Would you live most of the time away from your family to double your salary?

For a set period of time—say two years, yes I would/

Why don’t they move closer to where he works if it is constantly in the same city with a free house?

I recently found out that my husband has asked his workplace for more time away, working. He earns more when he takes jobs out of town, especially offshore on platforms at the like. He doesn’t want to spend time with us and that is just the reality of it. We don’t have the option of travelling with him, or meeting him for long weekends when he is away. We never know where he’ll be going or how long he’ll be away. That’s bad enough as a situation, but now, to know that he would rather do that than be home with us…. it’s a damn hard reality to swallow.

Men, when they live away, are eating out more and drinking more. I see it with my husband’s co-workers, a few friends who travel and take clients out for dinners as part of their job, and with my husband, to an extent. They just are less likely to eat properly and sleep properly.

If I was in your daughter’s situation, and my husband worked away, but was always in the same city with a ready made house, I’d move there. No question.

Thank you, @cazzie . The reasons are numerous why she won’t move where he lives: they want their home on seventeen acres; not an apartment. Their kids love their school and their piano and guitar teachers; all their friends are there in that small town. They want their St Bernard dogs; can’t have them in an apartment. She and the kids haven’t been invited to move; maybe it’s not a permanent position. My daughter knows one friend in his city; she has dozens of friends where she is now including his parents and his two brothers and their kids. If they were newlyweds I’m sure she would move. She’s just too settled where she is now.

Oh, and I forgot to tell you how sad I am for you for feeling so rejected. I know it’s even worse during the holiday season and I’m sorry, cazzie.

Yes, well, he’s leaving tomorrow for a week and then he has a trip to Italy and we aren’t sure exactly when or for how long, but he’ll be leaving before Christmas. In the first quarter of 2012, he’ll be away more than home in areas like Rio and New Orleans.

When you were engaged, did you know he worked like this or did he spring it on you? I had some dreadful things sprung on me in my last marriage that hit me like a ton of bricks. Never saw them coming at all. Some men like the social acceptance, if it still exists, of having a family somewhere.

Are you familiar with the song Traveling Man. by Ricky Nelson?

He has a girl in every port, according to the words of the song.

“Where the spouse goes, so goes the family”.

Distance makes the temptation to cheat and this setup has all the characteristics of someone cheating or attempting to cheat.

She needs to pack her bags and sell the dog and go where her hubby goes.

Once in a while I’d live away from my family for half pay.

But the majority of the time, I’m happy just getting by financially if I can spend time with them. Family > money.

@john65pennington I would hate to think I had to sell my home and dogs , rip my kids away from their friends in an attempt to keep my husband faithful. No; I’d rather stay put and cross that bridge if I come to it. Remember: he has not invited them. She thinks he’ll have a heart attack due to being 5’10 tall and a 2x or 3x. When some of us get older we learn to stop fighting the system and we let the cards fall where they may. You can’t change people.

@john65pennington Not everyone cheats just because they get the opportunity to. Really. Truly and honestly.

And I knew he travelled for a living, but when I get pregnant, he said he would find a way to stay home more. He also never told me that I would become the primary caregiver to his autistic son and that I would have to give up any idea of a career or schooling here because if it. The lack of interest his biological mother had in looking after her own child was a real surprise to me and he should have told me.

@cazzie So you think or know he off loaded his son on you , felt relief and is glad he did it? And if you split, you’d look like the bad guy to everyone . Wow. That is some situation. I can’t imagine!

*that should read, WHEN I GOT pregnant. We now have a child together as well.

Two Hours? For heavens sake, some people commute that far twice a day, every day of the week and think nothing of it. It sounds very fishy to me.

Personally, I would get a Nanny to watch the kids and Monday thru Fri at his free apartment, and come home on the weekends.

@yarnlady, thanks but it is at least 2 hours one way and they want to keep their 2 st bernard dogs on the seventeen acres, and keep the kids in their school and continue with their lessons. She’d never leave her kids for five days if that’s what you’re saying. She does not want to disrupt their lives and she has many friends in her town. If anything is fishy, and I don’t disagree, is that he is annoyed with the boy , they argue, he gets paid twice as much and he gets to drink all the beer he wants.

It’s hard to judge someone else’s relationship. Just because that arrangement would not suit me, apparently this couple does ok with it. Maybe they like the time apart. Maybe they appreciate each other more when they see each other. Maybe they like the extra money and don’t mind the sacrifice. Who knows. Only they know what they can and cannot tolerate. When it becomes intolerable, they will change some part of it.

So, it’s only 2 hours away? So, they never have to go, say 6 or 8 weeks away from each other at a stretch? Sorry, that’s not much of a hardship. Well worth the extra money.

@cazzie I guess whether or not it’s much of a hardship depends upon the individuals involved. I don’t think he minds being away from them. Not sure why I think this. For years when he’d get home from work he would not come inside the house but go directly to the barn until dinner was ready. I don’t know what he was doing down there and I never asked. I think beer was involved of which she doesn’t approve. But she , I think, feels slightly unloved if that’s a possible emotion and resentful that she’s actually alone and raising two kids mostly without help. Just how resentful she is I don’t know because she doesn’t tell me these things. I get “clues” , if you will, by listening to little remarks she makes on occasion.

He’s only two hours away. It’s not that far. He can come home if there is an accident or illness. He does come home often, from the sounds. She has YOU to help and loads of friends, from the sound of it. She is FAR from alone raising her two kids. I’ll send her video of what it’s really like to raise kids alone. I’m sure he makes sure the bills are paid and that they are stable financially. That would be a luxury for me. They’re going on holiday all together to the Bahamas? Wow. Something I can only dream of. Mega-luxury. I bet she can afford to have her hair done more than once a year and probably has someone to drop the kids off to when she has an appointment to go to. She probably doesn’t have to stand in the grocery store and try to decide what is more important that week; peanut butter or toilet paper, because all she’s got is $5 in her purse. She needs to be more grateful, from the sounds of things, and so do you.

Thank you, @cazzie. A whole other perspective on things. Even though it had a slight air of “she’s got money therefore she’s lucky.” I think she’s a little lonely even with all those friends in town. And trust me: she hasn’t complained outright to me yet; it’s a feeling of mine at this point. For instance, they went away for the weekend a few weeks ago and she called me twice complaining about his behavior. As her mother, I feel sorry for her. I know she’s grateful for her friends, kids and material things.

It’s not just the money. It sounds like she has family and friends around. If I had a support system around me, I could at least get back to school or be able to hold down a job and then I WOULD have some money of my own and I wouldn’t so freaked out about it. I’m also thinking of so many women who’s husbands are deployed overseas for months, sometimes years.

I have a good friend who’s husband used to do long haul trucking and she had two little girls at home. She had a routine down and a way she liked to do things on her own. When her husband came home and they spent time together, she was almost territorial and found herself treating him not like the husband and father, but like a visitor and the things he would do would bother her because she had the house a certain way and had the girls in a certain routine and felt he would show up for a few days every week or so and mess it up.

When you aren’t living day to day with someone it is really easy to resentful of the person and to get careless with the other person’s feelings. You are married, but in reality, living quite independent lives of each other. Coming back together and feeling like a couple is HARD.

I don’t resent my husband having a few beers and I don’t make him go out to a barn to drink them. In fact, I will have a beer as well, or share a bottle of wine with him and sometimes, even cuddle on the couch and watch a movie with him. We have rules and guidelines in the house about alcohol. No drinking before 5pm, not even on match day. (I know he will have a beer at the airport and on the plane, even if it’s around 10am… but he knows not to do it at home.) We’ll allow ourselves a glass of wine or a class of beer at dinner and then it gets put away until the kids go to bed. Once the kids go down, we’ll have another beer or two or finish the bottle of wine. No harm done. I still waking up bright eyed and bushy tailed for the kids in the morning. (Him not so much. He sleeps on the couch and will lie there until about 11am and we all have to tippy toe around him.)

I know he lives this other life, completely independent and without any thought of me and the kids. When he travels, he spends money going on side trips, expensive restaurants, hires motorcycles, goes to concerts and will even extend his trip so he can have few days to sight see if there are things he wants to do and see.

All I can do is raise the kids best I can and try to find a life of my own, too. It’s not the marriage I wanted. Not by a long shot, but it’s what happened.

I lived 550km from home for seven months while my youngest son finished school, and my wife sold our house etc, so they could move to be with me. I drove home every weekend, covering 60,000km in those seven months. I would NEVER do it again!!! Just not worth it.