsible for ourselves and our choices. He chose to have a third child, he chose to work more, he chose to neglect his social relationships, he chose to let his wife lead and therefore he’s now resentful. All his own choices made out of fear. Perhaps he should’ve gone to therapy and learned about setting healthy boundaries but he didn’t. So, you might think my views are crap but those are my views on the matter.

I don't disagree with you at all, but it's clear that the OP has been very conscious of what being a "good father" (and maybe even a "real man") is, just as many women martyr themselves on the ideal of being a "good mother". So to him a good father doesn't walk away from his kids, provides them with the best lifestyle he can, devotes as much time to them as he can.

I don't think those ideals are helpful for men or women, to go through life martyring yourself on a rigid ideal without realising that to be a good mother/father, you need to put your own desires first sometimes; but he's not unusual for falling into that trap. (Not least because kids pick up on any hint of "I'm only doing it for you" martyrdom and correctly find it insufferable!)

I think you’re getting a hard time here, OP. But this is MN, and generally unsympathetic to the male point of view! Neither you or your DW come out smelling of roses here.

You ill advisedly allowed yourself to be blackmailed- any ultimatum with the words or implication “or else” is blackmail- with your ‘D’W using your the happiness of your existing two children as bargaining chips. She got what she wanted and an easy job with you carrying the financial load.

You really should have had enough integrity and backbone to stick to your guns and tell her what to do with her ultimatum. Make sure you get your fair share and that the house is sold. She will have a rude awakening when she has to pay her own way and get a mortgage.

It’s always the children I always feel sorry for in this situation. No child should be brought into the world on the back of such vile tactics. No one’s entitled to x number of children. Every child is entitled to be wanted.