I showed my husband the spreadsheet I have made to split out our bills.
I has a collumn with our bills and the average amount, then a column with a space for the actual amount and columns for both him and me so we can track who paid what and how much.
Anyway he is not happy. His complaint is that I listed his Child Support payments under him only. I put his car gas, repairs under him and the dental for his daughter under him. Under my I listed the landline phone and the newspaper and my car gas and my car repairs.
I figured it would be easier to just pay our own car gas and oil changes and repairs rather than trying to split that. Is this wrong? How would you do it if you had to split bills?
I figured the child support for his two daughter should come out of his paycheck, They are not my Children and so I am not sure why he would thinks I would do okay with splitting his child support? Is it not his responciblity to make enough money to pay his child support, or as his wife as I suppose to be paying half his child support payments in addition to spliting the bills of our son together.
Help I need to know am I wrong, should I be paying the child support to his two children (pre-marriage).
*** Edit*** We have been married for 8 years, prior to this (ME as the primary income provider) I was paying the majority of his child support or he was paying his child support and nothing to our family how ever you want to look at it.
Am I Crazy - Child Support Question- please help!
March 30th, 2010 at 03:44 pm
March 30th, 2010 at 03:50 pm 1269964210
But if I Recall correctly, you are splitting. Um, I think his child support is HIS problem.
March 30th, 2010 at 03:54 pm 1269964442
March 30th, 2010 at 04:37 pm 1269967079
March 30th, 2010 at 04:43 pm 1269967385
You just need to always treat his budget like he has 3 children and you have 1, not as equal parents of your son.
March 30th, 2010 at 04:58 pm 1269968302
If someone said that to me, and the numbers make sense, I would not have a problem with it. After all, you'd think after 8 years of marriage, you have much bigger issues to worry about than who has to pay what. In the end, if it's "our money", it doesn't matter how expenses are paid so long as they are paid.
That's my opinion on that anyways.
March 30th, 2010 at 05:04 pm 1269968658
If you are asking about how to treat it going forward, staying together, that is something you two have to work out for yourselves. I agree with the other comments, and can see your husband's side if you were happy to chip in the last 8 years, and suddenly aren't. HE thinks you are okay because you have done it for so long. Many wives would be happy to support other children - many others wouldn't. You have to do what feels right for you, and get him to understand your feelings. It's hard to look at something like this as very black and white.
March 30th, 2010 at 05:11 pm 1269969065
March 30th, 2010 at 05:20 pm 1269969613
As an example, if my fiance still owns his house when we are married (unlikely because I don't want to get legally attached to him while he still has the money pit), there is no way I would assist him paying for it, or for the judgement on the lawsuit attached to it that he is facing.
This is black and white. I don't live in the house, I've never even been in the house. I never will live in the house. It's a big nasty mess he dug himself into before he met me, it's caused us nothing but problems since we got engaged and I could care less what happens to the house. I despise the house. It's so bad that I'd actually prefer he just foreclose and walk away with tarnished credit so we could have the cash to start our life together.
You get my point, it's his pre-meeting me problem and I should not be responsible for it. Likewise, he is not responsible for my car, or my loan payments.
The difference is, in your case it's a living child. I'd probably have a hard time not wanting to give to this child if I saw her regularly and had any sort of parental relationship with her. If my fiance had a child, I can't imagine not wanting to buy the child toys, meals etc. Although I'd probably do it on my own time and not contribute to the forced child support payments.
March 30th, 2010 at 05:34 pm 1269970463
If you are together for the long haul, I agree with Broken Arrow that it's all collective money in the end, so it might make more sense to pay everything together and then have separate his and her spending money in whatever proportions you agree on. Also, if you plan to stay married and knew about his other children from the start, it seems like the child support is part of the "baggage" that you chose to accept when you agreed to marry him- a preexisting condition that you either accept or acknowledge as a dealbreaker. A decent man's first loyalty will always have to be to any children he has. I truly respect people who can commit themselves to a marriage that requires putting another person's children first, since that's the deal stepparents enter into (for at least as long as the marriage lasts.) Good luck!
March 30th, 2010 at 05:58 pm 1269971925
His point of view must be:
For the 8 years we were married (up until now-when he wants to split income) I have always helped pay his child support. It was me that bought their birthday & christmas gifts and paid off his child support arears when we got married with my pre-marrage saving; the medical coverage for the girls was under my policy so WHY now would I not want to pay his child support payments for him.
My take was that he wanted us to split the payments so that he could have a larger pot of FUN money.
To clearify I have NEVER met the older daughter, both daughters live out of state but the younger one visits for a few hours a couple times per year.
March 30th, 2010 at 08:52 pm 1269982333
March 30th, 2010 at 09:12 pm 1269983577
March 31st, 2010 at 04:22 am 1270009371