Reply to SAHM’s - anyone successfully convince DH to support their staying home long term?

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Reply to "SAHM’s - anyone successfully convince DH to support their staying home long term?"

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[quote=Anonymous]My DH is very capable in household work - childcare, laundry to cooking - and will pitch in without asking.  But, he begged me to quit because our kids, home, marriage and life was suffering.  Mainly, it was hard with the kids because they were falling sick in the daycare and reliable childcare was frequently failing.  Anyways, when he begged me to quit I put forth certain conditions -
- I was never going back to work until I wanted to go back to work. I did not want him to expect that I could go back to work on his whim. First of all, the field I was in was not conducive to career breaks and secondly I was making a sacrifice that he had to respect.  
- I was not letting go of my cleaning woman, in fact, I wanted her to come twice a week instead of weekly.  I did not want to spend my time doing chores that I was already outsourcing before. I appreciated that my time was valuable (it was costing me my lost income) and so it had to be used wisely. 
- DH was completely responsible for kids college and our retirement.  I did not want us to be financially insolvent because that would be short-sighted. 
- He was still going to help at home. I did not want inequality in the family and I still needed help. Being at home was very exhausting even with help.

DH agreed with caveats. 
- He was not going to help with kids K-12 education planning.  He was willing to drive them to places on the weekend.  This was a big mental load off of him. He wanted the kids to do well in school and be happy, healthy and secure.  
- He was not going to pay for big fat weddings for the kids. We were only paying for their entire college. 
- We were going to live in a cheaper neighborhood, drive cheaper cars... We would not be able to swing for an expensive house, expensive cars etc on one salary and then also maintain a good standard of living, college/retirement saving etc.   
- He gives  me a set amount of money  to run the house. Out of that I pay for every single thing. He only pays the contribution to retirement fund, contribution to medical insurance and investments.  In the past 15 years the amount has not changed.

This has worked very well for us. Neither of us feel shortchanged and we feel that we are a good team.  What worked for us, may not work for others.

I will however say that I will always advice women to prioritize the finances of the family first.  The next priority is health and health coverage. The third priority is the need of the family. If you quit work and stay at home -  there are immense benefits, but you have to first make the finances work and also have health coverage.  Also, make sure that you have excellent insurance. [/quote]

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