OH has confiscated my cards

RoxieW

hand on heart there was one month where I spent far more than I should of on clothes. We were going to a wedding and i got carried away with expensive dress, shoes, jewellery, hair do etc etc. But on a normal month there wouldnt be much overspend by me on me, if that makes sense. More on nights out, family days out, holidays etc etc, all of which he has wanted as well.

RoxieW

to be honest we were overspending in every area. groceries, entertainment etc. But he was happy when we were spending it and when i said we couldnt afford he would shrug it off.

Soubrette

RoxieW wrote: »

im on the go all week with the children and also working 3 hours a day from home. All the housework/cooking etc is my responsibility. I don't sit down most nights till 9pm. i think a weekend job would tip me over the edge!
Although I am considering a full time job and putting the little one in nursery just to get abit of financial and emotional independence. he says if I do this then i have to pay childcare out of my wage and he will keep his wage for himself. We will then keep our money separate and he earns way more then I could having been a mum and housewife pretty much for the past 8 years.

Unusually your OH is starting to make me quite angry.

I hope you can work this out.

gratefulforhelp_2

RoxieW wrote: »

im on the go all week with the children and also working 3 hours a day from home. All the housework/cooking etc is my responsibility. I don't sit down most nights till 9pm. i think a weekend job would tip me over the edge!
Although I am considering a full time job and putting the little one in nursery just to get abit of financial and emotional independence. he says if I do this then i have to pay childcare out of my wage and he will keep his wage for himself. We will then keep our money separate and he earns way more then I could having been a mum and housewife pretty much for the past 8 years.

This bit worries me, does he have control issues? I would be really really uncomfortable in this situation.
It is reasonable to take the method person one suggested. I don't think that what he's (your DH I mean) saying about childcare is at all reasonable.
Is he very unreconstructed in his view of the female role?

Mrs_justjohn

RoxieW wrote: »

im on the go all week with the children and also working 3 hours a day from home. All the housework/cooking etc is my responsibility. I don't sit down most nights till 9pm. i think a weekend job would tip me over the edge!
Although I am considering a full time job and putting the little one in nursery just to get abit of financial and emotional independence. he says if I do this then i have to pay childcare out of my wage and he will keep his wage for himself. We will then keep our money separate and he earns way more then I could having been a mum and housewife pretty much for the past 8 years.

This post to me rang alarm bells.....

I think within a marriage everything is jointly earned and owned...no my money / your money...etc...

I know people who do work like this and if it works for them then that's fine but that sort of arrangement (IMHO) is not what marriage is about?

I think maybe you need to sit down and talk about more than your financial problems?:(

Barneysmom

If you got a full time job, what would you need him for?

You two really need to talk to each other xxx

Person_one

Yikes, this is getting worse and worse, from your first post I was hoping it might be a case of him not having thought through properly how to deal with the debts and going about things all wrong but essentially meaning well.

This is clearly not the case. He is using finances as a way of controlling you.

By confiscating your cards and preventing you from accessing any money apart from what he gives you (and then deciding what you can spend that on!) he has an awful lot of power of you and there isn't really much you can do about it.

It doesn't matter that you don't have a job (for the control issue, it might be a good idea for the debt issue but honestly that comes second right now) if your littlest child is under school age then its perfectly reasonable that you still be at home with them. I presume your OH was involved in the decision that you would be a SAHM for a bit? His wages are no longer just his to do with as he chooses, they are to support him AND his family, if you were working and he a SAHD it would be exactly the same. What if there were some sort of emergency while you were alone with the children and you needed money for a taxi to the hospital, or a locksmith, or a change of clothes for a child?

Don't want to seem over dramatic or scare you here, but does any of this sound familiar?

http://www.welshwomensaid.org/whatis/financial.html

Hectors_House

RoxieW wrote: »

Although I am considering a full time job and putting the little one in nursery just to get abit of financial and emotional independence. he says if I do this then i have to pay childcare out of my wage and he will keep his wage for himself. We will then keep our money separate and he earns way more then I could having been a mum and housewife pretty much for the past 8 years.

Do you have any idea how this has turned from being an initial issue with him trying to take control of spending to him threatening to withdraw his financial support to his family after you've suggested taking on work again?

You say you've been a SAHM for the last 8 years. Did he not expect you to go back to full-time work? Or have you never worked full-time?

It sounds like the money issues have bought some others to the fore for your OH and you both need to find a way to talk this out. Would he consider going to Relate?

ailuro2

You both need to be on board or it's not going to work.

you still seem to be intent on blaming your DH, which won't really get you anywhere, both of you need to accept both of you got in this mess together.

Be calm, methodical, write everything down and then agree on what you can have as 'pocket money' over and above this.

Agree a threshold over which both of you need to agree on whether something needs to be bought or not - so £50 threshold would mean if one of the kids wanted trainers at £75 you'd discuss it with each other first, but if school uniform came to £40 you'd buy it.

Again, both of you need to be onboard with this, and you need to have a debit card each and the credit cards cut up if they are up to their limit. come up with a plan to get out of debt and stick to it... (probably no £75 trainers and definitely no IPads...)

grey_lady

So if you go back to work full-time he won't pay half the childcare costs. Presumably they are not his children?