What would you think about this situation ?

[Wanttobefreeandhappy1985]

Hi all,

I need an honest objective opinion. I have been with my ''partner'' for the last 16 years. Old same story, I met him when I was very early 20s , he is 8 years older. We have a child who is 14. For years I wanted to get married, but he did not (he wanted to protect his assets I think, he never wanted to get talk honestly about thi), he owns a big property worth about £500k, he paid off his mortgage about 7 years ago. He has good savings (£100k I reckon but keeps it hidden way from me).

For many years I have worked part time, had no money, but lived in his ''nice property'' bill free- I have paid for all the food for the last 10 years though. I have cleaned, cooked etc - same old story ! I looked after the family. On the outside my life looked really good. I have upped my hours a few yours ago, I am now full time and earn OK wage. I have the potential to earn £45-£50k eventually . I still buy all the food but contribute nothing towards bills.

I had to pay him back in instalments for the family holiday when our child was little when I worked 1 day a week, once I upped my hours I have always paid half for the holidays (we went a lot) and all my outgoings . When I paid a bit less for a holiday before then, he expected me to go and get all the drinks at the bar (it was all exclusive , so it was a case that he sat on his ass and I had to go and get it for us). I feel sick thinking I have allowed myself to agree to this but he used money to control me of course.

I have tried to reason with him over the years to be equal but he kept telling me it's me who is benefiting from this relationship and I am lucky to live in a nice house and not having to pay a rent. He would call me a lodger a few times in the arguments. I am not an angel and called him a lot of names, but word lodger is not acceptable.

I moved to a spare bedroom 4 years ago as I have had enough. I bought a flat a few months ago (put £40k deposit-that was all the money I have saved over the last few years) , but I am really emotionally struggling to move out of family home and not seeing our child every other week. He has given me £10k to furnish the flat, so I am only walking away with £10k, which I keep telling him it's nothing. He says it's plenty. But I keep saying I have a mortgage now for 20 years while he has no mortgage and his house has almost doubled in price in the time we were together.

He went to the therapist lately as he is so unhappy with how things turned out and playing a victim, and gave me a letter yesterday giving me 3 options :

Option 1 I stay as a friend in a family home for a bit longer but I buy a better quality food, pay him a difference in council tax £90 to what he would pay if he was a single occupant) and start spending time with him over the weekend as ''family'', until i am ready to move out

Option 2 We give relationship another go

Option 3 I move out immediately and there is no going back

He said in the letter he loves me and always will but these are my 3 options lol

I have moved out recently as we had a massive argument (over the quality of food I buy! he says I am starving him) but I struggled to be away from my child, so i had to almost beg him to let me come back to a family home (I gave him the keys back when I left).

I don't love him, but I am attached to this family unit somehow. I just want my son to move out with me but this is not feasible and we would have our child every other week.

Do you think it's far I buy all the food if I stay in his property a bit longer until I am ready to move out ? I have outgoings on my own property now (£1000 a month or so).

My mum keeps telling me I should give him another chance but my friends keep saying he has financially abused me. I have given him a letter saying we either get married / I go on house deeds or I am leaving (he says it's unfair for me to want to be on house deeds unless I pay for part of the house) but I believe I paid for it with my other contributions in family life). I don't actually want to be married to him anymore as I have too much resentment, but I just felt better giving him this ultimatum.

Let me know your thoughts - am I reasonable to want to leave him ? My mum says I am all about money now, how about love .

Sorry about the long post !!!!

You do have to own your choice to do that though.

It goes without saying that you should have insisted on marriage when you had the baby. I’m not saying that to be cruel, I’m just writing that as a kind of headline in case anyone else in your position early on ever reads this looking for support.

I don’t really see how you can marry him now if you don’t love him anymore. It would be the most soul destroying thing ever. In your position now I’d probably push for being on the deeds, bide my time a bit once on them and then take the greedy bastard for every penny. Keep your flat as an asset and rent it out while you don’t beed to live in it.

And for what it’s worth you haven’t just been abused financially by this bellend, it sounds like you’ve also been abused emotionally what with the nonsense over food (unless you’re buying nothing but value baked beans, he’s being utterly ridiculous); the calling you a lodger/saying you’ve got a great deal here (that would have happened precisely once in this house, before his balls ended up being flattened in his sleep); and the example of you being his personal slave on holiday (I bet you’ve got loads of stories like this, haven’t you?)

The man is a cunt and there are no good options here, but I would be doing my level best to go for the one that gets you the most money as you’ve been his maid, supplier of food and childcare for the better part of two decades. And for God’s sake don’t listen to your mum. She sounds as deluded as he is.

Good luck!

Fab comment, thank you.

Going on deeds would involve sharing a bed with him and being in a relationship again, but I am so resentful that this will definitely not be an option for me to ever share a bed with this man after how I have been treated . I am still attached to this family unit but I cannot make myself get close to someone like this, so I will have to leave, but what annoys me is that he says I am breaking up the family over money when it's the other way round. He blames it all on me.

I obviously appreciate the fact that I got to live rent free in a nice big property etc and I have managed to save quite a bit of money as a result (and I have told him this numerous times) but I have also wanted appreciation from him for everything I did for this family - but he said it's me who has benefited more.

I spend about £400 on food for 3 of us, but I get shouted at that he wants me to buy him protein yogurts, protein bars etc even though he has mortgage free property and £100k in a bank.

That's why I am puzzled that some women might think I wanted to contribute nothing, that's not true.

Yes , I have loads of stories like this. He went to my work xmas party once and he said something about HIS house and my colleagues have corrected him saying well you are now a family so it is a joint house. That was embarrassing.

My bedroom in the house (he has quite a few) is also the only one with old horrible carpet as he kept saying for years that if I want a new carpet in my bedroom I should pay for it. I needed to contribute half towards broken oven glass (I know it's quite petty to mention this but still), half of school trips, pay for all school lunches for a child in primary school and secondary school. Its when he wanted half towards hoover when it broke, i have then told him to fuck off. I haven't just lived off him , so to clarify.

They have a child together!

You are totally lacking in empathy though.

Firstly, absolutely congratulations on having the forethought to buy the flat!

This man is an arse, but you already know that.

I almost can’t believe I’m going to say this. If he’s generally pleasant enough to be around, I’d give serious thought to this.

Move back in, stay in the spare room until your DS is 18 or at uni. Put a tenant in the flat and have them paying it off. Do you best to go up the career ladder and increase your salary. If you get a raise, tell nobody and save the extra or put it into the mortgage. make sure you’re paying NI and a private pension too.

Normally I’d be saying get out as fast as possible, but if it’s tolerable and you can grey rock him until your DS is 18, you could perhaps work yourself into a much better position financially.

But realistically her son will stay in the family home with his dad. He won’t want to leave his bedroom for her smaller flat.

OP in your shoes I would suck it up and save every penny for the next 4 years until your son leaves home/is an adult.

I haven’t read the full thread OP but sadly he knew just what he was doing here. This is al the perils of moving in with someone and being their “common law” wife /mother or their child without the actual legal status.
Move out and move on. The only silver lining here is that your son may inherit from this penny pincher then he’s older.

I was in your exact situation only I left my ex when our child was one. Personally I could not stay any longer with someone who treated our relationship like a transaction and had no regard for my future security/stability. I work full time in a good career but being on maternity leave showed me that I cannot rely on his financial support at all (even though he is very comfortable). Imagine getting very ill and being off work for a while and your partner offering you a zero percent loan to help out.

Couldn’t agree with this more! I was baffled reading the comments… I don’t know how we always make this leap on Mumsnet to everything is abuse and the man is always wrong!

If this story was told the opposite way round - I.e a man had been living in her very expensive house rent and bill free for years and only did the food shopping, and she had given him £10,000 in the proceedings of a break up - I can absolutely guarantee that everyone would be saying that the man had fully taken the piss out of her!!!

This was a choice they both made, that suited her well. OP has paid nothing for her life for years. Now she wants to leave she has, by her own admission, started buying crap food because she wants to live in the nice house and have her new flat that he contributed £10k to, and is somehow shocked that he has said if she wants to stay living rent free in his house (whilst slagging him off to anyone that will listen, including all over the internet) that she can at least continue to buy the food and not skimp on it. What a terrible man. Burn him at the stake 🙄🙄

I honestly don’t see what that has to do with anything?!

The child’s needs are being met by dad - he is financially looking after him?

The insulation that he owes her something and should financially take care of her forever simply because she is the mother of his child is wild. She is a grown adult who chose not to buy her own home and make sure she was financially stable before having a child. Just because she made a bad choice doesn’t mean someone else has to rescue her.

And no, I’m not a man. I’m a 35 yo mother of 2.

I have considered that frankly speaking, to stay and bind my time. But that would get me in the worse financial position and 4 more years would have been wasted , as I will need to continue buying all the food, pay him £92 in extra council tax supplement and also cook him all the foodas he won't cook. And carry on paying expenses on my flat, mortgage etc. And carry on being called a lodger in any arguments. But that means another 4 years would have been wasted of going treated like a skivy. I can't allow this

I appreciate all your comments by the way. It's good to get different perspective. It makes me feel good actually to hear that I got what I could and came out quite ok financially out of it

Just to clarify I wasn't able to up my hours for long time as he refused to do school runs . When I changed my job for more hours when child was 4 he refused to look after child when I went for interview so, I had to ask his mum. I have over the years suggested to him we split bills but that means he would have to cook in turns to make it more equal and he said he doesn't have time to cook. He wanted me to pay him bills in cash /money transfers , but I said I will only pay bills if my name is on it and he refused

He wouldn't even do a will

Some people might say I brought nothing to relationship financially. But isn't that a case for lots of young couples (we once were when we met ) and then you build it all up together? To me it seems that I have been put in the position of someone who adds non financial value while he built assets

I have offered that we just sit down and we look at what we amassed after we had a child and have this shared legally ( which means most of his house would be intact), I said that over the years, that would keep me happy and would be decent compromise but he refused

Yes I had a choice to leave over the years but that would means a shit financial position so I was much better off to save to get a good deposit and good prospects

He has been financially abusing you for years. Make the break and create your own life without him.

Laws around cohabitation in England are fucking insane.

Yes he knew from a start what he was doing. He used to blackmail me to have another child out of wedlock

Maybe I would have stay to bind my time for a few more years and rent a flat, but that would mean still cooking for him and being called a lodger when I say sth he doesn't like. It would also mean all the running costs on my flat ( incl mortgage ) plus buying him all the food, cooking and extra £92 payment to him a month and most importantly I would look like an idiot yet again, as I have issued ultimatum saying we either sit down and at least share what we both amassed since we had a child ( including my money) but as he amassed more , he won't share it saying I have had it easy

He would rather lose his family. He says he loves me but he won't do it. I don't love him anymore due to years of this uncertainty and treatment, but I am still attached to this family unit

He really has not. Have you read all the thread

That's true, thank you. That's why I am puzzled why some people might not see this financial abuse. Yes I have had it easy living bill free in his property, but I had to buy food and cook for him, and I have offered to sit down to have a more equal set up , but he refused

Like fuck would I stay in a relationship or live with him.

He’s given you 10k to appease you. If you had married him you’d be getting about 300k and he knows this. He’s laughing. He’s had a partner who has given him a child, paid for all his food and now it’s not worked out he has wriggled out of any costs of splitting up.

But I’m sure he would say ‘She’s had no rent or mortgage or bills for her entire adult life.’ He has a point.

This is why marriage is so important. He took advantage of you being 8 years younger and a bit naive.

I think if you had the inclination you could get a solicitor involved who could get you more than 10k but if it was me I would just go with your head held high.

geez, what do YOU want?! forget his ridiculous letter . Frankly I would be moving into the flat you've bought and rebuilding your life asap. This is a very strange set up and his attitude to the relationship so off, tell him to employ a housekeeper and go asap.

People see 'contributing' differently and always to the detriment of mothers with the economic disadvantage. He sounds awful to you.

Definitely option 3. Stop worrying about having a share of his house and savings. He's been pretty clear that's not for sharing. You should probably have moved out at least 4 years ago when the relationship died. Or given up much much earlier. Don't be bitter about the wasted time. It's been a good thing for your dc but at 14 old enough for it to be less of a problem.

Personally I wouldn't have had a baby without marriage. I'd have ringfenced his capital so he was entitled to what he put in. I'd have shared childcare 50-50 and not worked PT in your shoes because he doesn't seem like someone you could rely on.

He does sound like a penny pinching twat. You also seem to want A share of his assets somewhat unreasonably.

Just get away from him.

@Wanttobefreeandhappy1985 has decided you're bitter because your cynical resentment oozes out in every comment you make. You're not giving advice or stating your opinion. Instead, you are attacking the OP.

Kudos to you for all the sensible decisions and your financial independence, and for taking complete responsibility for your decisions and actions. You can be proud of that. It's just a shame you couldn't share any of this without the biting unkindness.

I think you have been abused and controlled for years.

I think you were in a Coercively controlling relationship for years and that is a crime.

I think it would be very good for youbto talk to Women's aid and to read up on Coercive control.

Perhaps you could talk to the police.
Perhaps legal advice would help you make a claim on his house.

He is a really bad man and he has very deliberately and in a calculated, knowing manner, abused and controlled you.

Reach out a speak to domestic abuse charities and maybe the police.
Hopefully they can help you realise just what a piece of shit he is.

Sorry who do you imagine I resent?