Imagine being married, working full time, and still draining your savings just to pay the bills.

If your spouse were focusing their time on an Etsy store that wasn’t making any income, would you tell them they need to get a real job, or would you make some major cutbacks in your lifestyle to save money?

The man in this story is thinking about taking that second approach, but he’s not sure how to talk to his wife about the cutbacks.

Let’s read the whole story.

AITAH for giving my wife an ultimatum about her “work”?

This is a financial story and I’m reacting to my wife’s decisions.

Context – I make $100k/year in Salt Lake County. Mortgage for my town home is $2200/mo, HOA $100. I have student loans at about $360/mo. Both cars paid off.

But we are still bleeding money.

Something needs to change.

My wife was a nurse but had been a sahm since our youngest was born – 6.5 years.

I would love for her to continue being a sahm, but we either need to change our lifestyle or she needs to get money to cover our current lifestyle.

For the last 2 years she has been trying to do this Etsy shirt-printing business. She started after her sister had been doing it for 6 months and broke into thousands in profit.

My wife has made, to my knowledge, net $0 unless she’s spending it in things I’m not aware of.

He thinks his wife spends money on unnecessary things.

In that time, with inflation and all, we have been draining our savings for things like car expenses. Or she’ll ask me for money for groceries after spending $300+ on a child’s birthday.

I see a lot of wasteful spending, like exorbitant snacks that I never touch, and lots of outings for kids.

I love my kids, but if we can’t pay for it, we shouldn’t do it. My wife can’t understand that.

Her mom has a lot of money and will constantly indulge her, paying for many of the more expensive things. I know it comes from a place of kindness, but it’s feeding an expectation of a “better” lifestyle in my wife.

He made a decision to cut back on expenses.

I became unsupportive of her Etsy business 1.6 years in.

My biggest issue is that she lets chores lapse and doesn’t pay attention to spending – not being a home maker because she’s investing into this business that has no fruits.

I told her by the 2 year mark, if we don’t see income from her business to contribute to our family, then I’m taking control of all spending.

I won’t make her quit – that’s her agency. But I’ll be cutting Netflix, Amazon, etc. I will do the shopping and I’m not buying the snacks she always gets. I’ll do the cooking if I have to.

He needs advice about how to actually put this plan into action.

The 2 year deadline is tomorrow.

We’ve run out of savings. If I lost my job, we’d be in huge trouble. I need to act on my ultimatum.

Do you have advice so I don’t come off as a controlling husband?

Also, what’s your best meal plan advice in case I need to fully commit and be solely responsible for groceries and meals.

Side note, I do a side gig about 5hrs a week at home that I budget towards car insurance and left over spending money. So I’m doing more than a full time job.

He works full time plus a side gig and is willing to also take over the shopping and cooking in order to let his wife focus solely on her t-shirt business that doesn’t make any money.

Surely there has to be a better solution. I think it’s sweet that he’s not going to try to convince his wife to stop her Etsy shop, but maybe she should raise her prices or something.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story.

This person doesn’t think his wife really understands their financial situation.

Here’s the perspective of another person with an Etsy t-shirt store.

Show her the numbers.

This nurse thinks she needs to go back to work.

This is probably what his wife is thinking.

If she doesn’t like the cutbacks, she can get a real job.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check out what happened when a family gave their in-laws a free place to stay in exchange for babysitting, but things changed when they don’t hold up their end of the bargain.