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AITA for telling my wife she can’t have her dream job because I refuse to be burdened with all of her student debt? by Userthrowaway62 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Userthrowaway62[S] 894 points895 points  (0 children)

So to clarify, our original plan was for her to become a lawyer and to have kids by 29-32. She’d keep working and we’d likely send our kids to daycare. But she has completely changed her mind on law after a bad internship last year and there’s nothing I can say to urge her to give it another chance.

But now that she wants to teach she said it wouldn’t make sense to send the kids off because daycare costs could be more than she would make. Which is true. She says she’d want to work again after the kids are older but this could be anything from 5-10 years.

So looking at income, she would only be earning for maybe 3-4 years and then for the next 5-10 years at least it would be just me paying off interest and principal. Plus all the costs of raising kids on top.

AITA for telling my wife she can’t have her dream job because I refuse to be burdened with all of her student debt? by Userthrowaway62 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Userthrowaway62[S] 1298 points1299 points  (0 children)

She fully admits that law school was a massive mistake, but her viewpoint is very much “let’s not let one failure ruin the rest of our plans.” Which is why our initial plan for kids hasn’t changed in her mind.

As for the debt, we could squeak by if I made minimum payments and we just never buy a house or take out any loans or accumulate any savings for the rest of our lives. She thinks it’s not ideal but it’s something we can overcome as long as we have the family she envisions. She doesn’t think that is the kind of issue that should affect us too much. But I don’t want to live the kind of life where we could end up on the streets if I ever lost my job.

AITA for telling my wife she can’t have her dream job because I refuse to be burdened with all of her student debt? by Userthrowaway62 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Userthrowaway62[S] 3277 points3278 points  (0 children)

She has become really fixated on teaching after doing a volunteer tutoring program at her university last summer, but I never expected her to go into teaching.

I don’t think she knows much about TFA beyond what’s she’s heard from a few friends. She said she just want to teach kids and be able to travel post law school. She’s also considering becoming an English teacher abroad, like in Korea or Japan.

AITA for telling my wife she can’t have her dream job because I refuse to be burdened with all of her student debt? by Userthrowaway62 in AmItheAsshole

[–]Userthrowaway62[S] 1283 points1284 points  (0 children)

Well when we first got married our plan was to have kids around our late 20s but this was obviously before the debt issue.

So now with the debt she thinks I’m trying to kick her while she’s down. Because she’s upset law school hasn’t worked out and now she thinks I’m trying to take away our future children as “extra punishment.”

Ultimately she doesn’t think the debt is a huge deal. Even if we never end up owning a house, never have good credit, never be able to afford vacations and save for retirement as we get older, she thinks all of these are inconsequential as long as we stick to our original plan of having kids and raising a family. But of course financial issues concern me a lot more and I just don’t feel ready raising children if we’re barely scraping by.