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What I’m saying is that you’ve done all this stuff for a while so adding more doesn’t seem crazy to her. I would not have let it get to the point where I was doing 2-3 week long things each year. If I didn’t live close by then either a week at a holiday OR a week of vacation would be ok.
Similar - when I didn't show up to places. My wife would find an excuse. He's sick or something else. I told her just tell them I couldn't make it. They can think I'm a #### - I don't care at this point
Yes, we have multiple kids (to summarize, we both were married before and each had kids and then we had one together). The in laws lived in town and moved away when the kids were in middle school or elementary school. There is only one kid left in the house as the others are in or are done with college.RUSF18 said:
Money is an issue with most couples, and it's more of what to do WITH the money than not having money. We have always had a weird finance system in my house, as there has been child support involved so there has never been a simple accounting method. I have always pushed for a system where all money goes into a joint account and all bills should be paid from said account.Bull Dozier said:
I guess it depends if you believe couples have individual funds or not.
This ties in to what I was trying to describe. She calls the money she spends to go away "her money." I call it "our money." For example, I would choose to travel less and save that money for other things (retirement, save for new vehicles, home appliances, rainy day / emergency fund, etc.). To her credit, she is getting paid anyway when she is away, so the expense is the cost of the trip. In my case, I LOSE the money I would have made by going away (in addition to whatever the travel expenses are). Not really sure I can negotiate something where I agree to go away more if she agrees to pay more bills because I am not working. I can pretty much tell that isn't going to fly.
As you've described it right here, money dooesn't have to be tight in order to have marital money problems. I've been married for 16+ years, and we started living paycheck to paycheck, and have progressed to being "comfortable." We've always had money problems, the conversation is just different. But, being on different pages is a problem no matter the amount of money your disagreeing on.
There isn't exactly buckets of money. But to answer your question, she has her account and I have mine. There is no joint account. It's pretty straight forward. We took all our bills and divided up who pays what. She pays bills 1-20. I pay bills 21-40. The piles are roughly equal in terms of total cost. There are times when she has a minimal surplus (like in winter as fuel is in her category) and times when she has huge surpluses (like when she gets her annual bonus or summer when there are no fuel costs). I have times when I scrape by (slow periods for work) and times where I can live high on the hog (lots of work to do). Overall, she generally will have a bigger surplus at the end of the year than I will, however.
This. Go get some premarital counseling. You really need it.
Same situation for me. Although, I'd say WAY too much re: my MIL.
Second marriages come with different issues than first marriages. Twice as many parents, twice as many families to deal with, step-kid issues, child support, etc.
By "buckets" I meant the Your Money bucket, Her Money bucket, and Our money bucket, not as in Piles o Cash, just to clarify.
I suspect we are not alone in trying to make a better budget plan. But that is hard to do when people are not on the same page. For example, last time we reviewed the budget and there was discussion on what should be eliminated, "shoes and hand bags" were not open for debate. Neither were "trips and outings" to see her family. But CLEARLY me grabbing a sandwich for lunch could easily be eliminated (but her lunch budget shouldn't change). Maybe things work differently in other households, but in my house things that should be no brainers are anything but.By "buckets" I meant the Your Money bucket, Her Money bucket, and Our money bucket, not as in Piles o Cash, just to clarify.
If you are each paying a relatively similar amount of bills, I'm confused on how her travel choices when you are not with her count as her spending joint money? Maybe it is more complicated, but if that is all you are budgeting, maybe it is just not a sophisticated enough plan.
I don't think a single person is siding with your wife here, and it's pretty rare that you won't get at least a couple token dissenters to the OP in threads like these. That's how ridiculous the 4-6 weeks/1K miles away thing is.
Got it. If we are moving on to the swimsuit competition, I'm not going to fare any better in that area either.
A small part of me is jealous at this, but I have a hard time believing your wife is okay with this. It's just not hard to smile and placate for a couple of days to make my wife happy.None. They live in Milwaukee and I live far enough away. They are very kind and generous folks to a fault. Even when I go to Milwaukee, I stay at a hotel and let Mrs. O hang out with them and I do my own thing. She’s headed to Milwaukee this Wednesday to see them. I’m heading to Vegas on Friday. Who’s got the better trip?
This is also what premarital counseling is for. Learning to negotiate this stuff is important. This should have been sorted ages ago. Leaving it to fester is just not good.
Preaching to the choir. I have asked for this several times over the years but some of us don't believe in counseling / therapy.
Don't get me wrong, I totally get that. My wife and I aren't on the same page, but fortunately she knows she's not good with money, so all of our income goes into my account, and I give her an equal amount of spending money as I get on a weekly basis. We can do whatever with that money. It is a blessing and a curse that she is not good with money. Its good that she knows it and lets me drive that ship for the most part. But it has taken a long time to get there, and obviously most couples aren't going to have one person willing to totally conceed that control.
She wishes things were different as do I, but they are old and I’ve never really had much to say to them. Maybe it’s different for me since my parents were both out of the picture by the time I was 17. I just fixed tech stuff when I was at their house only to find out they blew it up after I left. Just felt disrespected enough and their solution to everything is to throw money at it or ignore it all together.
Due to the language filter, I initially read this as a very offensive expression. I think we need to bring the naughty back so this kind of thing doesn't happen again.
Being joined at the hip is one thing - to fly in to the town where your inlaws live and stay in a hotel and do other stuff while your spouse visits is just weird. Osaurus has since given his explanation and I won’t question him - he said he felt disrespected so I get that part but he also referred to them as generous to a fault. It’s his wife’s parent - I think you have to spend some time with them.
This is the primary reason i am not still married. My ex-wife refused this as well. She has been trying to get back with me for years. IMO she blew her chance and i moved on. If you believe you need it, stand up for yourself.
She works in case management for a FORTUNE 100 healthcare / managed care company. She works two 8 hour days and two 12 hour days a week. Here is one example of how things are stressful.
Right. Not trying to criticize Osaurus here, but about 6 months ago my wife did something very disrespectful towards me that I probably won't "get over" for a long time. However, I still wouldn't think about staying somewhere else. I still see her as much. I'm still pleasant (although I don't start conversations with her and ignore her whenever I can). She's still a great grandmother to my kids and she's still family. Staying somewhere else just seems weird.
It’s actually pretty awesome. I get to see my friends, go to the “scary places” they won’t ever go to, and not sit around all day and wait to drive a freakin hour one way to some mediocre old person restaurant. It’s mostly the boredom that does me in (among other things).
I hear you. Like I said previously a part of me is jealous. Please don't take offense to anything I've said as I'm not trying to offend you. You've just made a choice I've genuinely never even contemplated as an option for my situation.
No offense taken and don’t be jealous. I put up with it for a long time and finally lost my cool after a trip I would describe as awful for all of us. I do remain remorseful for that and have told them so. I realized that I simply don’t want to put up with their bad behavior, narrow minded views of others, and a general lack of empathy for most who don’t see things the way they do.
I can't stay with my in-laws. She loves wind chimes. I can hear them EVERYWHERE. Drives me nuts. And the music-playing and chiming clocks. We have plans for that clock to become warm, close, personal friends with a shotgun eventually.
certainly appropriate for this situation. 
