True love is hard to find, and when you finally meet the man or woman of your dreams, you should hang onto them for dear life. But too often, perfectly good relationships fall to pieces because of one partner's fragile ego. Case in point: a man who says he left his wife and kids because he couldn't handle the fact she was the breadwinner.
Fast forward years later, and the man can't shake the feeling that he made a terrible mistake. He claims to still be in love with his lawyer ex but is worried she might not feel the same way. In a moment of vulnerability, he decided to bare his soul. Here's what happened next...
He married the woman of his dreams, then ended up leaving her because he couldn't handle the fact that she was the breadwinner
Image credits: Roberta Sant'Anna / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
Years later, he realizes he may have made the biggest mistake of his life
Image credits: Curated Lifestyle / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
Image credits: anon
The man didn't get the sympathy he was hoping for as some called him out for his "cringe" behavior
Some had advice for him, while others had harsh words
Image credits: Yunus Tuğ / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
He later revealed he'd taken his ex-wife on a date
Image credits: Getty Images / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
Image credits: anon
The couple went on a few more dates and was considering telling their children
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Image credits: Samuel Raita / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
He provided another update a few months later
Image credits: anon
"We found men to suffer when they earned less than their wives": What research says...
It seems the man is not alone when it comes to feeling “uncomfortable” about earning less than his spouse. A 2020 study published in the Work, Employment and Society journal found that the partner pay gap (PPG) is a touchy subject for many men, but only when they’re not the breadwinners.
In short, husbands in the UK get a psychological boost when they out-earn their wives and feel unhappy if their wives earn more than they do.
“Men exhibit an increase in life satisfaction in response to a recent increase in their proportional earnings relative to their wives’ earnings,” reported City St. George’s, University of London’s site. “Secondary-earning husbands report lower average life satisfaction than majority-earning and equal-earning men, while such differences were not found for women.”
Interestingly, the researchers found that for women, changes in proportional earnings had no effect on life satisfaction.
“We found men to suffer when they earned less than their wives, while women’s subjective well-being did not appear to be affected by being out-earned by their husbands,” said lead author Dr Vanessa Gash, who is the deputy head of the Department of Sociology at City St. George’s, University of London.
“These findings suggest that the partner pay gap is reinforced or supported by male breadwinning norms,” added Gash. “This tendency was robust to multiple tests, and alternative specifications. It is a finding based on statistically representative data for the UK as a whole.”
A separate study, which analyzed more than 6,000 married or cohabiting couples over a period of 15 years, found something similar.
"Men are happier when both partners contribute financially – but much prefer to be the main breadwinners," said the lead author of that study, Joanna Syrda from the University of Bath, School of Management, UK.
She found that men are stressed when they're the sole breadwinners but feel calmer when their partners earn up to 40% of the household income. However, as soon as the woman begins to earn more than that, the guys' distress levels increase sharply. They find it most distressing when they are entirely economically dependent on their partners, revealed Syrda.
"What a pathetic man": Many people felt the wife deserved better
