Well, there is a lot of resentment gunk to do with the work/money issue, going back twenty years and more.
Basically, for many years H had an easy time of it moneywise, as from about the age of seventeen or eighteen, after his mother died, he had money in a trust from her estate and so had an income. He could choose to live on just that or work and earn more etc. Very nice. The amount he had coming in monthly way back then was much more than I was earning by working full time (this was even before we knew each other.) So he had many years of being able to just fool around, travel, work at stuff he wanted etc. I am not saying his life was a piece of cake in other ways as he had the rejection of is father to contend with, but as far as money, he was quite independently well off for about fifteen years. He then chose to sink this capital into a business venture here in this country and to buy our previous small flat (this was still before we married, but we knew each other.) When the business was rocky, he took out a partial mortgage against our old flat. By the way, I helped substantially in that business, on the practical side, making some of the stuff to sell and manning stalls at fairs etc. Anyway, he closed the business when D was born, as it was losing money, and started doing the freelance work that he is now doing in order to earn our bread and butter.
My history of work, pre marriage, is that I pursued my own vocation part time, interleaved with many many boring but paying part-time or short term jobs. I derived enormous satisfaction from being able to do my personal work, made a little money from it, in fact was doing best out of it just before I married and came to live in this country. So things were looking up for me, as I made most of my money doing what I liked and was good at, rather than with cleaning jobs, shop work and other menial jobs, in addition to TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language, which I quite enjoyed.) I would point out that H has only once in his life never had to do a halfway meial and badly paid job.
After coming to this country, as I say, I helped H in his business and did a little teaching work too. When D arrived I was a full time Mum, and housewife. For many years I managed without the support of any family nearby, without a car and we didn't have much money. I did a little of my own kind of work at home, as much as I was able, when baby was asleep etc.
Next we spent nearly eighteen months in my counrty of origin, I had undertaken a job dealing with family matters and we were sort of stuck there for many months. This was mostly paid for by my money, that I happened to have from a family inheritance. H did not support us those eighteen months. He himself became very interested in my line of work and started doing it while we were out there. You could say it was my money that got him started to some extent, and gave him the opportunity to pursue this line. I encouraged him!
When we returned back home to this country, it was back to the grindstone for H. But he managed to make many trips abroad to pursue his personal work. He has made seven trips to my country of origin and the country he met OW 2 in during the last three years. These were only to pursue his personal interest/work. Although others expressed concern that H was making these expensive trips, I was behind him, thinking he needed to find himself and get into work that interested him and made him happy.
On my front, after D started school, I told H I would start doing some work, but put it off while looking for our new house (it took two years of looking), moving, dealing with my mother who was getting frailer by the day in other country etc. At this time H started acting strange. Didn't want to be with me, but in between would be affectionate. This is what kept me unsuspecting. Didn't partake much at all in the house search or move, only what he had to.
I have to say I didn't want to get a 'proper' job at this time, one that would commit me to full time work and no flexibility to get away and pursue my own project, even at long intervals (a month or so a year). It looks to me like H wanted me to be the one to have the "proper" job, have a steady income, be there at all times for D, so he can work less and then go off to pursue HIS personal interests. It is what he would like now too. Remember he recently told me he wanted to go off for eight months for his work? He assumed it would be me who would be there to look after D for him.
My current thinking is this, frankly. Tell me what you think. Brickbats accepted.
My personal work is what I am really good at. I need to work at it to allow it to bear fruit for me financially. It would give me the most satisfaction. Right now I have gathered all the material for one project and more than half for another. It is a matter of having the time and opportunity and concentration (these constant angry missives from H don't help, and I have even told him so) to be able to put a presentation together to get some interest in it from third parties. So it is commercial proposition.
In addition, I continue to work part time at teaching. Actually, I am open to doing as much as comes my way, it is just difficult to get new students and keep the ones I have as people are rather unreliable in that department. I do not want to go to school and teach classes of unruly kids.
Money from my mother's estate will help, it will take a while to come through though.
And through all this I am a single Mum too.
I am not a mind reader, also I think H doth whine unfairly. He resents having to "look after" a family. It is not as if he also did every other thing around the place for us either! He is not handy around the home. Not that he can't, he isn't interested.
As for me never wanting to talk about money, more like he didn't! Didn't want to dicuss his 'investment' with me, didn't tell me anything before going ahead with it, although it was highly risky. I tried to bring up the subject of having a budget to stick to, but that was brushed aside. When H wanted to spend 'his' money, he did, no questions asked. And although he gave me the bank card to use, I never ever made personal big purchases without asking him first if it was OK.
This year, he has been to other country to visit OW 2, he has purhcased a new laptop, a new cell phone, an expensive new piece of equipment for himself.
Ellie (if you are still here with me this far!!), I guess H may well have bailed out either or both OW and is now feeling the pinch even more and using me as his scapegoat. Perhaps that is why he got annoyed when D asked where OW 2 got her rent deposit money from?? Who knows.
I have paid my dues, I feel, in the menial jobs department, over many years. I will now do at least halfway decent and well paid work. I saw taking time off from outside work for D as a really worthwhile thing to do. Never did H say at this time that it was a bad thing. Anyway, childcare costs would have swallowed up any money I made part time. And I personally wanted to be a full time Mum to my D.
Anyone care to offer their thoughts?
Livnlearn
"The unexamined life is not worth living" - Socrates
