As of right now, I am a budtender in a very small town. I open and close the store, when I work I’m the only one there all day. My wife is a construction worker.
We’re recently trying to get a car because ours is in terrible shape and we can’t keep throwing money at a hole. I asked my boss to verify with my bank that I work here. My boss does. My boss then texted me and says, “ Save up buy it out right 😁 “. I only make MAX $22,000 before tax. We’re looking at a new Vehicle that’s $24,000.
And my wife, her boss is a 67 yr old man whose hobby is now drinking every chance he gets. So it went from rare rain days off, to if it’s even sprinkling there’s no work for the day, or now there’s Hangover days where he literally messages her the morning of saying he’s too hungover to work so now she doesn’t get to. I’ve told her she needs a new job. Because this year it’s basically only me working.
When she got home we started to talk bout how rude it was for my boss to just say “Save up 😁”. It really ticked both of us off because of our predicament.
Then my wife threw in the covo that I basically do nothing at work. It’s true, it’s not a physical job but it’s very mentally taxing and I thought she understood that. That threw me off, because she really ment it and double downed saying “you don’t do anything physical”. Meanwhile this year I’m the one bringing home the bacon. At minimum wage in Ontario Canada. Meanwhile she’s $23 an hour and only worked 3 hours yesterday.
Once I started to detest what she said, she then said another jab saying “for the first three years I supported your ass”. Meanwhile we both worked the same job, same hours, same everything. She paid the bills and I paid for food, and literally everything else we wanted to buy other than bills. We treated it like it was both our money. So that really hurt. She basically said I didn’t give her anything for 3 years which is absurd. I would have a very nice 4 wheeler paid cash right now if that were the case. But I don’t. Because we both contributed.
So right now I’m distancing myself from her. I need space to say what I want to say without getting too emotional.
How do I go about this? This is our biggest fight yet because I feel so invalidated. I don’t know if she’s projecting, because she’s basically barely working part time. So she can’t pay with her money ALL the bills, now I have to help with the bills also. Which is not an issue to me at all. I just don’t know where this came from.
Thank you for reading.
TL;DR! Is that my wife apparently see it that she’s paying for everything, and I didn’t contribute.
Comments
You’re both carrying a lot of resentment and not operating like a team. You are upset that she’s not working much and contributing to the household so all of it is on you and you’re broke, and she seems jealous that you don’t have to do physical labor at your job, and is being defensive about her lack of work. You both need to have an open conversation about finances and work that isn’t accusatory or hostile- at the end of the day you both want to be financially secure and look after each other.
Ask her:
“Are you looking to express how you feel, or are you looking to figure out how we can improve upon this situation? “
Because you should really only be focusing on one of those things at a time. And when she accuses you of that stuff, ask for more background on why she feels that way.
As far as your boss saying to buy it outright, it’s because he’s an out-of-touch stoner who has no idea about your income or savings situation.
She’s not realizing that by you not officially contributing to what she considers “bills,” you STILL ARE contributing a lot to your lives.
To focus yourself, for now, can you go through your bank statements and credit card statements and tally up all you’ve spent on the family’s “not bills” so when you two are ready to talk, you can show her in hard numbers that she’s simply incorrect about how much you contribute?
Another option is to discuss just splitting EVERYTHING fairly, instead of this piecemeal you do this bill and I’ll do that not-bill and it will all even out.
And yeah, she’s jealous that you have stable, not-physically-taxing work and she’s watching even that tough demanding work that she hates go down the drain so she’s probably feeling pretty shitty right now and is lashing out.
Hopefully some time to cool down and a calm talk, with proof of your contributions, and a plan to make where the money goes more transparent so no one feels taken advantage of, will help smooth this over.