I (31M) was just told by my partner (29F) that she wants to stop working fulltime

A Reddit user shared a story about the difficult situation with their partner, who has been battling cancer and is struggling with the stress of work and health. After completing her degrees, she now wants to work part-time to focus on her mental and physical well-being, but this would also disrupt their financial balance, especially considering her significant student loan debt. The user is conflicted, trying to support her while feeling uneasy about the growing disparity in their relationship. Read the full story below…

‘ I (31M) was just told by my partner (29F) that she wants to stop working fulltime’

First let me start off by saying my partner has been through a lot. We had been dating for 2 years and planning a life together when she was disagnosed with cancer. At the time she was in school for a dual graduate degree program and managed to finish it. Treatment was rough on her and she strugled a lot through it, and hasn’t done well mentally dealing with the unfairness of it all, how different her body is after surgeries, and the fear of it coming back. All perfectly understandable, and I’ve been as supportive as I can throughout it all.

Now all that said, she went into the graduate programs after we started dating and one of the degrees was at a very expensive school for something that was only related and not required for the work she planned on doing which would never pay very well. I questioned her about it gently at the time but she was adamant about getting the expensive degree. It was her life, and we agreed it would be fine because we could utilize public service loan forgiveness to pay off her debt that would total \~$100k. This was before cancer.

I earn a considerable amount more than her, when we started dating I made ~4x and even with her degrees I make ~3x what she does. I’ve always been happy to spend money on her, and after having moved in together over a year ago and proposing shortly after I really went into the mindset of it being “our” money.

When we moved in she was finishing her degrees and I covered 100% of our bills, including some tuition costs for an extra semester since she was slightly delayed by her treatment. This was totally fine because school was her job and she’d be able to contribute when she graduated and even though I make much more if we are both working full time jobs it felt fair.

Now that she has graduated and started working, she is miserable at her job mostly because she is incredibly anxious that she isn’t doing it well and doesn’t feel like her school prepared her. She was already prone towards anxiety and depression (she takes medicine for it) but mentally she is in a very bad spot because of all this. On top of that she feels like she doesn’t doing enough for her health (mostly exercise) to keep her healthy to reduce the cancer from coming back but she says she is too tired after work to do much else than occationally go on a walk.

Recently she got the idea in her head to start working half weeks to give her more time to exercise, and stress her out about work less. She says not knowing for sure how long she’ll live has changed her priorities about working. Before all this she was a pretty driven type a personality working multiple jobs. But working part time doesn’t meet the requirements for public service loan forgiveness.

We’ve talked about it extensively and she feels it is important for her to work part time, but I am not very comfortable with the idea for many reasons. I get where she is coming from in her needs but feel like she is looking for a quick fix to her problems that puts us in a pretty big hole financially because she is so miserable instead of fully dealing with her problems. I’d be more ok with it if it was short term while she sorted through some things but she says she just wants more time to exercise and be stress free so she doesn’t know when that would end.

I just feel like she is taking our relationship which is already unbalanced and asking to make it a lot more so–and soley because she is in a position to do so because of my job. We can financially afford it but I haven’t been able to come to terms about the disproportionality it would create in our relationship. I am just looking for some advice on maybe a better way to think about this that would maybe make me feel more comfortable with it, some opinions on if I’m just being a greedy/selfish a**hole, and some comiseration if anyone has been in a similar situation.

I probably left out a lot so feel free to ask questions, this post is already very long, and if you read it all thanks for sticking with me! I obviously shared my side but I tried to not be too uneven since I think she has legitimate points but it hasn’t changed my uneasiness with it. Tl;dr My long time partner wants to start working half time to relieve her work stress and give her more time to take care of her health but it makes me uncomfortable because she has $100k of debt and it would make our relationship very unbalanced.

Here’s what people had to say to OP:

elendinel −  I can see both sides; no, you shouldn’t shoulder the majority of the financial burden, and I get why you’re apprehensive about something that could delay her PSLF eligibility. But also, she just went through something traumatic, and it’s not uncommon for people to take some time to process that trauma and to figure out how to move on. She doesn’t want to completely stop working; she just can’t manage her stress while working full hours.

There’s probably a middle ground here you two can figure out, but it’s going to require a lot of communication about how this is going to happen, for how long, what alternatives are available for the parts you or your GF don’t want to do, etc. For example, is it possible for her to go on short term disability while she works on her anxiety and depression? It would pay more than part-time, and it’s going to have a timeline that forces you two to reassess in a couple months or so, once the time has run out.

Or, can she agree to only doing it for a year, for now, and going to therapy throughout so that she makes sure she’s getting the best help she can find for managing her stress? Or, can you two agree that she can go part time indefinitely, so long as you don’t have to handle more financially than you already handle? Etc. A couples counselor could also help mediate you guys through a discussion to help you two reach the best decision for you. But bottom line is that both of you have valid concerns, so you two just have to keep trying to figure out a solution that adequately addresses both of your concerns.

aerynmoo −  She needs therapy to deal with this. She can’t fix it on her own. Edit: everyone is focused on the money and the student loan debt. In my opinion this is about her mental health. She’s had her entire life rocked by the cancer. It’s changed everything for her. If she really did used to be a type A and now she’s wracked with anxiety, depression, body image issues, and imposter syndrome then she needs professional help to work through this.

Just throwing pills at it won’t help. And trust me, I did the SAHM thing and said I’d exercise all the time and keep the house up and I did not. It was just a different environment to be depressed in. She should work together with a psychiatrist, therapist, and her GP to tackle these issues. She should NOT try to do it on her own.

feelingprettypeachy −  I’m going to disagree with a lot of people here. I don’t think she is “using” you, I think she is in a bad place. Major health concerns can be traumatic, and also working so hard for a degree and not loving the outcome of that.

I was working full-time a few years ago and basically had a mental breakdown. I ended up taking short term disability from my career and going into a treatment program. It was 8 hours a day of intensive therapy and then we all went home, and half way through I went to work part time and therapy part time as I worked on my transition back to normal life.

If she works for the govt they probably have some sort of short term leave plan, and I highly suggest a program like I was in. They worked with the short term disability program and submitted all the paperwork and as long as I went to therapy I got 65% of my weekly pay, which was more than part time work, even at my company.

This program has group therapy, individual therapy, nurses, doctor’s, etc. My health insurance covered it and for what my copay was they let me pay a little each month. If she is struggling with her physical health it could help there, too. It absolutely saved my life, and it could be worth looking into something like that for her! I don’t live in a progressive or even super metropolitan area.

mrsmoose123 −  I’m chronically ill and have had to give up a lot to remain alive and functioning. You do have to listen to that voice which tells you you’re heading for a crisis, but you also have to consider multiple solutions.

What if you were to sit down with her and a financial planner and game out all the options, including changing jobs, getting therapy and staying in this job, changing careers, stopping work entirely? Work through the financial and emotional pros and cons of each scenario, thinking about what happens if you stay together and what happens if she becomes single for whatever reason.

If she can’t face thinking all that through, she probably needs to take a vacation and seek better mental health treatment. But she shouldn’t make any major changes until she can look at all the possibilities. I think your role right now is to say you can appreciate she needs a change, and there will probably be a way to make things better. Once she’s feeling calmer you can be upfront about your worries and your dealbreakers.

BrokenPaw −  I just feel like she is taking our relationship which is already unbalanced and asking to make it a lot more so–and soley because she is in a position to do so because of my job. We can financially afford it but I haven’t been able to come to terms about the disproportionality it would create in our relationship.

You’ve hit the nail on the head, right here. This is the core of the problem: the relationship is already unbalanced, and she wants to make it more so, by shifting more of the responsibility for your financial well-being onto your shoulders. For a relationship to be healthy, both partners need to be contributing equitably (not to say equally, because there are plenty of valid setups where one contributes in one way and the other contributes in a completely different way), so that both feel that what they are putting into the relationship and what they are getting out of it are fair.

She went through a very rough time, and you were there for her and took up the slack while she did. But that can’t be the default state of the relationship. It seems as if she wants you to be working on making sure the relationship has everything it needs, whereas she wants to be working on making sure she has everything she wants.. That’s an unworkable model.

The first thing to try would be to get her into counseling/therapy to deal with her anxiety and impostor syndrome about her work. If she can get her head sorted out so that work is no longer an anxiety-inducing thing, that may allow this imbalance to be resolved.
If she won’t try that, or she tries it and it doesn’t help, you’re left to play the cards you have in your hand. There’s nothing you can do to force her not to cut back to part time. You have to decide whether that balance of partnership is one you can live with, or not.

[Reddit User] −  Damn you guys are cold af. Consider yourselves lucky that you’ve never experienced the level of trauma and illness she has – because if you, or someone you knew had, I guarantee you’d be less of a collective a**hole.

Make sure if all ya’ll on here ever get married, you remove the “for better or for worse, in sickness and in health”, part from your vows. Right now OPs partner is “for worse” and “in sickness”. It is completely understandable that right now she would benefit from part time work, and full time healing, instead of full time work, and part time healing. And because I know some of you will mention it, no, you can’t just heal “part time” and work “part time”.

Many people may be put in situations like that where they have to, but that doesn’t make it right. If OP and his partner have the means to allow her to heal right now, they should 100% be focused on that. She almost lost her life – you don’t just come back from that without issues, let alone the real health aspects that need to be managed post critical illness. Christ’s sake it’s not even like she’s saying she wants to quit work completely.

Antlorn −  Reading these comments turns my stomach. People talking about her taking advantage, and how if she’s not ‘making the time’ to exercise now, why would she when she’s working part time. It’s very obvious to me how much most people commenting HAVEN’T experienced serious health problems.

I don’t know if she’s still experiencing physical symptoms post-cancer, but the stated need to exercise and exhaustion from work implies she might be (do correct me if I’m wrong). People are chatting about her like she’s lazy. She continued with a dual graduate programme while she had cancer and was going through gruelling treatment! The woman’s a f**king power trooper!

It sounds like she’s at or nearing a crisis point. I agree that therapy might be helpful, but also, she may just need to take some time out. It sounds like she’s going straight from a dual graduate programme AND having cancer to working full time. Often when faced with a traumatic situation and too much on our plates we battle through and don’t have time to process our emotions and rest and recover properly.

My personal background is of an ambitious overachiever whose health totally crashed after I just battled through too much for too long, and I’ve had to come to terms with the painful fact that I can probably never work full time ever again. But if I’d taken more time out to rest and sort through my trauma after certain events, rather than throwing myself into overwork, then maybe I wouldn’t have long term chronic illness now. I don’t have a supportive wealthy long-term partner and have basically had to come to terms with being in poverty due to my illness.

If you made 4x the amount she did when you started dating, and now make 3x the amount she does after her graduate degree then frankly it sounds like you’re rich as f**k. So, what do you want to do with your money? And how much do you care about this person and want to stay with her? Can you still live comfortably if she works part time? (and I’m not talking about fine dining out levels of comfort).

What’s more important, the relationship being financially balanced, or the mental and physical health of your partner? Maybe she’d be fine working full time after some therapy, therapy sounds like a good thing to explore anyway tbh. But maybe, after working too hard at the same time as having a major health crisis, she needs a bit of breathing space. Ultimately, it’s up to you where your priorities lie, going forward into the future.

fuckyourmermaid_ −  I’m coming from another point of view. It is a bit of a difference since my husband and I do have children. I am mostly a SAHM and wife. I started working part time after my daughter turned 1 to help out financially. But it was still a given that I would be responsible for most house chores, kids and dinner.

Just within the last two weeks we found out that i miscarried. This is our second miscarriage back to back. Very traumatic because I’m in the second trimester awaiting surgery. And even those this isn’t life or death for myself I have a history of clinical depression and anxiety. I asked my husband if I could stop working for a while and he was very understanding. I deeply appreciate that he is willing to take on the full load for a while. But I truly believe this is detrimental for my future mental health and I need to get fixed mentally before I can take on life again. For my children and husband.

my opinion is that if you truly love her and can afford it, is it possible to just talk about a timeline in which she can work part time? Tell her that she would need to go to therapy and expect certain limitations on spending. Also bring up an end date. 6 months sounds realistic. For myself I want to give myself a 3 to 6 month break. But if I feel ready faster that would be a plus.

A relationship is about compromise and doing things out of love. She isn’t asking to be taken cared of forever. She has gone through a life changing event and she just needs some time. And if you two were financially able to I would understand but she’s just asking for less hours not for you to take care of her as a SAHW forever.

Breatnach −  I think you are getting too hung up on the financial aspect of it. If you really make 3x what she makes and she goes part-time, you’d still be at 87% of your combined income (you make 6/8 and she was only making 2/8 anyway). Unless you are under a very strict budget, it doesn’t sound like it would force you to re-think your lifestyle.

You’re obviously committed long term, since you have gotten engaged – but did you ever talk about children? It’s not uncommon for one person to be a stay at home parent and very often that person earns very little or nothing. Would you feel the same way? The best advice I can give is to try it on a temporary basis for one year and agree in advance under what conditions it could / could not become a permanent arrangement.

JackPAnderson −  This one hit really close to home for me. Mrs. Anderson also had a bout with cancer when she was your wife’s age. I could write a bloody novel here, but I will try to keep focus and give you only two pieces of advice. First, and I cannot overstate the importance of this, but **speak with an employment attorney before you make any decisions**. That includes whether or not your girlfriend reduces her hours.

I don’t know what country you’re in, but there are good ways to handle this and bad ways, and the financial ramifications are huge. It is 1,000% worth a few hours of somebody’s time to make sure you get this right. Make sure you factor in any disability policies or SSDI that your girlfriend might receive if she’s no longer able to work due to the permanent effects of her cancer treatments.

Second, the default mindset of the caretaker is to prioritize fighting the disease and the comfort of the patient above all else. I think that’s what any loving partner would do, but it’s so easy to lose your own identity and everything is about the sick partner. Well, you matter too!

You are 31 years old and your girlfriend, through no fault of her own of course, is now in a very different stage of life from you. She’s 2 years younger and 30 years older than you, all at the same time. What were your plans and goals for life? How do you feel about this new life? Just to be clear, I am not advising you to leave your girlfriend. That’s up to you. But what I am saying is that you need to take careful deliberation and own your decision so you don’t wake up 20 years from now filled with regret.

I don’t know if it helps or not, but I’ll add that Mrs. Anderson and I were already married and had kids by the time cancer struck. Yes, we stayed together, and no, it didn’t even occur to me that leaving would make any sense, and no, I am not experiencing regret. But I’m me, and you are you.  Apologies since I’m sure this came across as callous. But it’s important information, and life isn’t always rainbows and unicorns. Wishing you the best as you navigate this.