Interested in hearing stories about spouse leaving workforce or going part-time
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Anonymous
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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]
(My wife is not interested in being a true stay at home parent. It’s just that she doesn’t want to be tied to a computer and a desk in an uninspiring job and she craves more flexibility and free time. She will likely try her hand at something entrepreneurial, or maybe dabble with hobbies. She’s struggling to find the thing she wants to do and wants the freedom to figure it out. She also wants more flexibility to be with the kids.) [/quote] That just sounds extremely self indulgent to me. Lots of people want to have the freedom to leave their jobs and I don't begrudge those who can make it happen. But if this is what she wants, she needs to be totally on top of the financial situation in your home, including being point person on managing all your finances and expenditures. To me that is the most important part of being the SAH Parent .. being able to live off of one income means you make significant trade offs in spending to make it happen. If I were you I would NOT agree to reducing your level of savings. She needs to identify other ways to manage to keep you guys living well on $100,000 less salary a year. Is she willing to give anything up? [/quote] +1. A DW planning on finding herself and a liteny of hobby jobs to lose money on, and keeping the preschool and housekeeper. You better actually love your job, b/c you are signing up to be her sugar daddy and breadwinner all in one. I think you should consider counseling and a post-nup to clearly define how this will play out, so you don’t end up flushing thousands for her photography and craft crotchet Etsy shop, and have fights about you come home wiped out from a job you hate and she expects you to take the kids and do dishes while she gets some mommy me-time. [/quote] OP here. Right, was expecting some of this reaction. So, she actually does manage the household finances and would definitely be willing to sacrifice on expenses to make this work. To be sure, we are in a privileged position to be able to give her the space to figure out her life’s passion. (I pissed away my 20s on all sorts of self-indulgent explorations. Women don’t have the luxury of as much a misspent youth as men.) I’m sure having her free half the day will make life a lot easier for me in many ways, and make my work trips more guilt-free. I am interested in understanding how much more financial risk we would be taking. Is it, for example, considerably harder for a part time nonprofit lawyer to “lean back in” to corporate work should my career run into serious problems? (she has all the prestige markers one would need to get back into a more hardcore track, but is obviously tipping her hand to the market that she doesn’t care that much about the work.) |
Anonymous
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[quote=Anonymous]
OP here. Right, was expecting some of this reaction. So, she actually does manage the household finances and would definitely be willing to sacrifice on expenses to make this work. To be sure, we are in a privileged position to be able to give her the space to figure out her life’s passion. (I pissed away my 20s on all sorts of self-indulgent explorations. Women don’t have the luxury of as much a misspent youth as men.) I’m sure having her free half the day will make life a lot easier for me in many ways, and make my work trips more guilt-free. [/quote] I can't advise you on going back to work for lawyers issue. But on the reducing spending issue -- if she really is managing the household finances, you absolutely earn enough that you can support a non employed spouse. Just ask her to look at the household budget and identify where the cuts will come from! And don't agree for it to come from savings. If she wants this, she should already have the plan. It sounds to me like the plan is "not save as much for early retirement" i.e. you say you are in your 40s and are talking about having enough in 15 years to maintain your lifestyle. Are you thinking of retiring in your 50s? Is she on board with that or is her staying home now going to mean you can't retire till you are 65? |
Anonymous
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It sounds like you both coukd benefit from talking to a financial planner. But, I also think OP that both of you could benefit from talking to each other in more depth about the pros and cons of her going part/time or to fill SAHM. Have you shared your career goals with DW as clearly as you have with an anonymous board as that is a key starting point? Could DW benefit from a few sessions with a career or life coachntomhas out where she is at and how best to balance pursuing new options? |
Anonymous
| What about taking a hard look at your budget and deeply cutting for a year to give you more of a cushion? Put the savings into an index fund, set it and forget it. And then after the year she leaves her job? |
Anonymous
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Foryears when our kids were younger DH would say, "you don't have to work," he a couple years after I finally took him up on it, he expressed his resentment. I explained all that I do for our household (we still have cleaners too), and that bnb made it a little better.
I am the COO of our household. I am responsible for calendars for all of us, rides for the kids (or arranging carpools if they both need to be somewhere at the same time), arrang8ng for and being home to meet repair people or contractors, bill paying, vacation planning, budgeting, grocery shopping, meal planning and cooking, making sure the kids have the right clothes in the right season in the right size, have uniforms clean on game day, have all forms signed and returned to school on time, all doctor, dentist and eye doctor appointments (plus specialists for one child), etc. Its like I am the personal assistant for ALL When you look at what the job really entails (even without the cleaning), I am undervalued as a SAHM! |
Anonymous
Oh please. I am not saying isn’t isn’t a lot of work, but I do everything you listed except budgeting and bill paying and I work full time. I have a schedule that allows me to be available in the afternoons so carpooling, etc. is on me and I left the house at 7 am. I cook from scratch daily. These are things that have to be done in every household. That is great that you are able to stay home with your kids and I hope it keeps the stress away from your whole family, but it is not rocket science. |
Anonymous
Wow I’m a single parent who does all of the above while working full time. And don’t have house cleaners. It’s called adulting. |
Anonymous
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You make plenty for her to stay home. We’ve done this arrangement on as little as $160k with a $3100 mortgage and 3 young kids. We now have a $220 HHI and the kids are all in parochial school and we are comfortable.
What I don’t understand is keeping the kids in FT/all day preschool. What hobby business is going to keep her busy for 8 hrs/day? You could probably cut back the housekeeping to once or twice a month too. It doesn’t make sense to quit to “stay at home” if you don’t really want to focus on the home front/family. |
Anonymous
She isn’t quitting to stay at home, she is quitting b/c she hates her job. We should hear from folks who came from that angle. |
Anonymous
Then time to put her big girl panties on and find a new job. It’s time to be an adult. |
Anonymous
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We have preschoolers and DW recently resigned from her job due to the company going downhill and the stress was affecting our family life (I supported the move also.. she's much happier now). My income is much higher so we can live off mine fine, which made it easier.
I think a financial planner is a good option here. They can show how to amass enough where you're comfortable, like having X months of expenses saved away in case something comes up. If she just wants less stress and fewer hours and she's an attorney, she can do things like contract review on a flexible basis for companies, or even hang her own shingle but limit how much work she takes on. Having her do "hobby business" stuff can be risky and atcually result in a net cash outflow from doing so. |
Anonymous
Fine then. Adults that don’t want to stay home with young kids or to take care of a sick family member should work. If she doesn’t like her job, she should find something else to do before she quits her current position. That is what adults do. |
Anonymous
| Your wife sounds sounds lazy. |
Anonymous
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DH and I have had the same conversation and I applaud OP for seriously considering it. I make $85K and DH makes around $200K. I have been diagnosed with Crohn’s disease and would like to reduce my hours by 20% to help my stress level and fatigue. DH refuses because it will put more stress on him as he is commissioned based. Instead of figuring out ways to manage his stress around it he just outright refuses. He even took a new job where he needs a few years to build up because he was unhappy with the culture of his company although he made good money without having to work much for it. He can unilaterally make decisions that are best for him but I’m not allowed to.
He’d rather me go through physical stress than to deal with his potential mental stress. We’ve met with a financial planner on my suggestion and he showed us we’d be ok but would need to cut back extras a little bit. It still makes him too nervous so I will continue to go deeper into negative sick leave. At least OP sounds like he views his wife as more than just a paycheck. |
Anonymous
Yes, please! |