To what extend did a career gap influence your relationship?

January 6, 2014

Hi All,

I'm curious to know about real life experiences about this.

I mean in the situation that one of the partners has a college education, a job and a beaming career, and the other partner has basically voluntarily been doing nothing for the past 5 years careerwise and is chilling all the time.

Or situations similar to this.

Has this influenced your relationship?

What were your experiences and di you guys end up staying together or breaking up?

January 6, 2014

The last semester in grad school I already had some experience with during internships, and I was adamant about getting a very specific type of career and only looked for certain jobs that I would apply for at that time. And because, I would not settle for anything less, and it was difficult to find one after searching during for months, even with a master's degree from a very prominent university. I did land one a couple months after I graduated that summer. We were living together at the time and I guess her parents were paying for the other half of the apartment bills while I was in school, as I did not fully realize this until I landed the job. At this point we had been together for almost two years, and she had a retail job.

Once I landed this job, I became the provider of the relationship with the career...unfortunately for and during the next two years, I had the most stressful time in my life...a militant, abusive boss who was constantly angry, even yelling at his own clients, and he knew there wasn't another person that could do what he did for them in the same way unless they went someone that was States away....it was by FAR the most hostile work environment I had ever worked in, and the career I thought I wanted did not did not become worth it, because of the high stress levels, I often allowed this to carry into my relationship...she knew I was very unhappy at my job and often would help me put out resumes while I was work constantly looking for new opportunities and helping me do mock interviews, and btw in 2010, jobs were very stagnant due to a poorly running economy at the time. I finally just made up my mind, told her I was going to quit because it became to much for me at the time. She felt like it was the best thing to do and was 100% in full agreement despite the bad luck in landing something and the unknowns that would follow.

I spent the next few months dedicated to perfecting my resume, interview skills and cover letters individual to each company I applied to and spent incredible amounts of time trying to figure out ways to network. Amongst this, it was also a huge relief from the situation we were in, and things were more pleasant then they had ever been in our relationship, so in a way it went right back into a bliss/honeymoon stage of our relationship which actually grew during that time as we spent numerous hours going to parks, riding bikes, running, exercising, grilling, enjoy a few beers outside or poolside apartment, it was great. I finally landed a new job in fact two offers came about in a week period and it was also a relief, because, although I had saved money up, finances were depleting month by month and we probably had a maybe another 8 months to 1 year or so left to live on before something really had to happen, I saved up knowing this.

Anyway to answer your question, it helped my situation tremendously due to the particular circumstances of life at that time. We ended up breaking up years later though, but it in fact helped it at the time.

January 6, 2014

Thanks so much for your reply, but in your situation you were actually both working really hard...

What I mean is situation in which one of the two partners is doing nothing BY CHOICE

January 6, 2014

Define 'doing nothing' for 5 years. Does that mean not studying or working in any way? Or just not making notable progress in their career?

January 6, 2014

I paid for her school at first because I valued education highly and always wanted her to get her degree. We actually had several arguments and fights over it (while I was working) because I never saw her study... she would tell me she was (and I'd give her the benefit of a doubt for a while) but, then ended up doing poorly on her exams and grades at the end of the semester. ...I was very frustrated at that too. But because of the horrible luck I had in not landing a new job, stop trying to motivate her to go to school, and figured that school wasn't even worth it anymore (which was my thinking then). In a lot of ways, I felt a huge loss of trust in the economy because of my own situation. She ended up back in retail, a part time job working about 20 hours a week after a few semesters until I quit and focused on getting a new job.

January 6, 2014

During the course of my marriage, I obtained a bachelors degree and then went on to obtain my MBA, all while working a FT job and raising 4 children. My husband was military, but had a very laid back career field and could often leave work, get off early, or take time off. He was never deployed, but did volunteer for a couple short tours in Korea and Germany at my pushing.

Because he was military, he could've used his tuition grant to go to school, but he always said he wouldn't do it unless I agreed to do the work for him, i.e. write his papers and do his assignments. He was just lazy. Period. Even for the exams he had to take to make rank, he would continuously put off studying to play video games and hang out with friends, and as a result, it would take him several tries to pass and move up in rank.

With my education, I received several promotions at work and my career and responsibilities grew. I became an educated, corporate career woman and mother, and he lived his life playing playstation and hanging out with the guys. I found over time, that we could no longer relate or even have, what I deemed, intelligent conversations. We couldn't discuss current events in the news, or the upcoming elections, because he didn't live in that world and I would just become annoyed and frustrated at his responses. He wouldn't even register to vote, because he thought it pointless and that there was some imaginary power that decided elections instead.

There were many other factors that eventually led to our divorce, but this played a big role. I was miserable and resented the person I shared my life with. When you push yourself to work hard and achieve something in life, and the person you're with doesn't value you those things, it becomes difficult to maintain a working relationship and be happy. I know that I could/would never do it again. In the end, it's not about how much money someone makes or how much education they have, but their level of intellectual maturity and whether or not they care about making a better life for themselves.

January 6, 2014

Define 'doing nothing' for 5 years. Does that mean not studying or working in any way? Or just not making notable progress in their career?

No nI mean like in the situation when one of the two is not doing anything at all in the career field, playing video games, hanging out with friends, working out...

January 6, 2014

During the course of my marriage, I obtained a bachelors degree and then went on to obtain my MBA, all while working a FT job and raising 4 children. My husband was military, but had a very laid back career field and could often leave work, get off early, or take time off. He was never deployed, but did volunteer for a couple short tours in Korea and Germany at my pushing.

Because he was military, he could've used his tuition grant to go to school, but he always said he wouldn't do it unless I agreed to do the work for him, i.e. write his papers and do his assignments. He was just lazy. Period. Even for the exams he had to take to make rank, he would continuously put off studying to play video games and hang out with friends, and as a result, it would take him several tries to pass and move up in rank.

With my education, I received several promotions at work and my career and responsibilities grew. I became an educated, corporate career woman and mother, and he lived his life playing playstation and hanging out with the guys. I found over time, that we could no longer relate or even have, what I deemed, intelligent conversations. We couldn't discuss current events in the news, or the upcoming elections, because he didn't live in that world and I would just become annoyed and frustrated at his responses. He wouldn't even register to vote, because he thought it pointless and that there was some imaginary power that decided elections instead.

There were many other factors that eventually led to our divorce, but this played a big role. I was miserable and resented the person I shared my life with. When you push yourself to work hard and achieve something in life, and the person you're with doesn't value you those things, it becomes difficult to maintain a working relationship and be happy. I know that I could/would never do it again. In the end, it's not about how much money someone makes or how much education they have, but their level of intellectual maturity and whether or not they care about making a better life for themselves.

This is exactly what I mean...you grow apart, not because you feel too good for them, but because of the difference in intellectual maturity you reach. Which can also be reached by even trying, or doing something that's valuable to them and feeds them intellectually WITHOUT making money. Like you say, it's not about the money AT ALL

January 6, 2014

No nI mean like in the situation when one of the two is not doing anything at all in the career field, playing video games, hanging out with friends, working out...

a highly UN-attractive quality for either gender imo

January 6, 2014

I paid for her school at first because I valued education highly and always wanted her to get her degree. We actually had several arguments and fights over it (while I was working) because I never saw her study... she would tell me she was (and I'd give her the benefit of a doubt for a while) but, then ended up doing poorly on her exams and grades at the end of the semester. ...I was very frustrated at that too. But because of the horrible luck I had in not landing a new job, stop trying to motivate her to go to school, and figured that school wasn't even worth it anymore (which was my thinking then). In a lot of ways, I felt a huge loss of trust in the economy because of my own situation. She ended up back in retail, a part time job working about 20 hours a week after a few semesters until I quit and focused on getting a new job.

aaahh see this part is what I was asking for. Would you also mind the fact that she had a retail job if she just told you college wasn't for her, and she just wanted to continue her job?

January 6, 2014

no I didn't care that she did that. I later came to the conclusion that she ENJOYED the retail job, so that is why she did it. It was slightly frustrating at first, but was something I accepted with all the other responsibilities that I HAD to think about.

January 6, 2014

No nI mean like in the situation when one of the two is not doing anything at all in the career field, playing video games, hanging out with friends, working out...

I can't see why anyone would sign up for anything like that. Even in situations where I've seen one partner supporting the other financially, the other person was either studying, working part time, taking care of the house/child, or temporarily unemployed (months, not years).

January 6, 2014

I can't see why anyone would sign up for anything like that. Even in situations where I've seen one partner supporting the other financially, the other person was either studying, working part time, taking care of the house/child, or temporarily unemployed (months, not years).

Sometimes one of the two has no sense of responsibility..especially when money is not an issue (at that time being)...

January 6, 2014

Hi All,

I'm curious to know about real life experiences about this.

I mean in the situation that one of the partners has a college education, a job and a beaming career, and the other partner has basically voluntarily been doing nothing for the past 5 years careerwise and is chilling all the time.

Or situations similar to this.

Has this influenced your relationship?
What were your experiences and di you guys end up staying together or breaking up?

I wouldn't be in a relationship with someone doing nothing with their life...we would be incompatible.

I very much need a man with his own goals, dreams, career, friends, a full human being who is interesting and who can add to my life. I can't imagine how someone who is "just chilling" would be of any interest to me. There would be no relationship, but if somehow it even became that, I would eventually grow tired of them.

Mind you, I don't need a man to have the same career as me or even the same education level, but I do need him to have his own career and goals and to be doing something with his life besides existing. I need him to be happy with what he is doing and contributing to society and I need him to feel like he has a purpose in life to fulfill. I'm in a PhD program and am pretty much doing similar things to what I will be doing once I graduate and who knows where my career will take me, but I travel a lot, go to conferences, give talks, for research I sometimes have to be away in another country or city for periods of time etc. and almost all my close friends are women who also have advanced degrees and ambitious careers...so at the least I need a man who is doing something he enjoys and considers worthwhile, as we would be an awkward match. He might feel very uncomfortable around my friends or feel resentful of me if he has nothing to contribute ever because he does nothing and with me having a lot of obligations and him none, I think the gap would be way more obvious than in a relationship where we're both doing stuff, even if they're very different things. Forget that, I don't see how I'd even get to the point of a serious relationship with him. But everyone is different.

Two of my exes were men who did not have college degrees, but they were nevertheless ambitious and successful and not to mention incredibly well-read and intelligent. They were not out of place around me and my friends and they had their own set of activities, interests and obligations that kept them excited and busy and that I liked hearing about. I am a restless person and I would VERY QUICKLY grow weary of a man who all he did was play video games all day or had no dreams and goals but was content to just drift around. Some people don't mind, but for me and how I am and what I need, I am best suited to be with someone stimulating and who has his own interesting and productive life.

Edited January 6, 2014 by MissBee

January 6, 2014

I dont care about degrees, but I do care about values and attitude when it comes to working. I want him to be the kind of person to grab life by the balls. This tells me something about his general outlook and is very attractive.

January 6, 2014

Just want to clarify though that what you're talking about is not the same as being a stay at home parent. Bring a full time parent of small children is a 24/7 job, much harder than any job I've had before and I used to work 60-80 hours a week

January 6, 2014

No, that would not work for me. I need someone that is passionate about their life and has goals and ambition. That just wouldn't be compatible.

January 6, 2014

I was married to a woman who didn't graduate college. That wasn't so much an issue. She was outgoing and socially adept, and she still managed to get every job she applied to, even stuff she wasn't qualified for. A year or so into being married, I was working full time and supporting us, and she got promoted to store manager where she was...the fastest promotion/rise that company had ever had. She then decided one day to take a vacation to Chicago with her mother to audition for American Idol, which I agreed to because we had savings and things were going well. When she got back, she revealed she'd quit her job before she left. Suddenly things weren't so great. She bounced from ****ty retail job to ****ty retail job, making excuses about looking for work and accepting lousy hours, all the while we fell into more debt. All she wanted to do was have a baby, but she wasn't willing to work so we could be in a solid enough place to make that feasible.

Our relationship suffered, because I was under a lot of stress providing for us both, including paying off a car and some debts we'd incurred because of her spotty work history. We maxed out credit cards, and it affected a lot of areas of our relationship. Eventually, we ended up getting divorced, but I think it was heading that way anyway.

January 6, 2014

My husband's XW did not have a degree nor was she interested in obtaining one, or keeping a job for any length of time. She is a bright lady.... he thought it an incredible waste, especially once the kids were in school and she did not take the opportunity to challenge herself.

It got to the point that he was embarrassed to bring her to work events. I greatly contributed to the demise of their relationship.

January 6, 2014

This probably sounds kind of harsh, but I have a hard time even being friends with people that unmotivated. I'm at a good place in my life, working on a masters with straight A's, interning at a great place in my field, living on my own, working on a novel, pursuing a pet research project purely for fun, running a pretty successful blog. But I have had to work SO HARD to get here, and I have to work hard to maintain it. I have a serious chronic condition (cystic fibrosis) that has worsened in recent years so I have a lung capacity of 40% normal when I'm healthy, I have to spend hours a day on meds and treatments, work really hard to get enough calories, have to work out regularly to stay healthy, and I am tired really easily and most of the time. In my early 20s I was in hospital a couple times a year, I had to live at home, couldn't work, and had to put off grad school, while dealing with a struggling LDR and my family's finances falling into ruin. It would have been so, so easy to just give up on my life goals, even understandable. Even now sometimes I break down because it's hard to have to work so hard all the time on limited physical resources. But I do not want to waste my life, I want to achieve and creat and learn and live, so I don't give up.

From this position it is really really hard to understand people who just don't try. I would give anything just to have their health, and they're doing nothing with it. Honestly, sometimes I feel upset and even resentful. It isn't very nice of me but I feel just so frustrated sometimes. If you have the chance to make something of your life, make something of it-- think of the people who just do t have that chance.

So, yeah, dating someone who isn't very driven is just out of the question for me.

January 6, 2014

This probably sounds kind of harsh, but I have a hard time even being friends with people that unmotivated. I'm at a good place in my life, working on a masters with straight A's, interning at a great place in my field, living on my own, working on a novel, pursuing a pet research project purely for fun, running a pretty successful blog. But I have had to work SO HARD to get here, and I have to work hard to maintain it. I have a serious chronic condition (cystic fibrosis) that has worsened in recent years so I have a lung capacity of 40% normal when I'm healthy, I have to spend hours a day on meds and treatments, work really hard to get enough calories, have to work out regularly to stay healthy, and I am tired really easily and most of the time. In my early 20s I was in hospital a couple times a year, I had to live at home, couldn't work, and had to put off grad school, while dealing with a struggling LDR and my family's finances falling into ruin. It would have been so, so easy to just give up on my life goals, even understandable. Even now sometimes I break down because it's hard to have to work so hard all the time on limited physical resources. But I do not want to waste my life, I want to achieve and creat and learn and live, so I don't give up.

From this position it is really really hard to understand people who just don't try. I would give anything just to have their health, and they're doing nothing with it. Honestly, sometimes I feel upset and even resentful. It isn't very nice of me but I feel just so frustrated sometimes. If you have the chance to make something of your life, make something of it-- think of the people who just do t have that chance.

So, yeah, dating someone who isn't very driven is just out of the question for me.

!!!!

Your story is definitely inspiring and I wish you continued success and improved health.

I feel the same about the bold. While I haven't had those physical challenges, coming from an immigrant family who made lots of sacrifices to give their children a better life, taking jobs that were less than what they had in our home country, learning a new system etc., I made sure I worked hard and so did they and made use of all opportunities, so it's mind boggling to me when people born and raised in the U.S. and have opportunities at their finger tips don't use them or worse try to cast immigrants as lazy or undeserving.

I'm definitely the type who always has a plan and is always working towards my goal and I'm always doing something productive. That's also who I keep around me as friends and I am very impatient with people who don't try and are lackadaisical about life, so dating a man like that would absolutely not be on my radar.

January 7, 2014

Thanks so much for all your replies guys..

I want to clearify the situation a bit so you know where my question was coming from..

Have been with bf for 3 years now, he has ptss and isn't doing anything in life..

Always has big plans about things he likes to do,but never takes steps to actually do them..

He says he takes his therapy seriously, but he only goes like once a month, and then sometimes a couple weeks after eac other, and then again he takes a break..

Which we all know, with ptss is crucial, the therapy needs to be continuous.

I also dont get why he would be slacking his therapy, he cant even get a good night rest because of his night terrors which come with ptss...

At first I was all supportive of him getting over his trauma's and then building a life for himself again, but it got to the point where I think he's using it as an excuse...He lives with his parents, works out, hangs out with his friends, plays videogames, cooks and goes shopping...thats about it what he does daily.

Also I let go of expectations of him, like living together or getting married, I know that in this lifestyle of his, he's far too comfortable..

I guess its just hard, you love someone and you're used to...but when after so many years, still nothing has changed, you start to lower expectations.

Im scared that eventually we will break up because of different life styles..

Dont get me wrong, like other posters said, I dont care about degree or anything...but I need someone to see the light of live...to have a goal..to pursue their own happiness..

I just really hope he will start taking his own life, and with that our future together, seriously soon..otherwise there might be an expiration date to our r-ship

Edited January 7, 2014 by SerCay

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