Husband is financially controlling me

[ChattyChai]

I posted yesterday in AIBU and was advised to post on this board, so here goes.

My husband and I have 4 children, our eldest are 23 and our youngest is 12. We got married when I was 18 and he was 20, because that’s what our parents said had to happen, I got pregnant at 16. I know, I know - I don’t need criticism for that.

Since then, I really struggled for work until our youngest was 2. I was in and out of jobs, did open university courses and eventually qualified as a solicitor. For the last ten years I’ve worked up to be an associate, but it’s been slow going. I’ve faced a lot of outright sexism, knocked back because of the time I took out of work with our children for childcare and I’m only on £35k now.

ive recently got a new job in the NHS, because I just can’t stay in the law. The sexism, the lack of professionalism, the lack of progression, working myself to the bone to make money for other people.

My husband is earning 2-3 times what I do, depending on commissions and bonuses. We split finances as follows:

50% of each income into the joint account. This pays bills, the mortgage, my husband’s golf membership etc. he says the golf membership needs to come from the joint account as it allows him to “network”, but won’t allow childcare to come from this as it allows me to work, so it’s my responsibility. Anything left over gets split - 50% to joint savings, 50% to his personal savings.

20% into savings. 15% to joint savings, 5% to solo.

He uses his other 30% as spending money, a lot of mine goes to things like before and after school clubs to allow me to work full time, everything for our children like bus passes, school lunches, school trips. He doesn’t contribute at all.

Because of the school spending I’m regularly going into my savings and spending more than I bring in some months. I don’t have a huge pension, because I spent about five years out of work because childcare was unaffordable to me. Taking a step back, I can see just how uneven it is, but I also couldn’t afford anything on my own. I brought it up to him last night and he basically said that if I wanted to be financially independent I could start paying for everything myself and “get a real job”.

Now I’ve written to out, I just don’t know what to do next. I can advise clients all the time, but I’m absolutely sure I wouldn’t be able to afford it if he moved out and stopped paying his share.

He calls golf networking because he goes off with the other managers at his workplace for a jolly, and says they’re “networking” - it’s utter shit.

In terms of work, it was agreed I’d leave because of my mental health. I’ve worked for ten years to try and get up, other people who started as newly qualifieds at the time time I did have been promoted up to senior associates and partners, one man has even been promoted to an equity partner. But whenever I go up for promotion I’m told no, and reading between the lines it’s things like the kids, my gaps in employment, the fact I qualified so late. That combined with the stress meant I needed to leave. Yes I’m going into a lower paying job, but I’ve been assured that there is the opportunity to progress and within a year or two I should be earning more than I am now.

Glad you will see a family lawyer - the sooner the better.
Your husband is financially abusing you, apparently as some sort of punishment for you looking after your joint children. The idea that his golf membership is a joint expense but childcare isn’t is plain ludicrous. He should be ashamed of himself.

Yoyve got good qualifications and are clearly a hard worker, once you’ve got a plan to move out and to divorce I think you’ll feel so much better. At the moment he’s just grinding you down.

Please don't make any changes until you've had some advice as abusers tend to escalate when they're losing control. You can contact Refuge webchat until 10pm. Don't mention seeing a solicitor or thoughts of leaving without advice.

Divorce!
Or give him an ultimatum:
Put everything on a spreadsheet. Different colour code income & contributions each to the joint account. Different colours for household bills and DC costs (pocket money, clubs, ...) and big fat highlight for the golf!
Different colours for family saving and personal savings.
Also note at the bottom how much each has left for personal spending.

If you both have a car, keep them separately, give each a clothes budget, list your own hobbies separately and offset them to his golf (= it stops coming out of joint account or you add yours.)

Present him with a fairer % system that will not let you (or him) short because of child / household related costs. These obviously have priority over hobbies ect.

If he's unreasonable about your proposal, leave, divorce get rid, ....

I’ll leave the constructive advice to others but god I’d be tempted to cancel his golf direct debit.

Does he not want you to work?

Half of what he’s doing is very fair - both contributing 50%, which means he contributes a lot more than you and pays most of the bills.

But anything to do with the children, he won’t pay - there has to be something behind this.

What would happen if you told him you can’t afford to work anymore?

I’s be tempted to call his bluff and give up my job but I wouldn’t because I’d worry that he’s doing this just so you give up your job and then he’d have full control.

Has it always been like this, even with the older ones?
Whats his relationship like with the youngest?

As Mumsnet advise famously says keep your cards close to your chest. Play nice to his face.

I don’t know how he’d react but this did give me a giggle!

I’m really not sure. He looks down on my career massively.

He does contribute more, but then whatever is left over at the end of the month is split between joint savings and his savings. He effectively gets 75% of the leftovers because the joint savings are half his

Agree. Get legal advice and crunch some numbers around what you could afford by yourself for you and the two youngest.

i would have a plan for where you could go temporarily if the abuse escalates.

DO NOT use your savings. Begin reducing your payments into the joint account. Stop using after school care for a 12 year old - I do understand why youre doing it but you can’t afford it and you don’t need it. Presumably he comes home with his sibling after school?

I honestly think you should stop wraparound for the 12 year old. It's an unnecessary expense and you can't afford it.

Your H is a dick and you are worth more than this shoddy treatment.

Wow. That’s golf clubs in the bin territory.
Or you could write down everything you pay for and what he pays for, and pin it up in his precious golf club for everyone to see what a prince he is. (Daydreaming is fun)
But seriously, divorce the awful man.

Last step before leaving is to remove 50% of the joint savings. Please tell me you have access to these?

You’ve got two different things here: your rights on divorce and your career.

If you divorce, you can ignore what your twat DH has told you because you’ll be entitled to at least half of everything (including his pension and any savings in his sole name) and you might get more based on the disparity in your earnings.

That takes us to the second point. You can earn a lot more as a solicitor than you can in the NHS, and on divorce a court will expect you to maximise your earnings.

I’ve been divorced twice. In my first divorce my husband told me I’d have to work on a supermarket checkout as that’s all I’d be able to do as a single parent to 2 infants. Instead I went straight to law school, qualified as a lawyer, and started working my way up whilst single parenting 2 (by then) primary school aged kids. I’m now a partner. I had another marriage and child along the way and sadly that ended too and I’m a single parent again to the little one. I have still managed to progress, and got a better job after the second divorce to increase my income.

I would be looking at going back to lawyering in your shoes.

Him and his sister go to different schools, she’s heading towards exams so tends to hang around in the library with friends “revising” (I’m sure she’s actually just chatting, but who am I to judge!), and comes back in her own time.

I do, thankfully

Agree with others that really your only actual option is to leave.

You can’t force him to pay for anything, contribute more etc while married- but once separated you can claim CMS depending on the care set up and at least then you can budget and organise your own life and finances independently.

So sorry OP, you must be incredibly unhappy being married to such a god damn awful man & father. Please divorce him.

50/50 is equal - the question is 50/50 of what? Free time? Savings? Spending money?

My eyebrows went up at the golf membership, then childcare.... Never came down again.

This is bullshit

Get documents
Get a lawyer
Get a divorce

And go after him for MORE than half (which is fair / right in your circs)

I’m sure I could earn a lot more, but at my stage it’s been made quite clear to me that it’s going to be a massive uphill battle, because of my breaks from work for childcare. My new manager in the NHS is already putting together a plan for me to be looking at management courses etc to progress within the first six months to a year, and thinks within a year or two I’ll be earning more than I could expect to earn at my current firm. We don’t live in a big city, so we don’t have huge high paying law firms near us.

I won’t see a penny from him.

He's bluffing. It's a matter for the divorce court, not for him.

@chattychaiyou could just change firm? I don’t understand the nature of the “breaks for childcare” - is that referring to historic gaps in your CV or day to day needing to leave at 3pm? If the former, that isn’t a reason for non-progression if you’re now working and are good at your job; if the latter, that’s a choice but many law firms are pretty flexible these days - especially the non-City ones.

I don’t work in London or for a high-paying firm. I’m still highly paid by any normal standard. If I want to leave the office at 3pm to pick up my kid, I do - but I make up the time later when she’s gone to bed.

This is terrible. I think you know what you have to do. He will have to split all assets and pay child support, so you will be ok finacially - probably a lot better of than you are now.

You’ll be so much happier you get away from this absolute piece of shit.