Income disparity in marriage

[BluEyeL]

I don't know if he feels resentful. I don't think he had to pay for much at all for my son so far. I don't have lots of savings outside of college and retirement accounts that are well funded, but I could pay for me and son even if sometimes I didn't feel I would have made a decision to go on a trip if it weren't for my FI for example, or to buy something and it was a stretch for me doing so. I also have a fully funded college account for my son, so I hope it'll be no issue with the college it's going to be enough to cover all 4 years.

 

If he'll feel resentful in the future we will talk about it hopefully and see how it goes, maybe make changes, but for now, we'll just commingle the way we agreed. I actually brought up a couple of times possible resentments regarding my son and expenses for him and FI said that he considers us a package deal and he doesn't care if he pays for him at one time or another. Which didn't really happen much yet, but yeah, with the comingling, if we subtract what my son costs, it makes my net contribution less than my actual income. If he's counting it that way and feels resentful it would be too bad but if he tells me we'll discuss. Like I said he says he doesn't feel that way. But sometimes he says things to be nice. Maybe he feels resentful but he doesn't think it's a nice feeling or something.

 

However, his name is on both the family and my account, so it's not like I keep anything from him. I'm fine with not being on his account although it would have been nice to have that trust. It's not like I'd go and spend a penny from there with no permission. But I understand baggage.

[BluEyeL]

Your ex-husband sounds horrible. It's already bad to have an affair, much worse with a student!

 

Nevertheless, I wanted to point out that it's really much easier for the one without power to feel the dynamics or the power imbalance.

Yeah, not that I excuse my ex-husband's behavior, but I didn't really understand his inferiority complex. I kept telling him we are a team and nobody cares who makes more and blah blah blah

 

He was a bad husband and a bad father nevertheless, and whatever the reason behind it, it doesn't matter. We met young, we evolved differently.

 

I was also reflecting the other day. I met my former Ph.D. advisor in D.C. a week or so ago and she told me about her two sons and their wives and also about a former fellow Ph.D. student and his wife. Well, neither one of these young men with great careers married career women. I was thinking about it from the point of view of my experiences with my first marriage where me being "better" in one way or another in my career was a huge issue. Men do identify with their work and how much money they make. If it bothers me a little to have less power now, although I personally think it's a great problem to have as a woman that also has her own money, I imagine that it's damn hard for many men to cope with income disparity.