I’m at a crossroads with my marriage, and I just cannot decide which path to take.
My husband and I are both 38, and live in a VHCOL area (Westchester, NY, USA). We have 2 little kids (ages 6 and 3).
My husband has not worked a paying job for the past 4 years. Up until 2019, he worked in a very high paying finance job. He quit his job in 2019 to pursue his own startup idea, a plan I vehemently opposed. He worked on this new business for 3 years (until 2022). The entire time, I was admittedly very negative on the situation, and I regularly begged him to go back to paid employment. The business never earned any income. Our relationship really began to deteriorate during this time, with him accusing me of being unsupportive of his startup and me accusing him of financially tanking our family.
A year ago, he finally agreed to throw in the towel and start a job search. While I know he’s looking for a job, I am quite underwhelmed with the effort he appears to be putting in. I have come home early unexpectedly and found him taking a nap or on the couch watching a movie. I check the tracker on his car or phone during the day sometimes and I can see he’s at a local park going for a run. He’s had 10 interviews over the past year (one of which he made it to the final round for), so I know he’s doing something, but I just don’t think he’s giving this his complete and total effort. The few times I’ve looked for a new job, I feel like I tried harder than him and each time I was also simultaneously working a full time job, whereas my husband is home all day with nothing else to focus on but his job search! When I ask him what he did all day, he’ll tell me he sent off 2 networking emails or something really underwhelming like that.
I work in finance as well, but in a back office area. My husband out-earned me by a factor of 6x, so his income was required for us to live on (in the area where we live; I earn enough to support us well in a lower cost of living area).
I have full time school / childcare for our 2 kids. I don’t expect him to do a full job search while watching little kids. He’s home all day by himself. He is good with chores and cleaning, but less wonderful with our children. He loves them, but I’m still very much the default parent. The kids are home with him for an hour before I get home, and then it’s basically all me (I cook dinner, get them bathed and fed, etc). On the weekends, we try to split the parenting, but inevitably I end up doing 80%+ of it. I definitely handle nearly 100% of the mental load as it relates to the kids.
At this point, we have burned through all of our savings that he (and I) worked so hard for. We own our home and 2 cars. We are barely, barely surviving off my income alone. There is zero wiggle room for any fun spending: no dinners out, no vacations, no nice clothes, almost no fun paid activities with the kids. Every dollar I make goes to paying the mortgage, health insurance, and groceries. There’s nothing left.
My relationship with my husband is terrible. He’s nice and upbeat to me, but I’m just so genuinely disgusted with his lack of working, that I cant bring myself to be kind back to him. I wake up angry at him, and I go to bed angry at him. I lash out at him regularly. I’ve openly told him he has single handedly destroyed our marriage by ruining our finances. I’ve told him there’s nothing less sexy than a man who hasn’t worked in years and isn’t financially contributing to his family. I’ve told him I’m so sick of having to cook every meal, never getting to buy anything nice for myself, and having to tell the kids they can’t do activities if they are pricey (this one hurts me the most – that my kids are affected by their father’s poor choices). I’m most upset because I feel the day to day stress of our situation starting to affect our older child.
I would be completely sympathetic to my husband if he’d lost his job. I feel such anger towards him because he voluntarily quit and then wasted more years on an unsuccessful start up venture, and he doesn’t seem to be making a huge effort now to even get back to work.
I worry my husband will never go back to paid employment. He has branched out and is looking for jobs in tangential industries and for which he’s overqualified, but still nothing.
If we didn’t have kids, I would have divorced him yesterday. My kids love their dad, they are innocent in this whole situation, and I don’t want to hurt them. I love them so much and just want the best for them.
I’m also very concerned about owing him spousal support. I don’t really know how much income could be imputed for someone who hasn’t had a salary in 4 years. What if he never goes back to work? I might be on the hook for paying him spousal support for a long time. We have been married 11 years. I really don’t want to / cannot support 2 households on my salary.
I also feel guilty for wanting out of my marriage because besides that fact that he’s unemployed, my husband is a decent guy. He’s happy, he’s kind, he’s easy going, and he loves us. I know I don’t love him anymore (4 years of $0 income from him has really destroyed any love I had), but perhaps I could again in the future.
What do you think?
19 comments
He needs to work. Right now he is Lazy.
Not married so take this with a grain of salt.
First, very sorry this happened to you. I get anxiety about money and I’m single with no dependents. I could not imagine having so much tied up in your life/lifestyle when your partner pulls the rug out from under you by declaring you the sole breadwinner with no choice in the matter.
Second, it seems like you posted about this in other subs. Did you take any of the feedback and put it into place? Outcomes?
Third, what is his response to all of this? You said that you shared your disappointment but there’s no mention of how he’s taken it.
Fourth, I think the only way this will change is if you posit a scenario in which his life is actually affected. He seems completely comfortable doing whatever with no regard for you or your family as a whole, probably because there are seemingly no consequences to anything. Maybe consider discussing the sale of your house or car or downsizing in a big way to the point that he’d actually be affected by a lifestyle change. Although perhaps having a frank conversation about separating might also be the thing to do – he cannot possibly think that this behavior should warrant calling your relationship healthy or even functional. Maybe the prospect of living apart will at least indicate what he wants to do from a viewpoint of extremity so you’re not making all the decisions about how to move forward.
Off his ass get to work. I’m not in the states so I don’t know how spousal support works there, but given that you’ve been the person who’s been running the house whilst taking care of kids, why should you pay him anything? He’s capable of getting a job. I understand how it’s difficult when children are involved. I’m sorry you’re going through this
It’s objectively kind of shitty you weren’t supportive of his career goals when he worked to be able to pursue that path in the first place. It’s also shitty of him to not acknowledge the impact this has clearly had on the person who’s supposed to be his life partner. It doesn’t sound like you two are dating at all. There’s no spark, no love, no passion. That’s a two way street so if you want to fix things, you both have work to do. For this reason, couple’s therapy could be a good starting place for you – but I’d also suggest you both do individual therapy since it really sounds like your love for your partner is conditional. Even better, y’all should trip balls on shrooms together lol I think a nice ego dissolution session would do you both lots of good
Also adding that the job market has been absolutely fucking horrendous for the past year. I wouldn’t be surprised if your husband isn’t able to find a serious job for some time now. He may absolutely be in a poor mental state even if he won’t admit it. He’s probably well aware he’s burned through everything he worked for and your words probably cut deep. If you want to fix this, you need to try meeting him where he’s at and encouraging him in a more loving way. I understand your frustration but there are other ways to be loving and supportive. Despite being on the edge of feeling like you’re losing everything, you’re still more blessed than the average person and that does need to be acknowledged. You’re both still young and have time to make things right if you communicate with each other and make a serious plan
Now that’s just one perspective. This is your story and you’re the one who will ultimately decide how your life will be from this point forward.
The truth is the only thing I would be wrestling with his either drawing the line in the sand with him and telling him he has six months to gain employment or you’ll be filing for divorce, or literally start getting his information off his computer, talk to a recruiter and push a bunch of applications with résumé through on the weekends while he watches the kids, I would even go as far to say he should be having the kids by himself on Saturdays and you go somewhere else with a laptop and his information and start pushing those until he gets a call back. And then I would be giving him a list of the employers and I would tell him this is where he’s going.
I would do this for the next three months, I promise you he will at least start working by then. Does he even know how close you are to divorce? I wonder if it would help out if he had an idea. Maybe you can help him with his applications while letting him know that if this continues you’re not going to have any choice but to leave… you can tell him you love him, but you are drowning, and he’s literally the only person who can change your circumstance, and he’s still not willing to see the desperation you have
I think you should downsize your life. Sell the house. Sell one of the cars. And seriously consider not paying for childcare. Maybe he needs motivation to keep up with your current lifestyle. He is likely applying for jobs at the level he left which limits his job prospects/pool.
I don’t understand how he isn’t responsible for cooking dinner and children’s responsibilities while he isn’t working. That would have been non-negotiable for me if my husband wasn’t working and I was financially supporting us.
You guys need to do therapy ASAP. Learn how to reorganize your marriage and chore distribution. Esp if you think you could love him again, give it 100% before calling it. There should be resources you can look into for low cost therapy in your town, community or state.
I saw your post weeks ago in working moms. They gave you some great advice about stopping to pay for childcare etc. Has anything changed ?
I am sorry that you are going through this.
With how you have criticized him, he sounds depressed. I can’t help but feel that if the roles were reversed, there might be a little more sympathy for him. While money is tight, is therapy via insurance an option?
Furthermore, and in my humble opinion, you guys need to right-size your life. I am guessing you make more than minimum wage salary, and it is possibly to live on one income. One just has to adjust their expectations.
Lastly, regarding spousal support and child support, talk with a family law attorney. While a tough lawyer might argue that he is remaining intentionally under employed, it sounds like you would likely pay term spousal support for roughly half the length of the marriage. He would be imputed and income, but it is typically fairly low. Child support is most often calculated by both punching both parties’ incomes and parenting time into a computer and seeing what spits out. So, you might have to pay it as well.
This sounds just absolutely awful. I’m worried that things are already too far gone with you guys. Check out [Gottman’s The Four Horsemen](https://www.gottman.com/blog/the-four-horsemen-recognizing-criticism-contempt-defensiveness-and-stonewalling/). The theory is that if these elements have crept their way into a marriage, the couple is already hurtling towards divorce. Staying together for the kids is not a good option. Children are very sensitive to their parent’s energies and it’s not good that they’re in the house where you have this much anger towards your husband. Also, one last thought is, even if he did get a job next week, is that really gonna be enough to undo all this pain he’s caused the family for the past few years? I doubt it. You aren’t going to simply feel happy if he gets a job, the resentment and sadness isn’t going to just melt away. I’m just so sorry this has happened to you, I know the path forward won’t be easy. I hope you get all the support you so deserve. Good luck 💖
At a minimum he needs to be taking care of the kids and house chores until he is working. Cancel whatever childcare you are paying for. He may not like being a full time parent which may motivate him to work. Now he can relax and do whatever he wants. Not having that freedom will hopefully motivate him to look for work more aggressively.
Well… you ARE bluffing aren’t you?
Cause you post about this? Then make up excuses as to why you can’t follow any advice.
I don’t mean this nastily. But. Until you are willing to actually DO something to force change? Then stop whining about it.
I seriously doubt you’d be ordered to pay spousal support in this situation.
He needs to just get ANY job at this point- even a part time minimum wage situation would loosen up the family financially and let them say yes to kids activities and eat out occasionally.
He also needs to pull his weight in the home. The person working full time should not be the one doing 80% of the housework.
Too obsessed with money. Need to downsize your lifestyles for real.
My friend and I were just talking about how many men are relying on their wives financially now. All I know is once you marry a man plan on supporting him.
Somehow I lack sympathy for your plight (I will think about it), but even so think you should sell your house and move someplace affordable. I don’t have to tell you Westchester ain’t cheap.
He needs to take ANY job, not just a great job, at this point.
Talk to a lawyer to see what you would likely have to pay in support. Then tell your husband you talked to a lawyer so he knows you aren’t playing.
My personal solution. I don’t accept lazy very well. All house and kid work is now his responsibility. No paying for extra childcare while there is a capable parent at home. He shops and cooks and cleans house. When you come home you can play with the kids, eat the dinner he cooked and do bedtime. It is also his responsibility to find local babysitters so he can make arrangements if he has a job interview. This is the next year. If he is not working by then he has to take any local job and just get on with it. Best guess, he will have a job pronto because he doesn’t want to care for kids and do housework all day. And if he toughs it out your youngest will be getting ready to go school anyway. I would tell him the vacation is over.