Combining funds and coming up with a plan that appears fair and practical for your home are two of the decidedly less romantic aspects of getting married and starting a family. But it’s a crucial component, and as your family expands and you experience the ups and downs of life, you’ll surely need to tweak and troubleshoot it.
Reddit agrees with the father’s request for the SAHM-wife to return to work because she isn’t watching their son.
When circumstances changed enough that he had to ask his wife, who has been a SAHM since 2006, if she could obtain some part-time work now that their kids are 10, 14, and 15, and they are all in school, a poster in Reddit’s AITA column found himself grappling with that question. Her response? It wasn’t really pleasant.
She accused me of lying when I stated she could be a stay-at-home parent after we got married, and both her family and mine agreed with her, the poster claimed. The fact that I’ve had to take two wage cuts at work and don’t have the luxury of seeking for another job, though, is beginning to put a burden on my mental health.
He continued by saying that the needs of their family had changed, along with how the financial landscape had changed significantly since 2006, and that he had to continue to turn down their youngest child’s request to participate in gymnastics because they couldn’t afford it. He even started delivering food on the weekends.
The advertisement said, “Now she asks why I got married if I can’t afford a family. “I just don’t know what to do,” Since the kids now need so much more money than they did when they were younger, our needs have changed. My wife hasn’t spoken to me in the last two weeks, and the rest of the family supports her.
As one commenter put it so beautifully
“NTA. Times are changing, inflation is rampant, and money is scarce… And it’s not like you have complete control over how much you get paid. If you said, “Yeah, I don’t feel like working anymore,” and then expected your wife to get a full-time job to pay for everything, that would be one thing, but that’s not what’s happening. You are asking her for assistance while doing what you can. That’s probably how it’s supposed to operate, I think.
No one is disputing the fact that being a SAHM or working stay-at-home parent is work – it is! — However, after the most labor-intensive and hands-on portions of the task are finished and the children have grown up, reassessing and talking about what the family needs is most definitely not a breach of prior commitments.
The charges that the OP “lied” about making his partner a stay-at-home parent are unfounded, and the long-term effect of one partner bearing all of the financial load can be even worse than a few missed extracurricular activities, according to another commenter, r/bamf1701: “Since your requirements have changed, the dynamics of your family must also adapt. She was able to be a SAHM for 16 years, and you never lied to her about it. In essence, you are working two jobs at once. You’re going to burn out if she doesn’t pitch in.
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