For many years my partner and I operated in the same way. I paid our rent, utilities and food while she spent on her hobbies and saved. I was not unhappy during this time because I didn't want much. A few years ago though, I became a bit more financially aware after having my first soul crushing job and realizing I couldn't rely on work to produce income in the same "easy" way I had when I was younger. The emotional cost had become too high. Managing this part of our relationship continues to be a multi-year process requiring ongoing discussions of what we have, what we want and what we'd be willing to do to get it. It feels like a muscle that atrophies, but I have made my peace with that because it works for us. I remind her what she wants and how she can get it by helping me now or spending less now. I even ask her to provide the same feedback for me. Her perspective on my spending is as important as my perspective of hers. I imagine we will regress in the future. Those moments will probably suck and cause a lot of stress. For now my only advice is to make a habit of these discussions in your relationship and protect the habit as long as you can.
"...having my first soul crushing job and realizing I couldn't rely on work to produce income in the same "easy" way I had when I was younger. The emotional cost had become too high."
I feel exactly like this.
My wife has basically changed what she wants (or stopped hiding it) now that we are married. She wants a big fancy house and she wants to live in an suburbanized and expensive area. She originally told me she wants to live in the country and own land. This area isn't the country and we can't afford land around here.
She doesn't care about her spending. She has never been required to support herself or even live alone. She would rather spend a lot on a her expensive horse hobby than contribute to our kid's college or our shared bills. By expensive I mean she spends as much or more each month than I do on the mortgage. One month of her hobby expenses equals what I spend in an entire year on hobbies, and many of my hobbies have a return on investment (like foraging/cultivating mushrooms, growing a garden, etc).
I've come to accept that I will be stuck here and miserable. I don't see myself living past 50 in this condition, so I just have to endure this until then. I don't really see much reason to try extending that either.
How? With a divorce, GP commenter will be required to continue supporting his* ex-wife's hobbies financially, now without any option to balance then with his own earning. He will not be permitted to earn less and reduce the spending proportionally.
On top of that if there are any kids he will be required to take up a portion of her only responsibility.
He can move to any country that doesn't have debt collection agreement with US (assuming he's from US). Like Philippines or New Zealand. Or just make himself judgement-proof. Convert his savings to Bitcoin, quit his job and work cash jobs. Court cannot force him to earn less.
Unpaid child support will result in an arrest warrant in many states. The debt itself may be civil, but it's a crime to avoid the court mandated payments.
My father in law was in a coma for a while and the child support payments stopped and he went broke from the lack of job and medical bills. They arrested him multiple times after that because he wasn't paying. Of course that gave him a criminal record and made it much harder to get a job.
If you're under some sort of child support and/or alimony, courts will often interpret losing a job as an attempt to dodge payment, and will not reduce payment to match the new circumstances.
(throwaway because I don't like to mix discussions of my relationships with professional discussions)
I was in a situation freakishly similar to yours for over 10 years. In late 2019 I left her, and while it was one of the hardest decisions of my life, definitely the hardest day of my life, and the road to a mentally healthy(er) position has been ongoing, it has proved to be a wise decision. I spend far less of my day feeling resentful, unvalued, and unvalidated, both individually and in my new relationship. In my own time and in counseling with a professional, I have learned many lessons about myself, what I want out of life and in a partner, and how to be my own advocate.
I deeply empathize with your position and you deserve to be happier. I hope this experience of mine might give you some vicarious experience to draw from, and I encourage you to consider making a change.
You're getting a lot of unsolicited advice here, from folks who mean well but all of us here can't know the particulars of your situation.
That you're posting this on HN suggests that you would really like to have someone to talk to about this, at the very least to feel heard about it.
From personal experience, consider a therapist for a while - starting just on your own. There's nothing wrong with you, but you're in a sticky situation and are unhappy, and you're worried about the implications for your daughter and your own longevity. It can be really nice to have someone to talk through this stuff with, especially when it might be tough to talk with your wife about it, at least at this point, if she's causing the problem. I don't know about you, but it helps me mentally figure out what to do when I can talk about it, and (good) therapists are good at pulling our thoughts out and letting us think about all the angles.
It's pretty low stakes, and while they do cost some money, it's not a ton (compared to the horses!). And it can really help you think through the particulars of your situation over time, which it's tough for any of us here on HN to do, and when it's time to do the tough stuff - like broaching the subject with your wife - you have got someone in the therapist who knows the background and can help you deal with any fallout.
Good luck. You deserve a happy life. Your daughter deserves a good future. We only get one shot at this.
Yes, agreed. I want to add, "You can’t pour from an empty glass of water.” Fill your cup first, take care of yourself, then your daughter, otherwise you might harm both.
I agree with the other comments that you need to do something, but I'm going to disagree with that you should jump to divorce as the first step. You haven't said what you have already tried, so I suggest:
1) telling her how you feel, in the form of "I feel X when you do Y". For example, "I feel unvalued when you spend more on your horse than we do on the mortgage. I feel scared for our kid's future when you prioritize your expensive horse over saving for his/her education. I feel trapped when you spend the money I make without deciding together how to spend it." It can be hard to know exactly how these actions make you feel unless you've practiced thinking about it, so you might want to write it down and revise it over a week or two. Also, depending on how your wife takes feedback, you might want to have discussions of just one at a time.
2) marriage counseling.
3) setting boundaries: "my standard of being treated is <...>" and take steps to "enforce" them. The easier levels are along the lines of "I want to be talked to respectfully, so I will leave the room when you do not, but when you are ready to talk respectfully, come and get me." I'm not sure how you communicate "I think our budget should look 25% house, 20% food/clothes, 10% retirement, 10% kids education, etc, which leaves $X for optional things like horse; if you need more than that you'll need to get a job" without being unilateral, though. But you have some financial values/boundaries that are being crossed and you need to communicate / enforce those.
4) It would be a bad sign if your wife didn't respond positively to any of the above. However, even in that case you could get counseling for yourself on how to respond healthily, and you are also likely to get insight into why your wife is behaving this way (the counselor might notice consistent signs of co-dependency, for instance).
5) Read pre-modern stories about how spouses handled toxic behavior. (The quasi-mythic ones that start off "There was once a woman in ... whose husband ...") I've read a few Japanese stories about wives that change the incentives for their husbands and they stop being drunkards and start being productive. (There's fewer stories the other way, but those exist, too.) Some of these stories are quite creative solutions; maybe something like that would work with your wife.
Don't just stay stuck and miserable, though. There are many ways to defeat the giants.
As a married woman, I’d say leave ASAP.
Your mental health is most important to a fulfilling life.
People marry the wrong person every day. Divorce is the way out of this situation. Judges are more realistic today about women and their plots.
Write down and document everything. Find a couples therapist so you have on record you are trying to make the marriage work for everyone.
The therapy will either make your wife “grow up” and perhaps better your relationship or it will show her inability to deal with reality of marriage as a working relationship.
Don’t be the guy that hates his life. There is the right person for you out there. Take that first step for your own sanity.
Her parents can help her out financially. She knows this too!
You need to change something. Other people have better advice, or at least specifics due to personal experience. But I can see that you are living in resentment and hell. There is no way your relationship with your wife is healthy. You've got a kid right? That child is watching you two and learning what it means to be in a relationship. They pick up on stuff left unsaid, you aren't hiding anything successfully (if you are indeed trying to hide these feelings).
Would you want your child to grow up to feel the way you do now? You're giving them the lesson plan right now.
Get a divorce attorney now, because you'll need one later.
For now, just because you're married doesn't mean you have to have complete sharing of finances. Get your finances completely separate. Create your own bank account; have your salary go there. Cancel any shared credit cards. Lock your credit report so new accounts cannot be made using your social security.
Then, offer to pay 1/2 the mortgage each month; or, better yet, let her pay the full amount from her own wages.
I am also an avid equestrian but support myself and my hobby on my own (which also costs more than my share of the rent). And I have to admit, I feel a bit envious of those who managed to make a fool work and sustain them without caring the smallest amount. But I hope it will bite her back the day you will leave her because you sound too miserable to stay in this relationship.
To what end? There is no award for Longest Suffering Person, just a life of wasted opportunities.
The repercussions and coping mechanisms are likely to only get more destructive the longer you put off dealing with misery. May you find your bliss, internet stranger.
I've seen couples drift apart pretty quickly once their daily experiences diverge.
If she spends all day working at an office, and he spends all day homemaking and with the kids, then each forgets what the other really does.
"The office" becomes an abstract place that someone just goes and isn't stressful at all. "The home" and "the kids" just magically take care of themselves and don't require much work.
Dual income has its own problems, but it seems a healthier default in terms of reminding people that work is... work.
I can relate to this but my wife is attractive, smart, honest and loyal so it seems like a fair trade. I earn all the income, do most of the house chores, spend almost nothing on myself, buy her almost everything she wants, move to whatever country she wants to go, I let her win all arguments (including arguments about who does the most chores). Thankfully when she sees me getting overly stressed, she gives me some slack. She even stayed with me after we ran out of money (I say we because we share all bank accounts) - Running out of money is the best test for a relationship.
My wife is almost 100% consumer and I'm almost 100% producer. She latched on to me the second we met. She initiated. I was a poor and shy college student at the time so it was quite a shock for me to suddenly receive so much attention. It's like she knew something about me that nobody else knew, not even myself. It's like she could see through everything and see the pure productive potential.
She spends a lot of time at home reading books (mostly non-fiction) and browsing the net (she reads a lot of online articles about a wide range of topics) and chatting with her friends on social media (most of her friends live in different countries because we traveled a lot). We do a lot of outdoor activities together but aside from that she doesn't like to do much. We both spend most of our time at home because I work remotely. She hates working or doing anything productive. She even tried painting once and is good at it but she could never be an artist as she is allergic to the idea of earning money.
