# Seeking anonymous wisdom on a broad range of topics



## JerryWylder

I have been married to my wife 14 years, and we have three kids (Infant to elementary school in spread). Overall, for the majority of our married/family life we've been happy. But there are a broad range of stressors that I don't know how to wrap my head around and overcome, so I am here to vent about them or read about similar situations to glean whatever insight I can.

Some more detail on the broad range of stressors:
-My career has probably been the biggest strain on our family life because we have to move around a lot (every 2-3 years) and I am gone frequently for months to a year at a time, usually overseas. The combination of frequent moves and my frequent absence has challenged my wife and kids. They finally decided enough was enough and have homesteaded in her hometown to be close to extended family. Hometown is a minimum of 3 1/2 hrs away from anywhere I can be stationed - luckily I am currently at that closest posting. This means we are now geographically separated for the remainder of my current career, at least six years. I'll likely have a thread or two with details, seeking advice in a couple of related matters.

-Our third child was a surprise baby, after we had said two was plenty. This was despite Wife having an IUD. Thankfully a happy and healthy baby, but I am still coming to terms with having a third kid when I was DONE before.

-Been struggling with my porn addiction and its occasional impact on our relationship.

Looking forward to chatting more soon.


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## ccpowerslave

Welcome!


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## Sfort

Be prepared for some very honest answers. They are meant to help, not hurt. 

Your wife made a smart decision to live near family in your absence.
You value your career more than your marriage.
You have a third child. Get used to it. 
The porn addiction can be solved today. Stop it.


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## JerryWylder

Sfort said:


> Be prepared for some very honest answers. They are meant to help, not hurt.


I hear you. Thanks for the heads up. I will be looking for varied perspectives to help me try to frame my point of view differently. I already am hoping to approach the stated situations with the goal of "how do I fix myself?" not "how do I manipulate my family?".

The way I see it, I am at a crossroads. I either take conscious steps to bring myself back closer to my wife, and family more generally, or I tuck tail and run. 

We got to where we are with mostly open discussion and deliberate joint decision making. I am putting career first for now because I am just six years short of a lucrative pension and healthcare that means a giant step closer to financial security for my family for the rest of our lives. I understand Wife's desire for stability for herself and the kids, but that decision happened right when I was going to have three full years "home," not gone on travel.

But now I feel like I'm getting into a bit more detail than I was originally going to in an intro thread. In the next few days I'll be starting a thread that dives into the details and nuances. In the meantime I'm browsing the rest of the forum to see what answers may already be out there.

Thanks for the welcomes!


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## Sfort

JerryWylder said:


> I am putting career first for now because I am just six years short of a lucrative pension and healthcare that means a giant step closer to financial security for my family for the rest of our lives.


What if, in six years, you have no family for which to provide financial security? You're in a marriage. A decision of this magnitude has to be a joint decision. You don't get to make it on your own and keep everything else as is. 

Do spend some time reading posts here. There are many. You should find them helpful.


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## CatholicDad

Money isn’t everything. I’d probably get a job at Walmart if I had to before I’d live apart from my wife and kids. I’d expect if you’re valued at job A it wouldn’t take long to be valued at job B. Hard and conscientious workers are always valued.


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## Sfort

CatholicDad said:


> Hard and conscientious workers are always valued.


[THREADJACK]
Not true. Not even remotely. They should be valued.
[/THREADJACK]


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## JerryWylder

CatholicDad said:


> Money isn’t everything. I’d probably get a job at Walmart if I had to before I’d live apart from my wife and kids. I’d expect if you’re valued at job A it wouldn’t take long to be valued at job B. Hard and conscientious workers are always valued.


While there is something to be said about the "money isn't everything" argument, in my case Wife made decisions along the way that come with a certain price tag that a Walmart job won't cover (a pricy mortgage primarily). Additionally, I have a complex bordering on compulsion or phobia when it comes to financial security after my childhood; my parents were notoriously cavalier about jumping into a new career life with no safety net, and while I still never wanted for anything, I saw the struggle and I foresee their lack of retirement funds becoming a burden for my brother and me in the mid-range future. I find it difficult to throw away a guaranteed pension and healthcare I'll be drawing from starting at the young age of 42. 

That and I have some excessive sense of duty to my country competing with duty to family; it wasn't (much of) an issue for the first decade of my career, but has grown in tension over the last ~four years.



Sfort said:


> What if, in six years, you have no family for which to provide financial security?


To provide more fidelity on this question, and not to make any life-altering decisions, is the primary reason I am here. As my post alluded to, I am struggling with a multifarious situation and the job and geographic separation are only one piece.

I'm continuing to read through the broad range of posts that address facets of my situation to see what others are going through while I try to formulate an initial set of questions of my own.

Thanks to both of you for your insights

P.S.


Sfort said:


> [THREADJACK]
> Not true. Not even remotely. They should be valued.
> [/THREADJACK]


I second this opinion, as it is demonstrated regularly even in my current occupation, and as I've witnessed through several friends who I know are among the hardest working and competent in their various fields.


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## CatholicDad

You’re primary duty is to your wife and kids and not just bankrolling them.

If you’re in the military I know of a lot of vets well rewarded/employed in the business world. Their leadership skills are hard to find. I think you’d do better than you think.Lots of “remote” jobs are opening up permanently after Covid too.


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## NTA

How many years to 42? I would tough it out. 42 is still young these days and having 2 pension sources will make things easier.

When your kids reach an age at which they can understand the importance of having a pension or two, you can explain to them. Tune out the hyperboles like "working for Walmart." There are better ways you can take a cut in pay if you have to.


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## CountryMike

CatholicDad said:


> Money isn’t everything. I’d probably get a job at Walmart if I had to before I’d live apart from my wife and kids. I’d expect if you’re valued at job A it wouldn’t take long to be valued at job B. Hard and conscientious workers are always valued.


You're W would leave you at Walmart, too, unless in a Walmart regional management office.


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## NTA

CountryMike said:


> You're W would leave you at Walmart, too, unless in a Walmart regional management office.


A cousin quit working for Walmart. She was in corporate accounts which entailed traveling around to corporate offices and recruiting them. Walmart would not pay for the gas nor for the time it took to drive to these companies.

yay for American capitalism. It does a good job in screwing the little guy.


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## CatholicDad

CountryMike said:


> You're W would leave you at Walmart, too, unless in a Walmart regional management office.


Hypothetically, I actually think my wife would think I was a hero if I left my career behind to live with her and raise my kids.

I’d think any wife would have a MUCH greater chance of leaving a hubby who’s never around. I’m sure every dude in town would be coming around trying to chat my beautiful wife up- if I were continually gone on work.


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## D0nnivain

Welcome to TAM. I'm relatively new around these parts too. 

This is what I see: 

A 14 year marriage​​You being gone a lot & you two now being 3 hours apart (which is close for you)​​Her homesteading where she grew up for family support​​You needing 6 more years to get security​
Honestly I think if you have done it for 14 you can do it for 6 more. At 3 hours apart you should be able to see each other every weekend. Assuming you are in the military, talk to your commanding officer about family support back home your wife can access. 

Be happy she's found support & made a stable home for your kids. Support her in that. Do help her to reach out to access the available support. 

Find things do to to keep you close. Daily video calls. Use technology to watch TV or movies together. There's some commercial for a service where the kids ask their grandpa to watch cartoons together. Maybe pick a children's book like _Alice in Wonderland_, the _Wind & the Willows_, _Black Beauty_, the _Hobbit_ or one of the Harry Potter books & read it as a family. Make it like your own family book club. Read a chapter per week then talk about it with the kids. 

Do not underestimate the importance of actual letters on paper mailed to the house with a stamp. They are so much more thoughtful and tangible than emails or texts but do have a steady supply of those.


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## Al_Bundy

It sounds like she was there from the beginning, so she knew what she was signing up for, but probably didn't realize how hard it would be. You've made it this far so you should stick it out for another 6 years. You don't know what the future holds. The last thing you want to do is quit now and then divorce in two years and be stuck with the "Walmart" job others have mentioned.


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## DownByTheRiver

What you need to be honest with yourself about and think long and hard about is this:

How do you think you would get along if you were back home permanently day in and day out and the children? I mean, sometimes not being there much is a lot easier to maintain a jovial relationship when you are there. So think about whether you really think being together full time would enrich both your lives and make you get along better or if you'll likely get sick of each other and just have more disagreements and arguing. Bear in mind that she has been making her own decisions and running the family her way because she had to and is capable of it, so the transition can't include you stepping in and taking over and doing things differently to the point it upsets the whole balance of the household. You will have to support HER decisions about the kids. 

So try to be realistic, and I think once you have thought about it from your own perspective, then you need to ask her that same question: Do you really think being back together full time will cause less conflict and bring more joy and make life easier, or do you think it will bring more domestic strife.

I agree she made the right decision to stay where she has support. She has a lot to handle. You'll need to discuss whether she will go to work outside the home and see if you both agree on whatever the answer to that is. If this does lead to divorce while you're stationed away, you will have a heavy financial burden until the kids are of age and even past that if you want them to attend college. If you come back and then that leads to divorce, the norm is you'd equally share custody -- and not just when it's convenient to both your work schedules, and she would have to start working as well. Either that or you both agree she gets the kids. If she IS working now, that's great. But if she's not, whatever happens, once child support payments expire, she will be in a real fix to support herself. So she needs to give this a lot of thought and you both need to work to establish something that can work into the future and not just put a bandaid on it.


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## JerryWylder

I'm heartened to see there are a broad range of opinions on what might work best in my current situation.

As a couple of people have pointed out, staying in my career for the six remaining years is a logical course of action. The pension and healthcare coverage I'll receive after equate to a world of flexibility with future career options. My wife has even halfway seriously said that I could be the part-time guy at the beer store downtown while she works on her second career (after a ~10 year hiatus from her first while doing the hardest job in the world).

The concerns that initially steered me to this message board won't necessarily go away if I pull the plug on this career and am back with my family full time doing something in or around our town. I could easily walk into a middle management job in any midsized company there with my resume/experience. My problem is that the idea of that makes me less happy than doing what I am doing, and I am still struggling with the idea of living in her hometown. I wasn't initially excited about buying the house there, and to put it in the bluntest terms, felt suckered into it. Note that the homebuying decision was independent of the decision for her to homestead there - ironically, the family living there is easier on the pocketbooks and makes it an easier pill for me to swallow than if we were struggling to rent it out. 

The bigger concern is that I struggle with wrapping my head around family life post-current career, going back and being a full time dad and husband. Up until recently, thoughts of splitting from my family were idle daydreaming or speculation; a sort of "what would life be like if I were single?" type of pondering. Then I had a bizarre dream a few weeks ago that stuck with me, and sent me down a spiral of more serious consideration about pursuing a split from my family. It wasn't so much the contents of the dream (which I'll spare you the details of), but the mindset in the dream and that stuck with me after that sent me down that rabbit hole. 

I think part of it is that I am unhappy with myself in the lack of effort I put into being a father; not necessarily the fact that I am away due to work, but how I am when I am with the family. I also feel a bit manipulated in a few decisions that I've made or almost made, from buying the aforementioned house to the direction I took my career. Not to mention that I feel like my wife's been gaslighting me (if so, maybe unintentionally) on those decisions - at the very least her memory of how the various discussions leading to decisions went down varies drastically from my own memory. That all has created a stew of mild discontent with my current state of affairs and a desire for change.

At this point I am afraid to mention where my head is at to my wife, because I don't want the ensuing conversation to spiral into ultimately bad decisions.

I am glad I've taken the time to read a number of threads here, as they've given me a glimpse in the looking glass. The desire to more seriously consider divorce or separation or whatever has abated somewhat already.

Is the above subject something I polish up, expand on and take to its own thread in the General Relationship Discussion? I'm considering doing so after a bit more self-reflection.


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## D0nnivain

I wouldn't share your fears with your wife before talking to a counselor. Many people worry about the transition to civilian life. Get a handle on it while reassuring your wife that you love her. 

Think back 14 years ago when your feet were on those yellow foot prints You feared you couldn't survive basic but you did. You can transition back & you will have help.


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## Sfort

JerryWylder said:


> I'm heartened to see there are a broad range of opinions on what might work best in my current situation.
> 
> As a couple of people have pointed out, staying in my career for the six remaining years is a logical course of action. The pension and healthcare coverage I'll receive after equate to a world of flexibility with future career options. My wife has even halfway seriously said that I could be the part-time guy at the beer store downtown while she works on her second career (after a ~10 year hiatus from her first while doing the hardest job in the world).
> 
> The concerns that initially steered me to this message board won't necessarily go away if I pull the plug on this career and am back with my family full time doing something in or around our town. I could easily walk into a middle management job in any midsized company there with my resume/experience. My problem is that the idea of that makes me less happy than doing what I am doing, and I am still struggling with the idea of living in her hometown. I wasn't initially excited about buying the house there, and to put it in the bluntest terms, felt suckered into it. Note that the homebuying decision was independent of the decision for her to homestead there - ironically, the family living there is easier on the pocketbooks and makes it an easier pill for me to swallow than if we were struggling to rent it out.
> 
> The bigger concern is that I struggle with wrapping my head around family life post-current career, going back and being a full time dad and husband. Up until recently, thoughts of splitting from my family were idle daydreaming or speculation; a sort of "what would life be like if I were single?" type of pondering. Then I had a bizarre dream a few weeks ago that stuck with me, and sent me down a spiral of more serious consideration about pursuing a split from my family. It wasn't so much the contents of the dream (which I'll spare you the details of), but the mindset in the dream and that stuck with me after that sent me down that rabbit hole.
> 
> I think part of it is that I am unhappy with myself in the lack of effort I put into being a father; not necessarily the fact that I am away due to work, but how I am when I am with the family. I also feel a bit manipulated in a few decisions that I've made or almost made, from buying the aforementioned house to the direction I took my career. Not to mention that I feel like my wife's been gaslighting me (if so, maybe unintentionally) on those decisions - at the very least her memory of how the various discussions leading to decisions went down varies drastically from my own memory. That all has created a stew of mild discontent with my current state of affairs and a desire for change.
> 
> At this point I am afraid to mention where my head is at to my wife, because I don't want the ensuing conversation to spiral into ultimately bad decisions.
> 
> I am glad I've taken the time to read a number of threads here, as they've given me a glimpse in the looking glass. The desire to more seriously consider divorce or separation or whatever has abated somewhat already.
> 
> Is the above subject something I polish up, expand on and take to its own thread in the General Relationship Discussion? I'm considering doing so after a bit more self-reflection.


With no disrespect intended, you didn't give us the whole story when you first posted. As this post demonstrates, there are other serious issues. You really need individual and/or marriage counseling with a counselor who is accustomed to working with people in your circumstance. There is possibly a path that will work to save your marriage and your career, but you don't need to waste any time looking for it. Do it now.


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