I want to empathize, but I just feel anger. Everyone I know (myself included) thinks they are the only sane person in a dysfunctional office. It brings up an old anxiety: he comes from a privileged background and never had the horrible minimum wage job. I cleaned toilets (and everything else) so I could pay for college. I know that to him it looks like a resignation, and there’s a bit of an identity crisis here; I see his reaction as legitimate and sufficient.
If I share these feelings with him, I think he will feel hurt and pushed into a dead end. If I don’t share, I feel like I’m being dishonest. I want to give him my support, but I also want to give him a quick kick.
We are in a small town with very few job opportunities. I think refusing this job means a long period of unemployment. He would spend his time wonderfully (he’s not prone to laziness), but I have a fair bit of money anxiety and prefer the security this job will give us.
No name, California: You don’t say whether you and he can afford long unemployment, and that’s a shame. That’s really all here.
According to you, you and your husband have two very clear and very different motivations: he wants a fulfilling job and you want security.
Before you go out of your way to get your emotional need met, it’s fair to see if he can realistically meet his need as well.
If you both have the savings to handle this, his search for a job with more prospects, fulfillment, and money could be worth the additional months of lost income. In fact, this “dead end job” could further harm your security over time if it slows down his career and/or drains his soul (and therefore puts a strain on your marriage).
This is of course only one possibility. This decision involves everything from your savings and its market value to the local job market and your mobility as a couple. And if you’re flirting with financial ruin, that puts all other variables aside.
But if your need for his salary is more emotional than financial, then expressing your anger now would only seem more honest; that would not be Truth with a capital T. You see his reluctance to accept this position as an exercise of his residual privilege, and it hits you right in the toilet brush. This means you are reacting emotionally – so you should at least consider that you are not clearly reading his motivations.
Find out what he is planning, down to the details: where, how, for how long and for how long he plans to look for this more suitable job. If his “plan” truly consists of rights and expectations, then tell him what you think. If he has ideas, money and discipline, then he deserves your faith and support.
