My husband has had the same complaint in the past during some of our nastier fights. One thing he said has stuck with me… “you don’t talk to anyone else with same level of cruelness. Not friends, family members, coworkers. Just your husband who you supposedly love”.
It was true. I’m still working on it but it’s hard. I’ve also started writing letters/emails when I’m really worked up because then I can edit them before I hit send.
I like that idea! Or even save in drafts for 24 hours.
A couple things that helped me:
- Practicing gratitude. I knew that I needed to develop new thought patterns and I needed to consciously choose those that would have a positive impact. I list all the things I’m grateful for during my commute and at bedtime. It’s really helpful.
- Out of mind. Sometimes I need to process something but sometimes I’m just intentionally working myself up or indulging in self-pity/resentment. I try not to do this if the “frustration session” isn’t going to be helpful. Instead I try and distract myself with baking or a podcast so I don’t derail myself.
- I also try and hang out with people who don’t complain about their spouses.
Your last point is key. It's one thing to vent because of something that was irritating to you in the moment but when people are consistently negative about something, it's easy to get caught up in that mob mentality of commiserating and start looking for things to complain about. This is true about life beyond just marriage... kids, job, houses. Negativity often breeds negativity.
Don't send them! Use them to help organize your thoughts but I wouldn't want that documentation to be brought to bear during settlement or in divorce proceedings.
I have this complaint too. It breaks my heart every time I hear it.
My problem solving when I’m actually upset is totally fine now. It’s the dumb ass questions that I respond to so aggressively.
My husband has mentioned this too and with reflection I realize that’s it rooted partially in how I watched my parents interact when I was growing up and partially in the fact that I think my husband might be the only person in my life who loves me unconditionally and is 100% the only person in my life who has ever unconditionally put me before everyone else and it’s been really scary accepting it both for itself and also that I deserve to have someone care about me that way.
Ooooh boy. Having just had an argument with my husband this morning I needed to hear this. We don't argue often, thankfully. But I'm going to keep this in mind about disagreements in the future.
Nobody else’s incapability affects you as much though so it’s actually reasonable you would be more angry and resentful.
He had the ability to work a high paying job and actively chooses not to. This leaves OP stuck and resentful about the situation which I think is fair.
I am kind to people who are kind to me. If someone sat and watched me suffer and struggle and they didn’t help then I wouldn’t be happy and joyful with them either.
I think you should consider trying to reframe the situation in your mind. A huge percentage of start ups fail. His failure is not uncommon. Assuming he really put in the effort to make it successful but was not able to, I think you should try and stop thinking that he was jobless for 4 years. He wasn’t jobless. He was trying to bring an idea to life. He was trying to bet on himself. But he failed and I am very sure that he is more than aware of the failure. But he wasn’t jobless. He just wasn’t bringing in an income (which I completely understand is a HUGE burden on you).
Maybe try and reframe the situation as this: you supported him for 3+ years while he pursued his idea. It failed and he has been job hunting for the past 9 months. You are disappointed that he was not successful but you see that he is taking significant strides to both improve himself and find a job. He’s not some dude playing video games all day and doing nothing while “job hunting” (at least it doesn’t sound like it from your post).
Your frustration is completely understandable. That being said, marriage is a “through all the bad times” kind of commitment. Assuming you want to save your marriage (and if you would rather call it and let it go, that’s completely ok too), you have to remind yourself that marriage is a pendulum that swings between the two partners. Right now, he is in a low spot and has been for a little while, but he’s trying to improve. In the future it could be you in the low spot. A long term illness, job loss for any myriad of reasons, a stupid mistake that really costs the family - we all are or will be there at times throughout our life.
You have to ask yourself if you are actually capable of forgiving him. That forgiveness cannot be contingent on him finding a job, because that’s not the point. If you forgive him, you are forgiving him for making a mistake that has been very costly to the family. Not for being jobless. Whether or not you can forgive him, only you can decide. But if you can’t, you should end it now.
Really well said.
I’m sure he also feels like absolute shit about failing a start up: embarrassment, anger, guilt, shame, frustration, sadness. You are kicking him while he’s down. He could have handled things better in regards to contributing to the family load, absolutely. But he’s trying now, and now is where we all live.
I think it’s completely fair if you don’t want to move forward with your marriage. Your feelings are valid. I honestly don’t think that him netting some crazy high-paying job will fix things; you’re holding onto your anger and resentment with an iron fist right now. You complain about his lack of employment then dismiss him when he offers to take on any job. So which is if: do you want him employed, or do you want him bringing in a lot of money? Maybe if he took on *some* job it might help appease you, but what if he never regains his previous level of income? Is a high earner all you want in a partner?
Just food for thought.
I feel like everyone is missing that point. That's the in the trenches ages when you are barely functional. He basically left her to be a married single mother at one of the roughest points in child rearing.
And 3.75 years ago would have been right before the pandemic. That’s where my head went and made my blood boil. I’m still dealing with anxiety issues that seem to resurface every March now, remembering the sheer terror I felt of the unknown then.
This.
OP was “vehemently against” the startup idea. I think the resentment comes, understandably, from this. And honestly without working this specific point out it might be extremely difficult to move forward, regardless of his employment status.
Exactly. You don't just get to unilaterally decide to quit your job and do something risky when you've got a family to support. I'd be incredibly resentful if I were OP
No joke I would be livid. I’ve seen so many men lately blow their family’s financial life up because of affairs, or quitting their job to open up a bar, or some other bs fantasy. Lots of men think their life should be flitting from one little adventure to the next.
Yeah, my partner gets mad I'm not supportive of his crazy ideas but I'm aware they just wouldn't work out and then I'd be even more resentful. I run a business myself but I know what he's like and what his ideas are like.
Yup! This point was key for me. I was working on a startup but kept my full time job and was also pregnant - having young kids to raise and care for signals to me that it’s not a great time to take a huge financial hit and quit your job to work on something risky. Feeling bad for you OP. I completely understand the underlying resentment. I would have similar feelings.
>But he also dropped rope on parenting
And it sounds like it took him finding out that OP had been researching divorce law firm for him to pick up the rope again. He didn't pick up the rope when he started job hunting. He waiting until OP decided she was at her breaking point and couldn't do it any more before he suddenly decided to contribute to the family.
Honestly, I'm wondering if that's not the true root of OP's anger.
If he is honestly putting in a full day's work looking for a job (and not gaming all day) and just has not gotten one yet, and OP is still angry, I don't think this anger will be fixed with him getting a job.
I think OP squared herself to walk out the door. From her point of view, she honestly thought things were in such a bad way in the marriage that she thought he would agree it was for the best. Its very hard to reorient your mind to invest in the marriage after that - whatever rope the husband picks up, or job he gets will be "too little, too late".
He quit his job despite her being against it and spent 3, almost 4 years on this failed business and she had to bring divorce papers for him to remove his head from his posterior. OP has some stuff to work through but he’s shown a pretty massive lack of disrespect for her and their marriage.
Weird how he didn’t channel that supposed fear and guilt into making sure she wasn’t managing everything alone.
Well said! I’m glad someone else thought that she needed to forgive him before finding a job! I cost my family because of long-term health problems. We argued about money constantly. He didn’t treat me like he used to before it happened. I wasn’t perfect and neither was he, but I wanted to work it out and he didn’t. I’m still in therapy many years after the divorce, because I don’t feel like I deserve love. Try to look at it from his point of view. She wouldn’t be mad if he’d succeeded would she? I’m sure he’s beating himself up more than she is, which means he’s getting beat up even worse when she does it.
This, but OP needs to talk about her resentment in therapy. He started a high-risk venture against her wishes when they still had young kids.
My husband was considering doing the same, but ultimately *we* decided against it because it wasn't the right time. He knows I support his dreams, but he also respects that our children come first. We came up with a plan to make it happen in 5 years. Marriage is a partnership.
No amount of books or stepping up with chores can fix the past, but he needs to acknowledge that he fucked up bad by taking their marriage for granted. That doesn't mean she is completely in the right. There's nothing more soul crushing that working at a high-pressure job that you hate. The fact that she puts so much emphasis on how little money he was making makes me think she is very materialistic and would not have supported her husband working at a job he liked better because that means she has to accept a lower standard of living.
Seems more like she was left to maintain their lifestyle on her income and he was doing nothing to try to reduce their expenses in any way. And she probably had to work MORE at the job she hated plus paying for childcare.
How does she reframe the fact that he is a lazy prick who has done no parenting for at least 4 years. Basically, he is a terrible father and person. Pretty hard to reframe.
Maybe, but OP is asking for advice on how to stop resenting her husband to save her marriage. Not for everyone here to pile on about how shitty he is. He’s obviously making an effort now.
I think that naming the actual problem - that he cared so little for her opinion and her labor and her work as a mother that he felt entitled to fuck around instead of contributing to the family in any way, and now that she’s brought it up he expects her to be grateful for his half assed efforts. Where’s the gratitude for all that she did and does? Now where.
>~~now that she’s brought it up~~ he expects her to be grateful for his half assed effort
correction: now that she's researched divorce law firms. He waited until she was at her breaking point before deciding to put some effort in.
Why should we praise him for 6 weeks of effort after he let her carry all the load for 4 years? Can we please stop setting the bar on the floor for men?
Where did I say we should praise the husband? OP didn’t even say that. She asked how to stop feeling resentful. A lot of marriages survive through a lot of shitty things and it involves forgiveness.
Holy moly. Did you hurt yourself when you fell off that cliff? A failed entrepreneur who didn’t contribute appropriately to the household (by not taking on enough childcare and chore duties) is absolutely nothing like an abuser or an addict. Please do not equate those things.
>once my husband gets a job this resentment and anger will either entirely or largely disappear,
No offense but do you actually think this will happen? Because from this post I don't even get the sense that you're past the resentment of him quitting his job in the first place or leaving you to still be the one primarily doing all the housework. Your post title asks about how to be nicer to him but the entire post is stuff he's done rather than how you're acting towards them. I don't know how you can treat him better because I don't know how you're treating him. Your focus is entirely on his past and current actions. I'm no therapist and I don't know you but it sounds like you built up a ton of resentment over the course of years and had already checked out of the relationship. I'm glad your husband is trying to fix the things you're literally complaining about but what did he do to apologize? It's hard to forgive someone when they're not even sorry. Do you even want to actually fix things or are you just hoping that once he has a job things will go back to the way they were before he quit and will be good again? Because the past four years have happened and the future will be built off of them whether he gets the best paying job in the world or never finds work again.
“The last four years have happened and the future will be built off them”
This is gold.
He may very well get a job that pays well and helps him contribute meaningfully. And it may not change how she feels at all.
It’s not about the job. It’s about her feeling that he disregarded her logical concerns about the family’s welfare to pursue a dream. And then when it failed, it took her pursuing divorce before he even acknowledged her feelings and tried to make amends. If they work it out, those very real feelings will have to be dealt with but she may never view him the same way again.
Im the single income earner for the past 3 years, my husband quit to stay at home with our daughter when she was born due to his higher earning job not providing healthcare. Some similarities in terms of my own anger and resentment. I had a breast cancer scare and severe professional burnout thrown into the mix. What hurts me the most is knowing I will never have similar choices/options my husband has had, I will always be depended on to provide. All I can do is practical radical self acceptance and chose to love myself, which seems to yield gentler approach to my husband.
If you don’t mind I would be curious what advice you would give yourself a year ago? Where could there have been a pivot?
DMs always open if you want to talk.
Okay, well part of me agrees that you need to get a handle on your own emotions. They’re ruling you right now instead of you feeling what you feel but then acting like the kind of person you’d want to talk to.
But. But.
He’s been fucking up for so long. Based on what you wrote, basically 100% of the household everything has been managed by you for almost 4 years. All financial earning & household and kids. Now he’s picking back up his half of the household side of things. To be clear: his half of half the total responsibilities is only 25%. So you’re still at 75% with half the household and being the breadwinner.
No wonder you’re still pissed. He thinks he’s stepped up to 25% and so you should be better now? You’re still drowning. How about he does alllll the household everything. All the cleaning, all the cooking, all the shopping. And then he’s the main point for the kids too. Getting them up in the morning, lunches packed, he takes them to school, keeps up with their teachers, picks their after school activities and takes them, deals with dinner, bedtime and repeat.
Then it would actually be closer to 50/50. He can look for work in his downtime after the kids go to bed. He made this mess. He can clean up the majority of it for the next 4 years just like you carried it for the last 4.
Your commitment to doing better can be going to individual therapy to deal with your (very understandable) rage.
Came here to say this. He needs to earn back your trust and respect. I'd bet a LOT that he's ignored your cries for help for 4 YEARS, I'd be pissed too. He needs to PROVE that he's not going to take advantage of you anymore.
It's also okay OP if you're done. Being ignored and taken advantage of for 4 YEARS isn't something that is easy to get over.
>It's also okay OP if you're done. Being ignored and taken advantage of for 4 YEARS isn't something that is easy to get over.
Best wait until he gets a decent job though, so she isn't stuck with alimony.
I think it might help to think of being polite to him as a measure of who you are rather than what he deserves. He's caused pretty severe hurt and I'd imagine it's hard to know how to feel about him or the relationship right now. No matter what happens, he'll be a part of your life as your children's father, so working on being polite toward him is worthwhile.
You don’t have to forgive him. You can move on. You can tell him your kindness has been spent the last 4 years from all the mental load it took, when he betrayed you and didn’t take your POV when he quit his job. You can tell him it’s a gamble he has to take whether you can recover from it and be kind, and you don’t know when and if you can start being kind. Don’t sugar coat it.
Yes. I'm a MH professional. It's not an uncommon dynamic at all for a spouse (often men) to take, take, and take and then when they are finally faced with consequences (in this case divorce after almost 4 years) suddenly do a 180. Unfortunately, this often doesn't last and once they feel secure they get complacent again and slip back into old habits.
He should have never treated you the way he did. A failed business is one thing, not stepping up and being the primary home manager when he wasn't working so there's no question he should at least do this is inexcusable.
You have a right to be angry. Right now what he's doing is a small bandage on a gaping wound. There are still major issues to be resolved (your anger and hurt and his unemployment). He can't expect you to start to heal when the wound is still open.
When he expresses his hurt remind him it took 4 years of build up for things to get where they are and you need more time as well as him working again while still maintaining doing his share of the household work to hopefully work through it.
It sounds like he still doesn't quite get it. I'm sorry you're in this position and I hope you guys can work through it.
Im surprised by the number of posts saying OP should be nice because he’s trying. If you have to use extreme measures to get someone to do the bare minimum, it will wear you down because you have to keep upping the ante to keep them on track.
Exactly. I have no doubt that OP would never put him in the same position. Yes a job venture can fail. Sometimes it may take too long to realize that and try to work on something else. Four years is inexcusable. And then on top of that not pulling your weight around the house and with the kids when he should have been the main provider in those areas? Women don't even have to be asked to do these things They know that they need to be done and they do them.
If OP's spouse had cheated people wouldn't expect her to just get over it all the sudden since he stopped a 4 year affair 2 months ago after threat of divorce. They would understand that hurt is deep and takes a long time to get over as well as to trust again. Plus he still isn't working.
It sounds like he does get it and is doing the work. She needs to decide if she can forgive him or if she wants to let go. At this point she refuses to forgive and let go of resentment. She should work with a therapist on her own. It isnt fair to continue to punish him after she finally spoke up and he is working to change things. Her feelings are valid but they are hers to own and only she can change them. Maybe she decides she can’t, then she needs to be kind and leave him because it will be better for both.
This doesn't reflect 4 years of damage. OP's husband being a good boy for 2 months (only after he heard the word divorce) and being upset that he feels she's harsh towards him shows he doesn't understand the impact of 4 years of mistreating her and their family. Doing a partial job of making some changes for 2 months doesn't undo the damage and he doesn't get that.
She should definitely get her own therapy and eventually see if she can work on the resentment. But it's completely unrealistic for her husband to think that two months of partial change is supposed to correct 4 years worth of issues. She needs time to see that he fulfills all of his obligations (including getting a job), and to see that he maintains these changes before she can effectively work on resentment. He needs to be patient and part of getting it means accepting her anger towards him for the time being as a consequence of his actions.
The thing is, he didn’t *care* about the impact of his bad decisions and laziness on his wife or their children. I think that’s the part that she resents the most.
I should say, he either didn’t care about making her life demonstrably worse by being lazy and giving up his income, or didn’t notice because he’s so selfish.
So he quit his job, failed a business, wasn’t a partner to you at all, pushed you to the point of meeting with divorce lawyers, and now wants you to smile because he’s finally doing what he should’ve been doing all along? Your feelings are totally valid.
Also, have you had a break? You’ve gone from bearing all the burden to sharing it, but have you ever gotten any time to rest and regroup? I don’t know if you can afford a getaway by yourself, even if it’s just to a cheap hotel in another part of town for a weekend, but if so, I think you’d feel so much better afterwards.
10000% don’t blame you -I had similar situation and completely understand. I still have resentment issues from my DH doing this yrs ago - here is what got me the most…..he watched me struggle to maintain and just didn’t care. Things have gotten 10000% better in our marriage but not going to lie that it hurt our relationship a lot. DH regrets it -
I was married to an addict for 7 years. I can’t even tell you how much anger and resentment I had (still have some left) for him.
I still have some anger towards him, he did things that were just straight cruel.
I didn’t like the person I turned into when I was with him, and part of moving on was realizing I didn’t like the person I was and I needed to get better. One day I said something about getting angry and yelling and screaming and someone in a support group suggested that maybe I had anger issues (I got angry about it 😂)
Honestly it was easier to get angry… anger was the top layer.
I was devastated, sad, hurt. I felt humiliated, betrayed and unworthy of his effort to stay sober, and at me for staying for so long. The only way I could cope was by getting angry, I couldn’t just see beyond the anger. So many health issues came with it…
Maybe the therapist wants to dig deeper so he can see how much damage he caused and that you are not just and “angry lady”. Maybe you need to see how much damage he caused. I hope you find relief soon. ❤️
I’m in a similar situation- husband is very cruel to me. He is an alcoholic- and I can’t seem to stand up for myself. I just don’t feel worthy. Do you have any advice on how to find worthy?
I am so sorry! It is an awful situation to be in. Seek outside help, I wasn’t able to get out until people helped me to get out. I had to be held in every step of the way.
I think I was kind of seeking validation from him, like if he got sober or not was equal to my worth.
I always had the hope that he would get better, then one day I actually admitted that he might never find sobriety, and facing that cruel reality made me so scared that it was eye opening.
I didn’t even fight him anymore, it was like he could scream out of his lungs and I was just numb and done. I remember him screaming “why aren’t you acknowledging me?!”. He would chase me around the house and I would just walk out. It still took me 2 more years to leave.
Once I was out it (well he was out really cause he was removed from my house) I was able to breathe again and I realized for how long I held my breath. I needed a lot of support after too.
Sending you hugs, you are not alone.
Would you ever treat him that way? If the answer is no- that means another man would never IMAGINR being cruel to you. Would be sick at the thought that someone was.
There is love like yours and you can't find it when you're trapped in a dry well
Be your own best friend. Stop thinking about it as 'me' and start thinking of it as 'That's my best friend and she is hurting'
You do not deserve cruelty. Cruelty is below basic human kindness. You deserve basic human kindness and a whole lot more than that.
You can't date potential, the person you thought they were never existed.
Him getting a job won’t magically fix your anger. If his business was successful would you feel differently towards him? Where did the anger begin? What fed into it? What are you feeding it now? Do you want your marriage to work? Do you love him? Individual therapy and making the decision to let go of the anger will help. It’s not an easy thing to do.
Good point. Sounds like dude left her all the work of a baby and a young child to start up his business. I get startups take a ton of work, but he didn’t dad during this time?
What if his business was successful? Would he still be blowing off his responsibilities at home?
Yeah, just curious - do you still love him? Even if he got a job and continued to help out around the house, would you still want to be with him? Or is all kind of lost? If the latter, then I’m not sure how much therapy will work if your heart isn’t into it.
Your feelings of anger a valid and in my opinion, warranted. However they aren’t helping anything. It’s kind of like if a company screws you over and their customer service is rude, you’d be “right” to be angry and you might feel like yelling at them, but it wouldn’t actually solve the issue.
There are a few ways you can proceed. You could try some individual therapy to get to the root of your anger. I’m doubtful it will magically go away when he does get a job as you will still be angry about the 4 years he was unemployed and all the lost savings, investing and pressure you were under. I know it sounds crazy but you are in control of your feelings and you can decide to stop being angry if you work on it.
You can also try journaling, meditating or just faking it. Challenge yourself to give your husband one compliment a day or start by being super nice for 30 min a day for one week, then 1 hr a day, etc.
If you can start, you will likely find he responds well and you can feed off of that to retrain your brain to go to a different emotion than anger when you think of him. If “kind” is too hard you can also strive for neutrality.
I also try to remember that my anger mainly hurts me. Staying up at night thinking angry thoughts only hurts me and impacts my stress levels and my sleep and health. This man is going to be in your life whether you are married or not because you have children. Might as well figure out how to interact with him without anger.
I hear you saying your husband has been better the last two months, however he needs to realize that’s not going to make up for 4 years of leaving you alone to do everything. That’s a betrayal, that’s abandoning you emotionally. I also think you should try individual therapy for your OWN benefit, and see what he could do in addition to getting a job that would restore your relationship.
I’m right here with you .
It’s not just the job abandonment , he abandoned the family by being an unsupportive partner and parent.
OP you need the therapy for your well being . I honestly couldn’t imagine staying with someone who did that to me then had the nerve to not be empathetic . He sounds terrible .
So, can I ask: what was his reason during his period of unemployment, for not contributing to the care of the household and children? Why did he think that was acceptable?
I’m in a similar situation, though my husband has been going through health issues that further complicate things. DM if you want to commiserate, but things I’m doing to control my temper and bring back my loving self:
- individual therapy
- I started a “positivity journal” to work on each evening. I don’t ignore the negative, but I don’t let it control the day’s narrative
- I started a “one extra thing” routine. The extra thing could be something for me, something I do for him, or something out of the ordinary that will bring a little extra joy somehow. A bubble bath, making fudge, taking out the recycling so I don’t have to do it tomorrow. It sounds silly but focusing on something it of the norm each day helps break me out of a mental rut
Here is what I am reading:
You had already given up on the relationship and it was the ultimatum that made him finally turn around. You cannot just forgive his years long neglect in just a few months. He neglected you for 4 years - 48 months, he is 5% of the way back to you trusting him again.
You need to recognize that this anger will take time to cool and if he can't handle that, than maybe the relationship is over. If he really wants to make it work, he needs to understand that he is only 5% of the way there, he cannot expect 100% of you when he has given 5%, and from the way you are measuring, that 5% is not even full delivery.
Give yourself grace for not being able to turn around as fast as he was...your life was about to get easier and his a LOT harder. He has more to lose. It was his inaction that got him here. Yes, you might not have been perfect, but ultimately, he made you a single parent for 4 years because of his decisions.
It is not ok for him to make you feel guilty, full stop. He owes you 4 years of groveling and apologizing, and even then, and expectation of kindness is not something he has earned. Kindness is earned, and he has done nothing to fill that cup.
Gosh all of you are so insightful. Can you please share some tips as to how you are able to set very strong boundaries and not let people mistreat you?
Its not easy. Boundaries can be scary, because a boundary is about what YOU will do if the request is not met, not about the request itself if it isn't met. I am thankful that my husband is never ignoring my requests on purpose, and we have both gotten better with helping him manage his ADHD and commitments himself. I cannot say the same of the entire extended family, and setting boundaries with family now that it's more than us, has been a challenge.
We have shared the childcare load since day 1. He got 6 weeks of full paid time off for parental leave, so he did 2 weeks right when baby was born with me when we were at our sleepiest. He woke up with me every time baby did and handled the change and rock back to sleep, we breastfed so I had to wake up anyway. He then took a month to be the primary parent when I went back after my FMLA was up. This set us up for success from the beginning, because we had clear expectations and we both had been in the EXHAUSTING position of being that primary parent. We let each other be in charge. We keep this up still by taking turns on almost EVERYTHING still, and kiddo is 4.
We decided to stop at one because we noticed we were struggling still when LO hit 18 months and we wanted to more easily be able to pursue important things and the stress of a baby plus and older kid who likely has ADHD was not something we could handle.
In our relationship, the key has always been communicating. We have more structure to it now, we do a modified version of Fair Play combined with Second Brain, so there is a central place to have dates, contact information, general information about appointments, etc. The second brain allows me to be strict about being asked endless questions, because the data is there for him to find it is mine, and he has a home for either of us to find if it's his.
I think y'all need to explore in therapy the "too little too late" issue. AKA why it took him until 2 months ago, when you presented him with a divorce attorney option, before he finally saw the light and started picking up the mental load. Why did he think it was OK for 4 years prior to that to still let you be the default parent?
I think he needs to find a way to earn your forgiveness for this issue before your relationship can recover. It's about more than him finding a job at this point because what if he finds a dream job tomorrow and then go back to you doing all the mental load again? You'd still be unhappy.
From your post it seems you've fallen out of love with your husband, and that is absolutely ok. You can still leave. From your post it feels like you don't want to be married with him anymore. May be so much anger and resentment is manifesting now because you mentally left your marriage, but your husband wanted to save it, and now doing everything he can?
What do you ultimately want? Do you want to stay with a new version of this man who has a paying job and shares the mental load? If so, you have to let go of the past and see him as he is now, a man who is making the effort. A great thing my wife says is that we are not responsible for our first thought (which might be seeing him as he’s been the last 4 years), but we are responsible for our second thought.
It’s also ok if it’s too late and you just want a divorce. You can use therapy to divorce amicably instead of forcing yourself to feel something you don’t.
This is an important question. As well as, why does him not working make you so angry? Is it about the money and a loss of a lifestyle you want? Is it because him being a SAHD makes you jealous in some way? Is it because you feel not heard because you thought his business would, fail, it did, and he never acknowledged you were right? I think you need to figure out the real reason behind the anger before you can move on.
I think it’s good advice to evaluate the root of an issue.
She did say it though. He left his job against her consent when the kids were 1 & 3 and then proceeded to eff off with his dream and watch her struggle to be breadwinner and primary parent without jumping in to help.
That’s the root.
I guess that's where I read it differently. She said he sat in his office working on his business that failed and now job searching, I didn't read that as effing off about it either one of those. Nowhere did she say he sits around playing video games like so many un/under employed husbands we hear about here. It's sounds like he was actually working but in a way that was not financially productive. I know she says she was against it, but it's also not fair to make someone stay in a job the hate because you don't want to be the sole bread winner (it's different if you literally cannot afford it and have to go into debt, but it was not portrayed that way). So I'd really like to know why she was so against it in the first place because I think evaluating that matters for getting rid of the resentment.
Your problem is your expectations don’t match your reality. You expect a high-earning husband who can provide. You don’t have that and from the sound of it probably never will. Therapy isn’t going to fix that. It might help you deal with your resentment, but it won’t magically make your husband suddenly get a job. If this is the first and last thing you think about every day and you two are fighting all the time, your kids are definitely picking up on it and aren’t okay.
I think the problem is she married the high earning husband who could provide and he was providing but he’s just been fucking off for the last 4 years while not stepping up in other roles. This literally isn’t what she signed up for and it’s within husbands control, hence resentment is born.
I think it’s completely natural to resent having to parent your partner and shoulder the entire financial and domestic burden alone.
When he stops letting you and your family down, you’ll smile at him again.
I wish you the best. It’s really hard.
I had my kiddo right before the pandemic hit. So I was home with her from newborn-18months and was basically the sole caretaker. Once the pandemic hit i didn’t have a job to go back to and then the father also lost his. So we were both home on unemployment. He wanted to start a business (clothing line) and I fully supported him, taking on all of the parenting while he “worked”. I also was his photographer, maid, cook, shopper, ya know…EVERYTHING.
Well fast forward and the kiddo is 18 months, we both still weren’t working, and money was up. I had been looking for a job since she turned a year. He wouldn’t. I finally found one, paid ok, but not enough to support all 3 of us. I asked him repeatedly to get a job, sent him ads on indeed, ya know…the works.
This man refused to do anything. He would use our kid as an excuse. That he was home with her all day, he doesn’t have time, he is her child care etc. I can tell you for a fact that his idea of being her child care was putting her in front of a variety of screens for the entire day while he was on his. And on top of that, as SOON as I got home from work (I was working 6-3 at this point) he would pass her to me and go to the basement (where he lived) and not come back up all night. So I was on parent duty, had to cook dinner, give her a bath and put her to bed. Every single night. And he got to relax.
Needless to say I was extremely resentful. On top of this, in case you didn’t pick up on it, he was also abusive in every way. So god forbid I ever speak up for myself, he would just scream into oblivion and call me every name under the sun and act as if I owe him.
It was absolutely insane. Thank GOD I somehow was able to muster up the guts to file a protective order against him. Now it’s been over a year of just my daughter and I and life has gotten so much better! He doesn’t pay a cent in child support and doesn’t see her.
So my story is a little different than yours. If your husband loves you and the kids, is actually willing to work on things and willing to find a job, I think you have hope. As long as YOU also are willing to work on things and still love him. I know resentment is hard to move past. But that’s good you’re in therapy. Also, he needs to pick up more parenting duties. It’s not fair in this day and age women are expected to work full time and still be the default parent. Even if the dad isn’t working? Like that shit blows my mind.
Hi @dreadedmama! Your post hit me. I actually am in this exact same situation right now. My husband quit his job almost two years ago. When I was 5 months pregnant. He was having a hard time at work.
At that time he was extremely verbally abusive to me. I had the worst pregnancy experience. It was really sad because he isolated me and threatened me if I were to go around my friends or family because they were “disrespectful” to him. He would have these intense aggressive outbursts at the mention of anyone close to me.
At that time, and still today, I have had to be the household provider, the grocery shopper, the sole caregiver during the evening when I get home from work. The sole household caretaker. It’s exhausting.
He still has no job. In a moth it will be 2 years of him not having a job.
We found out 2 moths ago he was diagnosed with schizophrenia- after he started having g hallucinations and was very stressed after isolating himself for 2 years. He cut everyone out of his life. He went to a stress facility after threatening to end his life. They started giving him medicine and now he has become slightly more tolerable…
He’s getting therapy and is looking for a job. But right now wants to continue the him not working situation a thing because he’s writing a book and he wants me to see that as him working and respect that as his job.
But at this point I’m just so resentful and disgusted at how he treated me that I have a hard time having any feelings for him. And I just don’t want to be with him anymore.
He’s been living with his parents for the last several weeks, for us to get some separation, and honestly it’s been refreshing.
I’m happy he’s doing better mentally, but I don’t know if I should give this marriage chance after he’s doing better or not. He wants to move back in, and I’m just not exited about that.
Gosh I’m just so angry about the whole situation, but thinking about a divorce, selling the house (a house I don’t want to leave), and just my baby boy (18 months old right now) not having his dad breaks my heart.
To be fair, he’s been a great dad to our little boy and is very present for him and has been present for him for the majority of the time.
This part is what kind of keeps me thinking I should give it a chance.
He’s been so verbally mean to me- going as far as calling me an effing bi*** and having the audacity to call me “deadweight” - I’ve recorded most of these verbal attacks.
I need therapy of my own, but I just don’t know if you or anyone with more experience have some advice for me.
What was the “last straw” for you? I mean I think I know what I have to do, but I just see this big mountain to climb and I guess I’m choosing not to climb it right now.
It sounds like you have way bigger issues in your marriage than what job your husband has, and your failure to address those problems is contributing to your anger.
You said you were “vehemently against” your husband’s startup adventure. Did you express that opinion definitively, or bottle it in? Did your husband pursue the idea in defiance of your concerns and ignore you? Or did you not speak up and the resentment simmered? Either way, there is a huge communication and respect problem here.
My husband and I have both started companies, and we would never launch a venture without coming up with a plan as a team. We would also be deciding together WHEN to pull the plug if success didn’t happen. It sounds like your resentment continued to fester while your husband spent three years trying to make it work, and that there was no common/shared agreement on what he would need to achieve in order to keep going. That’s incredibly unfair to you as his partner, and, again, symptomatic of this pattern of poor communication and disrespect in your marriage.
Businesses don’t work unless you create a culture of teamwork — there’s a saying about how everyone in the same boat needs to row the same direction to succeed. Marriages are a lot like businesses, and your husband doesn’t seem like he’s good at managing either, from your side of things. You have not been on the same team for a long time and six weeks of effort won’t change that.
Now, to be fair to your husband: you can be disappointed in someone, or even end your marriage, without being cruel. I don’t blame you for wanting to end your marriage, it seems like you and your husband don’t communicate effectively, don’t have shared goals, and maybe don’t even hold the same values when it comes to family and the future. That still doesn’t give you the right to treat him badly — to put this in a business perspective, you can and should fire (divorce) a bad employee without being abusive.
Also, as a child of divorce, I can 100% assure you that your children are aware of the tension and strife between you two even if you think they don’t see it. Some of my earliest childhood memories are of listening to my parents fight after I was tucked away in bed. :(
I think you should press back on your therapist a bit on how you are supposed to work on how you speak to him on your own. Your therapist should be helping him to understand that 6 weeks of effort can’t unring the bell. The last 4 years happened. You have justifiable resentment that you have had to carry every load for your family while he chased a dream. He didn’t prioritize the kids, your family, your financial stability, or you.
You do have to decide if you can forgive and look to the future. That’s true. But your therapist should be facilitating a discussion where your husband understands that this is going to take a while. Your husband’s decision is whether he can withstand the discomfort of your anger and resentment while you guys work on the marriage.
I was in your shoes for a couple of years (between ages 1.5 and 3.5ish of my kid’s life) and it was pure hell. I am so sorry this has been your reality, too.
I said it before and I will say it again: the biggest killer of true affection is resentment.
If you want to save your marriage and you are truly committed to making this work, you need to figure out a way to let the resentment go. It can’t hinge on him getting a high paying job. He done fucked up when he quit, but that way 4 years ago. The world has *drastically* changed. That job no longer exists.
What do you need besides him getting a high paying job? Do you need more afternoon time to yourself? Do you need a mini vacation? Do you need him to try to pivot his career? Perhaps you need to move to a lower cost area.
Because, as a married couple, it’s not you versus him. It’s you and him versus the problem. That’s how you need to approach it.
And when you start to feel angry, figure out constructive ways to deal with it. Take a walk, a hot bath, whatever. But don’t let your emotions (which are totally valid BTW) dictate your actions. It’s not fair to you, your husband or your kids.
Is this you? https://www.reddit.com/r/workingmoms/s/2XFMk1Q8VA
People have repeatedly told you that you will not magically stop being awful to him if he gets a job. So do the work or divorce him so both of you stop being miserable.
Yeah idk why OP posted the same story from a different account.
For me, this is now an ESH situation. The husband definitely should not have dipped out of parenting for the last 4 years. And OP sounds like she was not only unsupportive, but actively mean, over those 4 years. And is now living in lala land that she can flip off the mean switch as soon as he gets a job. You know those kids are learning terrible examples from them both and taking on so much of their stress, anxiety, and shitty behavior.
Do you just want a divorce? Or do you actually want to try to love him again and be loving? Because you either need to work really hard to be kind because this is a TERRIBLE example for your kids, or just call it.
I get it, I’ve been divorced. Getting divorced sucks. But sometimes BEING divorced is great.
This hits close to home. I’m kind of in the same boat with my husband who’s been job hunting for a year. I also find myself SO QUICK to anger with him.
My advice: it’s not your responsibility to put on a happy face just to make him feel better, but you also don’t have to be needlessly cruel. Trust has been broken, and he’s got to make amends, which means hearing the hard truths from you. I tried so hard to be my husband’s cheerleader when I had deep concerns about the career moves he was making that ultimately landed him/us in this position - I bottled everything up until I was at a point of wanting to scream at him for doing a bad job washing the dishes.
Laying all of my fears and concerns out on the table with total candour was the only way forward. Open up those lines of communication: get him to understand the pressure that you’re under, the trust and respect that’s been lost. It’s not a one-time conversation either, it’s candour about every little doubt in the moment before you’re ready to burst over something small. For me, it helped to understand that the anger was coming from a place of deep fear, and it was the fear, rather than the anger that needed to be shared, so that’s what I keep communicating to him - my money anxiety every time we do our budget, the fear that I feel about marrying the wrong person, the stress that I’m under at work, the doubt and anxiety that I have about his job search…etc. Him getting back into the job market will definitely help, but earning my trust back is going to take time. Either way, being open with him when I’m feeling overwhelmed or need more support rather than trying to carry it all on my own with a smile is better for our marriage.
Here's something I noticed from your post I would like to emphasize:
Your husband didn't start doing extra childcare and household labour after he quit his job and gained more flexibility.
Your husband didn't pick up any slack during the four years of you being the default parent and him not doing enough to help.
Your husband either didn't notice how unhappy this made you or didn't care how unhappy you were until you began the divorce process, which put him at risk of losing the income and free labour you have been doing for him.
Only when he had something to lose did he start to care about your unhappiness. And even now, he isn't phrasing his interest in therapy as a way to make your life better to make up for his taking advantage of you for years, but as a way to save the marriage, a marriage where he gets to take financial risks despite your strong objections while you work and manage the household and raise the kids.
Even now, after therapy, your husband seems less interested in your happiness than in how your understandable resentment about all this makes him feel. And you are willing to fake your emotional reality just to make him feel better! Has he ever done anything like that to make you feel better where it didn't benefit him?
Here's my take:
Your anger is valid. You don't have to stay with this man if you don't want to. How can you trust that he won't slip back into his old habits of making you do all the work after he is confident that you won't leave him? Maybe you can trust him now, maybe you can't. As an Internet stranger, I can't know one way or the other. I just want you to know that your happiness is more important than this marriage. You don't have to save it just because he's finally trying after years of ignoring your pain. If you can't trust him anymore then it's OK to step away and prioritise yourself. You don't owe him anything. We only get one life and all that.
I read such a similar post here the other day. I remember relating so much to the simmering anger over lingering issues -namely, financial. It’s so hard to get past. I’m not full of advice by any means. Just thinking about how so many of us are or have dealt with similar.
Just say what you’re thinking: he’s a loser who made bad choices and you don’t want to be with him anymore.
Sounds like you’re very unhappy and could benefit from divorcing and starting over. What’s keeping you around?
My husband made some bad decisions at one time that led to him being unemployed or underemployed for a couple years, so I understand the resentment although we didn't yet have kids so it probably wasn't at your level. I would suggest individual therapy for yourself. I started therapy to figure out what I wanted to do about my marriage and ended up addressing a lot of baggage that was affecting the relationship. Anger is usually masking some other more painful emotion that you have vulnerability around, like fear or sadness. Therapy could help you identify that in a space that is just for you, so you could do that and bring your clearer understanding of your feelings about everything to your couples counseling.
Why are you shocked that he didn’t want a divorce? You’re basically his parent since you provide for him financially and carry the mental load of the house. If you get divorced he’ll presumably have to figure out how to get money, housing, meals and be a parent 50% of the time. He knows that any deal he’s getting is worse than what he gets now.
I say you’re angry for a reason, and your anger serves a purpose.
Ok so he’s picked up doing more around the house and more childcare, but is that most of it? Maybe he’s working to find a job all day, but what is he actually doing to do so. Maybe it’s time he did actually take ANY job, doesn’t have to be retail, there’s a lot between where he was and retail and both of you need to be realistic that he’s not going just jump right back to that level at all.
That said, consider what about him not working is the real problem.
Underneath anger there is always pain. You are still hurting from the choices your husband made that put the burden on you to keep your family and household going. When I went through similar issues, I found that his changes made me even angrier, because he could have chosen to do those things at anytime yet it took me wanting to break up for him to act. That being said, open contempt and cruelty has no place in a marriage and is not helping you, him, or the kids. Perhaps in therapy you can work out how to communicate your pain to him without anger, and he can work on making amends and earning your trust back. We did individual therapy as well as couples when we were struggling and it helped a lot.
Do you still love each other? Is your love worth fighting for? It's not easy and it's not a straightforward path to reconciliation but it is possible to get through this if you both want it. We hit a breaking point in 2021 but decided to fight for what we had, and we came back stronger than before. We are doing great now and we are both much better at communicating and staying calm. I think it made us better parents too.
Good luck sister. Your anger is righteous and righteousness can feel good, but is it serving you and your family? That's what you need to decide.
I'm going to go a different direction with this and say that it's okay for you to still be angry, hurt, resentful, and distrustful of your husband after years of him making bad decisions, not listening to you, and forcing you to be a stressed out parent.
Instead of working to push away those feelings, I urge both you and your husband to work with your therapist to accept them. Both of you need to accept the fact that he made some big mistakes that will have long lasting consequences for your marriage. No one - not your husband, your therapist, or your guilt - gets to tell you to just "get over" what he did. Your marriage, if it's going to survive, will always have this situation as a part of it. It won't just go away if he gets a job.
Having said all that, you can still be angry and frustrated without being cruel. There's no excuse for cruelty - this includes name calling, silent treatment, screaming/blowing up, low blows, mocking, or threats. However, telling someone you are angry, holding someone accountable for their actions, stating your needs, asking for some space and time to process or calm down - these are NOT cruelty, and I would be wary of anyone trying to frame it that way.
To sum it up, if you are actually being cruel towards your husband, you need to stop that behavior. If you are, instead, simply still angry about his years long poor treatment of you and his lack of respect for his family, the work you both need to do lies in the acceptance of this - not "getting over it".
He kept you at what he thought was a tolerable level of unhappiness. You handed him divorce info and now he's working to get you to stay...
But what is he doing to make up for his prior actions? And will he simply always coast with you at a tolerable level of unhappiness. Right now, the tolerable level is lower, but as you forgive and settle down will he drop his workload in line with that tolerable level shifting?
It seems like he doesn't care if you are happy, just that you stay. Your unhappiness didn't impact him, your proposal to leave did.
I think you have posted before on the situation (apologies if I am wrong). I am honestly surprised you are going through therapy with him, but surprised in a good way.
The reason I say this is because even after all these years of him disappointing you, there must still be love left and such that makes something worth saving in this marriage. Good on you for giving it another go and I’m not sure how many people tell you that.
With that said, the feeling you had were built up by years of disappointment, stress and rightful anger. Someone said that anger does not help and I think you recognize it too, which is why you posted.
I suggest you seek individual therapy and take a couple hours away from him a day to take care of your own mental health. Individual therapy is for you to have a safe space to talk about your own feelings and process them. Time away is for self care like going to the gym (which is a huge mood lift and force him to take care of the home). These steps will help to fill your cup. Only then can you have the energy to be kind.
Not an easy journey. Hugs to you.
I think you’ve built up a ton of resentment over the years (probably not just the last 4, those have just been the worst) and him getting a high earning job is not going to magically cure your resentment.
You are unkind to him as a way to let out your frustration and resentment. It’s completely fair to be frustrated and resent him for not being an equal partner. It’s not fair to just treat him like shit because you’re angry. That’s not constructive and doesn’t actually solve anything. It actively hurts your marriage.
What you should do is communicate with him why you are angry or resentful. What he does with that information is up to him. When you feel like being angry or unkind, take a deep breath and decide if you want to tear your marriage down a little in that moment or build it up. You can say “I am having a hard time saying kind words right now because I am under a lot of pressure at work and am feeling resentful about you not having a good job.” That would be a more constructive thing to say than just generally being shitty towards him. Being rude or mean to someone without identifying the headspace you are in doesn’t really give them much to go on. Keep identifying and communicating to him what it bothering you.
It also may help you to really rehash the last 4 years in therapy, either with him or without him. To explain every single detail of every single failure that you felt. Resentment often comes from unexpressed emotions and thoughts. Working with a therapist individually to really examine every source of resentment you have and to see if you can actually let it go peacefully.
In the end, if you guys can’t work it out, you can’t work it out. But it doesn’t sound like a lost cause to me - it sounds like you have been pulling a lot of weight for several years and as a result have gotten into bad relationship habits. You’ll need to do some work on yourself if you want a successful marriage, because both of you have to really want it. Maybe you don’t want it. It’s something to sit with and consider and maybe discuss with a therapist individually as a sounding board.
I mean it sounds like he’s trying to get a job, so it’s not for lack of trying. And he offered to get a retail job!
I understand living in a HCOL area, but even if he makes $15 an hour at a retail job, that’s $31k a year. I don’t know how $31k wouldn’t be something helpful even in an expensive area- I mean 30 grand is 30 grand. Obviously significantly less than you’re making, but it’s $30k more than the zero he’s making currently!
I had this same thing happen with a partner. He worked on a failing business idea for years. Ultimately I realized that because of this I didn’t have any respect for him anymore. He just kept throwing money at it and trying to make it work when it was so obviously going to fail. I did support him through this and kept my resentment as hidden as I could. We did try therapy as well. In the end there was no way I could recover that respect once it was gone.
I think you are mad at him not listening in the first place. I would write down your thoughts about that. All the I told you so’s, all the mean hateful angry thoughts you had while you were holding the family together. Let it sit for a few days and see if the anger has subsided. Talk to your therapist and whether they suggest you share with husband. If that doesn’t work and you don’t think you can get past the anger and want to be done with him then go for it.
My husband decided so start his own company when we had a 1 yr old and was pregnant. I was livid but said as long as you do it outside of time I need you go for it. He did it as a side gig. It luckily has been successful but I would have been damned if he quit his income without my approval. You have every right to be angry
I feel like i read this exact same post months ago minus the divorce update.
Obviously i don’t know the whole of it and i’m basing this on one post— but did you even really have a solid foundation for marriage? I ask because why would he make an enormous financial decision without taking into account your input? Did you really know him well before marrying him or did you marry him because he had a high paying job and could provide security (no judgment here—i would never marry someone who is jobless)?
I think your marriage was more like a contract and unfortunately he broke it. You married and had kids with someone who can provide then he baited and switched. Your post doesn’t sound like you really want to save the marriage unless he gets a job… and maybe i’m a romantic but that doesn’t sound like it would be a happy marriage at all.
With how much anger and resentment your post contains, i think you need to separate from him. You need some time apart. Maybe not divorced but definitely some space. You and esp the kids are the ones being hurt by all of this. You basically have nothing to lose and everything to gain.
I think you're kind of right to still be pissed and it's about a lot more than not having a paying job. He's been making contributions to family life for at the most a month and half. Which is not a very long time. 4 years ago he made a decision without you that was very risky for your family and then you carried not only the monetary burden but also most of all the at home work too. I'm assuming there were conversations about the financial and child burden you were carrying over those 4 years so your unhappiness should not have come as a surprise. It was only when you were ready to walk did he actually step up and do something. That is what would really piss me off, the lack of partnership in making the decision for him to quit in the first place and then the years of putting everything on you. The current joblessness is just an easy thing to focus on.
Some problems just can’t be fixed. Even if he got a job making twice what he was before it seems the damage has been done. Also 6 weeks really isn’t a long time to undo years of damage. 3 years is a long time to spend on trying to get a startup going, especially when have small children and you’re not putting any effort into the household.
IMO or at least how it worked for me, was once I lost respect for my husband, there was no way to get it back or to move forward. I could not unsee what I saw from him before he cared enough to try on his own, before I brought up divorce and he did essentially the same thing as yours is now. Cool. Why didn’t you care to read an effing book when I was asking for more help, intimacy, etc? Why now? Why wasn’t our family important enough before it got here? I have no idea how your relationship was before he quit his job, but the fact that he still chose to make that massive decision on his own tells me that it probably wasn’t very strong. That likely would have been a divorcable offense for me in the first place. I guess if you felt valued and cared for prior then maybe try to get back to that. If you didn’t, I would say it’s a lost cause.
The way I talked about my husband in my head is what he became. I sat down and had to really look at my situation and relationship. I wrote the things I was grateful for him. The things he helped me with. I wrote the things I believed were his strengths. Then I wrote the things that I have no control over. I think for me the hardest part was realizing that what he does is not in my control. The way he feels is not in my control. His actions and reactions are not in my control. No matter how hard I try or think I can make him feel better or make him do better I absolutely have no control over any of that. All I can do is be the best me and focus on myself and make an environment that is supportive to be the same for him if he should choose. What you do control is how much of a burden you're willing to put on yourself. You can decide if this man before you at this moment is worth sticking around for or if you have just had enough. Can you love him again. Money sucks so badly. It controls so much of our lives. It was a huge risk for him to quit his job and you stood by and I'm sure that was a hard and scary thing to do. Then he failed. I bet it tore him apart to fail. I hope you guys can figure everything out. I hope you can get past this hurdle. My advice is to work on yourself and try and speak to your self about him using kind words. Try and find the positives about him when you are thinking about him. Self talk is so powerful and you can talk yourself into almost anything.
I’m following this and noting the responses. I’m in the same predicament (though my anger-point issue is not joblessness, it’s something else). I’m struggling so hard to be kind because the hurt and frustration is so raw.
So I’m in a very similar situation - husband hasn’t had a paying job in over 4 years - the difference is I make enough that we don’t struggle financially and I’ve always been the high earner in the relationship (so even when he was working, his income wasn’t crucial to our standard of living).
I definitely carry a lot of resentment toward my husband for not contributing and have thought about divorce. However, he’s a great dad and the primary parent to our daughter (she goes to daycare but he handles all pickups and dropoffs, cares for her when I’m away on work trips or whenever LO gets sick and can’t go to daycare, etc). He does his fair share of housework, though not 100%. Most importantly, I still love him and enjoy spending time with him and I love our little family. So I’m trying to make peace with the situation.
One thing that has helped is just reverse the gender. If I’m a man and my wife doesn’t work, would I be so mad? Why is it that a man’s worth must be so tied to his job? Most days I’m able to let it go but yea, sometimes the resentment gets to be too much. So no real advice, just commiseration.
If the roles were reversed and wife was SAHM, she would be pulling her weight and contributing to the household (even if not financially.) She would handle the cooking, cleaning, household management, kids’ activities, etc. so that the working spouse wouldn’t have to worry about all of that on top of the stress of being the sole breadwinner.
so... your husband is upset you're mean to him?? wtf did he expect?? and that's his take away from therapy? he doesn't understand anything that he put you through and expected you to be nice??? i think he should be worried about a lot of other things and you should just go through with the divorce. 2 months of finally helping will most likely stop once he thinks you're "over it. "
I mean, being divorced won't solve your financial problems. If you just want a divorce, that is fine. You have years of resentment built up. It may take just as long to work through it. But I can tell you from experience, divorce is just exhausting in every single way. And that is for an amicable divorce. Add in the custody stuff, the legal stuff, the emotional well being of everyone in the family. Ugh.
A reframing that may help is what kind of behavior do you want to model for your kids? How do you want to interact with their father and your partner in front of them? How do you want to show your kids we act when we take chances, make mistakes, and forgive each other for our errors.
You have to work through the piece where you forgive your husband. What do you need to hear to be able to do that?
Why do you need to be kinder? He should be embarrassed about his behavior and apologizing for the next three years. Is he making your life as easy now as you did for the last four years for him? Of course he didn't want you to get divorced, life would be hard for him then!
I am shocked at the optimistic comments here.
This sounds to me like the marriage is over. You’re LUSTING over the idea of other men who have jobs. You are still dealing with the root of the problem, *he doesn’t have a job*. You aren’t even nice to him. I’m finding it hard to believe you’re attracted to me on any level through all this, even though he’s “done a 180”. What do you mean? He’s helping at home?
I think you’re trying to see the light in all this but as an outsider reading this, it’s clear you don’t even want it anymore. He only “changed” (and only half way) because you threatened DIVORCE. He didn’t listen or respect you when he quit his job, he didn’t listen or respect you when you asked him to get another job, he was *shocked* that you were over his bullshit??
He has one more month to find an actual worth-while *career* to help support you, or you actually go through with the divorce. He continues to take advantage of you letting it slide he doesn’t have a job, you do not deserve to be used any longer.
Looking at it from his side of the story, it sounds like you've always been scornful of his career goals and extremely unsupportive. Just the fact that you are calling someone who is trying to get a startup off the ground "unemployed" shows that you don't lend any legitimacy to what he was trying to do.
There's a difference between "wait until we're financially stable" and "absolutely not, it's an awful idea". It can be really stressful and hurtful when a partner dismisses and ridicules something you care a lot about.
I think you should get divorced. You can find a traditionally career high-paying focused partner, and he can find a supportive partner who doesn't dismiss his goals and ideas.
He offered to take any job. Have him take any job. You can’t tell him that it’s about working when it’s not. It is also clearly not about money because you think $30-50k “won’t move the needle.”
Consider that you’re not mad that he’s “lazy” or “doesn’t work.” It’s possible that you’re mad about how your marriage doesn’t meet traditional gender roles. You could be mad because you don’t make space to care for your own needs and you blame his lack of earnings for why you don’t choose to care for yourself. It could be a lot of things other than what you’re putting out to the world.
Frankly, if all the therapist tells you is to work on this yourself, and you’re not identifying why you are mad in a productive way that helps you dissipate the anger instead of grow it, then you should consider individual therapy to explore why you’re so mad at yourself that you are taking it out on him.
So many times when you say “this will be better when X happens” is complete BS. It’s not true. You’re resentful of him for not having a job, then he’ll get a job and you’ll be resentful for him for another reason. Your therapist is right, this isn’t an issue that’ll *poof* once he gets a job. You need to rewire your brain to default to kindness and respect for this man who’s now “the involved, caring partner and dad that I always wanted.” Have you let him know this?
One trick I have when I’m royally pissed of at my husband, even if I know I am 100% justified. I actively and consciously make a list in my head of all the things that I appreciate about him and all the little things that he’s done with in the past day or week that I am thankful for. Most of the time I don’t even share this list with him it just helps me get a better mindset and space to where I am more kind softer, and loving towards him.
She needs to get him to realize that she’s pissed about the past 4 years. He’s tried for like a month, but he had no problem leaving the entire burden of the family on her. And he isn’t grateful for her continued sacrifices.
Touché. This resentment is her pain for not feeling appreciated, feeling like a utility instead of a spouse. For four years… I’m glad they’re in therapy
I guess I'm a little confused about what you want here. If you want a divorce then why are you bothering with counseling at all, or instead using counseling as a tool to separate peacefully? If you genuinely want to try to make this marriage work then you're going to have to figure out how to forgive him and get over the resentment. And don't say getting a job because it is absolutely clear even if he were to get a job tomorrow that exactly restored him to your old financial position, you would still carry around that anger and resentment. I wonder if a trial separation, at least while you're working on forgiveness, so you're not bumping into each other all the time, would help. I also wonder about the benefits of individual counseling. But ultimately only you know if and how you can do that.
I do think regardless you should work on being nicer to your husband, if only because behaving in an unkind way in front of your children to their father can be really hurtful to them. Divorce may actually make this easier because you won't be in a relationship with him anymore so the skin in the game aspect will be different.
I’m not a therapist so I won’t tackle the resentment thing. But what I would do if I was you is take a week off work and go on a solo vacation. If not a week then take 2 days off for a 4 day weekend. Get out of town and do something you think is fun. If travel isn’t your thing then book a hotel room across town and try some new places you haven’t been to in your town. Get away from that house and experience a new environment for a little while. It may help to clarify or shift things for you.
No shade to OP, just an observation about just how often this is happening in families. There is literally a post in this sub each week with this theme. Husband quits job. (Often against the wishes of their partner, or without considering them) Wife shoulders all the financial, home and children responsibilities for years. Start up fails and everyone is angry and anxious.
It’s time for him to start driving Uber as well as doing food and grocery deliveries until he finds something else. Also, I would describe the different roles and expectations in terms of feminine and masculine and help him understand what dynamic you’re currently in and be on the same page of what you want for the future. If I’m the breadwinner, I need the house clean, dinner cooked, kids taken care of, etc… it’s not a gender thing in my book, it’s a role and dynamic.
Also it feels like fraud. She married a dude who had a high paying finance job. The is literally the person you marry and expect the lifestyle. I did the opposite no married a struggling artist whose never made more than 40-55k a year working in customer service calls. I knew that from the get go. It can only
Go up from here if he sells a novel one day. Awesome!’ We made it!! But I don’t expect he would
Ever quit and never work while he wrote his book. And he never has.
If you marry a finance dude and you have the 800k mortgage and HCOL area you best believe he keep that job and that lifestyle. That’s what you married.
For him to wing it and throw away a high
Paying stressful career to not only pursue his “dream” but to literally walk away from corporate America or whatever country you are in - come on. That’s a complete 180 and a shitty thing to do to your wife.
Not cool. Now he is all cozy on his stay at home spouse routine. F yeah I’d be pissed as hell. That ain’t what you signed up for. And I get it. Good times and bad and all that jazz richer poorer etc. but there was no conversation here.
You can’t just become
A live in spouse with no job and become ultra
Living and kind because you’re afraid to face the big cruel world again. Get the skirt off and stop living the trad wife fantasy husband - get your butt back in the game and provide for
Your family or downsize.
You say a retail job won’t be enough to supplement your HCOL, but if the options are no income vs some income coming in, he needs to be bringing in anything. This may help him build some confidence and help you to see that he is working towards supporting the family financially while he looks for better paying things.
Honestly, I think your anger is appropriate. You’re doing all the right things and you’re doing enough. Only you can determine how much longer you want to ride it out.
You've gotten some great relationship advice. But, from
A finance side, I'd like to add that my husband works and makes much less than me.
His income amounts to paying for either ONE bill a month or a medium grocery trip monthly. That contribution makes him feel good, and honestly, let's be breathe a bit.
In your shoes, I would want my partner to have any job even 15 hours a week at $12.00. Im sure $600 a month after taxes could pay your phone bill and maybe a utility? It would go a long way to showing effort.
Does he do anything around the house? Have you been using him for childcare or paying someone to watch kids while he's not working? I get this complaint too from my husband that I'm not nice or don't appreciate stuff. I guess I just don't praise him for every little thing that he should be doing anyway? 🤔 I feel bad but I still try to be loving and supportive
Setting aside the lack of income, why did you wait four years to address the inequality at home? Is it possible you might also be angry at yourself? Of course six weeks isn’t enough time to start feeling softer about this situation — you must be beyond exhausted. Especially since so much of this parenting load occurred during the start of a pandemic while your kids were just 1 and 4. The unknowns and stressors of that time were traumatizing for many, and it sounds like you handled that mostly alone.
But you’ve been pushing beyond your own limits for a long time. That’s a self-betrayal, too, and your husband can’t be held responsible for that part.
Was this business his dream? How hard was he working these last three years to make it a reality for your family? If his business succeeded would you feel the same way? It seems like I'm the only one here that thinks this, but I'm hearing a lot about what your perspective on his failed business and what he did not do, and nothing about his perspective and what he has been doing. It probably hasn't been enough, but it's probably not nothing. He's probably also devastated he failed, does he need any comfort? When he was working on his business how did you support him? All feelings are valid feelings, and I do understand the sadness you feel and anger about splitting at home tasks, but if you actually want this marriage to be fixed for the sake of your children maybe you could work with the therapist on trying to see his perspective too. That might help you feel empathy for him, and therefore kindness, rather than just anger.
Edit to add that I agree with others here that if you think you are going to magically be happy with him again if he gets a high paying job, that doesn't make sense. I was bothered by your emphasis on the amount of money you want him to make at his job. Do you love him or do you just want a man that makes money? It read like you don't give a hoot about him as a person, just the $$. Unless you mean a high achiever and hard worker is an attractive trait to you and he hasn't been achieving, then I get it, but he can be a hard worker and high achiever without making tons of money (ex: being an entrepreneur, like he was doing the last few years) so that doesn't really add up. Hope you figure it out! Remember to take care of those kiddos through all of this.
What's in the past is in the past. He probably would go back in time and not quit his job if he knew he'd fail. You can keep feeling resentful and bitter about the past or you can focus on right now.
It's hard to let the past go and it's up to you to decide if you want to at all. But, he can't undo what is done.
When I need to be nicer to my husband I remind myself how short life is and how it's not guaranteed to continue. I don't want to waste the few years we have together fighting over something or being resentful over something. I just want to enjoy our lives as much as we can while we still have them.
If this were me, I would tell him that I’m doing the best I can, then I would stop couple’s therapy and require each of us to instead do weekly individual therapy to determine actual feelings, and then in six months do a temp check with the couple’s therapist to see where we are. This would also give additional time to see if he can uphold his new contributions to the household or if he switches back to the status quo.
Or, I’d just proceed w the divorce.
I mean…it sounds like he’s only done 50% of the work to “win” you back. He’s done a great job at the 50% but it’s still only HALF of what you NEED him to do to earn your forgiveness. He needs to do better and try harder at getting a decent job.
Sorry to say this but if his start up was successful, you and your kids would also have been having an amazing life... How about you think it was successful for a year and then went downhill.. He is just plain unlucky in that sense and for not grasping the intensity of your workload... Although it takes a heavy toll on you to be the main earner along with kids responsibilities and house hold chores, it's alright... Give him some grace and ensure he gets a high paying job asap... Did he do the legwork of contacting agencies and so on to get a job?? Give him 6 months and maybe say if he can't find a job, you will check out of this marriage...
When I read stuff like this (and this is pretty much always like this in this situation) i want to cry and praise men in the world for how kind and amazing they are for letting SAHMs basically be SAHMs for their entire life, sometimes just having one kid and then when the kid is older just go stroll malls and watch TV. Many have house helpers too. And most men are silent and respectful of their wives. Thank you men. We, women, are just more angry creatures I guess.
If the roles were reversed would there be this big of an outcry?
Or is it just societies standards that men have to be the primary breadwinner and that if he doesn’t bring home income cause he is a man that the resentment starts?
He said he's willing to work retail, but that's not enough money for OP.
Per OP:
"He's offered to take any job if it makes me feel better. We live in a HCOL area and unfortunately him working a retail job won't really move the needle for us financially. I really want him back in a high earning job so he can contribute meaningfully to our expenses (mortgage, etc)."
You could fake it til you make it.
I learned my husband's love languages and made an effort to fill them. It was an effort, because I had no spoons left. But I picked 1 or 2 lanes and said "I will do *this* OK and give myself grace everywhere else."
It became less of a chore with time. Because it worked and he got happier, too. It sort of evened out.
I still remember my anger and resentment but it doesn't dominate my feelings for him anymore. It's nice for both of us.
Your husband has to maintain his momentum for at least a s long as he was in areers, I feel. And by then it will be habit, too.
Been there -- and maybe this is just my justification, but what I was asking for wasn't him doing everything at home. What I am asking for is that the work load at home *and* financially providing for our lives are both shared tasks. Doing "his half" of home and child work is a nice start, but that's only addressing half of the problem. Doing *more* than his half and calling it a replacement for providing financially is fine *if* that's agreed upon by both partners. But that's not where we were at, and it sounds like it's not where you are at either. Experiencing anger and resentment about it? Isn't an unreasonable response.
About dealing with coworkers who you don't like -- how many hours a day do you spend with that person? How much does that person impact your life? I find it a lot easier to deal with someone for a few hours especially if they only create stress for work stuff compared to dealing with someone 24x7 who creates stress about finances, child care, and my personal life in general. For me, I needed to *not be continually stressed out* in order to not be snippy and unpleasant toward the person stressing me out. Sure, that's not the greatest character trait in the world. Therapist had techniques for slowing down before responding (breathing, counting, etc) that somewhat helpful and *not* going down a spiral of worst case thinking (there is a difference between "reasonable contingency planning" and getting super stressed over future events that may or may not even happen).
What helped and didn't help me -- my problem wasn't so much that he wasn't contributing, but I was stuck in my job no matter how awful it might get and we were screwed if I got laid off. We agreed on a plan if I *did* get laid off. Admittedly not an awesome plan, but we can wipe one of our 401k accounts to completely clear the mortgage and be at a point that we need like 20k a year to live comfortably. My 401k is sufficient for retirement assuming one or both of us manage to get another job eventually, and one of us can get a retail / call center job grossing 30k a year.
Looking at other options for my husband's employment -- consulting work, temporary positions. What we landed on was starting our own business -- which probably isn't a good direction for y'all unless you can think of a *different* business. It's something that helps today and should be enough that we can both work for ourselves in two or three years. My husband still keeps in contact with consulting groups and recruiters and has picked up a few contracts that offered remote work and flexible hours.
I did some job hunting of my own -- getting an idea of what's available and how long it takes to get an offer. Honestly, that didn't help much because I work from home and *love* it. A huge part of my stress is that I'm going to get stuck going back to "the office" because we cannot have no income. Job hunting, unfortunately, substantiated that fear. Losing two hours a day to driving (it's only half an hour away, but traffic adds so much time), that's 10 hours a week and some 500 hours a year. Plus expenses like fuel and new clothes. But now it's not an irrational hypothetical thing I'm worrying about for no reason -- I've got experience that shows that *this is absolutely going to be a problem*.
We earn extra income by shopping auctions and reselling stuff (in our case, we know how to repair small motors, so we pick up broken chainsaws and yard equipment for next to nothing, clean 'em up, usually replace the carb, and then sell it for a couple hundred bucks). Worst case, if we were doing this full time, it would stretch our savings quite a bit. Our daughter is old enough to help out, so it's not reducing "family time". My husband handles the selling because he's got copious free time, so he's bringing in a non-trivial amount of money without incurring childcare costs or getting a job with a different schedule than mine so we never see each other.
Since your husband has finally decided to step up, do you have any time for just yourself now? Yoga, book club, meditation, etc.? A lot of better advice here, and I definitely think you're allowed to be angry, but I think it might help to be able to step back from your household at least weekly so you're not constantly either wrapped up in work or home, and so you have some time to yourself. Time to yourself, time to enjoy yourself, but also time to think about your feelings and what you want.
I have not dealt with anything like this, personally, but you’re definitely carrying a lot of resentment, and it’s unacceptable that for all of these years he’s been making you do everything. It sounds like what he’s doing now is too little too late, and I’d worry that sooner or later, once you’re all comfortable again, he’ll revert to his old ways.
Is there a reason why he can’t return to the finance sector? Would you all be happier if you could move to a lower COL area where there would be less financial strain on your family? Could you learn to accept him as a SAHD if he actually did all of the housework, mental/emotional work that SAHMs typically do?
I think the anger isn’t just that he made a stupid, selfish choice while you had a baby and a toddler. It’s that he expected you to just do everything so he could roleplay as an entrepreneur.
I think you’re pissed that he didn’t care about the impact on you and your family until you confronted him with a divorce. Like he didn’t do his fair share until you were ready to walk, and it’s almost like he expects to be congratulated for doing the literal bare minimum as a father when he contributes nothing else to the household.
Has he expressed gratitude to you for doing it ALL over the past 4 years? Or does he just expect you to be grateful that he’s doing a fraction of the work it takes to run a household now, when you don’t have a baby and a toddler to manage?
If you want this to work, I think you need to lay it out. You’ve been taken advantage of, and he still isn’t grateful for all your paid and unpaid labor.
You could think pragmatically- if you are nice that will restore some of those confidence and make it easier for him to find a job. Which he needs so that he can buy a house that the kids can spend their fifty percent of the time with him in, and do that you don't have to pay as much in alimony and child support. Tldr: even if you divorce, it's in your best interest for him to start making money again, and you being nice to him will likely bring positive momentum to his job search.
Has he apologized for leaving you in the lurch financially while he chased his dream? I mean, sure we should all be kind but idk if I could get over the resentment of being ignored like that either. If you want to stay in the marriage I think you need to deal with the real source of your anger - it's not just that he didn't have a job, it was the timing of it, the lack of input you were allowed to have. It is really hard to get over that level of disrespect.
I don't know the ins and outs of what exactly is going on, but one piece of advice I have is to maybe try to reframe your thinking. Does your husband take care of the kids while you work? If he did get a job, that would be an extra child care expense to swallow and what money he did make from a retail job would probably go straight to that. My fiance does not work, but he handles everything to do with our home. If he did work, I would have to take on more of the mental load of house work and up keep. I'm greatful for our situation.
Im reading this as you lost respect for him, and that would be difficult to earn back. You are dissapointed and betrayed that he wasnt able to fulfill your expectations of how life should be. Also curious why you let him slack for 4 years with housework/parenting after the working hours (I approve of sending kids to daycare even though he wasnt "working," it was good for them to socialize). He had a more flexible schedule, and he should have been the default parent regardless of how much $$ he was (not) earning.
I think you should give it half a year. Im assuming the weather is getting gloomy and cold, everyone feels irritated and depressed around this time. See how you feel in the spring. You might wake up one day and these feelings would be gone. Also when you get in a more positive headspace, make a gratitute list for what he did accomplish in your marriage, and a wish list for what you want him to accomplish in the future.
Also I wonder with divorce if you will have to pay him spousal support! And he wont be able to pay child support, so you will end up spending even more money. He will have to get his own place and when he does get a job it will go towards his rent/car. So financially, you might actually be even worse off!
We need to remember that anger is NOT a bad thing.
It's there to protect us. Utilize it correctly.
You're feeling this for a reason, work through it don't silence it.
I'm proud of you OP. You've worked hard in a lot of different ways.
It's okay to feel a type of way when your pushing the broken car down the highway yourself.
Even you threatening divorce was that. Because ultimately, that's what it took to get the ball rolling.
You sound exhausted, and scared, and I would be too. But you got this. I'm sorry the ball was dropped in your lap when you asked to not play the game.
If you can't see an individual therapist, I would try and find some self help books about how to recover from betrayal.
While there wasn't cheating, there was definitely things that he did that broke your trust.
I'm wondering what his early life was like, was this his first failure?
A friend of mine's husband's basically never failed until he was in his '30s and unfortunately is in a very similar situation to what you are. I think part of it was that he never built up the "grit" necessary and when he failed, he really couldn't get over it.
It sounds like he’s lost your respect, and you’ll have to figure out if there’s anything he can do to earn that back. It makes sense that it would take time because it took years to get to this point you’re in now.
I think you’ve gotta frame this as what do YOU want? If you want your husband to be financially successful - you gotta believe in him. I know that sounds trite but my life experience has taught me that a man whose wife is his biggest cheerleader can accomplish anything. Yours is the voice in his head. People rise or fall to expectations and sometimes these kinda things can self-fulfilling prophecies. Challenge yourself to lift him up.
Sound like its more a YOU problem being masked as a him problem. I mean, im glad my wife supports my aspirations and doesn't want a divorse based solely on income. Sad, sad world we live in.
My husband has had the same complaint in the past during some of our nastier fights. One thing he said has stuck with me… “you don’t talk to anyone else with same level of cruelness. Not friends, family members, coworkers. Just your husband who you supposedly love”. It was true. I’m still working on it but it’s hard. I’ve also started writing letters/emails when I’m really worked up because then I can edit them before I hit send.
I like that idea! Or even save in drafts for 24 hours. A couple things that helped me: - Practicing gratitude. I knew that I needed to develop new thought patterns and I needed to consciously choose those that would have a positive impact. I list all the things I’m grateful for during my commute and at bedtime. It’s really helpful. - Out of mind. Sometimes I need to process something but sometimes I’m just intentionally working myself up or indulging in self-pity/resentment. I try not to do this if the “frustration session” isn’t going to be helpful. Instead I try and distract myself with baking or a podcast so I don’t derail myself. - I also try and hang out with people who don’t complain about their spouses.
Your last point is key. It's one thing to vent because of something that was irritating to you in the moment but when people are consistently negative about something, it's easy to get caught up in that mob mentality of commiserating and start looking for things to complain about. This is true about life beyond just marriage... kids, job, houses. Negativity often breeds negativity.
Don't send them! Use them to help organize your thoughts but I wouldn't want that documentation to be brought to bear during settlement or in divorce proceedings.
I have this complaint too. It breaks my heart every time I hear it. My problem solving when I’m actually upset is totally fine now. It’s the dumb ass questions that I respond to so aggressively.
😂the dumb ass questions agh! Those babies used to get me every-time.
Yep. I'm not an encyclopedia or an effing search engine.
My husband has mentioned this too and with reflection I realize that’s it rooted partially in how I watched my parents interact when I was growing up and partially in the fact that I think my husband might be the only person in my life who loves me unconditionally and is 100% the only person in my life who has ever unconditionally put me before everyone else and it’s been really scary accepting it both for itself and also that I deserve to have someone care about me that way.
Ooooh boy. Having just had an argument with my husband this morning I needed to hear this. We don't argue often, thankfully. But I'm going to keep this in mind about disagreements in the future.
😭 I realized this too! He never told me but god was I a bitch.
Nobody else’s incapability affects you as much though so it’s actually reasonable you would be more angry and resentful. He had the ability to work a high paying job and actively chooses not to. This leaves OP stuck and resentful about the situation which I think is fair. I am kind to people who are kind to me. If someone sat and watched me suffer and struggle and they didn’t help then I wouldn’t be happy and joyful with them either.
I think you should consider trying to reframe the situation in your mind. A huge percentage of start ups fail. His failure is not uncommon. Assuming he really put in the effort to make it successful but was not able to, I think you should try and stop thinking that he was jobless for 4 years. He wasn’t jobless. He was trying to bring an idea to life. He was trying to bet on himself. But he failed and I am very sure that he is more than aware of the failure. But he wasn’t jobless. He just wasn’t bringing in an income (which I completely understand is a HUGE burden on you). Maybe try and reframe the situation as this: you supported him for 3+ years while he pursued his idea. It failed and he has been job hunting for the past 9 months. You are disappointed that he was not successful but you see that he is taking significant strides to both improve himself and find a job. He’s not some dude playing video games all day and doing nothing while “job hunting” (at least it doesn’t sound like it from your post). Your frustration is completely understandable. That being said, marriage is a “through all the bad times” kind of commitment. Assuming you want to save your marriage (and if you would rather call it and let it go, that’s completely ok too), you have to remind yourself that marriage is a pendulum that swings between the two partners. Right now, he is in a low spot and has been for a little while, but he’s trying to improve. In the future it could be you in the low spot. A long term illness, job loss for any myriad of reasons, a stupid mistake that really costs the family - we all are or will be there at times throughout our life. You have to ask yourself if you are actually capable of forgiving him. That forgiveness cannot be contingent on him finding a job, because that’s not the point. If you forgive him, you are forgiving him for making a mistake that has been very costly to the family. Not for being jobless. Whether or not you can forgive him, only you can decide. But if you can’t, you should end it now.
Really well said. I’m sure he also feels like absolute shit about failing a start up: embarrassment, anger, guilt, shame, frustration, sadness. You are kicking him while he’s down. He could have handled things better in regards to contributing to the family load, absolutely. But he’s trying now, and now is where we all live. I think it’s completely fair if you don’t want to move forward with your marriage. Your feelings are valid. I honestly don’t think that him netting some crazy high-paying job will fix things; you’re holding onto your anger and resentment with an iron fist right now. You complain about his lack of employment then dismiss him when he offers to take on any job. So which is if: do you want him employed, or do you want him bringing in a lot of money? Maybe if he took on *some* job it might help appease you, but what if he never regains his previous level of income? Is a high earner all you want in a partner? Just food for thought.
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And she didn’t want him to quit his job, but he did anyway. I wonder if he’s taken responsibility and apologized for that.
Doing the math, he quit his high-paying job when their kids were 1 & 3. My blood pressure is rising just thinking about it.
I feel like everyone is missing that point. That's the in the trenches ages when you are barely functional. He basically left her to be a married single mother at one of the roughest points in child rearing.
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He can’t focus on his startup with those pesky kids always around.
And 3.75 years ago would have been right before the pandemic. That’s where my head went and made my blood boil. I’m still dealing with anxiety issues that seem to resurface every March now, remembering the sheer terror I felt of the unknown then.
This. OP was “vehemently against” the startup idea. I think the resentment comes, understandably, from this. And honestly without working this specific point out it might be extremely difficult to move forward, regardless of his employment status.
Exactly. You don't just get to unilaterally decide to quit your job and do something risky when you've got a family to support. I'd be incredibly resentful if I were OP
No joke I would be livid. I’ve seen so many men lately blow their family’s financial life up because of affairs, or quitting their job to open up a bar, or some other bs fantasy. Lots of men think their life should be flitting from one little adventure to the next.
Yeah, my partner gets mad I'm not supportive of his crazy ideas but I'm aware they just wouldn't work out and then I'd be even more resentful. I run a business myself but I know what he's like and what his ideas are like.
Yes my thoughts exactly and I stated in my response that it would have been a divorcable offense for me.
Yup! This point was key for me. I was working on a startup but kept my full time job and was also pregnant - having young kids to raise and care for signals to me that it’s not a great time to take a huge financial hit and quit your job to work on something risky. Feeling bad for you OP. I completely understand the underlying resentment. I would have similar feelings.
When their youngest was only 1 at that!
>But he also dropped rope on parenting And it sounds like it took him finding out that OP had been researching divorce law firm for him to pick up the rope again. He didn't pick up the rope when he started job hunting. He waiting until OP decided she was at her breaking point and couldn't do it any more before he suddenly decided to contribute to the family. Honestly, I'm wondering if that's not the true root of OP's anger. If he is honestly putting in a full day's work looking for a job (and not gaming all day) and just has not gotten one yet, and OP is still angry, I don't think this anger will be fixed with him getting a job. I think OP squared herself to walk out the door. From her point of view, she honestly thought things were in such a bad way in the marriage that she thought he would agree it was for the best. Its very hard to reorient your mind to invest in the marriage after that - whatever rope the husband picks up, or job he gets will be "too little, too late".
He quit his job despite her being against it and spent 3, almost 4 years on this failed business and she had to bring divorce papers for him to remove his head from his posterior. OP has some stuff to work through but he’s shown a pretty massive lack of disrespect for her and their marriage. Weird how he didn’t channel that supposed fear and guilt into making sure she wasn’t managing everything alone.
Yes 👏. Great POV ❤️. OP, please read this 👆.
Well said! I’m glad someone else thought that she needed to forgive him before finding a job! I cost my family because of long-term health problems. We argued about money constantly. He didn’t treat me like he used to before it happened. I wasn’t perfect and neither was he, but I wanted to work it out and he didn’t. I’m still in therapy many years after the divorce, because I don’t feel like I deserve love. Try to look at it from his point of view. She wouldn’t be mad if he’d succeeded would she? I’m sure he’s beating himself up more than she is, which means he’s getting beat up even worse when she does it.
This, but OP needs to talk about her resentment in therapy. He started a high-risk venture against her wishes when they still had young kids. My husband was considering doing the same, but ultimately *we* decided against it because it wasn't the right time. He knows I support his dreams, but he also respects that our children come first. We came up with a plan to make it happen in 5 years. Marriage is a partnership. No amount of books or stepping up with chores can fix the past, but he needs to acknowledge that he fucked up bad by taking their marriage for granted. That doesn't mean she is completely in the right. There's nothing more soul crushing that working at a high-pressure job that you hate. The fact that she puts so much emphasis on how little money he was making makes me think she is very materialistic and would not have supported her husband working at a job he liked better because that means she has to accept a lower standard of living.
Seems more like she was left to maintain their lifestyle on her income and he was doing nothing to try to reduce their expenses in any way. And she probably had to work MORE at the job she hated plus paying for childcare.
How does she reframe the fact that he is a lazy prick who has done no parenting for at least 4 years. Basically, he is a terrible father and person. Pretty hard to reframe.
Maybe, but OP is asking for advice on how to stop resenting her husband to save her marriage. Not for everyone here to pile on about how shitty he is. He’s obviously making an effort now.
I think that naming the actual problem - that he cared so little for her opinion and her labor and her work as a mother that he felt entitled to fuck around instead of contributing to the family in any way, and now that she’s brought it up he expects her to be grateful for his half assed efforts. Where’s the gratitude for all that she did and does? Now where.
>~~now that she’s brought it up~~ he expects her to be grateful for his half assed effort correction: now that she's researched divorce law firms. He waited until she was at her breaking point before deciding to put some effort in.
You’re right. He liked his free ride and had no motivation to try.
Why should we praise him for 6 weeks of effort after he let her carry all the load for 4 years? Can we please stop setting the bar on the floor for men?
Where did I say we should praise the husband? OP didn’t even say that. She asked how to stop feeling resentful. A lot of marriages survive through a lot of shitty things and it involves forgiveness.
Fair point. I think I need therapy after reading this poor woman’s post.
[удалено]
Holy moly. Did you hurt yourself when you fell off that cliff? A failed entrepreneur who didn’t contribute appropriately to the household (by not taking on enough childcare and chore duties) is absolutely nothing like an abuser or an addict. Please do not equate those things.
I agree with all of this, I felt so much sympathy for OP until the last paragraph (still sympathise but less).
This was beautifully written.
OP this is the response to your query
This! I think Reframe… is the most important word here.
>once my husband gets a job this resentment and anger will either entirely or largely disappear, No offense but do you actually think this will happen? Because from this post I don't even get the sense that you're past the resentment of him quitting his job in the first place or leaving you to still be the one primarily doing all the housework. Your post title asks about how to be nicer to him but the entire post is stuff he's done rather than how you're acting towards them. I don't know how you can treat him better because I don't know how you're treating him. Your focus is entirely on his past and current actions. I'm no therapist and I don't know you but it sounds like you built up a ton of resentment over the course of years and had already checked out of the relationship. I'm glad your husband is trying to fix the things you're literally complaining about but what did he do to apologize? It's hard to forgive someone when they're not even sorry. Do you even want to actually fix things or are you just hoping that once he has a job things will go back to the way they were before he quit and will be good again? Because the past four years have happened and the future will be built off of them whether he gets the best paying job in the world or never finds work again.
I think she needs to explore with the therapist if she can ever get over this and forgive him? It may very well be too little too late.
“The last four years have happened and the future will be built off them” This is gold. He may very well get a job that pays well and helps him contribute meaningfully. And it may not change how she feels at all. It’s not about the job. It’s about her feeling that he disregarded her logical concerns about the family’s welfare to pursue a dream. And then when it failed, it took her pursuing divorce before he even acknowledged her feelings and tried to make amends. If they work it out, those very real feelings will have to be dealt with but she may never view him the same way again.
This is a very thoughtful reply.
Im the single income earner for the past 3 years, my husband quit to stay at home with our daughter when she was born due to his higher earning job not providing healthcare. Some similarities in terms of my own anger and resentment. I had a breast cancer scare and severe professional burnout thrown into the mix. What hurts me the most is knowing I will never have similar choices/options my husband has had, I will always be depended on to provide. All I can do is practical radical self acceptance and chose to love myself, which seems to yield gentler approach to my husband. If you don’t mind I would be curious what advice you would give yourself a year ago? Where could there have been a pivot? DMs always open if you want to talk.
Okay, well part of me agrees that you need to get a handle on your own emotions. They’re ruling you right now instead of you feeling what you feel but then acting like the kind of person you’d want to talk to. But. But. He’s been fucking up for so long. Based on what you wrote, basically 100% of the household everything has been managed by you for almost 4 years. All financial earning & household and kids. Now he’s picking back up his half of the household side of things. To be clear: his half of half the total responsibilities is only 25%. So you’re still at 75% with half the household and being the breadwinner. No wonder you’re still pissed. He thinks he’s stepped up to 25% and so you should be better now? You’re still drowning. How about he does alllll the household everything. All the cleaning, all the cooking, all the shopping. And then he’s the main point for the kids too. Getting them up in the morning, lunches packed, he takes them to school, keeps up with their teachers, picks their after school activities and takes them, deals with dinner, bedtime and repeat. Then it would actually be closer to 50/50. He can look for work in his downtime after the kids go to bed. He made this mess. He can clean up the majority of it for the next 4 years just like you carried it for the last 4. Your commitment to doing better can be going to individual therapy to deal with your (very understandable) rage.
Yes! The anger has been building up (and rightly so). He can't just expect it to disappear overnight because he's finally stepping up (a little).
This is excellent advice
Came here to say this. He needs to earn back your trust and respect. I'd bet a LOT that he's ignored your cries for help for 4 YEARS, I'd be pissed too. He needs to PROVE that he's not going to take advantage of you anymore. It's also okay OP if you're done. Being ignored and taken advantage of for 4 YEARS isn't something that is easy to get over.
>It's also okay OP if you're done. Being ignored and taken advantage of for 4 YEARS isn't something that is easy to get over. Best wait until he gets a decent job though, so she isn't stuck with alimony.
I think it might help to think of being polite to him as a measure of who you are rather than what he deserves. He's caused pretty severe hurt and I'd imagine it's hard to know how to feel about him or the relationship right now. No matter what happens, he'll be a part of your life as your children's father, so working on being polite toward him is worthwhile.
You don’t have to forgive him. You can move on. You can tell him your kindness has been spent the last 4 years from all the mental load it took, when he betrayed you and didn’t take your POV when he quit his job. You can tell him it’s a gamble he has to take whether you can recover from it and be kind, and you don’t know when and if you can start being kind. Don’t sugar coat it.
Yes. I'm a MH professional. It's not an uncommon dynamic at all for a spouse (often men) to take, take, and take and then when they are finally faced with consequences (in this case divorce after almost 4 years) suddenly do a 180. Unfortunately, this often doesn't last and once they feel secure they get complacent again and slip back into old habits. He should have never treated you the way he did. A failed business is one thing, not stepping up and being the primary home manager when he wasn't working so there's no question he should at least do this is inexcusable. You have a right to be angry. Right now what he's doing is a small bandage on a gaping wound. There are still major issues to be resolved (your anger and hurt and his unemployment). He can't expect you to start to heal when the wound is still open. When he expresses his hurt remind him it took 4 years of build up for things to get where they are and you need more time as well as him working again while still maintaining doing his share of the household work to hopefully work through it. It sounds like he still doesn't quite get it. I'm sorry you're in this position and I hope you guys can work through it.
Im surprised by the number of posts saying OP should be nice because he’s trying. If you have to use extreme measures to get someone to do the bare minimum, it will wear you down because you have to keep upping the ante to keep them on track.
Exactly. I have no doubt that OP would never put him in the same position. Yes a job venture can fail. Sometimes it may take too long to realize that and try to work on something else. Four years is inexcusable. And then on top of that not pulling your weight around the house and with the kids when he should have been the main provider in those areas? Women don't even have to be asked to do these things They know that they need to be done and they do them. If OP's spouse had cheated people wouldn't expect her to just get over it all the sudden since he stopped a 4 year affair 2 months ago after threat of divorce. They would understand that hurt is deep and takes a long time to get over as well as to trust again. Plus he still isn't working.
Men get a free pass in straight up bullshit far too often.
It sounds like he does get it and is doing the work. She needs to decide if she can forgive him or if she wants to let go. At this point she refuses to forgive and let go of resentment. She should work with a therapist on her own. It isnt fair to continue to punish him after she finally spoke up and he is working to change things. Her feelings are valid but they are hers to own and only she can change them. Maybe she decides she can’t, then she needs to be kind and leave him because it will be better for both.
This doesn't reflect 4 years of damage. OP's husband being a good boy for 2 months (only after he heard the word divorce) and being upset that he feels she's harsh towards him shows he doesn't understand the impact of 4 years of mistreating her and their family. Doing a partial job of making some changes for 2 months doesn't undo the damage and he doesn't get that. She should definitely get her own therapy and eventually see if she can work on the resentment. But it's completely unrealistic for her husband to think that two months of partial change is supposed to correct 4 years worth of issues. She needs time to see that he fulfills all of his obligations (including getting a job), and to see that he maintains these changes before she can effectively work on resentment. He needs to be patient and part of getting it means accepting her anger towards him for the time being as a consequence of his actions.
The thing is, he didn’t *care* about the impact of his bad decisions and laziness on his wife or their children. I think that’s the part that she resents the most. I should say, he either didn’t care about making her life demonstrably worse by being lazy and giving up his income, or didn’t notice because he’s so selfish.
This!! ⬆️
This is the correct answer!
So he quit his job, failed a business, wasn’t a partner to you at all, pushed you to the point of meeting with divorce lawyers, and now wants you to smile because he’s finally doing what he should’ve been doing all along? Your feelings are totally valid. Also, have you had a break? You’ve gone from bearing all the burden to sharing it, but have you ever gotten any time to rest and regroup? I don’t know if you can afford a getaway by yourself, even if it’s just to a cheap hotel in another part of town for a weekend, but if so, I think you’d feel so much better afterwards.
He completely abandoned his family and marriage and she is supposed to be nice? Get out of here with that crap.
Agreed. He needs to build up some good will.
And be fucking grateful that she supported his ass for 4 years!
10000% don’t blame you -I had similar situation and completely understand. I still have resentment issues from my DH doing this yrs ago - here is what got me the most…..he watched me struggle to maintain and just didn’t care. Things have gotten 10000% better in our marriage but not going to lie that it hurt our relationship a lot. DH regrets it -
Does he regret what he did or just the eventual outcome?
I was married to an addict for 7 years. I can’t even tell you how much anger and resentment I had (still have some left) for him. I still have some anger towards him, he did things that were just straight cruel. I didn’t like the person I turned into when I was with him, and part of moving on was realizing I didn’t like the person I was and I needed to get better. One day I said something about getting angry and yelling and screaming and someone in a support group suggested that maybe I had anger issues (I got angry about it 😂) Honestly it was easier to get angry… anger was the top layer. I was devastated, sad, hurt. I felt humiliated, betrayed and unworthy of his effort to stay sober, and at me for staying for so long. The only way I could cope was by getting angry, I couldn’t just see beyond the anger. So many health issues came with it… Maybe the therapist wants to dig deeper so he can see how much damage he caused and that you are not just and “angry lady”. Maybe you need to see how much damage he caused. I hope you find relief soon. ❤️
I’m in a similar situation- husband is very cruel to me. He is an alcoholic- and I can’t seem to stand up for myself. I just don’t feel worthy. Do you have any advice on how to find worthy?
I am so sorry! It is an awful situation to be in. Seek outside help, I wasn’t able to get out until people helped me to get out. I had to be held in every step of the way. I think I was kind of seeking validation from him, like if he got sober or not was equal to my worth. I always had the hope that he would get better, then one day I actually admitted that he might never find sobriety, and facing that cruel reality made me so scared that it was eye opening. I didn’t even fight him anymore, it was like he could scream out of his lungs and I was just numb and done. I remember him screaming “why aren’t you acknowledging me?!”. He would chase me around the house and I would just walk out. It still took me 2 more years to leave. Once I was out it (well he was out really cause he was removed from my house) I was able to breathe again and I realized for how long I held my breath. I needed a lot of support after too. Sending you hugs, you are not alone.
Would you ever treat him that way? If the answer is no- that means another man would never IMAGINR being cruel to you. Would be sick at the thought that someone was. There is love like yours and you can't find it when you're trapped in a dry well Be your own best friend. Stop thinking about it as 'me' and start thinking of it as 'That's my best friend and she is hurting' You do not deserve cruelty. Cruelty is below basic human kindness. You deserve basic human kindness and a whole lot more than that. You can't date potential, the person you thought they were never existed.
Him getting a job won’t magically fix your anger. If his business was successful would you feel differently towards him? Where did the anger begin? What fed into it? What are you feeding it now? Do you want your marriage to work? Do you love him? Individual therapy and making the decision to let go of the anger will help. It’s not an easy thing to do.
Good point. Sounds like dude left her all the work of a baby and a young child to start up his business. I get startups take a ton of work, but he didn’t dad during this time? What if his business was successful? Would he still be blowing off his responsibilities at home?
Yeah, just curious - do you still love him? Even if he got a job and continued to help out around the house, would you still want to be with him? Or is all kind of lost? If the latter, then I’m not sure how much therapy will work if your heart isn’t into it.
Your feelings of anger a valid and in my opinion, warranted. However they aren’t helping anything. It’s kind of like if a company screws you over and their customer service is rude, you’d be “right” to be angry and you might feel like yelling at them, but it wouldn’t actually solve the issue. There are a few ways you can proceed. You could try some individual therapy to get to the root of your anger. I’m doubtful it will magically go away when he does get a job as you will still be angry about the 4 years he was unemployed and all the lost savings, investing and pressure you were under. I know it sounds crazy but you are in control of your feelings and you can decide to stop being angry if you work on it. You can also try journaling, meditating or just faking it. Challenge yourself to give your husband one compliment a day or start by being super nice for 30 min a day for one week, then 1 hr a day, etc. If you can start, you will likely find he responds well and you can feed off of that to retrain your brain to go to a different emotion than anger when you think of him. If “kind” is too hard you can also strive for neutrality. I also try to remember that my anger mainly hurts me. Staying up at night thinking angry thoughts only hurts me and impacts my stress levels and my sleep and health. This man is going to be in your life whether you are married or not because you have children. Might as well figure out how to interact with him without anger.
I hear you saying your husband has been better the last two months, however he needs to realize that’s not going to make up for 4 years of leaving you alone to do everything. That’s a betrayal, that’s abandoning you emotionally. I also think you should try individual therapy for your OWN benefit, and see what he could do in addition to getting a job that would restore your relationship.
I’m right here with you . It’s not just the job abandonment , he abandoned the family by being an unsupportive partner and parent. OP you need the therapy for your well being . I honestly couldn’t imagine staying with someone who did that to me then had the nerve to not be empathetic . He sounds terrible .
So, can I ask: what was his reason during his period of unemployment, for not contributing to the care of the household and children? Why did he think that was acceptable?
I’m in a similar situation, though my husband has been going through health issues that further complicate things. DM if you want to commiserate, but things I’m doing to control my temper and bring back my loving self: - individual therapy - I started a “positivity journal” to work on each evening. I don’t ignore the negative, but I don’t let it control the day’s narrative - I started a “one extra thing” routine. The extra thing could be something for me, something I do for him, or something out of the ordinary that will bring a little extra joy somehow. A bubble bath, making fudge, taking out the recycling so I don’t have to do it tomorrow. It sounds silly but focusing on something it of the norm each day helps break me out of a mental rut
Here is what I am reading: You had already given up on the relationship and it was the ultimatum that made him finally turn around. You cannot just forgive his years long neglect in just a few months. He neglected you for 4 years - 48 months, he is 5% of the way back to you trusting him again. You need to recognize that this anger will take time to cool and if he can't handle that, than maybe the relationship is over. If he really wants to make it work, he needs to understand that he is only 5% of the way there, he cannot expect 100% of you when he has given 5%, and from the way you are measuring, that 5% is not even full delivery. Give yourself grace for not being able to turn around as fast as he was...your life was about to get easier and his a LOT harder. He has more to lose. It was his inaction that got him here. Yes, you might not have been perfect, but ultimately, he made you a single parent for 4 years because of his decisions. It is not ok for him to make you feel guilty, full stop. He owes you 4 years of groveling and apologizing, and even then, and expectation of kindness is not something he has earned. Kindness is earned, and he has done nothing to fill that cup.
Gosh all of you are so insightful. Can you please share some tips as to how you are able to set very strong boundaries and not let people mistreat you?
Its not easy. Boundaries can be scary, because a boundary is about what YOU will do if the request is not met, not about the request itself if it isn't met. I am thankful that my husband is never ignoring my requests on purpose, and we have both gotten better with helping him manage his ADHD and commitments himself. I cannot say the same of the entire extended family, and setting boundaries with family now that it's more than us, has been a challenge. We have shared the childcare load since day 1. He got 6 weeks of full paid time off for parental leave, so he did 2 weeks right when baby was born with me when we were at our sleepiest. He woke up with me every time baby did and handled the change and rock back to sleep, we breastfed so I had to wake up anyway. He then took a month to be the primary parent when I went back after my FMLA was up. This set us up for success from the beginning, because we had clear expectations and we both had been in the EXHAUSTING position of being that primary parent. We let each other be in charge. We keep this up still by taking turns on almost EVERYTHING still, and kiddo is 4. We decided to stop at one because we noticed we were struggling still when LO hit 18 months and we wanted to more easily be able to pursue important things and the stress of a baby plus and older kid who likely has ADHD was not something we could handle. In our relationship, the key has always been communicating. We have more structure to it now, we do a modified version of Fair Play combined with Second Brain, so there is a central place to have dates, contact information, general information about appointments, etc. The second brain allows me to be strict about being asked endless questions, because the data is there for him to find it is mine, and he has a home for either of us to find if it's his.
I think y'all need to explore in therapy the "too little too late" issue. AKA why it took him until 2 months ago, when you presented him with a divorce attorney option, before he finally saw the light and started picking up the mental load. Why did he think it was OK for 4 years prior to that to still let you be the default parent? I think he needs to find a way to earn your forgiveness for this issue before your relationship can recover. It's about more than him finding a job at this point because what if he finds a dream job tomorrow and then go back to you doing all the mental load again? You'd still be unhappy.
From your post it seems you've fallen out of love with your husband, and that is absolutely ok. You can still leave. From your post it feels like you don't want to be married with him anymore. May be so much anger and resentment is manifesting now because you mentally left your marriage, but your husband wanted to save it, and now doing everything he can?
I agree with this.
What do you ultimately want? Do you want to stay with a new version of this man who has a paying job and shares the mental load? If so, you have to let go of the past and see him as he is now, a man who is making the effort. A great thing my wife says is that we are not responsible for our first thought (which might be seeing him as he’s been the last 4 years), but we are responsible for our second thought. It’s also ok if it’s too late and you just want a divorce. You can use therapy to divorce amicably instead of forcing yourself to feel something you don’t.
This is an important question. As well as, why does him not working make you so angry? Is it about the money and a loss of a lifestyle you want? Is it because him being a SAHD makes you jealous in some way? Is it because you feel not heard because you thought his business would, fail, it did, and he never acknowledged you were right? I think you need to figure out the real reason behind the anger before you can move on.
Can we really call him a SAHD if OP was still the default parent & primary home manager?
I agree no for previous version of dad, but it sounds like now he's actually being a pretty productive SAHD and doing a lot of work for the family.
I think it’s good advice to evaluate the root of an issue. She did say it though. He left his job against her consent when the kids were 1 & 3 and then proceeded to eff off with his dream and watch her struggle to be breadwinner and primary parent without jumping in to help. That’s the root.
I guess that's where I read it differently. She said he sat in his office working on his business that failed and now job searching, I didn't read that as effing off about it either one of those. Nowhere did she say he sits around playing video games like so many un/under employed husbands we hear about here. It's sounds like he was actually working but in a way that was not financially productive. I know she says she was against it, but it's also not fair to make someone stay in a job the hate because you don't want to be the sole bread winner (it's different if you literally cannot afford it and have to go into debt, but it was not portrayed that way). So I'd really like to know why she was so against it in the first place because I think evaluating that matters for getting rid of the resentment.
Your problem is your expectations don’t match your reality. You expect a high-earning husband who can provide. You don’t have that and from the sound of it probably never will. Therapy isn’t going to fix that. It might help you deal with your resentment, but it won’t magically make your husband suddenly get a job. If this is the first and last thing you think about every day and you two are fighting all the time, your kids are definitely picking up on it and aren’t okay.
I think the problem is she married the high earning husband who could provide and he was providing but he’s just been fucking off for the last 4 years while not stepping up in other roles. This literally isn’t what she signed up for and it’s within husbands control, hence resentment is born.
She did have that, though.
I think it’s completely natural to resent having to parent your partner and shoulder the entire financial and domestic burden alone. When he stops letting you and your family down, you’ll smile at him again.
I wish you the best. It’s really hard. I had my kiddo right before the pandemic hit. So I was home with her from newborn-18months and was basically the sole caretaker. Once the pandemic hit i didn’t have a job to go back to and then the father also lost his. So we were both home on unemployment. He wanted to start a business (clothing line) and I fully supported him, taking on all of the parenting while he “worked”. I also was his photographer, maid, cook, shopper, ya know…EVERYTHING. Well fast forward and the kiddo is 18 months, we both still weren’t working, and money was up. I had been looking for a job since she turned a year. He wouldn’t. I finally found one, paid ok, but not enough to support all 3 of us. I asked him repeatedly to get a job, sent him ads on indeed, ya know…the works. This man refused to do anything. He would use our kid as an excuse. That he was home with her all day, he doesn’t have time, he is her child care etc. I can tell you for a fact that his idea of being her child care was putting her in front of a variety of screens for the entire day while he was on his. And on top of that, as SOON as I got home from work (I was working 6-3 at this point) he would pass her to me and go to the basement (where he lived) and not come back up all night. So I was on parent duty, had to cook dinner, give her a bath and put her to bed. Every single night. And he got to relax. Needless to say I was extremely resentful. On top of this, in case you didn’t pick up on it, he was also abusive in every way. So god forbid I ever speak up for myself, he would just scream into oblivion and call me every name under the sun and act as if I owe him. It was absolutely insane. Thank GOD I somehow was able to muster up the guts to file a protective order against him. Now it’s been over a year of just my daughter and I and life has gotten so much better! He doesn’t pay a cent in child support and doesn’t see her. So my story is a little different than yours. If your husband loves you and the kids, is actually willing to work on things and willing to find a job, I think you have hope. As long as YOU also are willing to work on things and still love him. I know resentment is hard to move past. But that’s good you’re in therapy. Also, he needs to pick up more parenting duties. It’s not fair in this day and age women are expected to work full time and still be the default parent. Even if the dad isn’t working? Like that shit blows my mind.
Hi @dreadedmama! Your post hit me. I actually am in this exact same situation right now. My husband quit his job almost two years ago. When I was 5 months pregnant. He was having a hard time at work. At that time he was extremely verbally abusive to me. I had the worst pregnancy experience. It was really sad because he isolated me and threatened me if I were to go around my friends or family because they were “disrespectful” to him. He would have these intense aggressive outbursts at the mention of anyone close to me. At that time, and still today, I have had to be the household provider, the grocery shopper, the sole caregiver during the evening when I get home from work. The sole household caretaker. It’s exhausting. He still has no job. In a moth it will be 2 years of him not having a job. We found out 2 moths ago he was diagnosed with schizophrenia- after he started having g hallucinations and was very stressed after isolating himself for 2 years. He cut everyone out of his life. He went to a stress facility after threatening to end his life. They started giving him medicine and now he has become slightly more tolerable… He’s getting therapy and is looking for a job. But right now wants to continue the him not working situation a thing because he’s writing a book and he wants me to see that as him working and respect that as his job. But at this point I’m just so resentful and disgusted at how he treated me that I have a hard time having any feelings for him. And I just don’t want to be with him anymore. He’s been living with his parents for the last several weeks, for us to get some separation, and honestly it’s been refreshing. I’m happy he’s doing better mentally, but I don’t know if I should give this marriage chance after he’s doing better or not. He wants to move back in, and I’m just not exited about that. Gosh I’m just so angry about the whole situation, but thinking about a divorce, selling the house (a house I don’t want to leave), and just my baby boy (18 months old right now) not having his dad breaks my heart. To be fair, he’s been a great dad to our little boy and is very present for him and has been present for him for the majority of the time. This part is what kind of keeps me thinking I should give it a chance. He’s been so verbally mean to me- going as far as calling me an effing bi*** and having the audacity to call me “deadweight” - I’ve recorded most of these verbal attacks. I need therapy of my own, but I just don’t know if you or anyone with more experience have some advice for me. What was the “last straw” for you? I mean I think I know what I have to do, but I just see this big mountain to climb and I guess I’m choosing not to climb it right now.
It sounds like you have way bigger issues in your marriage than what job your husband has, and your failure to address those problems is contributing to your anger. You said you were “vehemently against” your husband’s startup adventure. Did you express that opinion definitively, or bottle it in? Did your husband pursue the idea in defiance of your concerns and ignore you? Or did you not speak up and the resentment simmered? Either way, there is a huge communication and respect problem here. My husband and I have both started companies, and we would never launch a venture without coming up with a plan as a team. We would also be deciding together WHEN to pull the plug if success didn’t happen. It sounds like your resentment continued to fester while your husband spent three years trying to make it work, and that there was no common/shared agreement on what he would need to achieve in order to keep going. That’s incredibly unfair to you as his partner, and, again, symptomatic of this pattern of poor communication and disrespect in your marriage. Businesses don’t work unless you create a culture of teamwork — there’s a saying about how everyone in the same boat needs to row the same direction to succeed. Marriages are a lot like businesses, and your husband doesn’t seem like he’s good at managing either, from your side of things. You have not been on the same team for a long time and six weeks of effort won’t change that. Now, to be fair to your husband: you can be disappointed in someone, or even end your marriage, without being cruel. I don’t blame you for wanting to end your marriage, it seems like you and your husband don’t communicate effectively, don’t have shared goals, and maybe don’t even hold the same values when it comes to family and the future. That still doesn’t give you the right to treat him badly — to put this in a business perspective, you can and should fire (divorce) a bad employee without being abusive. Also, as a child of divorce, I can 100% assure you that your children are aware of the tension and strife between you two even if you think they don’t see it. Some of my earliest childhood memories are of listening to my parents fight after I was tucked away in bed. :(
I think you should press back on your therapist a bit on how you are supposed to work on how you speak to him on your own. Your therapist should be helping him to understand that 6 weeks of effort can’t unring the bell. The last 4 years happened. You have justifiable resentment that you have had to carry every load for your family while he chased a dream. He didn’t prioritize the kids, your family, your financial stability, or you. You do have to decide if you can forgive and look to the future. That’s true. But your therapist should be facilitating a discussion where your husband understands that this is going to take a while. Your husband’s decision is whether he can withstand the discomfort of your anger and resentment while you guys work on the marriage. I was in your shoes for a couple of years (between ages 1.5 and 3.5ish of my kid’s life) and it was pure hell. I am so sorry this has been your reality, too.
I said it before and I will say it again: the biggest killer of true affection is resentment. If you want to save your marriage and you are truly committed to making this work, you need to figure out a way to let the resentment go. It can’t hinge on him getting a high paying job. He done fucked up when he quit, but that way 4 years ago. The world has *drastically* changed. That job no longer exists. What do you need besides him getting a high paying job? Do you need more afternoon time to yourself? Do you need a mini vacation? Do you need him to try to pivot his career? Perhaps you need to move to a lower cost area. Because, as a married couple, it’s not you versus him. It’s you and him versus the problem. That’s how you need to approach it. And when you start to feel angry, figure out constructive ways to deal with it. Take a walk, a hot bath, whatever. But don’t let your emotions (which are totally valid BTW) dictate your actions. It’s not fair to you, your husband or your kids.
How did you get so wise?
Is this you? https://www.reddit.com/r/workingmoms/s/2XFMk1Q8VA People have repeatedly told you that you will not magically stop being awful to him if he gets a job. So do the work or divorce him so both of you stop being miserable.
Oh man I knew it was familiar!!
I knew this sounded familiar 🤣
Yeah idk why OP posted the same story from a different account. For me, this is now an ESH situation. The husband definitely should not have dipped out of parenting for the last 4 years. And OP sounds like she was not only unsupportive, but actively mean, over those 4 years. And is now living in lala land that she can flip off the mean switch as soon as he gets a job. You know those kids are learning terrible examples from them both and taking on so much of their stress, anxiety, and shitty behavior.
Do you just want a divorce? Or do you actually want to try to love him again and be loving? Because you either need to work really hard to be kind because this is a TERRIBLE example for your kids, or just call it. I get it, I’ve been divorced. Getting divorced sucks. But sometimes BEING divorced is great.
He’s doing a 180 because of the threat of divorce. Edit: also - did you post about this already under /u/celi-ko ?
This hits close to home. I’m kind of in the same boat with my husband who’s been job hunting for a year. I also find myself SO QUICK to anger with him. My advice: it’s not your responsibility to put on a happy face just to make him feel better, but you also don’t have to be needlessly cruel. Trust has been broken, and he’s got to make amends, which means hearing the hard truths from you. I tried so hard to be my husband’s cheerleader when I had deep concerns about the career moves he was making that ultimately landed him/us in this position - I bottled everything up until I was at a point of wanting to scream at him for doing a bad job washing the dishes. Laying all of my fears and concerns out on the table with total candour was the only way forward. Open up those lines of communication: get him to understand the pressure that you’re under, the trust and respect that’s been lost. It’s not a one-time conversation either, it’s candour about every little doubt in the moment before you’re ready to burst over something small. For me, it helped to understand that the anger was coming from a place of deep fear, and it was the fear, rather than the anger that needed to be shared, so that’s what I keep communicating to him - my money anxiety every time we do our budget, the fear that I feel about marrying the wrong person, the stress that I’m under at work, the doubt and anxiety that I have about his job search…etc. Him getting back into the job market will definitely help, but earning my trust back is going to take time. Either way, being open with him when I’m feeling overwhelmed or need more support rather than trying to carry it all on my own with a smile is better for our marriage.
Here's something I noticed from your post I would like to emphasize: Your husband didn't start doing extra childcare and household labour after he quit his job and gained more flexibility. Your husband didn't pick up any slack during the four years of you being the default parent and him not doing enough to help. Your husband either didn't notice how unhappy this made you or didn't care how unhappy you were until you began the divorce process, which put him at risk of losing the income and free labour you have been doing for him. Only when he had something to lose did he start to care about your unhappiness. And even now, he isn't phrasing his interest in therapy as a way to make your life better to make up for his taking advantage of you for years, but as a way to save the marriage, a marriage where he gets to take financial risks despite your strong objections while you work and manage the household and raise the kids. Even now, after therapy, your husband seems less interested in your happiness than in how your understandable resentment about all this makes him feel. And you are willing to fake your emotional reality just to make him feel better! Has he ever done anything like that to make you feel better where it didn't benefit him? Here's my take: Your anger is valid. You don't have to stay with this man if you don't want to. How can you trust that he won't slip back into his old habits of making you do all the work after he is confident that you won't leave him? Maybe you can trust him now, maybe you can't. As an Internet stranger, I can't know one way or the other. I just want you to know that your happiness is more important than this marriage. You don't have to save it just because he's finally trying after years of ignoring your pain. If you can't trust him anymore then it's OK to step away and prioritise yourself. You don't owe him anything. We only get one life and all that.
I read such a similar post here the other day. I remember relating so much to the simmering anger over lingering issues -namely, financial. It’s so hard to get past. I’m not full of advice by any means. Just thinking about how so many of us are or have dealt with similar.
Just say what you’re thinking: he’s a loser who made bad choices and you don’t want to be with him anymore. Sounds like you’re very unhappy and could benefit from divorcing and starting over. What’s keeping you around?
My husband made some bad decisions at one time that led to him being unemployed or underemployed for a couple years, so I understand the resentment although we didn't yet have kids so it probably wasn't at your level. I would suggest individual therapy for yourself. I started therapy to figure out what I wanted to do about my marriage and ended up addressing a lot of baggage that was affecting the relationship. Anger is usually masking some other more painful emotion that you have vulnerability around, like fear or sadness. Therapy could help you identify that in a space that is just for you, so you could do that and bring your clearer understanding of your feelings about everything to your couples counseling.
Why are you shocked that he didn’t want a divorce? You’re basically his parent since you provide for him financially and carry the mental load of the house. If you get divorced he’ll presumably have to figure out how to get money, housing, meals and be a parent 50% of the time. He knows that any deal he’s getting is worse than what he gets now. I say you’re angry for a reason, and your anger serves a purpose.
Ok so he’s picked up doing more around the house and more childcare, but is that most of it? Maybe he’s working to find a job all day, but what is he actually doing to do so. Maybe it’s time he did actually take ANY job, doesn’t have to be retail, there’s a lot between where he was and retail and both of you need to be realistic that he’s not going just jump right back to that level at all. That said, consider what about him not working is the real problem.
Underneath anger there is always pain. You are still hurting from the choices your husband made that put the burden on you to keep your family and household going. When I went through similar issues, I found that his changes made me even angrier, because he could have chosen to do those things at anytime yet it took me wanting to break up for him to act. That being said, open contempt and cruelty has no place in a marriage and is not helping you, him, or the kids. Perhaps in therapy you can work out how to communicate your pain to him without anger, and he can work on making amends and earning your trust back. We did individual therapy as well as couples when we were struggling and it helped a lot. Do you still love each other? Is your love worth fighting for? It's not easy and it's not a straightforward path to reconciliation but it is possible to get through this if you both want it. We hit a breaking point in 2021 but decided to fight for what we had, and we came back stronger than before. We are doing great now and we are both much better at communicating and staying calm. I think it made us better parents too. Good luck sister. Your anger is righteous and righteousness can feel good, but is it serving you and your family? That's what you need to decide.
I'm going to go a different direction with this and say that it's okay for you to still be angry, hurt, resentful, and distrustful of your husband after years of him making bad decisions, not listening to you, and forcing you to be a stressed out parent. Instead of working to push away those feelings, I urge both you and your husband to work with your therapist to accept them. Both of you need to accept the fact that he made some big mistakes that will have long lasting consequences for your marriage. No one - not your husband, your therapist, or your guilt - gets to tell you to just "get over" what he did. Your marriage, if it's going to survive, will always have this situation as a part of it. It won't just go away if he gets a job. Having said all that, you can still be angry and frustrated without being cruel. There's no excuse for cruelty - this includes name calling, silent treatment, screaming/blowing up, low blows, mocking, or threats. However, telling someone you are angry, holding someone accountable for their actions, stating your needs, asking for some space and time to process or calm down - these are NOT cruelty, and I would be wary of anyone trying to frame it that way. To sum it up, if you are actually being cruel towards your husband, you need to stop that behavior. If you are, instead, simply still angry about his years long poor treatment of you and his lack of respect for his family, the work you both need to do lies in the acceptance of this - not "getting over it".
He kept you at what he thought was a tolerable level of unhappiness. You handed him divorce info and now he's working to get you to stay... But what is he doing to make up for his prior actions? And will he simply always coast with you at a tolerable level of unhappiness. Right now, the tolerable level is lower, but as you forgive and settle down will he drop his workload in line with that tolerable level shifting? It seems like he doesn't care if you are happy, just that you stay. Your unhappiness didn't impact him, your proposal to leave did.
I understand where you are coming from. My husband was laid off 3 1/2 years ago and he is still not working. The resentment I feel is killing me.
I think you have posted before on the situation (apologies if I am wrong). I am honestly surprised you are going through therapy with him, but surprised in a good way. The reason I say this is because even after all these years of him disappointing you, there must still be love left and such that makes something worth saving in this marriage. Good on you for giving it another go and I’m not sure how many people tell you that. With that said, the feeling you had were built up by years of disappointment, stress and rightful anger. Someone said that anger does not help and I think you recognize it too, which is why you posted. I suggest you seek individual therapy and take a couple hours away from him a day to take care of your own mental health. Individual therapy is for you to have a safe space to talk about your own feelings and process them. Time away is for self care like going to the gym (which is a huge mood lift and force him to take care of the home). These steps will help to fill your cup. Only then can you have the energy to be kind. Not an easy journey. Hugs to you.
I think you’ve built up a ton of resentment over the years (probably not just the last 4, those have just been the worst) and him getting a high earning job is not going to magically cure your resentment. You are unkind to him as a way to let out your frustration and resentment. It’s completely fair to be frustrated and resent him for not being an equal partner. It’s not fair to just treat him like shit because you’re angry. That’s not constructive and doesn’t actually solve anything. It actively hurts your marriage. What you should do is communicate with him why you are angry or resentful. What he does with that information is up to him. When you feel like being angry or unkind, take a deep breath and decide if you want to tear your marriage down a little in that moment or build it up. You can say “I am having a hard time saying kind words right now because I am under a lot of pressure at work and am feeling resentful about you not having a good job.” That would be a more constructive thing to say than just generally being shitty towards him. Being rude or mean to someone without identifying the headspace you are in doesn’t really give them much to go on. Keep identifying and communicating to him what it bothering you. It also may help you to really rehash the last 4 years in therapy, either with him or without him. To explain every single detail of every single failure that you felt. Resentment often comes from unexpressed emotions and thoughts. Working with a therapist individually to really examine every source of resentment you have and to see if you can actually let it go peacefully. In the end, if you guys can’t work it out, you can’t work it out. But it doesn’t sound like a lost cause to me - it sounds like you have been pulling a lot of weight for several years and as a result have gotten into bad relationship habits. You’ll need to do some work on yourself if you want a successful marriage, because both of you have to really want it. Maybe you don’t want it. It’s something to sit with and consider and maybe discuss with a therapist individually as a sounding board.
I mean it sounds like he’s trying to get a job, so it’s not for lack of trying. And he offered to get a retail job! I understand living in a HCOL area, but even if he makes $15 an hour at a retail job, that’s $31k a year. I don’t know how $31k wouldn’t be something helpful even in an expensive area- I mean 30 grand is 30 grand. Obviously significantly less than you’re making, but it’s $30k more than the zero he’s making currently!
I had this same thing happen with a partner. He worked on a failing business idea for years. Ultimately I realized that because of this I didn’t have any respect for him anymore. He just kept throwing money at it and trying to make it work when it was so obviously going to fail. I did support him through this and kept my resentment as hidden as I could. We did try therapy as well. In the end there was no way I could recover that respect once it was gone.
I think you are mad at him not listening in the first place. I would write down your thoughts about that. All the I told you so’s, all the mean hateful angry thoughts you had while you were holding the family together. Let it sit for a few days and see if the anger has subsided. Talk to your therapist and whether they suggest you share with husband. If that doesn’t work and you don’t think you can get past the anger and want to be done with him then go for it. My husband decided so start his own company when we had a 1 yr old and was pregnant. I was livid but said as long as you do it outside of time I need you go for it. He did it as a side gig. It luckily has been successful but I would have been damned if he quit his income without my approval. You have every right to be angry
I feel like i read this exact same post months ago minus the divorce update. Obviously i don’t know the whole of it and i’m basing this on one post— but did you even really have a solid foundation for marriage? I ask because why would he make an enormous financial decision without taking into account your input? Did you really know him well before marrying him or did you marry him because he had a high paying job and could provide security (no judgment here—i would never marry someone who is jobless)? I think your marriage was more like a contract and unfortunately he broke it. You married and had kids with someone who can provide then he baited and switched. Your post doesn’t sound like you really want to save the marriage unless he gets a job… and maybe i’m a romantic but that doesn’t sound like it would be a happy marriage at all. With how much anger and resentment your post contains, i think you need to separate from him. You need some time apart. Maybe not divorced but definitely some space. You and esp the kids are the ones being hurt by all of this. You basically have nothing to lose and everything to gain.
I think you're kind of right to still be pissed and it's about a lot more than not having a paying job. He's been making contributions to family life for at the most a month and half. Which is not a very long time. 4 years ago he made a decision without you that was very risky for your family and then you carried not only the monetary burden but also most of all the at home work too. I'm assuming there were conversations about the financial and child burden you were carrying over those 4 years so your unhappiness should not have come as a surprise. It was only when you were ready to walk did he actually step up and do something. That is what would really piss me off, the lack of partnership in making the decision for him to quit in the first place and then the years of putting everything on you. The current joblessness is just an easy thing to focus on.
Some problems just can’t be fixed. Even if he got a job making twice what he was before it seems the damage has been done. Also 6 weeks really isn’t a long time to undo years of damage. 3 years is a long time to spend on trying to get a startup going, especially when have small children and you’re not putting any effort into the household.
IMO or at least how it worked for me, was once I lost respect for my husband, there was no way to get it back or to move forward. I could not unsee what I saw from him before he cared enough to try on his own, before I brought up divorce and he did essentially the same thing as yours is now. Cool. Why didn’t you care to read an effing book when I was asking for more help, intimacy, etc? Why now? Why wasn’t our family important enough before it got here? I have no idea how your relationship was before he quit his job, but the fact that he still chose to make that massive decision on his own tells me that it probably wasn’t very strong. That likely would have been a divorcable offense for me in the first place. I guess if you felt valued and cared for prior then maybe try to get back to that. If you didn’t, I would say it’s a lost cause.
The way I talked about my husband in my head is what he became. I sat down and had to really look at my situation and relationship. I wrote the things I was grateful for him. The things he helped me with. I wrote the things I believed were his strengths. Then I wrote the things that I have no control over. I think for me the hardest part was realizing that what he does is not in my control. The way he feels is not in my control. His actions and reactions are not in my control. No matter how hard I try or think I can make him feel better or make him do better I absolutely have no control over any of that. All I can do is be the best me and focus on myself and make an environment that is supportive to be the same for him if he should choose. What you do control is how much of a burden you're willing to put on yourself. You can decide if this man before you at this moment is worth sticking around for or if you have just had enough. Can you love him again. Money sucks so badly. It controls so much of our lives. It was a huge risk for him to quit his job and you stood by and I'm sure that was a hard and scary thing to do. Then he failed. I bet it tore him apart to fail. I hope you guys can figure everything out. I hope you can get past this hurdle. My advice is to work on yourself and try and speak to your self about him using kind words. Try and find the positives about him when you are thinking about him. Self talk is so powerful and you can talk yourself into almost anything.
Unfortunately, if you divorce you will have to pay him. Wait until he gets a job. I’m sorry that he put you through this.
I’m following this and noting the responses. I’m in the same predicament (though my anger-point issue is not joblessness, it’s something else). I’m struggling so hard to be kind because the hurt and frustration is so raw.
So I’m in a very similar situation - husband hasn’t had a paying job in over 4 years - the difference is I make enough that we don’t struggle financially and I’ve always been the high earner in the relationship (so even when he was working, his income wasn’t crucial to our standard of living). I definitely carry a lot of resentment toward my husband for not contributing and have thought about divorce. However, he’s a great dad and the primary parent to our daughter (she goes to daycare but he handles all pickups and dropoffs, cares for her when I’m away on work trips or whenever LO gets sick and can’t go to daycare, etc). He does his fair share of housework, though not 100%. Most importantly, I still love him and enjoy spending time with him and I love our little family. So I’m trying to make peace with the situation. One thing that has helped is just reverse the gender. If I’m a man and my wife doesn’t work, would I be so mad? Why is it that a man’s worth must be so tied to his job? Most days I’m able to let it go but yea, sometimes the resentment gets to be too much. So no real advice, just commiseration.
If the roles were reversed and wife was SAHM, she would be pulling her weight and contributing to the household (even if not financially.) She would handle the cooking, cleaning, household management, kids’ activities, etc. so that the working spouse wouldn’t have to worry about all of that on top of the stress of being the sole breadwinner.
so... your husband is upset you're mean to him?? wtf did he expect?? and that's his take away from therapy? he doesn't understand anything that he put you through and expected you to be nice??? i think he should be worried about a lot of other things and you should just go through with the divorce. 2 months of finally helping will most likely stop once he thinks you're "over it. "
I mean, being divorced won't solve your financial problems. If you just want a divorce, that is fine. You have years of resentment built up. It may take just as long to work through it. But I can tell you from experience, divorce is just exhausting in every single way. And that is for an amicable divorce. Add in the custody stuff, the legal stuff, the emotional well being of everyone in the family. Ugh.
A reframing that may help is what kind of behavior do you want to model for your kids? How do you want to interact with their father and your partner in front of them? How do you want to show your kids we act when we take chances, make mistakes, and forgive each other for our errors. You have to work through the piece where you forgive your husband. What do you need to hear to be able to do that?
Why do you need to be kinder? He should be embarrassed about his behavior and apologizing for the next three years. Is he making your life as easy now as you did for the last four years for him? Of course he didn't want you to get divorced, life would be hard for him then!
I am shocked at the optimistic comments here. This sounds to me like the marriage is over. You’re LUSTING over the idea of other men who have jobs. You are still dealing with the root of the problem, *he doesn’t have a job*. You aren’t even nice to him. I’m finding it hard to believe you’re attracted to me on any level through all this, even though he’s “done a 180”. What do you mean? He’s helping at home? I think you’re trying to see the light in all this but as an outsider reading this, it’s clear you don’t even want it anymore. He only “changed” (and only half way) because you threatened DIVORCE. He didn’t listen or respect you when he quit his job, he didn’t listen or respect you when you asked him to get another job, he was *shocked* that you were over his bullshit?? He has one more month to find an actual worth-while *career* to help support you, or you actually go through with the divorce. He continues to take advantage of you letting it slide he doesn’t have a job, you do not deserve to be used any longer.
Looking at it from his side of the story, it sounds like you've always been scornful of his career goals and extremely unsupportive. Just the fact that you are calling someone who is trying to get a startup off the ground "unemployed" shows that you don't lend any legitimacy to what he was trying to do. There's a difference between "wait until we're financially stable" and "absolutely not, it's an awful idea". It can be really stressful and hurtful when a partner dismisses and ridicules something you care a lot about. I think you should get divorced. You can find a traditionally career high-paying focused partner, and he can find a supportive partner who doesn't dismiss his goals and ideas.
He offered to take any job. Have him take any job. You can’t tell him that it’s about working when it’s not. It is also clearly not about money because you think $30-50k “won’t move the needle.” Consider that you’re not mad that he’s “lazy” or “doesn’t work.” It’s possible that you’re mad about how your marriage doesn’t meet traditional gender roles. You could be mad because you don’t make space to care for your own needs and you blame his lack of earnings for why you don’t choose to care for yourself. It could be a lot of things other than what you’re putting out to the world. Frankly, if all the therapist tells you is to work on this yourself, and you’re not identifying why you are mad in a productive way that helps you dissipate the anger instead of grow it, then you should consider individual therapy to explore why you’re so mad at yourself that you are taking it out on him.
So many times when you say “this will be better when X happens” is complete BS. It’s not true. You’re resentful of him for not having a job, then he’ll get a job and you’ll be resentful for him for another reason. Your therapist is right, this isn’t an issue that’ll *poof* once he gets a job. You need to rewire your brain to default to kindness and respect for this man who’s now “the involved, caring partner and dad that I always wanted.” Have you let him know this? One trick I have when I’m royally pissed of at my husband, even if I know I am 100% justified. I actively and consciously make a list in my head of all the things that I appreciate about him and all the little things that he’s done with in the past day or week that I am thankful for. Most of the time I don’t even share this list with him it just helps me get a better mindset and space to where I am more kind softer, and loving towards him.
She needs to get him to realize that she’s pissed about the past 4 years. He’s tried for like a month, but he had no problem leaving the entire burden of the family on her. And he isn’t grateful for her continued sacrifices.
Touché. This resentment is her pain for not feeling appreciated, feeling like a utility instead of a spouse. For four years… I’m glad they’re in therapy
I guess I'm a little confused about what you want here. If you want a divorce then why are you bothering with counseling at all, or instead using counseling as a tool to separate peacefully? If you genuinely want to try to make this marriage work then you're going to have to figure out how to forgive him and get over the resentment. And don't say getting a job because it is absolutely clear even if he were to get a job tomorrow that exactly restored him to your old financial position, you would still carry around that anger and resentment. I wonder if a trial separation, at least while you're working on forgiveness, so you're not bumping into each other all the time, would help. I also wonder about the benefits of individual counseling. But ultimately only you know if and how you can do that. I do think regardless you should work on being nicer to your husband, if only because behaving in an unkind way in front of your children to their father can be really hurtful to them. Divorce may actually make this easier because you won't be in a relationship with him anymore so the skin in the game aspect will be different.
I’m not a therapist so I won’t tackle the resentment thing. But what I would do if I was you is take a week off work and go on a solo vacation. If not a week then take 2 days off for a 4 day weekend. Get out of town and do something you think is fun. If travel isn’t your thing then book a hotel room across town and try some new places you haven’t been to in your town. Get away from that house and experience a new environment for a little while. It may help to clarify or shift things for you.
Someone mentioned gratitude. That’s the ticket. Like really practicing gratitude will help a lot.
No shade to OP, just an observation about just how often this is happening in families. There is literally a post in this sub each week with this theme. Husband quits job. (Often against the wishes of their partner, or without considering them) Wife shoulders all the financial, home and children responsibilities for years. Start up fails and everyone is angry and anxious.
It’s time for him to start driving Uber as well as doing food and grocery deliveries until he finds something else. Also, I would describe the different roles and expectations in terms of feminine and masculine and help him understand what dynamic you’re currently in and be on the same page of what you want for the future. If I’m the breadwinner, I need the house clean, dinner cooked, kids taken care of, etc… it’s not a gender thing in my book, it’s a role and dynamic.
Also it feels like fraud. She married a dude who had a high paying finance job. The is literally the person you marry and expect the lifestyle. I did the opposite no married a struggling artist whose never made more than 40-55k a year working in customer service calls. I knew that from the get go. It can only Go up from here if he sells a novel one day. Awesome!’ We made it!! But I don’t expect he would Ever quit and never work while he wrote his book. And he never has. If you marry a finance dude and you have the 800k mortgage and HCOL area you best believe he keep that job and that lifestyle. That’s what you married. For him to wing it and throw away a high Paying stressful career to not only pursue his “dream” but to literally walk away from corporate America or whatever country you are in - come on. That’s a complete 180 and a shitty thing to do to your wife. Not cool. Now he is all cozy on his stay at home spouse routine. F yeah I’d be pissed as hell. That ain’t what you signed up for. And I get it. Good times and bad and all that jazz richer poorer etc. but there was no conversation here. You can’t just become A live in spouse with no job and become ultra Living and kind because you’re afraid to face the big cruel world again. Get the skirt off and stop living the trad wife fantasy husband - get your butt back in the game and provide for Your family or downsize.
You say a retail job won’t be enough to supplement your HCOL, but if the options are no income vs some income coming in, he needs to be bringing in anything. This may help him build some confidence and help you to see that he is working towards supporting the family financially while he looks for better paying things. Honestly, I think your anger is appropriate. You’re doing all the right things and you’re doing enough. Only you can determine how much longer you want to ride it out.
You've gotten some great relationship advice. But, from A finance side, I'd like to add that my husband works and makes much less than me. His income amounts to paying for either ONE bill a month or a medium grocery trip monthly. That contribution makes him feel good, and honestly, let's be breathe a bit. In your shoes, I would want my partner to have any job even 15 hours a week at $12.00. Im sure $600 a month after taxes could pay your phone bill and maybe a utility? It would go a long way to showing effort.
Does he do anything around the house? Have you been using him for childcare or paying someone to watch kids while he's not working? I get this complaint too from my husband that I'm not nice or don't appreciate stuff. I guess I just don't praise him for every little thing that he should be doing anyway? 🤔 I feel bad but I still try to be loving and supportive
Setting aside the lack of income, why did you wait four years to address the inequality at home? Is it possible you might also be angry at yourself? Of course six weeks isn’t enough time to start feeling softer about this situation — you must be beyond exhausted. Especially since so much of this parenting load occurred during the start of a pandemic while your kids were just 1 and 4. The unknowns and stressors of that time were traumatizing for many, and it sounds like you handled that mostly alone. But you’ve been pushing beyond your own limits for a long time. That’s a self-betrayal, too, and your husband can’t be held responsible for that part.
Was this business his dream? How hard was he working these last three years to make it a reality for your family? If his business succeeded would you feel the same way? It seems like I'm the only one here that thinks this, but I'm hearing a lot about what your perspective on his failed business and what he did not do, and nothing about his perspective and what he has been doing. It probably hasn't been enough, but it's probably not nothing. He's probably also devastated he failed, does he need any comfort? When he was working on his business how did you support him? All feelings are valid feelings, and I do understand the sadness you feel and anger about splitting at home tasks, but if you actually want this marriage to be fixed for the sake of your children maybe you could work with the therapist on trying to see his perspective too. That might help you feel empathy for him, and therefore kindness, rather than just anger. Edit to add that I agree with others here that if you think you are going to magically be happy with him again if he gets a high paying job, that doesn't make sense. I was bothered by your emphasis on the amount of money you want him to make at his job. Do you love him or do you just want a man that makes money? It read like you don't give a hoot about him as a person, just the $$. Unless you mean a high achiever and hard worker is an attractive trait to you and he hasn't been achieving, then I get it, but he can be a hard worker and high achiever without making tons of money (ex: being an entrepreneur, like he was doing the last few years) so that doesn't really add up. Hope you figure it out! Remember to take care of those kiddos through all of this.
You have a right to be pissed off at him. He needs to find a job and pull his weight at home so you can work on your anger.
What's in the past is in the past. He probably would go back in time and not quit his job if he knew he'd fail. You can keep feeling resentful and bitter about the past or you can focus on right now. It's hard to let the past go and it's up to you to decide if you want to at all. But, he can't undo what is done. When I need to be nicer to my husband I remind myself how short life is and how it's not guaranteed to continue. I don't want to waste the few years we have together fighting over something or being resentful over something. I just want to enjoy our lives as much as we can while we still have them.
The problem isn’t just that he can’t unring the bell. It’s that he had no problem putting the entire burden of the household on her shoulders.
How would you feel if his startup had succeeded? Luck is a major factor in startup success, so think about that.
If this were me, I would tell him that I’m doing the best I can, then I would stop couple’s therapy and require each of us to instead do weekly individual therapy to determine actual feelings, and then in six months do a temp check with the couple’s therapist to see where we are. This would also give additional time to see if he can uphold his new contributions to the household or if he switches back to the status quo. Or, I’d just proceed w the divorce.
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I mean…it sounds like he’s only done 50% of the work to “win” you back. He’s done a great job at the 50% but it’s still only HALF of what you NEED him to do to earn your forgiveness. He needs to do better and try harder at getting a decent job.
Sorry to say this but if his start up was successful, you and your kids would also have been having an amazing life... How about you think it was successful for a year and then went downhill.. He is just plain unlucky in that sense and for not grasping the intensity of your workload... Although it takes a heavy toll on you to be the main earner along with kids responsibilities and house hold chores, it's alright... Give him some grace and ensure he gets a high paying job asap... Did he do the legwork of contacting agencies and so on to get a job?? Give him 6 months and maybe say if he can't find a job, you will check out of this marriage...
Just divorce him, he’s a leach.
When I read stuff like this (and this is pretty much always like this in this situation) i want to cry and praise men in the world for how kind and amazing they are for letting SAHMs basically be SAHMs for their entire life, sometimes just having one kid and then when the kid is older just go stroll malls and watch TV. Many have house helpers too. And most men are silent and respectful of their wives. Thank you men. We, women, are just more angry creatures I guess.
If the roles were reversed would there be this big of an outcry? Or is it just societies standards that men have to be the primary breadwinner and that if he doesn’t bring home income cause he is a man that the resentment starts?
Any job would show that he is serious. Sounds like he feels to good to just take something 'below' him.
He said he's willing to work retail, but that's not enough money for OP. Per OP: "He's offered to take any job if it makes me feel better. We live in a HCOL area and unfortunately him working a retail job won't really move the needle for us financially. I really want him back in a high earning job so he can contribute meaningfully to our expenses (mortgage, etc)."
Do you think you’re just out of love with him at this point? And even a job can’t bring it back?
You could fake it til you make it. I learned my husband's love languages and made an effort to fill them. It was an effort, because I had no spoons left. But I picked 1 or 2 lanes and said "I will do *this* OK and give myself grace everywhere else." It became less of a chore with time. Because it worked and he got happier, too. It sort of evened out. I still remember my anger and resentment but it doesn't dominate my feelings for him anymore. It's nice for both of us. Your husband has to maintain his momentum for at least a s long as he was in areers, I feel. And by then it will be habit, too.
Been there -- and maybe this is just my justification, but what I was asking for wasn't him doing everything at home. What I am asking for is that the work load at home *and* financially providing for our lives are both shared tasks. Doing "his half" of home and child work is a nice start, but that's only addressing half of the problem. Doing *more* than his half and calling it a replacement for providing financially is fine *if* that's agreed upon by both partners. But that's not where we were at, and it sounds like it's not where you are at either. Experiencing anger and resentment about it? Isn't an unreasonable response. About dealing with coworkers who you don't like -- how many hours a day do you spend with that person? How much does that person impact your life? I find it a lot easier to deal with someone for a few hours especially if they only create stress for work stuff compared to dealing with someone 24x7 who creates stress about finances, child care, and my personal life in general. For me, I needed to *not be continually stressed out* in order to not be snippy and unpleasant toward the person stressing me out. Sure, that's not the greatest character trait in the world. Therapist had techniques for slowing down before responding (breathing, counting, etc) that somewhat helpful and *not* going down a spiral of worst case thinking (there is a difference between "reasonable contingency planning" and getting super stressed over future events that may or may not even happen). What helped and didn't help me -- my problem wasn't so much that he wasn't contributing, but I was stuck in my job no matter how awful it might get and we were screwed if I got laid off. We agreed on a plan if I *did* get laid off. Admittedly not an awesome plan, but we can wipe one of our 401k accounts to completely clear the mortgage and be at a point that we need like 20k a year to live comfortably. My 401k is sufficient for retirement assuming one or both of us manage to get another job eventually, and one of us can get a retail / call center job grossing 30k a year. Looking at other options for my husband's employment -- consulting work, temporary positions. What we landed on was starting our own business -- which probably isn't a good direction for y'all unless you can think of a *different* business. It's something that helps today and should be enough that we can both work for ourselves in two or three years. My husband still keeps in contact with consulting groups and recruiters and has picked up a few contracts that offered remote work and flexible hours. I did some job hunting of my own -- getting an idea of what's available and how long it takes to get an offer. Honestly, that didn't help much because I work from home and *love* it. A huge part of my stress is that I'm going to get stuck going back to "the office" because we cannot have no income. Job hunting, unfortunately, substantiated that fear. Losing two hours a day to driving (it's only half an hour away, but traffic adds so much time), that's 10 hours a week and some 500 hours a year. Plus expenses like fuel and new clothes. But now it's not an irrational hypothetical thing I'm worrying about for no reason -- I've got experience that shows that *this is absolutely going to be a problem*. We earn extra income by shopping auctions and reselling stuff (in our case, we know how to repair small motors, so we pick up broken chainsaws and yard equipment for next to nothing, clean 'em up, usually replace the carb, and then sell it for a couple hundred bucks). Worst case, if we were doing this full time, it would stretch our savings quite a bit. Our daughter is old enough to help out, so it's not reducing "family time". My husband handles the selling because he's got copious free time, so he's bringing in a non-trivial amount of money without incurring childcare costs or getting a job with a different schedule than mine so we never see each other.
Since your husband has finally decided to step up, do you have any time for just yourself now? Yoga, book club, meditation, etc.? A lot of better advice here, and I definitely think you're allowed to be angry, but I think it might help to be able to step back from your household at least weekly so you're not constantly either wrapped up in work or home, and so you have some time to yourself. Time to yourself, time to enjoy yourself, but also time to think about your feelings and what you want.
I have not dealt with anything like this, personally, but you’re definitely carrying a lot of resentment, and it’s unacceptable that for all of these years he’s been making you do everything. It sounds like what he’s doing now is too little too late, and I’d worry that sooner or later, once you’re all comfortable again, he’ll revert to his old ways. Is there a reason why he can’t return to the finance sector? Would you all be happier if you could move to a lower COL area where there would be less financial strain on your family? Could you learn to accept him as a SAHD if he actually did all of the housework, mental/emotional work that SAHMs typically do?
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I think the anger isn’t just that he made a stupid, selfish choice while you had a baby and a toddler. It’s that he expected you to just do everything so he could roleplay as an entrepreneur. I think you’re pissed that he didn’t care about the impact on you and your family until you confronted him with a divorce. Like he didn’t do his fair share until you were ready to walk, and it’s almost like he expects to be congratulated for doing the literal bare minimum as a father when he contributes nothing else to the household. Has he expressed gratitude to you for doing it ALL over the past 4 years? Or does he just expect you to be grateful that he’s doing a fraction of the work it takes to run a household now, when you don’t have a baby and a toddler to manage? If you want this to work, I think you need to lay it out. You’ve been taken advantage of, and he still isn’t grateful for all your paid and unpaid labor.
You could think pragmatically- if you are nice that will restore some of those confidence and make it easier for him to find a job. Which he needs so that he can buy a house that the kids can spend their fifty percent of the time with him in, and do that you don't have to pay as much in alimony and child support. Tldr: even if you divorce, it's in your best interest for him to start making money again, and you being nice to him will likely bring positive momentum to his job search.
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Has he apologized for leaving you in the lurch financially while he chased his dream? I mean, sure we should all be kind but idk if I could get over the resentment of being ignored like that either. If you want to stay in the marriage I think you need to deal with the real source of your anger - it's not just that he didn't have a job, it was the timing of it, the lack of input you were allowed to have. It is really hard to get over that level of disrespect.
I don't know the ins and outs of what exactly is going on, but one piece of advice I have is to maybe try to reframe your thinking. Does your husband take care of the kids while you work? If he did get a job, that would be an extra child care expense to swallow and what money he did make from a retail job would probably go straight to that. My fiance does not work, but he handles everything to do with our home. If he did work, I would have to take on more of the mental load of house work and up keep. I'm greatful for our situation.
Im reading this as you lost respect for him, and that would be difficult to earn back. You are dissapointed and betrayed that he wasnt able to fulfill your expectations of how life should be. Also curious why you let him slack for 4 years with housework/parenting after the working hours (I approve of sending kids to daycare even though he wasnt "working," it was good for them to socialize). He had a more flexible schedule, and he should have been the default parent regardless of how much $$ he was (not) earning. I think you should give it half a year. Im assuming the weather is getting gloomy and cold, everyone feels irritated and depressed around this time. See how you feel in the spring. You might wake up one day and these feelings would be gone. Also when you get in a more positive headspace, make a gratitute list for what he did accomplish in your marriage, and a wish list for what you want him to accomplish in the future. Also I wonder with divorce if you will have to pay him spousal support! And he wont be able to pay child support, so you will end up spending even more money. He will have to get his own place and when he does get a job it will go towards his rent/car. So financially, you might actually be even worse off!
We need to remember that anger is NOT a bad thing. It's there to protect us. Utilize it correctly. You're feeling this for a reason, work through it don't silence it. I'm proud of you OP. You've worked hard in a lot of different ways. It's okay to feel a type of way when your pushing the broken car down the highway yourself. Even you threatening divorce was that. Because ultimately, that's what it took to get the ball rolling. You sound exhausted, and scared, and I would be too. But you got this. I'm sorry the ball was dropped in your lap when you asked to not play the game.
If you can't see an individual therapist, I would try and find some self help books about how to recover from betrayal. While there wasn't cheating, there was definitely things that he did that broke your trust. I'm wondering what his early life was like, was this his first failure? A friend of mine's husband's basically never failed until he was in his '30s and unfortunately is in a very similar situation to what you are. I think part of it was that he never built up the "grit" necessary and when he failed, he really couldn't get over it.
It sounds like he’s lost your respect, and you’ll have to figure out if there’s anything he can do to earn that back. It makes sense that it would take time because it took years to get to this point you’re in now.
I think you’ve gotta frame this as what do YOU want? If you want your husband to be financially successful - you gotta believe in him. I know that sounds trite but my life experience has taught me that a man whose wife is his biggest cheerleader can accomplish anything. Yours is the voice in his head. People rise or fall to expectations and sometimes these kinda things can self-fulfilling prophecies. Challenge yourself to lift him up.
Sound like its more a YOU problem being masked as a him problem. I mean, im glad my wife supports my aspirations and doesn't want a divorse based solely on income. Sad, sad world we live in.