Can’t get dh to stop day trading and get a job

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Forum -> Household Management -> Finances

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amother

Chocolate

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 12:58 pm

amother OP wrote:

It’s impossible to get through to him. He says he’s smarter than everyone else so he will succeed. And I am not supporting him now so he will be angry at me when he succeeds.

I don’t know what to do. This is ruining our marriage. We can’t pay our bills and it is so hard. He refuses to get a job. He says people end up not being able to afford a frum lifestyle with a job. But we’re not affording life now either! He says, give it time.

I feel like im not good at being a wife. I should figure out a job he can do instead and maybe he’d do it then. I don’t know what he can do. I don’t know how to make him stop trading.

It’s so hard to parent our kids when this stress if weighing me down.

And maybe he will succeed, I don’t know.

You can’t change him, he’s an adult
Insist on both of you sitting down with your rabbi and separately with a marriage counselor to discuss this and how he puts zero weight into your opinion. That’s not a partnership.

amother

Chocolate

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 12:59 pm

amother Canary wrote:

This!
He needs to speak to a professional financial counselor and an addiction therapist. He needs a day job and then maybe you can come to an agreement how much he can trade a day or week. This is a bad addiction under the guise of a job.

Yes, agree all the way

amother

Chocolate

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 1:02 pm

amother Aubergine wrote:

Another wife of a day trader who isn't making money here. We are literally living off tzedaka money because he's not making any money and if he does he immediately loses it all.

We've gone to rabbonim and to marriage counseling, nobody can convince him to get a job. He's also convinced that he's smarter than everyone else and he's going to make it big one day.

Op, this is not your fault. You are not a bad wife. You're the victim in this situation. He's not necessarily a bad person, but this is an addiction and these men lose their seichel. I once heard a speaker talk about how Pharoah wasn't a stupid man, but Hashem took away his seichel and that's why he kept saying no even though his country was being destroyed. That reminded me of my husband. He's a smart person who completely lost all of his seichel when it comes to day trading. He can no longer have a rational conversation about finances, because it all goes back to how rich we're going to be very soon.

I wish I had some good advice for you, unfortunately nobody I've turned to has any good advice for me.

I don’t think I’d want my tzedaka money going to someone who chooses voluntarily to try risky schemes for Parnassa instead of doing his proper hishtadlut and getting a regular job since he’s able bodied yet he’s choosing not to.

naturalmom5

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 1:26 pm

NO NO NO NO

DID I SAY NO

when we were first engaged my chosan was doing that
He was going for a finance degree and very smart so I just trusted him

He lost about 80 K from the proceeds of his fathers house when his father passed away
By the major crash in 87 he first made 25 k and went on a trip to Bahamas , then a few months later lost about 70k

Since then, for the next 30 years he either had jobs that pay 10-12 an hour or he was learning in Yeshiva . So we have fluctuated between destitute to dirt poor to working poor

OP, you are young still, dont let this be your future, pun intended

amother

Burntblack

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 1:31 pm

amother Chocolate wrote:

Should the wife and kids starve and live on the street because the husband isn't doing what he should?

amother

Denim

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 1:49 pm

where is he getting continuous cash flow to keep investing?

amother

Aubergine

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 1:59 pm

ectomorph wrote:

The men are not wrong. It's impossible to afford a frum lifestyle on any normal salary. For many men, they're afraid to try because they think their wives/ community will only respect them less if they fail.

If they don't try, there's always the possibility that they would have been very successful if they had tried.

The truth is that we have gotten used to a lifestyle that is not necessarily sustainable as a community. Most men cannot provide for their families what their families expect as a minimal support. High paying jobs are few and far between.

This leads to exactly the situation - where men are afraid to get a regular job and work their way up. They end up doing high stakes, high reward things, because they do badly want to be respected and provide for their families. They can't emotionally handle the idea of failure and working hard and being poor

Wow! This almost feels like you're blaming the victim. I don't have high standards and I don't need him to make a lot of money and I had a lot more respect for him when he was at a low paying job that helped provide for our family. I work full time and I honestly love it. But I can't support our family on my own. I've literally showed him on paper that we need an additional $50-60 thousand a year and we'll be ok. I've begged him to take any job where he'll be paid consistently so that he has a reliable paycheck, even if it's not a lot of money. But he thinks he'll be rich one day from day trading and he considers it his full time job that's an investment towards the future. In the meantime we just don't have enough to cover our basic needs and he wont do anything about it.

amother

Impatiens

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 1:59 pm

ectomorph wrote:

This is very dangerous to justify an addict.

Op I know a lot about it. It is unfortunately an addiction disguised in a poor job excuse. Sadly I don’t have advice, this has been a lifetime struggle for my relative.

Don’t feed into it and hide your own money from him. Also, don’t get excited when he tells you of this fail proof once in million year opportunity he has discovered. It’s an endless cycle.

amother

Aubergine

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 2:00 pm

amother Burntblack wrote:

Should the wife and kids starve and live on the street because the husband isn't doing what he should?

Thanks. Bh the local tzedaka fund understood the situation when I explained it to them. It's not the first time they've seen this scenario play out sadly.

amother

Steelblue

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 2:28 pm

amother Chocolate wrote:

Are you ok with your tzeduka money going to a family where the father is struggling with a mental illness? That’s what the situation is. Either way, it’s not chesed if you’re assigning din to it.

amother

Bluebell

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 2:30 pm

Dear OP,
No no and no do not allow this!
Married to a day trader (traitor) 20 a+ years.
The havoc this caused my marriage is indescribable. Millions of dollars lost. Trust lost.
It’s an addiction like any other. He took out credit cards and loans on my name unknowingly because he got himself in such a rut. (I found out when collections started calling me. Thankfully I have an accounting degree and hold a great job.
I keep my money separate and pay all the major bills.

How didn’t I realize this before my eyes - I was taking care of 3 under 3.

The days they make money they’re in an good mood. The days they lose all hell breaks lose.
A real rollercoaster.

He has a regular low paying job.
I’m not for certain he doesn’t trade but he def doesn’t have money too.

I actually believe this addiction stems from low self esteem / low self worth. And thinking having money will change their status.
He also grew up in a poor home - where the parents would constantly remind the kids that things are expensive . And I feel he wanted his life to be the opposite.
For this reason. I am soooo careful with my kids especially the older ones how I talk about money and teach them to manage their money responsibly.

I hope you convince your husband to do something stable.

amother

Oxfordblue

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 2:32 pm

If you substituted "degenerate gambler" for "day trader" I think all of the enabling and excuses would disappear.

Maybe if it was referred to in this manner, people in the larger community wouldn't somehow treat it as a somewhat respectable thing to do.

ectomorph

Fri, Dec 23 2022, 3:22 pm

To be clear, day trading is flat out gambling. I'm against it. Your husbands need to recognize it's become an addiction. You should separate your finances and not trust them and definitely do not support it.

I'm only explaining that this is also part of a larger social issue in our community, where the ability of the average man to earn a respectable living has dropped drastically. When this happens, many men turn to other ways to feel good. In the olden days, it was alcoholism. Now it's day trading. But I mostly blame the frum newspapers.

amother

Tiffanyblue

Sat, Dec 24 2022, 12:54 pm

My sympathies. I recently discovered that my DS is doing this and stole money from me to finance it.

He does have an almost full time job in addition but Im very disturbed. We'd all like to get rich quick but that's not how it works. He's also very smart which just goes to show that smart people are also vulnerable.

It's gambling and people can't gamble more than they can afford to lose

amother

Lawngreen

Sat, Dec 24 2022, 3:54 pm

Dear OP
I don’t want to scare you but you need to take drastic steps to stop this.
It’s gambling. Which is addiction which is an emotional issue.
He needs help.

It’s a slippery slope. I personally was involved in a case like this that stared with innocent day trading and ended with mafia cuz of borrowed funds to continue this addition.

amother

Canary

Sat, Dec 24 2022, 6:13 pm

Please make sure you have a job and put it safely in another account he doesn’t have access to. Is he paying all the bills?

amother

Mon, Dec 26 2022, 7:17 am

I stopped posting because it felt like I was betraying my husband. But I need help figuring this out.

I work full time. My paychecks go into my personal account which he does not have access to. I pay most of our bills but do not earn enough to pay all of them. We have fifteen thousand in credit card debt so far. It is so frustrating to be paying minimum payments on the credit card and be paying such high interest. We need to just earn enough to pay it up and pay our bills and save for our future.

We’re in a weird situation where we also have 20,000 in our savings account, in addition to the debt. I worked hard for that money when I was single and it makes me feel safe. I do not want to use it but it makes no sense that we are paying high interest on credit cards.

He was trading with some money he had made years ago. But he lost it all now and he doesn’t know what to do. He keeps saying he will not use any our savings because he knows how upset I would be if he lost them. He doesn’t have access to them anyways, don’t worry.

He needs to get a job but he’s been unemployed for a few years now. I don’t know how we can write a resume. And I don’t know what field he should go into. He doesn’t either.

This is so hard. I am so unhappy all the time. I will not have another child with him until he has a steady income.

Part of me wants to give him $1,000 and hopefully he can turn it into tens of thousands the way he did in the past, day trading.

amother

Dill

Mon, Dec 26 2022, 7:23 am

Sounds like you are doing everything right. DO NOT give him any money to feed his addiction. I don't know where you live, but many places have career counselors available through the Jewish federation or other organizations. Someone can guide your husband in writing a resume that emphasizes his skills rather than arranging his jobs chronologically.

I know it's tempting to wish you could get rich quick. Alas, that's not how the world works for most of us.

amother

Clover

Mon, Dec 26 2022, 7:26 am

amother OP wrote:

Can you cut up the credit cards, borrow from savings to pay back the loan, and pay yourself back with automatic monthly withdrawals in the amount of your minimum payments?

Would DH be willing to take a less skilled job just to get back into the workforce? It’s often easier to change jobs than to get one from nothing.

amother

Mon, Dec 26 2022, 7:53 am

amother Dill wrote:

Thank you for saying I am doing things right! My husband and I are so sad all the time, feels like I’m doing everything wrong.

We did get rich quick from it though and that is the confusing part. I know he lost it but he admits that’s because he did stupid, reckless trades and he would know better this time.

amother Clover wrote:

I don’t earn enough to be able to pay myself back.

We also owe money to the IRS. About fifteen thousand to them too. We haven’t filed taxes so don’t know the exact amount. Because my husband earned a lot one year and then lost it all after the year ended. So I do not want to pay back credit cards and then not have money to pay the IRS with. I am filing taxes next month when I’ll have some extra time to work on it and I am so scared to see what will happen. This probably ruins the I am doing everything right from before.

About a job, he doesn’t want a job at all, let alone a menial one. And he doesnt respect anyone. Thinks he’s smarter than everyone else so there’s no one we could talk to.

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