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Redundancy stresses

8 replies

hungrierhippo · 30/11/2009 22:15

DH and I have had a huge row. I'm not sure what to do.

DH was made redundant a few weeks ago. I was on maternity leave but last month left my job and started to do freelance work 1 day a week, which is quite well paid. We are living in a rented house after selling our house last year and I have a sizable inheritance which means we, luckily, have plenty of money in the bank so we aren't in as desperate position as some.

But things are still stressful. The problem is DH is so negative about everything (always has been). He has been very proactive about applying for jobs but is convinced he won't get any of them. He was on fairly good money but says that the only job he can possibly get will be for about half that. If I tell him to aim a little higher he tells me that I'm being unrealistic and putting too much pressure on him.

He doesn't actually like the job he does, which he has been doing for 15 years and kind of fell into it after University. he is very clever and talented and, quite frankly, is wasted. He has been making sideways moves now for years and his colleagues seem to get younger and less experienced all the time. He wants to move into something different that he would enjoy more which I am fully behind. I have told him that he doesn't have to rush in to take the first job he is offered and he can take some time to work out what he wants his next move to be.

The trouble is he keeps coming up with impractical ideas. The one he had tonight is that he would go back to University and do another undergraduate degree. When I asked him how we would pay for it he said 'it would cost about £20k'. I would have to go back to work full time which I really don't want to do when my children are so small and, even when he finished, he would still have an entry level position on less money than he has been on previously.

We wouldn't be able to get a mortgage as I don't have a permanent job so we would be stepping off the housing ladder for 4 years, or buying a much smaller house than I would like so we didn't have a mortgage.

It turned into a huge row over my parents' inheritance as, to me, it is there to give us some security and give me the option of not having to work when my children are small .... not to allow him to go off and change careers because he doesn't like his job.

He got all huffy and stroppy and just said 'well, you've made your position perfectly clear, I'll forget it'. Then he says he'll have to get a job in a call centre instead.

I feel like one of us is being a spoilt brat and I don't know which one. .

He is refusing to talk to me now and claims to just want to watch TV.

I am miserable.

OP posts:
hungrierhippo · 30/11/2009 22:31

that was long - sorry!

OP posts:
mamayaya · 30/11/2009 22:42

When I was made redundant I went through all kinds of mad ideas about retraining in loads of different areas.

In the end I tarted up my cv and sent it by e-mail to the person in charge of the department I wanted to work in at, oh, about 35 different firms.In the end got a job and was out of work for 3 weeks only. I think it is normal to go through that. I was going to be a teacher, social worker, barrister, do a masters in literature, need I go on?!?! It feels like the ground has been pulled from under your feet when it happens.

Just try and sit tight for a few weeks but get him sending his cv off. Phone to get e-mail addresses, and research it.

Good luck!

ABetaDad · 30/11/2009 22:56

A slightly off the wall idea but not so off the wall - as I actually sort of did what I am going to suggest.

It seems your DH has no real ambition to build a career but would he enjoy being a SAHD while you go out to work full time and he could do an Open University course as well?

Some people are just not ambitious but have talent nontheless. Once he has done his OU course he can decide if he wants to continue being SAHD or change career.

Either way he makes a contribution just in a different way.

hungrierhippo · 30/11/2009 23:01

Abetadad, it's a suggestion - except that I don't want to work full time. I love being at home with my children and working a few days a week.

I know that's selfish of me but that has always been the plan.

I'm prepared to do it while he looks for another job but not on a long term basis. He doesn't really want to be a SAHD either.

Am I being unreasonable?

OP posts:
ABetaDad · 01/12/2009 08:01

Well if that is the agreement you have then of course that is entirely reasonable.

Just wonder if the reality of you now being SAHM and part time is really something he is really happy with. Especially now he is redundant and feelng pressure to 'provide'.

Sometimes I think men pretty much feel they have no option but to agree to go out to work and begin to resent it. There are a lot of threads about men being unhappy and critical of SAHM and I wonder sometimes if the men feel railroaded into the life they have once children come along.

diddl · 01/12/2009 08:22

Is this also to do with the inheritance?

Does he want to use that to do the course he wants?

Also if it´s "sizeable",can´t you use it towards a house so that you have no or a very small mortgage?

sparkybint · 01/12/2009 10:03

Is it a very large inheritance HH? Perhaps changing his career is just as important to him as you being able to stay at home with the kids when they're little. Being in the wrong line of work is utterly soul-destroying; I know because I quit my job last week with nothing to go to. I'm a single parent by the way but when I was with ex-H he was a SAHD and I worked full-time. I'm going to sell my house and possibly down-size which will give me enough money to retrain for something or set up my own business. I really don't like the idea of having to work for someone else again.

How old is your DH? I agree with ABD, some people are very talented but just not that ambitious (me for example). I agree this must be very frustrating for you but maybe he sees it as you getting it all your own way. I think it all depends on the size of your inheritance and whether some of it could go towards helping him change career direction.

Bramshott · 01/12/2009 10:23

There are many ways to change career which don't involve doing another undergraduate degree. Could he go and talk to a careers advisor about what interests him?

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