Need advice so coming here for perspective.
Married for 5 years and things have been good so far.
Dual Canadian-US citizen living in Texas for now.
However, in recent years, my husband's continually buying anime merchandise, manga, comic books and they're nearly always unused; I estimate he's spent around $92k of our $280k-a-year income on this. Had to use a calculator app to do this.
He wasn't like this in the early days of living together or being married.
This is being taken from our shared income; not separate bank accounts.
He's even gone as far as paying for storage of the manga/comic books and buying prepaid cards, or paying kids to go and buy comic books for him.
He's a nerd, got no problems with that. It's part of who he is, I like that he's passionate.
My other main hobby is on hold due to covid anyway; I like restaurants and social activities, conventions/fairs etc. and spending on vintage fashions although I have sold a lot on ebay over the years, not sure I can do so on etsy same as ebay.
I like fashion but don't spend thousands on it even though I'm very very girly in esthetic and behavior. I guess it's just alien to me to spend thousands on fashion.
One of the issues is most of the manga and comics are unread, and he's been taking out loans to buy them too, we've had manga packages from Amazon sent to our house, and he's buying comics and manga off eBay; a guy from across the pond's sending him some comics apparently.
We've fought about this.The finances mainly.
Well, we have fought about his hobby, since I found out he was a comic book "whale", apparently, bulk-buying comic books and manga from comicbook shops after hours. That's been a big cause of arguments for months now; well since August 2019.
I'm worrying this is a hoarding situation and the drain on our finances. He's spent loads on storage and buying new ones.
He's already bought 40 copies of Motor Trend from 1995 to 1998, but they're unread too, and IIRC he doesn't even read that title. He only bought them since they came with the DC Comics title he liked on ebay as part of a bundle.
I've said to him about digital manga and comics, but he's already said:
Nothing's gonna replace the feel of a manga or comic book.
I can't work from home as my job role makes me unable to do so, it doesn't work over Zoom and also I'm handling heavy equipment etc. and doing maintenance on servers, so I'm effectively temporarily unemployed. No idea when I can return to the office or offices, since I move about for work and don't really have an office.
I'm still being paid but have dispensation due to covid not to participate in Zoom sessions etc. due to my job role; one of only six people with this status.
My job role means that working from home and Zoom/Teams etc. just doesn't work for me.
I've only been in the US 13 years now.
Financially, I'm usually well-informed; the main one in charge of this, the bills are paid on time.
I'm usually OK at budgeting, the biggest splurge recently was purely practical stuff since we were in quarantine, simply for cookery equipment since I couldn't work. However, it gets used often, since I'm unable to work for now, and am often trying new recipes online.
My worry is over retirement and saving for it, since he keeps spending.
We both want a bigger home post-pandemic, move from Texas to a state like California or Minnesota or Florida, can't decide which, although saving for it's the problem since husband spends a lot of money.
It's not a "spender vs saver" since I'm in the gray area between spender and saver, although it seems to be more saver than spender.
Although I don't have a major issue with the hobby, I do have an issue with him having no "end game"; I've bought all the cookery books I want for now, sold some old ones for pennies on the dollar via eBay months ago. He doesn't seem to have that.
Nothing wrong with having a passion; he likes my passion for cookery and food; that's what comes from growing up in a Japanese-Canadian/Italian-Canadian family does to you due to mix of cultures.
In our house, I'm normally the one who does the budget and he goes along with it; he's not normally into financial matters and seems to think I know everything.
I think he's not read almost half the comics/manga he's bought, or watched the DVDs , he claims no manga/anime on Amazon Prime, Netflix or Hulu; we've got all three.
My worries are over finance and retirement issues etc. / IRA etc. and his spending on the hobby.
I don't know how much he's spent on them; I do know for general spending/restaurants etc. as I keep a Numbers spreadsheet and keep print copies.
I need advice and ideas since I want to come to it with fresh insight and to be able to discuss this rationally.
I love my husband but am worried about him due to this. Don't know where to begin, need help.
August 28, 2021 at 05:21AM
