I married a sexist.
When my husband and I got married, his wealthy grandfather gave us $60,000 for a down payment so that we could purchase a home- which we did.
My husband and I both work full time.
I have a daughter- I pay for her daycare (which is pretty much half of my paycheck), I have her on my health insurance plan. I pay for half of the groceries, all of the toiletries (shampoo, paper towels, TP, soap, laundry detergent), and all of the expenses for my daughter (camps, clothing, etc…). I will usually pay one of the bills of the household (electricity, or something), sometimes two of the bills depending on how much my husband bonuses for that month. I pay for my own gas, and if there are holidays/birthdays, I buy the gifts (this goes for birthday parties, Christmas for my family and his, birthdays for my family and his). Additionally, I pay for my own student loans every month (my only debt).
My husband makes more than I do, and used a large chunk of our wedding-gift money, as well as additional money from his grandfather to pay off his $15,000 in credit card debt (he is now completely debt free). He pays the majority of the bills around the house- he pays mortgage, half of the grocery bill (his half is more of larger chunks- we will go grocery shopping one big trip per month and he will pay for that- my half is more spread out- completing meals on a day to day basis type of thing), and the rest of the household bills that I don’t pay for. He pays for his own cell phone bill and his own car insurance (I am on my parent’s cell plan still and my parent’s car insurance and they don’t charge us for that). He spends a lot more money than I do on his own stuff- he plays video games and buys those, he drinks regularly, he uses chewing tobacco. He pays for his own gas. We have a savings account- that is leftover money from i-bonds his grandfather gave to him. My husband also usually pays for us to go out to dinner, see movies, and recently paid for a vacation we have planned in May to Disneyland (which is like 3k).
If I were to lose my job tomorrow, he could probably afford all the bills and grocery on his own. We’d have to cut back on going out to dinner/eating out and stuff like that- but the only place we would be REALLY hurting is health insurance for my daughter and I. So I keep working. I like working. I was a stay at home parent for the first 2 years of my daughter’s life (stayed at home when I lived with her dad, when I loved out and lived with my parents, and while I went back to school)- and I hated it.
So that is the basic financial situation my husband and I are in. Very little debt, we have a nice chunk of money in savings for a “just in case” fund, we have a house that we have $63K in equity in. We both work full time.
Hourly- I work Monday through Friday, get paid for 40 hours per week. My daughter’s daycare is near my work, so I do all the driving and pick-up for her (my husband works further away so him driving to daycare wouldn’t make any sense). We usually leave the house at 6:45am, I drop her off at daycare, and I am at work by 8. In the evening there is more traffic- I leave my work at 5, pick her up at 5:20ish, and we don’t get home until 6:30 (sometimes later depending on traffic). I also do all the putting of my daughter to bed (bath time, reading a book, tucking her in). Her bedtime is 8:30pm.
My Husband works from 6:30-4 on Tuesday and Wednesday, 10-7 on Thursday and Friday, and 6:30-6 on Saturday. He usually leaves the house an hour before his scheduled time, and returns an hour after his scheduled time depending on traffic. He works downtown in the city, so sometimes he sits in traffic for longer.
The problem is this: My husband expects me to do all of the cleaning in the house. All of the dishes, all of the laundry, all of the picking up garbage, vacuuming, sweeping, cleaning the bathrooms, etc… He is willing to take out the trash- and he only does so when the bin is VERY full and heavy and smells like garbage. My husband will sometimes cook when he gets home before I do- he expects me to do all of the cleaning up afterwards, save leftovers. He wants me to make him lunches.
I will try to do this stuff- but without his help, it becomes too much of a burden. For example, last week on Monday, I loaded the dishes before I went to bed. Last week, my daughter did a camp and he got home before me every single night that week- he didn’t unload the dishes once, and now our sink is full of dirty dishes. He chews, and will leave can after can of chew spit all over our living room table. He refuses to eat in the dining room with my daughter and I- and will leave his dirty dishes all over the living room table. He drinks- and will leave shot glasses, empty cups, and cups full of soda in the living room. We have a laundry basket in our bedroom full of dirty laundry. His clothes won’t even make it in there- he leaves them in a pile in the living room, where he takes them off and runs around the house in his underwear and a tank-top. He will leave poop stains all over in the toilet and expect me to clean it. One time, he woke up in the middle of the night drunk, and peed in the cat box. He left it for 2 days until I finally screamed at him about how unsanitary and gross that was, and I ended up having to clean it up (my daughter and I used the other bathroom).
There are weekends in which I have cleaned the whole weekend- only to come home on Monday to find that…and I just give up. I leave dishes in the living room too. I won’t unload the dishwasher either.
This will usually go on for about a week, then he will get PISSED at me all of a sudden. Calls me ungrateful, tells me that he pays for everything and I provide nothing and won’t even clean for him. He says that I don’t discipline my child enough and she acts like a brat, so that is all my fault too. He accuses me of being lazy, not paying attention in life, and being a greedy gold-digging wife. Last night, I went to bed at 10, and he stayed up until 2. He sent me 13 text messages at 1:45 am that I found this morning about how I do nothing, provide nothing, and am an ungrateful wife. He says that since he is spending his inheritance on me (the money for the home, and i-bonds were pieces of his inheritance from his grandfather- his dad died when he was 11, so all of his grandfather’s money is going to be split between him and his aunt), I should do all of the cleaning of the home.
I feel that he is being sexist. Before we got married, we lived in a condo, and had the same problems. He expected me to do all the cleaning of the condo and would go off on me for being lazy and ungrateful and how he did everything and I didn’t do anything.
Additionally, he thinks that I have a “cushy” and easy job, and that he works so much harder than I do. I am a LPN at a community health center. He is an assistant manager at an auto shop. While I don’t doubt that he deals with customers who are pissed off all the time and he works very hard- I deal with people who have no money, are sick and cranky, and get treated like crap on a daily basis by patients. I literally have to clean up other people’s vomit, hold children down and give them shots (and have gotten kicked and hit and one time bitten at work), and I deal with patients on a daily basis with severe psychological problems. I might get bank holidays off, but my job is NOT easy, and it is really demeaning when he acts like I have a job that a monkey could do.
I don’t even want to hear, “well you need to talk to him and tell him how you feel.” Seriously- this is all people ever tell me when I complain. Do you think for one minute that I haven’t talked to him? I have talked, I have texted him, I have e-mailed him. He will say “sorry” for acting the way that he does, but it goes in one ear and out the other. Two days later, he behaves the same way. It is so frustrating. He REALLY FEELS the way he acts, which is why I could talk until I am blue in the face about how his behavior makes me feel, how it is sexist, how it is demeaning and hurtful…he refuses to listen, and he refuses to change his stance.
I just need to vent right now. I have no intention of leaving right this second and uprooting my life and my daughter’s. I am so TIRED though. I just need to vent. And hugs. There are never enough hugs. :(
