I, 38M, have been with my wife, 37F, for 17 years, 9 of which we’ve been married. We were best friends long before we started dating and have always had a deep love for each other. We have a nearly 4 year old child together and she’s been a stay at home mom for that child’s life. She was always clear that’s what she wanted and it’s what I want as well. By all appearances, we have a great marriage. Nice house, beautiful and healthy child, love and trust abound.
However, I have grown to feel that my wife is in love with a version of me that isn’t really me. I work a very demanding job and am involved in a lot of things that both bring us extra income and fulfill my passions. I need a lot of things going on to keep from getting bored and my wife is the opposite. She doesn’t really have hobbies or interests and has always just kind of floated day to day. She’s content to waste time and do nothing for hours on end while I can’t stand to do nothing. I like down time as much as the next person but my down time is engaging with my hobbies, not doing nothing. She is a good mom and takes that job seriously but isn’t much for doing other things around the house. She gardens but we have cleaners, landscaper, even a grocery shopper. I handle the finances and all the other household obligations. She also spends freely (wastefully?) and has never really understood the value of a dollar.
My wife always wants me around, which isn’t a bad thing. But because of the way she is, she has no appreciation for the amount of time and work it takes to live the life we do. I don’t work a corporate job and don’t have a salary, I have to work to get paid. I have no paid vacation or people to hand stuff off to if I’m not working. I do it or it doesn’t get done. Even when we try to take a vacation, I’m never really “off.” In her mind though, she thinks I can just go sit at my desk for 8 hours a day, never work on the weekends, take vacations, turn my phone off during family time, and everything will be just fine. For the last several years, especially since my child was born, I’ve just accepted her version. We have dinner as a family every night, we hang out on the weekends (often doing nothing), and I try to be present as much as possible. My wife views the weekends as something of a break for her and kind of wants me taking primary parenting responsibility when possible. Understandable but we have grandparents that routinely step in and babysit, sometimes for a week at a time. On average, she probably gets a week free per month not including weekends. She doesn’t use this free time to take anything off my plate. She mostly uses it for self care, like pedicures and facials or going shopping. I do feel I get the freedom to do things I want to do but there is always some level of guilt involved.
After 4 years of this, it has been a disaster. Our finances have suffered because she stopped working and I’m not working enough. She hasn’t dialed back her free spending ways despite my pleas to live on a budget. If she wants me to work less, we have to cap spending at some point. I’m miserable because I’ve always been ambitious but I’ve not been able to progress with my career because it takes more time than I’m giving it. I’m in this kind of one foot in, one foot out position that isn’t sustainable and has actually proven harmful. I find that I am most happiest and productive when I’m working out of town or when my wife and child are out of town because I can work long hours and be full throttle without the constant pressure of being present. And when I get those opportunities, I feel refreshed and am extra present with my wife and child when I’m finished. My wife doesn’t like this though and gets frustrated if I’m absent too much.
So to recap, I have to start dedicating more time to my career or it’s going to fail. Meanwhile, my wife is demanding more of my presence than ever. I feel that she would be far more happy with a man that is less ambitious. We have many friends with husbands that work mid level corporate jobs and are far more capable of being present without much effort. She envies their schedules but claims to love my drive and ambition. On the other hand, I think I’d be more happy with someone that is a bigger supporter of my career and is more of a cheerleader. I always thought she was that but it turns out she supported the lifestyle it affords, not the sacrifice it requires. She hasn’t showed interest in my work in years. But neither of us has really dated as adults so it’s not like starting over is all that appealing.
I still love her but I think she’s more comfortable than ever and I’m more restless than ever. I’m to the point that I just want to focus on my child and my career because I don’t believe I can ever meet my wife’s expectations. Resentment is building as I’m falling behind where I wanted to be and stressing over finances while she’s living her best life. We’ve had many conversations about adjusting the balance and she says she understands but it lasts a week or two at most before she’s back to the old ways. I feel like if I just start doing what I need to do, it will end very badly. On the other hand, talking about it hasn’t accomplished anything in years. She is who she is and so am I. We just didn’t realize how that would conflict until we had a child and time became that much more precious.
I’m stuck at this fork in the road. I can’t keep compromising. If we separated tomorrow, I don’t think I’d be that upset. I’ve often joked to myself that I wish she would just meet a nice guy that would take care of her and we both could move on amicably. I’m not sure what that says about the relationship. I don’t know where to go from here or whether this situation is even salvageable in the long term. It’s not as simple as choosing my career or her – everything would have to change if I walked away from my career now. And I think she’d be equally unhappy if I shifted my career ambitions and we meaningfully changed our lifestyle to account for it. If I gave it up for her and she still wasn’t happy, I’d be angry forever.
How would you handle it? Do I just start doing what I need to do and see how things go? Do I give an ultimatum in advance? Do I actually bring up the idea that she might be happier in a different situation? How do I get it across that this is life or death for our relationship and for my career? Obviously having a child complicates things tremendously but I know I’m capable of being a good dad through quality time. I’ve never had an issue being heavily involved when it matters most. But I know these things impact kids no matter what. I’m just at a loss for the right answer but I’m running out of time.
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Dude, it sounds like you have been bottling up your frustrations until they have become resentment, and you just want a nice way to drop it all on your wife all at once. That’s really not how it works, and you would be doing both of you a total disservice.
This is Reddit, you are not going to get anything near the balanced nuance you need to handle this like an actual adult. You need to speak with a professional who can help you talk to your wife without you dropping what appears to be long-held resentments on her out of nowhere. And yes, you would be doing it out of nowhere from her perspective.
You describe your wife as someone who is happily living her life and wants you to be more involved in it. Meanwhile, you are stacking resentment like Legos, and angry that she doesn’t see any of it. She won’t until you actually communicate with her. The problem is that communication does not seem to be your strong suit AT ALL. You say a few times how you love her, but it doesn’t sound like you even like her. Get professional counseling so that you can learn to open your mouth before you blow up your entire family by dropping an ultimatum out of nowhere.
sounds like two completely different people who want to live their life differently and the fact neither one of you is willing to compromise/adjust is very sad. you are driven and obsessed with work and you put it above everything and tbh, thats a you problem. all you want to do is work, work, work because of your passions and dreams. but hey, you have a family now, not everything is about work or always being on the move. to your wife, you’re never around and don’t do much with the kids and tbh, she is right. even if she is lazy, even if she doesn’t clean often or work, you are still a father and you still need to do things with the kid and spend time with your baby and BOND. but again, being a stay-at-home mother was her “dream” and you need to respect that too if you want her to respect you chasing yours all the time. but the live in cleanner and stuff… yeah, no. with a four year old, cleaning should be managable if she’s just at home 24/7 and if she isn’t disabled. thats just extra money and for what? what kind of house are yall even living in that you’d need to hire people to do all of that work? your wife wants a low-key, simple comfortable life thats as easy as possible for her whereas you want the opposite. you want to work all the time, always have something to do or somewhere to be to always keep your mind busy. she is the opposite of that. your busy lifestyle is affecting her now, because you’re not around enough for her or the kid and thats because you want to always work or do something. like you said, you’re just both very different and you both want the other person to change and do more but neither is willing to give up their lifestyle as it means one of you would suffer. you could start off by firing the extra help and see how she goes with that? make minor changes/steps first and see what shes comfortable with and maybe that can be small compromises along the way, and maybe you could spend a few hours wit hthe kid while she rests or something.
You’ve written a great deal but said a whole lot of nothing.
What exactly do you want to do? Focus more on work? Take more time for yourself? Your wife is fundamentally different from you but this is probably what made you compatible. Would you be okay with someone who was ‘on’ all the time?
You also seem to forget that raising a child is a full time job. Her doing ‘nothing’ might just be her resting. And there is nothing wrong with that.
The reality is being ambitious and having a family are two very different areas of focus. It is really hard to have both without some kind of sacrifice. Also, you need to ask yourself what will be more important to you on your death bed. Your family or your career?
Lastly. What exactly is the point of a career except to support your lifestyle?
You need to figure out your priorities first and then everything else will follow. That everyone comes out happy at the end is another discussion.
I agree with the poster who said that you probably need to seek a professional to help you work through both your frustration and your method of communicating with your wife. I have sympathy for the situation you both find yourselves in. It’s also not really clear what your communication to her about this has been: you say you have pleaded with her to live within a budget, but was that a sitdown conversation where you take her through the finances, how much you make, how much you miss out on when you don’t do the extra work, and ask her if she is willing to pick up the slack on grocery shopping, cleaning, landscaping service, etc.? And ask her for other solutions? If it wasn’t then it just sounds kind of like nagging. “It’d be great if you could spend less money on self-care this month.”
I do think you sound a bit like a restless workaholic who thinks family life come second to putting in the work effort and hours, but I also understand that you feel like she expects a certain lifestyle and believe that’s the only way to provide it.
Until you have done EVERYTHING possible to make the disconnect between her spending, the household spending, and your workload crystal clear, there will be no fix.
On the other hand, do you want a fix? It also sounds a little bit , reading between the lines, like you have already decided that you are done? And the thing that you really need to process about that is that separating and divorcing will not give either of you what you want. It’s fine to do it if you don’t have the feelings you need to have to stay in a relationship. But you shouldn’t perceive it as the solution that’s going to let you live the way you prefer. You will either be poorer or busier balancing childcare and work, or both, for several years to come.
Again: That’s not a reason to not separate, if that’s where your feelings are taking you – it’s just a reality you need to consider if you imagine that everything will somehow be easier.
Your wife wanting you to eat dinner with your family each night and spend time together on the weekends isn’t unreasonable. Thats a fairly normal amount of time split between work and family.
You are unhappy with that, so what specifically would you change? Only a few nights a week with your family? One weekend day? Whole weekends away?
Have you spoken any of this to her? Will she listen to you? The spending freely is insane. One income. You I assume own your business. It’s rewarding but definitely weeknight and weekend hours are part of like with this setup.
Everyone has a budget.
Can you go to a couples therapist for neutral ground for discussion?
Wow, you need to be able to talk to your wife. You have a family. What do want from that? If you split up, how are you going to do 50/50 custody? Just hire a nanny? Do you even want to spend time with them? My suggestions is to get some counseling and figure out what you really want and how to communicate it.
It sounds like you should get into marriage counseling ASAP. Since you’ve already tried talking to her about it and nothing really changes, maybe having an objective 3rd party will help to finally get the message across. And to make an ultimatum, if needed.
If you guys have a joint account where all your pay goes into, I would start by removing her from those accounts OR starting your own separate account and shifting your pay to that new account… then, putting in money for her every month, so you can finally control her spending. And remove her access to the credit cards, too. Tell her only after you’ve done it, so you don’t have to waste time on her trying to talk you out of it.
It also sounds like she needs to have more fulfillment in her life. I would ask her to get a job, even if it’s only part-time, so she’s not just sitting around all the time. That should also give her more appreciation for how hard you work, and help her finally learn the value of a dollar. It will also help you greatly in the event you do divorce her.
Since talking to her so many times hasn’t worked… desperate times call for desperate measures. Good luck!