If you were married to someone who felt more like your child than your partner after years together, what would you do? Would you give them the opportunity to change and commit to bringing out the potential you see in them, or would you call it quits?
This woman, in her early 30s, has a husband her age, and they’re really having a tough time in their marriage. Things are so hard that it’s not even easy for her to verbalize all of the problems they have been encountering.
Now, they both have jobs, they live in the same house, and they have a child who currently goes to daycare. They each have their own set of mental health and physical struggles, which have built up into making their rough patch even worse.
“My husband and I have points of contention, including in no particular order: lack of intimacy, lack of honesty, suspected romantic infidelity (still trying to confirm), confirmed financial infidelity, and unequal sharing of household/ parenting responsibilities,” she explained.
“My husband justifies most of these behaviours (these are all one-sided things only he does, with the exception of the unequal labour division) by saying he’s the primary earner in our household (making approx 60% of our income) and as the ‘patriarch’ he has certain rights/expectations.”
“I make less money, in part because I have taken on the lion’s share of our household responsibilities, his healthcare, my healthcare, and the care of our special needs daughter; additionally, all of our benefits (insurance, life insurance, retirement, etc) come out of my wages.”
Not too long ago, she picked a fight with her husband over how they don’t split the household chores in a way that’s fair to her, or equal.
She also threw in there that her husband is unreasonable with what he spends time and money on. They work the same hours at their respective jobs, and she has to be in the office five to six days each week, while her husband works from home.
She dislikes that her husband subscribes to the idea that she should do more of the childcare and household responsibilities simply due to her gender.
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Additionally, she hates that her husband makes everything into his money or her money, when they have joint accounts and private ones too.
Yet, they’re always arguing nonstop about how her husband likes to spend too freely. He wastes about 10% of the money they take home after taxes, but then he gives her a hard time about what she spends.
“We could save my whole income and more, to live off what he makes entirely if he were willing to make small changes, but instead, to my embarrassment, we are barely paying the bills on a mid-6-figure combined income,” she admitted.
“I told my husband recently that I don’t feel like I have an equal partner, I feel like I have a full-time job and that I’m a single mom to two children, which upset him.”
“I love him deeply, and I see enormous potential in him, but I cannot handle the burden of being a mother/wife/house manager/maid/personal assistant long term. I suggested marriage counselling, which he has refused. I don’t know how to get through to him.”
Her husband fails to see how he’s the problem and has convinced his loved ones that he’s perfect. She did reach out to his mom and dad as a cry for help, and they painted her as a liar when she told them about what he’s doing.
She’s at a loss and unsure of what to do.
Well, I only see two adventures she can give her husband to choose from: file for divorce, or get counseling like she’s been asking for, while agreeing to take on more household responsibilities.
She clearly can’t keep on waking up every day and living like this. How exhausting! But I’m afraid that since her husband has been getting away with doing the bare minimum for so long, he might just melt down when confronted with his choices of how they can move forward, since he is so childlike. Then, I think she has no option but to file for divorce and free herself of the burden that is her husband.
What advice do you have for her?
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By Bre Avery Zacharski
Hi, I'm Bre, Chip Chick's CEO! I have a degree in Textile/Surface Design from The Fashion Institute of Technology, and... More about Bre Avery Zacharski
