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Boyfriend's work is causing major issues
I need to vent somewhere and I think this is the right place to do so. Anyway, so some backstory first. My boyfriend and I have been dating for almost two years, and living together since March. Things between us are great minus one thing, his job. He works for his uncle who is a workaholic which means a job that should include long hours has even more hours for reasons that make no sense half the time. His uncle will ask him to come into work a hour early and then he will ask my boyfriend to do something that takes 5 minutes and make him either 1) redo the same task over and over for a hour or 2) make him sit in boredom till they go to do the real job they are supposed to be doing. Anyway, the long hours are driving me insane and putting a toll on our relationship. I've told him he needs to go to school and get a new job. He says he will but has yet to actually put a plan into place to reach any type of goal.
Also in the next 5 years I want to start trying to have a child because I'm 22 and I want kids before 30. But I refuse to do that when he's gone 80% of the time. At the moment he works 16 hours a day and to me that is not conducive to starting a family. Especially when he can't even get a proper day off work. Alot of times he'll work 6 or 7 days a week at a time, with the odd day off inbetween. And even then he can't get guaranteed days off work because his uncle will call him at the last minute (like literally 5 minutes before they have to go somewhere) and tell him that he has to work that day, so we can't even plan to do anything together. Ugh, sorry this is kinda jumbled, but I'm frustrated.
Re: Boyfriend's work is causing major issues
He also sounds like some kind of nut.
Your BF needs another job. What kind of quality of life is this? is he also being paid overtime for all the hours he is putting in? or is he on salary?
Your BF needs to set some boundaries with his employer. Sadly, though, that's hard to do when you don't have another option for employment, and until your BF actually goes back to school or takes some new job training, it sounds like he's stuck where he is.
And this:
What makes you say that? Everything you've said seems to imply that you don't want that to happen, but that your BF isn't doing a whole heck of a lot to make sure it doesn't happen.
I'm not trying to be harsh, but I think you should have your eyes wide open in this relationship, before you get married or start having children (especially before you start having children!).
All the wanting in the world isn't going to make your BF change. He needs to want it too; for himself, and for the two of you and your future. I would suggest setting some deadlines, and being willing to stick with them:
"BF, six months from now I want you enrolled in classes. We can't live with you working like this forever, because I want more for our future family. If you're not willing to take the first step to ensure we have a better future, I'm not sure I can see myself in this relationship forever."
Yes I don't want this to happen and neither does my boyfriend. Every night he comes home and complains about how his uncle wants him to have no life like he has no life outside of work. So it's not only me who thinks and says that. I know why he's sticking with this job though, he likes the money. It's nice being 19 and making 60k a year straight out of high school.
We had a conversation like this the other night after we got back from visiting his family. I told him he needs to go to school next fall. I said next fall since that would give us time to pad our savings a bit more and we wouldn't stress out about money as much. I do have a deadline in mind also, and it's next fall. If he doesn't enroll by then well I'm leaving cause I'm not happy with having a boyfriend who is never around. In fact, living with him and having him work so much is worse than when we were in a long distance relationship for a year.
~Benjamin Franklin
DS dx with celiac disease 5/28/10
OK, first... Please understand your life will more than likely not follow the exact plan you have in your head. This whole "I'm 22 and want to have kids before I'm 30 so I want to start popping babies out in 5 years" thing? Yeah, slow down, OK? Its good to have goals but if your goals keep you from seeing a bigger picture, ignoring red flags, etc., just so you can reach that goal, you need to step back and re-asses things.
Second, he is showing you where his head is at - he is valuing the money more than he values you. Or he doesn't have enough of a backbone at 19 to put his foot down. Either of those are big red flags. Remember, its actions, not words, that matter. He's talking a good game but there isn't any follow through.
Third, you're 22 (yes, yes, I know... You're an adult and can make your own decisions, etc., hear me out). You haven't finished maturing (the human brain doesn't stop growing/maturing until age 25). You haven't really figured out who you are yet. Freedom and being out of school makes you feel like you can take on the world because you're a "real grown up" now. Get a little more life experience under your belt before you start trying to settle down and have a family. The person you will be in 5 years will probably laugh her butt off at the now-you - you will actually change that much.
Fourth, don't settle. I know you have a plan for how you want your life to go, but don't let it cause you to pick a poor partner just so you can have kids (or have a big, fancy party AKA wedding). We see that all too often on this board. "It was just the next logical step", "I thought that's what we were supposed to do", and of course "I got married too young and ignored all the red flags so that I could have my perfect wedding day".
Oh, you can plan to do things together. It's just that your BF would rather work than spend time with you. Nobody is holding a gun to his head and forcing him to answer the phone when his uncle calls on his day off. He's choosing to do that.
Think long and hard before you sign yourself and your before-30-regardless-of-who-the-father-is kids up for a lifetime of coming in last.
this is a neon flashing red flag. it means one of two things: EITHER the job thing bothers him as much as it bothers you but he's just too lazy / unambitious to actually bother to search for a new job or apply to schools, OR it doesn't really bother him like it does you, and he's fine with the crazy amounts of time that he spends at his work.
either way, this is a bad sign, and if i were you i would seriously be rethinking long term plans with this guy, of marriage or of kids.
Ding.
I nearly started laughing at the "I'm 22 and want kids before I'm 30!" That's eight years. You guys have things that need to be worked out before you start having children. There's no need for an arbitrary timeline.
At 22, I wanted to be married at 27 and having kids by 30. Well, I was married at 30 and we'll start for kids around 33 because that's the way life goes.
How nice of you to tell him what he should do with his life.
You're going about your life backwards - wait until you're in a good marriage before worrying about having kids, and don't stay in a relationship that isn't working just to meet your ridiculous timeline for kids. There are WAY worse things in the world than having kids after 30; being "stuck" in a relationship with someone who has completely different priorities than you is one of those things.
You will do your unborn children a huge solid by waiting for the right man to be their father... not just the one who's "there". Please don't settle.
Because when your children are born before your ovaries shrivel at the ripe old age of 30, YOU will be the one left holding the proverbial cooking/cleaning/diaper change bag if he can't stand up to his uncle and put his own family first.
You think he has no time for you now? Working a 16-hr day is not in any way, shape, or form conducive to a family. And, you know, actually doing things with them.
I want to be an "old" mom! I decided to be well established in my career, move up the rungs, bring home a solid paycheck and to live well with my husband first. I wanted to ensure that we had a good game plan for child care (something I'm still working to set up now), a nice nest egg, and funds to educate and travel with our kid.
I know not everyone sees things this way and that's cool. But, there's nothing wrong with NOT having a child before the age of 30. I'm perfectly content with the idea of our kids running around until we're in our 50s. Once my children leave and have kids of their own, I'll think of myself as an old lady. I don't want to feel that way in my 40s!
It's not about the soonest I can get my house back or some idea that 30 is "too old" for kids; it's about giving our child as much of ourselves as possible. I could never have done it, with my chosen profession, until now or in a few years.
Take it from someone whose husband works about a million hours-- if you don't want to be doing this young mother thing alone, get on the same page. Either with him or without him. If he likes what he is doing and doesn't want to go to school, there is no way you are going to make him. At 19, are you sure that he wants kids in a couple of years? He is one or two years out of high school, are kids even on his radar?
I'd be surprised if marriage is even on his radar.
Actually, your boyfriend's work is NOT causing major issues. His job and how he handles it is revealing to you EXACTLY what kind of person he is.
Let me highlight the major points:
1.) He isn't good at setting boundaries and saying no.
2.) He prefers immediate gratification (big salary) to long term planning (school).
3.) He is smart enough to know that making this kind of money ($60K) at his young age (19) is rare and that he is in a very fortunate position.
4.) He is a hard worker - he is willing to put in the long hours.
5.) He tells people what they want to hear to avoid conflict.
6.) I am going to speculate on this one, but I bet he spends a lot of this money and isn't a huge saver. At his age with so few responsibilities, he could be socking away $10K-$15K a year.
Not all of these traits are negative and some of his behaviors will probably morph with age and increased responsibilities, but essentially, this is who he is. You have to love that guy precisely as he is RIGHT NOW and NOT THE GUY YOU THINK YOU CAN MOLD HIM TO BE. This is key.
You want to take the positive (hard worker) and use the not-so-positive (people pleaser/weak on boundaries) to get what YOU want - a father for your children and a solid provider - just like his uncle is manipulating him to get what he wants - a life companion and an indentured servant. Stop doing that not because it is not something you should do to any other person but because IT WON"T MAKE YOU HAPPY!
Bottom line: not once in your original post did you say that you loved him. DTMFA!
~Benjamin Franklin
DS dx with celiac disease 5/28/10
Where did we get that he was 19? I saw her being 22, but I missed the other bit...
Also, they've been together for eight months, and she's already thinking baby. Yikes.
ETA: Oh, I misread her ticker. They've been together for eight months in the SAME PLACE. Never mind. Ignore me.
I'm of the mindset that this guy is 19 and isn't interested in marriage or kids at this point in life, which is great. He shouldn't be interested in either, really.
And that's why he hasn't stopped working crazy hours, either because the pay is good or just because he doesn't need to worry about being completely available to you.
Do you live together? If not, then you really need to get a hobby or a job of your own so you're not worrying about him all the time.
And, to be quite honest, I truly think you should rethink this relationship, seeing as you have different goals. You're significantly older than him at this point in life (19 vs. 22) and, therefore, have different ideas of what you want in a relationship.
100% Ditto to what Geek and the other posters have said.
OP-- please re-evaluate the timeline you have for yourself. Goals are wonderful. We should all have them, but you can't fit big life events into a neat little line like that. You absolutely want to make sure that the man you choose to have kids with is who you want him to be not who you feel you have to mold him to be.
The truth of the matter is that your SO likes working those hours (no matter what he tells you) because he likes the money. If he really wanted to be with you as much as he says he does then he would cut back his hours. However, I am betting that he likes to spend the money he makes (and more power to him. He's 19 with a great paycheck).
I know that you are on the baby-train in your mind (I started having baby urges around age 23 so I understand where you are coming from there) but I think you are putting the care WAY before the horse on this one. You don't want to have a child with THIS man. You have some Dream Date Dude in mind and you are trying to mold this guy into him in order to fit your timeline. *danger Will Robinson, Danger!*
Lets put it this way-- I started wanting a baby at 23. It didn't happen and we weren't in a position to do it until 28. The world doesn't end if you aren't done procreating by age 30.
Do yourself a favor and either come clean to your BF about why you are pushing him to be someone he is not. OR cut him loose and find someone who's in the same place as you are with regards to what they want for this time in their life.
I have a feeling if you brought up your ideas to your BF about kids that he would flip out. Good luck.
I said we can't plan to do things together because of his work schedule, I never said we never spend time together. In fact we spend alot of time together when he isn't working. Last night for instance we had our weekly date night, it didn't last long since he didn't get home till 9pm and had to get up for work at 4:30 in the morning. But we did hang out and spend time together. He does make sure he spends time with me even if it can't be for a very long time, so don't assume that he doesn't make time for me when he can.
Also I guess I should add more of a backstory to this thread. My boyfriend and I are living together now. Before we were in a long distance relationship and over 2,000 miles apart. But we made it work and I was able to thankfully get a work permit so I could go live with him in his country, thanks to my job getting me a work transfer. And he works in the oilfield in northern Alberta. All the jobs here take alot of time up and working 12 hours a day or being gone for weeks at a time at work is normal here. And quite honestly I'd be ok with him working 12 hours a day, if it wasn't that his uncle just likes to tack extra hours on for no good reason alot of times because he's a workaholic.
As for my boyfriend asking for days off, well he can't really do that since the company is run by only him and his uncle and his uncle only has one truck so them hiring someone else would be pointless pretty much. The job is a two man job and my boyfriend would have to be on call 24/7 regardless, which I'm ok with. I'm just not okay with him getting called at 8am on his day off and being told his uncle is outside waiting for him to come to work when it's not even an emergency for them to be working.
And yes he does have issues with standing up to his family sometimes. He's a people pleaser in that regard and it's one of the things I dislike about him. But no one is perfect, and I've learned to deal with it. Does it make him not the right guy for me? No. I want him to be the father of my children and my husband one day. If I didn't I wouldn't have spent the money, time, and effort to move to his country and leave my entire family and most of my friends behind. Before I met him I wasn't even sure if I wanted to have kids or get married anymore, like I did when I was younger. I was gonna be happy just being single and traveling the world on my own, but he changed all of that. I'm not with him because I want kids on a certain timeline, I'm with him because I love him and he loves me. We both want to start trying to start a family in 5 years time after we get married in a year or two. And as regards to marriage, well he brought it up before I did. He wanted to be engaged by now but after talking some, we decided till I am able to apply for my permanent residency for his country we are not going to even get engaged. That way we can get married after I have it and not risk being torn apart as newlyweds. Not every 19 year old guy is afraid of commitment.
Anyway I talked to him more last night. He told me that he does want to work better hours and have a better job, but that at the same time he is afraid of going to school now because of the fragility of our financial situation. It could be up to a year before I am granted my PR and my work permit runs out in about 7 months and he's afraid that if he goes to school right now that that will leave us in a bad situation financially since he'd take home much less pay and I might not be working at all at that time. We do have a savings already, about 5k or so at the moment, but he wants more in there just in case something happens in the next year or so. So I told him I understood that but he did need to go back to school. I then told him to go look up classes for going to school and he said he's going to talk to one of the head guys over at the local college and ask him about some information on Monday. So things are getting better.
Thanks for the advice, and I know I will change alot over the next few years. My mom's told me that herself and I know she's right. But I don't consider my partner to be a partner. He's a hardworker and has the drive to provide for me (his current family) no matter what and he's loving, affectionate, and caring. He's also my best friend and I love him. So I'm not settling. I know what settling is because I did it before with my ex who I almost married just because I thought it was the right thing to do at the time. Also I don't want a big wedding, I'd be perfectly happy either eloping or going down to the courthouse and marrying my boyfriend in jeans and a tshirt. As long as he's standing in front of me saying "I do", I will be happy.
You don't consider your partner to be a partner?
What does that even mean? What do you consider him to be?
Like a previous poster said, you're trying to cram a square peg into a round hole. You aren't with him for who he is right now, you're with him for who you hope you can force him to be later.
I predict that this relationship is doomed, particularly since he's still a child. Every single 19-year-old on the planet thinks they know everything and guess what? They don't. You said yourself he doesn't have the backbone to stand up for himself. You know that in all likelihood he doesn't have the backbone to stand up to you either, right? What makes you think he's not just telling you what you want to hear in order to shut you up?
You say he's a people pleaser and while it's one of the things you hate about him, you've learned to deal with it. Pumpkin, if you had learned to deal with it, you wouldn't be here b!tching about how he lets his uncle walk all over him and how it's having such a horrible effect on your life together.
Help me with the math here, You've been together for less than two years and living together since March. So he was 17 or 18 and you were 20 or 21 at the time you and he started your 2,000-mile long distance relationship. But at some point before you started this relationship, you were previously engaged.
You sound really desperate to be married. Did you two even meet before you started your long distance relationship, or was this an Internet thing?
Your backstory is actually quite helpful, it makes it very obvious why you're so desperately trying to force this relationship to work.
I've got $10 that says you'll be pregnant within the year, the only thing that will change in regard to your boyfriend's work schedule is that he'll start working even longer hours/more days, and you'll still be complaining out of one side of your mouth while backpeddling and trying to justify everything out of the other side. Best of luck, and hopefully I'm out that $10 and in 10 years you aren't filled with regret over the decisions you're making now.
I wanted to start having kids by 25 and be done by some point before 30. In college I met a wonderful, kind, funny man (boy then, I guess!) who I just knew could give me that. He also would have not only supported but encouraged my being a stay at home mother - which sounded great. It was my perfect, idealistic life sitting right in front of me, and I was so, so happy!
He was a farmer, from a long line of farmers. He owned his own land, bought a house at age 21, and made good money. A lot of that money was put into savings, the rest put back into the farm (aka - the business).
He also worked 80+ hours per week. Our days together followed a schedule like this:
He was out of bed by 3:30 or 4 a.m. I got up about 7 a.m. He would work, I would "take care of the house" while he was out. Around noon, he'd come back in and I'd have lunch made. Ahhh, I was doing so well in my perfect life!
He'd go back out to work more, I'd do more "around the house". Laundry, clean, decorate, bake...Dinner right around 6 p.m. About 7 p.m. he'd be back out for night chores, then in by 8:30 and in bed by 9. Rinse and repeat.
So after awhile I started thinking about our family. When was he going to go to dance recitals? Soccer games? Parent teacher meetings? Family vacations?
The truth was, never. He was never going to be able to do those things with me. We had already, at 20 years old, established a system in which I'd take care of the "home and kids" and he'd take care of "working". And that was GREAT in my 20 year old mind: I could adjust my expectations because at least I'd have the family I desperately wanted.
But over time, I started to realize that having kids before 30 wasn't going to mean too much to me without a partner to raise them with. And as much as I loved the idea of being a wife, it was pretty lonely without a husband to be with.
He was wonderful, supportive, and kind. And he is a GREAT husband, I'm sure. But not to me. Because what he wanted for his life was work, and a wife who would support that. All the wanting in the world couldn't turn us into the couple I wanted us to be.
I tell you all of this to say - nobody here is trying to be mean to you. We're just trying to make you see that sometimes two good, loving, supportive people that love each other very much can't make a relationship work. It doesn't mean the relationship is a failure, or the people stop loving each other, it just means that they're not the right partners for each other, and that's what marriage should be about: two people who make each other better, stronger, more successful.
You and your BF do not have the same goals right now, or at the very least you don't have the same timeline for your goals. You can spend the next two years working towards the same goals (and God knows I did - for almost four years!), but at the end of the day, it's still going to be painful to face the fact that you're going to have to adjust those expectations.
Maybe that's fine with you - maybe you will be just as happy having kids at 35 as you would have been at 25. But maybe you won't. Maybe you'll hit 25 and resent that you have not started yet. And you'll blame him, and he will know it. Eventually you'll have the kids, but he'll still be the same workoholic that he was at 20, or 22 and you'll still be the same person that wants a family and a husband with time to participate fully and take you all on vacations except now there are children involved and your family and friends are still 2,000 miles away and your options seem far more limited.
You don't have to break up with him right now, or next month, or in a year when he still hasn't enrolled in classes and made big decisions to change his future career options. Just think seriously about if you can spend the rest of your life, and raise your children with the man that he is today. If you can't, then you should strongly consider moving on. Because going into a marriage with a man you think you can change is a bad, bad idea. Mostly because you're probably wrong.
He doesn't have to be afraid of commitment to not be ready for it.