How long would you give it if a spouse wants to experiment with freelancing?

[Anonymous]

Long story short: After much thought and discussion, DH decided to transition to a different career field at age 45. He quit his well-paid job, with my support, and wants to go into freelance consulting. He has lots of relevant background for the field that interests him. He also gets about $50k/year from an invested inheritance. That is less than a quarer of what i make, but my salary would comfortably support us all even without his investment income.

Problem: eight months after quitting his job, he shows few signs of moving forward with his plan to freelance. He spends his days browsing the web, sometimes reading about his industry and about how to launch a consulting career, but often he's just reading random newspapers and blogs. He watches sports; he goes to the gym; he listens to music. The only friends we see are my friends, and these days he has hardly any human contact aside from me, the kids, and random people he happens to talk to at the gym. He has not done any networking whatsoever, and when I sometimes say things like, "hey, I met a guy who said he was looking for someone with your expertise, he told me to urge you to get in touch" he looks interested but does not follow up. And meanwhile he seems more and more irritable and tetchy. I no longer mention my own work successes for fear of making him feel bad.

I am becoming both very worried and somewhat resentful, since I'm now the primary breadwinner and also still the primary caregiver -- in a household with a guy who spends a lot of his time acting sulky. Obviously at some point, if nothing changes, I need to have a more serious talk with him about what's going on. (And whether he should perhaps abandon the freelance dream and just get a job.)

I should say that he is a brilliant, accomplished, and-- mostly!-- funny, kind guy. I wouldn't mind if he made little money as long as he was happy. But I think he is scared and depressed, and this is keeping him from moving forward. When I have tentatively suggested this to him, however, he angrily rejects the idea and tells me he is doing research and making a plan and I just have to leave him alone to do it his way.

To be fair, this is a huge career change for hm in every way, and sometimes I think he is right and I just need to stop fretting and try not to hover: he will find his own way, but just needs time, and maybe it's not so weird if he also just needs time to think and decompress from his old career.

What would you do? Is there some point in time at which you would say, if there has been no change, "Listen, this is not working, you need to get moving or get a job or see a shrink?" If so, what is that point? Give him a full year from when he left his old job for that conversation? 18 months? Longer?

[Anonymous]

I think the key thing is that this should become a both-of-you thing rather than a just-him thing. Obviously not 50/50, but you guys can be co-planners and confidantes on this stuff so it doesn't feel like you're occasionally swooping in to check on him and finding him wanting. He does sound like he's in a rut, but making this a "together" thing is probably the best way out of it.

[Anonymous]

I think counseling for anyone making a big life change.

[Anonymous]

He is clearly struggling, OP. It's proving harder than he thought.

Usually people quit their jobs when they're ready to launch their own consulting, not when they're "thinking about starting a consulting practice". He should have had his network, clients, everything already sorted out before he left.

So now you have to make it clear that you want deadlines. Ether he gets this off the ground fast, or he finds a job (or gets his old one back). If he wants to stay home and look after the house and kids, and you're fine with that, then he would have to actually do that job well too and stop being grumpy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
He is clearly struggling, OP. It's proving harder than he thought.

Usually people quit their jobs when they're ready to launch their own consulting, not when they're "thinking about starting a consulting practice". He should have had his network, clients, everything already sorted out before he left.

So now you have to make it clear that you want deadlines. Ether he gets this off the ground fast, or he finds a job (or gets his old one back). If he wants to stay home and look after the house and kids, and you're fine with that, then he would have to actually do that job well too and stop being grumpy.

+1

It sounds like freelancing isn't for him, it takes a kind of entrepeneurship (SP?) Sounds like he has a kind of inertia, depressed maybe.
While it's important to be financially stable, happiness in the family is not negotiable!