Unsupportive spouse?

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Anyone starting or in Nursing School and their spouse isn't supportive? My husband is trying to ruin me going to school from ever angle. Anyone else dealt with or dealing with this? He makes it nearly impossible for me to go to class without an argument and we have 3 children so he always uses them as an excuse.

It is sorta crazy how this thread turned into a thread on abuse. Listen what one women can handle another maybe can't. To each is own. It isn't as simple as just leaving..there are kids involved. She is trying to do this after having all of the kids. Was this discussed when they got married and after the kids? Maybe he would have been more supportive if you wouldn't have had the kids first. The grass isn't always greener on the other side. There are nurses that hate their jobs...their kids are running amok while they are working their 12 hr shifts and they are just plain miserable. I hope you have a great system in place if you decide to leave this man. Think it through thoroughly because if there is no real abuse and you are doing this for the wrong reasons, you and your kids will suffer down the road. Money doesn't fix everything. A stable home for the kids is priceless and if you have enough money to live comfortably then learn to be happy. Just so you know a job can be like a marriage and a marriage like a job. If you want out of this without giving it your all..who is to say you won't feel the same way when you start working as a nurse and the stress starts getting to you? Seems like everything was ok before because you kept having his kids. Why wasn't he a problem after the first or second one? Now all of a sudden things are an issue..hmm. Now you want him to change so you can go to nursing school but you didn't ask him to change after the first child, lol. Wow!

Like someone else said before. You don't know what I've asked of him. So you can keep your "wows" and snarky comments. You have no advice, so why comment? To try and make me feel bad for having more kids with him? Things aren't black and white dear.

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There are two sides to every story and I don't see this as abuse. I see it as two people having money problems but knee deep in kids and not having a family support system, hence why he keeps telling her to work and not work. I would never tell someone to stay in an abusive marriage but I don't think she is being totally honest.

For the record we do not have money problems!!! He makes more than enough to support us.

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Honestly her post has many contradictions. One minute she can't take it anymore due to the abuse..next she is going to wait it out. Either you are abused and need to get away asap or you are not and are just making this thing up. What if you wait too long and can't get away?...that is if you are really being abused. It has been long enough and you should know by now. There are shelters everywhere.

I never said I was being abused, the people who commented said it sounded like abuse. Read my post I never said I was abused.

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Usually in an abusive situation we advise the woman to leave, with the kids, and go stay with family or in a shelter if they have no other choices.

It is really hard to kick an abusive spouse out of the house.

But again, I'm not convinced by this one-sided story that there is abuse going on. If there is OP, then leave.

Never said I was abused.

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Just another of the many reasons not to start having sex, moving in together, and generally getting overly involved and entangled way too soon, as has become the norm in our society. Taking things slow gives you the time to see these things and react appropriately instead of ending up trapped because you're already knocked up and sharing a lease before you figure out who they really are.

Boy am I glad I waited a few years before we got married.... Dating someone for years, you can still be blindsided by the real them.

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The problem occurred after he asked her to start working and couldn't figure out that she couldn't telepathically start dinner, do laundry and care for the children at home while physically at work. Then he becomes upset and gets her to quit. And then wants her to work, but not get the schooling that would improve her job prospects. If you note, she was happy as a SAHM. He was the one that wants her to work and nags whether she works or not.

Second, they have had several children in a short period of time. She didn't make them by herself, so he certainly has a responsibility to help raise them, upon occasion clean up after them and feed them. If he doesn't want more children at this time, then HE should be discussing it with her and HE should take precautions not to have more. Condoms are cheap and do not require a prescription, risk cancer, cause damage to internal organs, increase risks of strokes or DVTs, and he can't claim that he was "set up" if a baby shows up.

And if he wants her to work or not work, once the decision is made, he needs to stop nagging and do his share of cooking, cleaning and childcare, without any complaint. She has done what he wished, he has no right to be angry at anyone but himself.

I believe that he thought that housework and childcare was easy until he had to do it.

He still lies and says it's easy.

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Specializes in hospice.
Boy am I glad I waited a few years before we got married.... Dating someone for years, you can still be blindsided by the real them.

Only if you're not paying attention.

He still lies and says it's easy.

Jeez, you really married a child. But, you're here defending your marriage and say you have no intention of leaving. So, I think until your kids are older and more self sufficient, you're not going to be able to do nursing school.

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He isn't supporting me financially through school.

Pffft, he sounds like a grrrrrreat catch Here's to 20 more years of eye rolls.

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Sometimes people change. I met my XH when we were both 21. By the time we hit our thirties and had three kids, we had both changed more than I think either of us expected. Sometimes what works well for you in your twenties doesn't work as well with life stress added to the mix. I didn't realize my ex was controlling with *his* money until I didn't have any of my own. We were too young and dumb to have some of those tough conversations that maybe we should have had to be sure we were on the same page. My XH is also an alcoholic and changed considerably when he quit drinking. Again, I didn't realize the extent of it until he hit his rock bottom and I had already invested several years into the relationship. I honestly didn't have high enough standards for myself at the time and I accepted a lot of behaviors that my older self wouldn't dream of tolerating. That's how people end up married to people they shouldn't. We chose the path of least resistance - get married or break up. There wasn't ever anything so obviously bad that breaking up seemed like a better choice. So we got married, had a couple of kids, and my going back to school ended up being just one part of the catalyst that finally did us in.

I saw some red flags before we got married but I chose to ignore them because I wasn't confident enough to prefer being single over being married to the wrong guy. So there are a lot of reasons why smart women don't choose the right guy. You can never know the whole story just by reading a few posts on the internet.

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Specializes in Adult and Pediatric Vascular Access, Paramedic.

Your husband sounds controlling! Please keep going to nursing school so you can support yourself and children if need be!

Annie

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Done counseling, he's been trying to force me to work since I had our first child, I got a job selling cars and he quickly started complaining about how I wasn't home to cook or take care of the kids because I was working 10-12 hours a day. Every time I've gotten a job I've quit because of his complaining. He wants the money from me working, he just doesn't want me to work the actual hours because I won't be home to cook him dinner or watch the kids. Lol it's not because our kids are young, it's because he's selfish. He knew I wanted to go to school and we agreed I would be a stay at home mom, none of this was sprung on him.

you have to pick one or the other. You can't be a stay at home mom and a full time nursing student. Nursing school is easily as intensive as a full time job.

my sister in law just finished her first year of nursing school, she and my brother have 4 children ages 4-14 (the 8 year old is a type 1 diabetic which is a very difficult wrench in family life). Even with my brother being fully on board and supportive she needed me, and my parents, to fill in the gaps for childcare, and even then there were days were she just got overwhelmed. Sick calls from school, the diabetic kid has extensive medical appointments frequently, if he's the sick kid it's even worse, a freshman son flunking classes, the worst winter on record, multiple snow days for kids, and unexpected medical concerns for herself. She did well, and is halfway done her program, but it wasn't easy.

If your your husband is not on board, and you have no other support, you are not going to do well. Your kids are so young, they are very needy. Personally, in your situation, I would put off school until either you have more support (not just your husband, but other support as well) or your kids are all in school full time. Your situation now is setting you up for failure. In nursing school there is no second change, you fail you are out, period.

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I've seen this so many times, nurses leave as soon as nursing school is over. It's like you are using your husband to reach your goals only to dispose of him after. My advice is to leave ASAP if that's your intention, don't use him to further your career.

Wow... kind of how I've been feeling this first quarter.

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