Think my marriage is over, not sure I can afford to leave though?

Gin_and_Milk

Happier_Me wrote: »

One of the hardest things to do on threads like these is to weedle out the responses that either offer really rubbish 'advice' or are very emotive/destructive/hurtful. Personally OP I wouldn't respond to the posts that fall into the latter category. Concentrate on the posts that help you resolve the problem.

You have absolutely every right to be angry. It's a repeat offence, you are married and financially linked and you're not pi$$ING your own wages up the wall. If my husband ran up debts of this nature just once I'd remove certain body parts and add them to a stew, which he'd eat as part of my money saving plan to get us back on track... so maybe I'm a financial abuser too! Personally I'd call it being a grown up and taking responsibility for your joint finances.

The only thing that I'd suggest you do is work out a budget - SOA - ensuring the contributions you are both making are fair and you have a similar amount of disposable income each month.

Thanks for that, and you're right about the destructive responses, I don't this I'll ever understand the logic behind some people's behaviour, but having read their responses to other people's posts it just seems to be what they do!


We have agreed to sit down over the weekend and go through our finances properly, I'm going to look into this SOA thing, as it's cropped up a few times on this thread. No doubt I'll find something on the 'debt free wannabe' section of the forum.
Thanks again

PeacefulWaters

Gin_and_Milk wrote: »

We have agreed to sit down over the weekend and go through our finances properly

You've done this before. Are you confident of a different result?

I still think the pair of you would benefit massively from joint counselling. It may give him the confidence to highlight things that he hasn't done before, or help him identify his real reason for reckless spending without consultation.

Gin_and_Milk

pearl123 wrote: »

Clearly, he has mental health issues. Get him to the GP for some treatment/ councilling. If he can't control his spending then perhaps you should give him an allowance.

His mental health issues are pretty much well under control. He isn't eligible for counselling (he has had it in the past) and I doubt he'd ask anyway given that there's a very good chance he'd been seen by former colleagues. His main health issue now is that he has a spinal condition which is now exacerbated by arthritis. Understandably this is getting him down, but we've got an appointment on Monday so fingers crossed we'll get somewhere.


I really don't want to take control of his finances, although I fully understand where you're coming from. I'd feel awful giving him an allowance.

Gin_and_Milk

PeacefulWaters wrote: »

You've done this before. Are you confident of a different result?

I still think the pair of you would benefit massively from joint counselling. It may give him the confidence to highlight things that he hasn't done before, or help him identify his real reason for reckless spending without consultation.

The aim at the weekend is to come up with an actual plan which he has been loathe to do before, however he agrees now that it's a good idea. He's a bit unsure about counselling at the moment and wants to see how things pan out with our plan (whatever that might be). I think the reason he's reluctant is down to embarrassment as much as anything.


I'm hopeful of a different result, which may or may not answer your question, but yes, trust is a big issue in any marriage.

fairy_lights

Gin_and_Milk wrote: »

The aim at the weekend is to come up with an actual plan which he has been loathe to do before, however he agrees now that it's a good idea. He's a bit unsure about counselling at the moment and wants to see how things pan out with our plan (whatever that might be). I think the reason he's reluctant is down to embarrassment as much as anything.


I'm hopeful of a different result, which may or may not answer your question, but yes, trust is a big issue in any marriage.

Does he know how close this has driven you to ending the marriage? Perhaps that will shock him in to taking a bit more responsibility for himself.

PeacefulWaters

Gin_and_Milk wrote: »

The aim at the weekend is to come up with an actual plan which he has been loathe to do before, however he agrees now that it's a good idea. He's a bit unsure about counselling at the moment and wants to see how things pan out with our plan (whatever that might be). I think the reason he's reluctant is down to embarrassment as much as anything.

I'm hopeful of a different result, which may or may not answer your question, but yes, trust is a big issue in any marriage.

Counsellors are rarely judgemental. Their skill when dealing with a couple tends to be on opening new dialogue to help understand and deal with matters.

He may feel embarrassed and you may feel frustrated as hell. But getting away from blame, finding common ground and an environment to say what needs saying (both ways, you may end up being shocked by his unspoken words when he finally lets them out) should be of benefit to you both.

Whatever happens, best wishes from me.

Ames

Counselling doesn't have to be on the NHS - I'm having it through a charity.

When you do the SOA you need to make sure it's realistic. I'd suggest that you don't do it this weekend, but do it in a month or two and in the meantime keep a spending diary. It's usually a real eye opener, and if he doesn't know where the debt was built up it was probably an extra pound or two here, a fiver there, which all add up.

It also needs to have fun/hobby stuff built in. Not a few hundred for a new guitar every month, but an allowance for each of you. And I think you need to let him have input into the new budget. If it's something that's imposed and which is too strict then he's really not going to stick to it.

Perhaps spend a bit of time browsing the debt free wannabe board on here for an idea of what should be in a budget. It's common for people to work out a budget and on paper have a massive surplus, but they've forgotten the insurance that's due in a couple of months, or haircuts, or a yearly magazine subscription...

runninglea

The same happened to me a few years ago, the only way I found out was when I had a letter sent to our home saying I had agreed to go as guarantee on a loan with advent loans. The amount was 15K at 39.9% apr.

Before giving her the letter and asking about it, I did a credit check on her as we were due to remortgage to a better rate. There were three c/c, two loans, argos card, next card etc - 19K in total.

We did separate for a bit but the children would have ended up with neither parent owning a house etc.

We are still together but no credit cards are held by either of us - the mortgage is getting paid off (again), I've become slightly obsessive about it by paying off in 100 payments.

We remortgaged and even took 7K extra for a fantastic holiday.

The children are happy even though our relationship has lost some trust etc as I still don't know what the money went on. If we do split up then at least we tried to save the marriage

Tabbytabitha

Gin_and_Milk wrote: »

His mental health issues are pretty much well under control. He isn't eligible for counselling (he has had it in the past) and I doubt he'd ask anyway given that there's a very good chance he'd been seen by former colleagues. His main health issue now is that he has a spinal condition which is now exacerbated by arthritis. Understandably this is getting him down, but we've got an appointment on Monday so fingers crossed we'll get somewhere.


I really don't want to take control of his finances, although I fully understand where you're coming from. I'd feel awful giving him an allowance.

Only if you consider that his mental health is a separate issue from his spending, which several of us don't. If he would benefit from counselling then get it for him rather than waiting for the NHS to provide it, you're in the fortunate position of having money in the bank to pay for it.

Gin_and_Milk

fairy_lights wrote: »

Does he know how close this has driven you to ending the marriage? Perhaps that will shock him in to taking a bit more responsibility for himself.

Whilst I don't want to keep ramming it down his throat, I think he does realise. Whilst there hasn't been the tears this time, I think the fact there is 28k in the bank is definitely at the forefront of his mind.