My wife is leaving

Long story.

My wife worked for a major university when we got married five years ago, a late first marriage for both of us. I quit my Job as an engineer to move to her city. It wasn’t quite as it sounds; my company had been bought by an international corporation and they were methodically getting rid of all the old guard. I landed a position at the largest in the field doing the same job and they were closer to her house than my old house was to my old employer. So, I happily moved.

A few years ago, she was laid-off due to department re-organization (did not have tenure). Anyway, her loss of income was not a hardship, since I am employed and bring home a decent paycheck. She picked up some consulting work on the side to keep her busy and give her money to spend as she wanted, so things were fine.

Then, she gets news of positions opening at other universities for positions similar to what she had been doing. I encouraged her to apply, as you never know what will happen. She says that a public university is never going to match what I make as an engineer so there really is no point. I tell her to go ahead, that you can’t turn down a job that isn’t offered and, who knows, maybe you will find the perfect job. So, she does, goes on some interviews. First one strikes out. The next one appear to. The initial interview is a “drop everything, we have to have you come in right now” kind of thing. They tell her at the interview that there is one other candidate they are interested in and they will let her know. Through the grapevine, she hears who the other person is and when they interview. Months pass with no contact. She tugs on the grapevine to see if anyone else has heard, and her contacts know nothing. More than six months after her initial interview, they call her with an offer. A nice offer. More than I am being paid. She goes and interviews with them again, and it becomes clear that they really want her (specifically, they want Mrs. Excavating, not just someone who does what she does) and a lot of her views on how the department should be positioned and where it should go are very much in line with the Director.

So, I tell her to take the job. I can quit mine and perform consulting work, or find something else, but this is the closest thing to the perfect job that she will likely see, so it would be stupid to turn it down. Plus, with our combined incomes, we now become some of those nasty rich people who don’t pay any taxes (thanks, Obama).

The plan is that I will remain at my current job for another year, so we can hopefully save up enough to pay cash for a large, old house in the new city. I will also get this house ready for sale and tidy up loose ends, laying groundwork with people in my business to open up a consulting business. With the house paid for, even if my consulting business is a flop, her salary should keep us happy until our retirement plans start to kick-in.

So, the packers are in the house packing up everything in sight. In one day, bookcases are empty, everything but the furniture is being packed. We made this decision months ago, but now it is hitting home. She will leave me tomorrow and all I’ll be left with is a dog, one TV, and an echo-filled house.

I am very Sad.

excavating (for a mind)

Your gratuitous attack on the president removes any sympathy I might otherwise feel about your situation. If you’re lucky enough to be in the highest tax bracket, you’re lucky enough.

Seconded.

I thought you meant leaving as in you’re divorcing.
That’s always tough to respond to because you have to feel around a little before you know if you should say “I’m sorry” or “Congarats!”

In your case however I can confidently say - relax, you’ll see her soon and when you do, you’ll be reminded all the more how much you love her.

Oh and bring flowers when you go to visit, seems like a little thing but little things count.

Procrustus, Two Many Cats, political disagreement doesn’t give you the right to be an asshole in an MPSIMS thread. If you have a problem with the OP, take it to the Pit.

twickster, MPSIMS moderator

That’s being an asshole? :confused:

II don’t think you can call me an “asshole” in a MPSIMS thread.

Procrustus, jr mod.

Just to reassure me that I’m not becoming senile. is this post what we in Australia call a joke? If so, it’s pretty good.

My husband and I did the living-apart thing several times over the years, the longest separation being about 2 years. It was not fun, but in the end, it was worth it. Plus he was just 2 hours away via Southwest, and I got quite a few free flights because of all the flights I bought.

Sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do… Good luck to you!

I’ve been apart from my wife many times due to military deployments. My advice to you:

  1. Focus on the fact you are both working on a plan that will significantly improve your lives once it is over. Constantly remind yourselves of the end goal, that there is a reasoned purpose for being apart. Having this year apart will make the following years better for both of you, financially and even your marriage. Set goals and hold each other to the plan. Ensure that when the year is over and you are together in the new city, you both agree that yes, a year apart was difficult, but it was worth it. Teamwork.

  2. Skype and FaceTime are your friends. Schedule it.

  3. Use the time to do something else that would be more difficult if your wife was there. This is the time to dig deep into a pet hobby or project. Restore that old muscle car, or hit the gym really hard and get big, or take an art class. Whatever your thing is. Encourage her to do the same.

  4. Take zoid’s advice. It is the little things.

Because money is everything, right?

Excavating, good luck. toofs casual mentioning of military deployments can be stuck on both your fridges for when you feel down - neither one of you is in Afghanistan.

Not at all, which is why I was jarred so much by the tax rant buried in an unrelared post.

can you clarify? because I am confused. you are really rich and your wife is not leaving you - is that correct?

Oh, I am getting senile. It isn’t a joke.

Is this what they mean by “first world problems?”

Uh, no.

People all over the world live in different places to improve their lives. Very common.

Or I just got wooshed…

An attempt to pull rank on somebody who outranks you rarely goes well.

I agree my complaints are mundane and pointless. Hence, the forum.

To clarify, yes, my wife is leaving, moving over 500 miles away. We will remain married. We both love each other very much. We are not rich. Actually, for the past five years, I’ve lived closer to my paycheck than the previous 10. It is true, she drives a Mercedes and I drive a BMW. Hers is 23 years old with nearly 200,000 miles; mine is only 15 years old with 155,000 miles. Neither one was bought by us new, or even from the people who bought them new. Both are nice cars, but both of them could be bought for less than the cost of a brand new Ford Focus. Old luxury sedans are cheap, but we like them. Through a combination of a lack of experienced people in my profession, my being very competent, and a lot of luck, my compensation has risen rapidly in the past 10 years. My wife is very intelligent (unlike me; I’m merely competent, but lucky), and is very good at what she does. Unfortunately, to do what she does, she has to work under public university administrators, which are often very powerful but less intelligent. As a result, she has been pushed aside, ignored, and insulted. She has found a very promising position with a university several states away, which is paying nearly twice what either of us expected. In fact, this thread could be considered merely stealth-bragging on my part on what she has been able to do.

For those interested in the finances, I will admit that either one of our incomes is way above the national median income, but both of us are also way above the national median for education, work experience, and marketable skills. Oh, neither of us have kids. Some take that as a good thing, others as a bad thing. To us, this is just reality and nothing either of us can do anything about. Things were that way when we first met.

For thin-skinned liberals, get over it. Nobody is attacking your idol, gratuitously or otherwise.

For rank and file Democrats, I offer no apology since no apology is needed; I have made no offense.

For those who feel that with our income, we should be happy and not complain about anything, I hope ya’ll are happy and content with your situations and remain so. That hope, actually, goes out to all, not just those jealous of what others have. For those with problems, regardless of their source, I hope you find solutions.

For me, however, I am Sad. We are going down a road that we laid out before us, it is just that as the reality sets in, I am finding it difficult. I know, I played a trick with my title and OP to get people to think my problems are worse than they are; I did that intentionally, perhaps to remind me that the Love between my wife and me is still there, but we won’t be together. We are not young kids, we are both in our 50s, so I don’t worry about us drifting apart, I just worry. We spent last week in New Orleans, where we spent our Honeymoon. Valentines day will be spent apart. I find that hard to face.

As for hobbies, I have that covered. While I have gotten rid of my muscle cars, I do have a 7-series BMW that is nearly as old as my muscle cars were when I started that kick, and I think have found a decent mechanic to help me take care of it. I also make my own beer and my wife and I have just began making our own soap. Yeah, not typical hobbies, but we really aren’t typical, in any sense.

I do appreciate the helpful advice and encouragement. It does help. Things would have been much easier if I would have told my wife to just stay at home and let me worry about working, but, one, I don’t like to do things the easy way, and two, above all, I want her to be happy and I don’t believe keeping her away from what she likes is gong to do that. I have already walked away from a very good job so we could be together and am about to do it again to let her do what she loves. No, neither were the perfect job for me, but they were very good jobs. I have no regrets about that part, it’s the being apart that I am regretting. We are doing this because it offers us the best shot at allowing us to live the rest of our lives in greater happiness than otherwise would have been possible, but it is still difficult. As advice I have given in the past, though, nothing worthwhile is easy.

Even though most of the positive suggestions are ones that I have already thought of, it is helpful for the encouragement on taking the path we have chosen.

Thanks for the comments from all. Regardless of your intent, it does help.

excavating (for a mind)

I’ve been in a long-distance relationship for just over 3.5 years. My other half is over 600 miles away.

Skype is your best friend. I will say that Skype and the phone, email, etc., are all great at bridging that gap of not being able to talk to your beloved, but it does make you long for the physical even more. It makes it that much better when you *do *see each other again. You guys sound like you’re strong together.

I know how that sad feeling goes when separation comes. It sucks. But you can get through it, I promise.

Just to respond to this specifically.

One, yes, I am very lucky. I am lucky I found the woman I married. It took half my life (perhaps more) looking for her and when I did, I was lucky that I was able to convince her to marry me. I have had many other lucky events in my life, but this was, by far, the luckiest.

Two, our finding ourselves in the highest tax bracket is not just luck. Sure, on my part at least, I had my share of luck, but it takes a lot more than that. There were lots of people with the same public education opportunities I had. My opportunities at college weren’t uncommon, either; state school with minimal parental support - only enough to keep me going if I proved it was important to me. I took advantage of the educational opportunities offered, and when in “the real world”, I pushed. I made a lot of mistakes, but learned not only from them, but from the mistakes I saw others make. Yeah, luck was involved, but it would seem that not everyone responds to the luck they are offered the same way. My wife, on the other hand, was much more privileged than I was, in many ways. She accomplished much more academically than her siblings (or me, for that matter). She also has struck out on her own more than her siblings, with nobody there to catch her if she failed. A lot like me, but with much different abilities. By the time we found each other, we were our own people, not the sons/daughters or brothers/sisters of anybody.

Anyway, I am grateful for the luck. But, I am not going to let anyone dismiss anything either I or my wife has accomplished because of luck. We got to where we are because we did what we felt needed to be done at the time. And, that same thinking is taking us into the future.

I guess the sorrow I am feeling is that, while I have walked away from good jobs with excellent opportunities in the past, I have not walked away from one who had my heart (or, allowed her to walk away from me). Procrustus, while I don’t think you intended this, your comments have really helped me understand my feelings and have made me feel better. Thanks.

excavating (for a mind)