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The original was posted on /r/relationships by /u/WhatsTrade on 2024-01-22 16:02:23+00:00.
Hi! So my girlfriend (23f) and me (28m) have been together 2 months shy of 3 years. We have two wonderful children together and I adore them to pieces.
Just recently my girlfriend seems to want me to take time off work repetitively to help look after the children with her. I understand 2 under 2 is hard for her and I completely empathise with how hard it can be, however she is on a basic maternity pay with no bonuses and I’m not on the best wage around.. doing the bare minimum hours I do at work just about sees us through in regards to rent, car expenses etc. She seems to fail to understand that if I don’t go to work then all these luxuries we have will cease to be as I won’t be able to afford them. For example I came home today to being locked out by her putting the key in the door to stop me from unlocking it, and when she finally let me in about half an hour later she explained that she’s done it all day on her own anyway so she might as well have done the rest of the day on their own, followed by her explaining loudly to the kids that “their daddy doesn’t care about them”.
Am I being unreasonable by refusing to leave work early/have days off? I’m getting to the end of my tether with this relationship but I really want it to work for the children. I understand they would rather see their parents separated and happy, but I’ve got too much care for her despite how much I currently dislike her and wouldn’t want her to be in a position where she would be unable to afford to live. I’m torn.
Tl;dr - girlfriend has started becoming mentally abusive because I’m refusing to take time off work to help with the kids because simply put I can not afford to have time off work due to all of our expenses