WTF is this behaviour?

[SquirrelsAreNuts]

For background, DH and I have a combined income of about £150k but he earns way more than I do. I have a minimum wage term-time job because I do all the childcare for our DC and DSC. We also live in one of the most expensive parts of the SE. Wouldn't be my choice, but it's so we can be close to DH's DC (my DSC).

We're comfortable but not rolling in it. I mention all that just because what triggered this thread was money, but it's not really about money IYSWIM?

We've had next year's holiday reserved but not paid for since the summer. It was coming up to the time we have to confirm everything and start putting deposits down and booking flights, etc. DH has been fully up to speed on all these plans, the timings, the costs, everything. I've managed the admin but have kept him informed of all the details at each step. As far as I was concerned he had signed off on all of it. I don't know what more I could have done, which is why I'm baffled.

Last night DH and I sat down together and spent about an hour searching the best flights in terms of price and time and figured out the most cost effective way to do it was fly out to one airport on a one way ticket and fly back from a different airport on a one way ticket.

We booked the outbound flight together and then he lost interest and went to sit in the front room. So I carried on and booked the inbound flight on my own (but with his agreement, I thought).

Once it was done I went into the front room and told him I'd booked the flights back and he started freaking out. Saying that now we're committed to the holiday cost and he didn't realise it was going to be so much. How much was I going to pay towards it, etc, etc. I was floored. What did he think we'd just been doing? It was such a weird reaction from him I didn't know how to respond other than WTF.

He freaked out so much he insisted I cancelled the whole thing. So this morning I've wasted a load of time cancelling the flights and trying to get our money back. The kids are going to be so upset.

He sort of has form for this. In the past he's agreed to having work done on our house (which is a fixer upper). Has let me put in a load of time and effort contacting builders and getting quotes, etc, only to say no to everything at the last minute.

I feel utterly powerless in this relationship in terms of finances. I don't think he's being controlling as such, it's more his extreme anxiety at spending any money. But the net effect on me and the kids is the same. House and garden is crumbling around our ears and we never go anywhere.

For the first time ever in our marriage I am wondering what it would be like to leave him as this latest holiday reverse ferret feels like one too many. But the thought is terrifying. I'm sure if you asked him, he'd say I'm a wasteful spendthrift who just wants the high life. But to him, the 'highlife' is putting the heating on, or having the dishwasher on anything but Eco setting.

I haven't been able to stop crying this morning but I can't put my finger on why. It's not just the cancelled holiday. It's the weird behaviour - letting me do all that organising and spending an hour booking flights with me then completely changing his mind - I don't even know what to call it.

Exactly this.

Do NOT continue to give up your earning power for a man like this.

Why the f should you? Get a long term plan so you can make some decent money. Might mean a lot of work and retraining but you CANNOT continue to be at the mercy of a man who is at best mean spirited and at worst controlling.

I would make him feel your anger about these flights. Make a big argument of it. Tell him exactly how you feel and do not spare him the details. Make the point that you’d get a huge chunk of his precious savings in a divorce- far more than some flipping flights. Let him know how serious this is and you won’t be pandering any more. You’re married so there is no his money and your money- you’re one financial unit and you both get an equal say in how you live your life.

I think some people are just like this. I know i can be like this, it took me a whole year to buy a sofa. Just a weird thing I have I guess. I would spend ages looking have it in the basket ect and then just chicken out. Finances are pretty comfortable.
I would explain it frustrating for you but also I don't think its something he can help.

The first thing that came to my mind is he is very secretive. You don't have a clue where his money is going. This would be an enormous issue for me. The level of spending anxiety suggests there are outgoings you don't know about.

You've mentioned he grew up poor, but he isn't poor anymore. Growing up poor often means being surrounded by people who exhibit 'instant gratification' behaviours which perpetuates the cycle. Seeing these example as a kid can make you either lean into the same behaviours, find a happy medium or go the exact opposite way, like your DH has. He is being downright miserly. He strikes me as the type of person who would walk an extra mile to a shop simply because the eggs were 5p cheaper than the one on the doorstep.

The strangest part of this was him going along with booking flights out but backtracking on flights home. There is an underlying need for him to control the situation there, he doesn't like that you took the initiative to book them without his presence, now whether that is because he thought he could find flights that were 50p cheaper and doesn't trust your judgement or whether your spending without his consultation triggered a 'what if she starts spending money without asking me' response, who knows. It could even be plain malice to punish you because he felt he had 'lost control' of the financial decision. Either way it's not normal behaviour, it's actually quite cruel and letting the children down like that is totally unacceptable. Broken promises causes trust issues and nobody wants an unreliable husband/father. What a let down!

Our current sofa is so old and stained it's embarrassing and we got it second hand anyway. He has had a tab open on his phone with a link to the sofa he wants to buy for over a year now.

My ex was continuously worrying at me that we were struggling (we weren't not by the end of the relationship), but would then go out and spend on the things he wanted.

It was part of his controlling - he wanted me continuously worrying about him and his work stress (I also worked and looked after the kids like you OP - earning 30-50% what he did, and would have been earning the same as him if I had the freedom I granted him by doing everything), so I didn't expect him to pull his weight with kids/house, and importantly not spending his money.

Then he'd occasionally throw me off by telling me to just spend the money and get the kids nice coats/shoes (often when he was planning something spendy himself I realised) - but then the next time I'd try to do something nice he'd tell me off for it and get back on the 'but do we have enough money, I'm not sure how long I can keep this up' spiel.

I couldn’t live like that. Or make my children live like that.

I would leave him.

Sounds very familiar. I'm just having such a difficult time reading it as abusive. It doesn't seem intentional or calculated from him. I always thought it was more like his panic and anxiety around money. But maybe it's really, really insidious control and I just haven't spotted it until now? It's very confusing.

Me neither - it took me ages to realise that was what was going on. I'm almost ashamed how long it took me given the absolutely clear pattern now I look back!

I still don't now if it was intentional or just a way he'd learned to behave that worked for him. Doesn't make any difference given the effect on me/the kids (and maybe you) though.

Genuine question OP I’m interested to know the answer; Why did you cancel the flights? I know he asked you to, but why?

Did it not occur to you to say “No, we’ve made a decision, it’s booked now, we’re going. Part of my money is invested in this too not just yours. If you want the money back that badly YOU cancel it, I’ve spent enough time on it”

You’d spent over an hour doing the admin booking the flights, and then all of the next morning faffing around cancelling them like his skivvy.

I think abusive people mostly don’t think they’re abusive..? whether he intends it to be the case or not, you have no financial control and as you’ve posted it’s clear he’s fine with spending on himself. But resents spending on you and the kids.
I know the job market is hard but I’d be single focussed on improving my salary however I could.
As a minimum, I’d be seeking marriage guidance counselling. And probably legal and financial advice for myself.
lots of love to you.

There's probably something else going on. He's got money worries but isn't communicating them properly. Could be down to job security, job stress, etc. Likely to be a combination of a number of things. He's feeling under pressure. If you'd already booked one set of flights what happened in the time it took to book the second? What did he check/look at? If you booked outward flights, the obvious question was how did he think you were going to get home? I'd have asked him to rationally tell you what's going on.

I was beginning to think that of my then husband, his reactions to literally non-events were so extreme. Turns out it's just part of the training, to keep you wondering which way is up, confused, doubting yourself and doing your very best to please them, to make it alright again, which you can never do.

Perhaps your husband has had the tab open for the sofa he wants in the hope you'll pay for it?

It is hard to think that the person who is supposed to love you above all others is abusive, but once you consider that as a possibility you can start to look at their behaviour more objectively, rather than not being able to see the wood for the trees or having your head filled with the fog of their making.

Those of us who have experienced the same type of behaviours can recognise it without having any emotional attachment. A PP mentioned she would never let her partner do now what she did when she was with him - that's why they don't want us having any autonomy, they don't want a strong us because strong women don't obey. It's not until we are away from them that we can regain the strength they have envied and robbed us of.

There’s a saying: “Don’t assign to malice what can be explained by incompetence.”

I don’t disagree with PP that the outcome of his behaviour is controlling, but I don’t think it is necessarily intended to be controlling. It sounds like poverty trauma and he literally has no clue how to handle his finances, which results in him having huge panics and doing odd things. There will be an element of control over you because he feels so out of control himself.

I highly recommend doing a CAP course to learn about handling money, and as a PP said get a financial adviser as he is high earning. If he still isn’t able to behave better towards you after a while (it’s a learning process, remember, he’s been dealing with money badly all his life so it won’t get fixed in a month) then I would start to question whether there is more sinister intentionality around the behaviour which other PP are suggesting.

Well while you mull I'd not be doing the headwork or graft for anything else going forward.

You need a plan

Yes absolutely. Fuck that. If he wants anything else sorting he can do it himself.

He holds this debt against me even though it's quite hurtful because the reason for the debt is because I had to leave home ASAP at age 18 due to the abusive circumstances and he knows this.

I've just seen this @SquirrelsAreNuts . This is again another tactic of abuse. You share something with them when they have gained your trust, something personal and difficult, and further down the line they will use it against you.

Please be very careful with this man

I'm sorry to say but this is veering dangerously close to financial abuse.
If you split up he'd have no choice but to give you money. Just a thought...

This is such a good question and I'm really having to think why.

The simple answer is that I'd booked it on my card so being the card holder, it was easiest for me to do it.

But there was also a feeling of my having done something 'wrong'. He went into such a flap and started claiming that I hadn't told him how much the total cost of the holiday was (I had, multiple times) and that he didn't realise how much he was in for as if I'd somehow duped him into booking a holiday he couldn't afford. The vibe was very much that I'd been underhand in some way and he was only now discovering my ruse.

I suppose the short answer is I felt guilty? Although fuck knows why.

Sound tight.

@SquirrelsAreNuts I had an ex who would also agree to things and then let me organise them before denying he had ever agreed to that or said he wanted to do that, and making me cancel them. Then later wondering why I had cancelled because of course he wanted to do that. Gaslighting basically. It drove me batshit, which of course was the whole point. It was about control and wanting me to feel on the back foot all the time, scrabbling around to meet his whims while he constantly flip flopped on everything. Note that he's an ex now.

suppose the short answer is I felt guilty? Although fuck knows why.

Because he manipulated you. The more you post about him the clearer the picture is becoming.

How manipulative of him.

This also begs the question, why did you use your card to book it? From your opening post I’m guessing you earn approx only £20k per annum, while he earns £130k?? Ridiculous to book using your card in these circumstances.

Did he tell you to use your card/refuse to let you use his?

My card collects points. His doesn't. I've been on at him for years to get the same card as me so we can collect double the points but he never sorts it out. It's another example of such a simple thing that would take him 20 mins to do but he has a total mental block over because it would mean signing up to a credit card and then buying things on it and having to tolerate being in debt for a month until paying the balance off.

Oh, yes, I had that too - I managed all the bills, paid everything on my card, and gave him a companion card. The one time the limit was maxed out and he couldn't make a purchase, he held over me for years (edit - he was 'just joking' of course, any of the 10s of times he brought it up over the years)

It's just sensible now for you to book the flights - you're the one with the right card (which you put in the effort to get) etc. it's total co-incidence that you now get to do all the work and take all the risk (and if something goes wrong, it's all your fault because you did it).

The one time we had to cancel some flights and it was left to him, he didn't cancel them, and we lost a grand when we were pretty skint (and soon to be jobless, with a young baby). My income was the only thing keeping us afloat at that time, and he still (now I look back) used to try to sabotage me by trying to get me to come back to bed or pay attention to him rather than doing my work.

My mum was a career woman and she always told me to settle for someone who was in the same income bracket as you.

I listened well. never had issues who power dynamic was rooted in money.