Ask HN: Why does thinking about moving homes give me a panic attack? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Why does thinking about moving homes give me a panic attack?

13 pointsthatwebdude34 comments

I should be excited to think about the prospect of moving to a larger home, in a better neighborhood for my kids (read: more kids around), with more space. But every time my wife brings it up (and she's very persistent on it) I start to freak out inside. it just seems like so much to do.

I'll do my best to convince her that where we are now is good enough, but it's obvious that this is something she really believes in. And it's becoming more obvious that there's just not enough room.

I think that growing up in a small house in an old neighborhood makes me feel like this is a "keeping up with the Jones'" sort of moment. But in reality, we're outgrowing our neighborhood, size-wise and financially.

Homes in the midwest are affordable and huge. Neighborhoods grow like warts around here. I suppose I just need more convincing?

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I was a wife and homemaker for a lot of years, so some thoughts:

I was married about 16 years before it finally sank in with my husband that when he dropped his dirty clothes on the floor instead of putting them in the hamper, it left me in the position that I could either pick up after him or just be in a messy space all day. So, it was a lose-lose situation for me. I was home a lot more than him and this was where my work was done. It would be kind of like if I went to his place of employment and dumped dirty clothes on his desk.

Whether your wife has a job or not, the odds are good that she is doing more of the house work and child rearing than you are. That doesn't necessarily mean you need a bigger house, but it does mean that if she is not happy with the house, it is not a good idea to be all "meh -- not like she will divorce me over this."

Men typically have very different priorities than women and the work you have been doing on the house may in no way meet her needs. It may be possible to make this house work for all involved parties, but you likely have blind spots as to what she needs. A good kitchen and laundry area can make the women's work vastly less burdensome. If your entertainment area is awesome, but her work spaces are terrible, this may be a case that it bothers you less than her because you have completely different experiences of the same house.

Since this issue persists, it really would not be a bad idea to get some professional mediation rather than asking HN.

>if she is not happy with the house, it is not a good idea to be all "meh -- not like she will divorce me over this."

Implying that you think living in a too-small house actually is grounds for divorce?

Implying that fundamental lack of respect for her as a human being whose opinions are equally important as her husband's in determining their lifestyle is grounds for divorce as it tends to cause all kinds of very serious problems.

Stop shaming people over stuff like that, living space is important! It is kinda like when companies are shaming employees for wanting to leave if they don't get a decent salary.

So a marriage should be like a contract where each party is expected to fulfil certain obligations? You might want to rethink that analogy.

I'm not the poster, but I'll take a stab at the answer - mostly drawing from my experience being a housewife and in a relationship where things weren't split very evenly.

Small places are usually good for one person. The more folks you add to a small space, the more work there is for a single person. This is especially if folks happen to have a lot of things they aren't using, have hobbies that require a fair amount of physical space, or have differing hobbies/interests that take a smaller amount of space.

Additionally, some things make for daily frustrations, depending on the housing situation. Fighting with your own storage space to put the dishes away, for example. These sorts of frustrations add up and affect the quality of life. One person winds up having to deal with it most of the time, and there aren't coworkers there to vent to. There is no one.

One solution is to gain more space and more efficient "work" or "duty" areas (laundry, restrooms, and kitchens). Another solution is to do things that make the other's daily life easier, hence the picking up after oneself. Making sure to split the chores up fairly evenly so that both parties get days off or simply doing it more often so a homewife/husband gets some time away from the monotonous daily grind.

The answer is both yes and no.

Edited for clarity.

Whoa, this escalated.

You're assumptions are incredibly wrong.

> Whether your wife has a job or not, the odds are good that she is doing more of the house work and child rearing than you are. That doesn't necessarily mean you need a bigger house, but it does mean that if she is not happy with the house, it is not a good idea to be all "meh -- not like she will divorce me over this."

She works harder than I do full-time; I am at home many nights without her, with the kids, while she wins more bread. We split responsibilities quite well but she'll be the first to tell you I am an All-Star dad. I usually clean the house as I'm the neat-freak of the family, and what most people consider clean is just getting started for me. I spent the first 9 months of our first child's life at home being a semi-stay-at-home dad, rearing her almost completely as my amazing wife positioned herself into a career that helped us tremendously and really aids in our lifestyle now.

We appreciate each other, but don't value one's output over another, except maybe at our places of work. We're a team and we play like one.

> A good kitchen and laundry area can make the women's work vastly less burdensome.

Agreed, although we upgraded these features and requests to pinpoint issue we both had, as we both split duties performed in these areas at least 50% (different areas and different weeks demand different percentages).

... Sorry I took that so personally. I understand where you're coming from; but before we started a family I decided to play a much more important role in my child's lives than just the check-writer.

My email notifications do not include these two reasonable comments, but do have a really ugly personal attack against me that I am not currently finding here. I can only assume you changed your mind and deleted it.

I made a good faith reply based on sketchy information, thus drew on aggregate statistics to fill in the gaps. I stand by my actual suggestions to you that it might make sense to get mediation, etc. There is nothing in my actual suggestions to you in my first reply that is ugly or any of the other things I have been accused of here.

I realize this is your question and you are probably feeling like everything I have said here is thus about you. But most of what I said here was in defense due to being randomly attacked by some guy who swears he does not have baggage, yet feels perfectly fine with putting ugly words in my mouth and upping the ante with every single comment and not backing down.

But instead of fussing at him for derailing your question, you chose to fuss at me. Maybe you should wonder why that is.

I am only bothering to point that out to suggest that if you really want to work things out with your wife, it may help to wonder how you are coming across. Because the pattern for how this conversation went of he-said-she-said and the shit show just escalates is an all too common one. It does not build bridges.

I sincerely hope you and your wife can find a way to work this out. But I am feeling quite crapped on overall here and wondering why I bother to try to build bridges, keep the peace etc.

I am not your wife. Presumably you two have positive things going on as well. But this entire conversation is all too emblematic of what is wrong with the entire men vs women crap in the world today.

So I plan to step out of this discussion permanently. At this point, whatever else gets said, I just don't feel any good can come of me trying to make further good faith efforts to participate and I am incredibly tired of feeling like I got shit on for the crime of being female in a majority male forum.

"it just seems like so much to do."

All big events fall into this category but they can usually be broken into small stages that are a lot easier to visualise and accomplish.

Sometimes, just getting on with it is all that's needed; you can over think stuff.

Sure, this is all typical 'self help' mumbo-jumbo but there is something in it.

We are moving soon and just sold our house.. My wife is a stay at home mom so if yours is also, this might help you?

I thought our house was just fine. It's a 4 bedroom for a family of 4 and has 3 baths. I'm only there for long periods of time to dinner/gets kids into bed and sleep other then the weekends. My wife is there almost all the time. We got the house as a starter home and she wants stuff in it that just isn't there.

Just think of it like your desk at work, If you just have a small monitor you might be upset that you don't have a larger monitor with better resolution that can make you more efficient. That's sort of how my wife sees our current house. It works but it isn't everything she wants.

I just have to remember, she is the one in it most of the time and taking care of it.

Living in a tiny apartment with my partner in New York, I love it. The way we see it, we have less stuff to own, clean, (if it didn't come included) heat, etc- and it works out just fine. I personally think that having more stuff and space doesn't make me happier, having better life experiences (good friends, travel, walkable neighborhoods) does. Also, I also value community involvement very much, which makes anywhere I live way more interesting and engaging.

However, I can relate to the wildly opposing viewpoint perspective between you and your SO, so perhaps a mediator may be in order- an impartial friend, a therapist, whomever you trust and isn't biased. Neither side needs convincing, but perhaps both sides may need a happy medium. Perhaps a new house may be in order regardless, or maybe just reorganization or expansion on your current place. But the way you describe it now, it sounds like nobody will end up really happy with the outcome.

I'm in the process of selling my house and moving to a new city right now. I'm actually in my new town while my family stays behind to take care of the house. I'm having a panic attack today. Good luck - there are many things about moving that are stressful.

Buying a house can be stressful - really stresful. And once you are finally sure you've found the right one, it can go back and forth for weeks of uncertainty if you'll actually get it.

And moving is indeed a heck of a hassle.

And having a small house that's well within your means makes everything financial in your life much easier.

So, there's obviously some truth to your feelings.

That said, the pain of moving can go to almost zero if you pay good professionals to do it. They can just move everything, and when you walk into your new house, and open your sock drawer, your socks are already there.

On the house buying process, I would just expect it to be terrible, and it probably will, but it's only temporary pain. The new place feels like home really fast.

As for the budget - can't help you there.

Just reading this post got me stressed out thinking about what I would do if I had to move. We were lucky to get our current house in Los Angeles. We bought in 2012 when prices and interest rates were low ($415k and 3.5% for a 30y fixed in our case). Now houses in our neighborhood are going for $800k or more, so while we could sell easily, anywhere we would move would be even more. We put a lot of work into this house with a kitchen, bath, and sunroom remodel, artificial grass, a new covered patio, and solar panels, and I would hate to have to go through all that construction again so soon. Plus, this is the only house my 4 year old daughter has ever known, and I wouldn't want to give that up.

Your last point hits home to me. We have two and a third due next month. Room is starting to get cramped, but I highly value a place where my kids can grow up entirely within its walls.

Also, I've done a lot of renovations to the home myself to cut cost and also update it faster: wood-look tile floors throughout, new flooring in bathrooms, update kitchen appliances & cabinets, deck, floor trim, etc. I often think that my commitment comes from all the blood and sweat (and even more tears) thrown into those things.

Also, congrats on being in the right place at the right time with that boom. I sincerely hope that works out for you in the event you ever do need to move (way, way, way into the future).

Growth here is significantly more tame.

I used to drive through this neighborhood in college and imagine I would live here someday when I was rich. The real estate crash made it possible, as $800k houses came down to the low $400k range. Now they're back to their old level. We only looked for houses because our daughter was on the way at that time...we have her to thank!

Kids can really align your priorities quite well, and quite quickly. So glad it worked out!

I think this is a personal issue that will improve through discussion with your wife and a counselor or therapist. I doubt that it'll improve much through discussion on HN.

I've had this conversation with my wife many times. She's aware of my arguments, and I'm aware of hers. I don't necessarily think it needs any mediation, though. That, to me, would signal that it's much more of a life intrusion than it is. I mean, I'm not going to lose her over it.

This is more of a "does anyone else get this way?" because I'm having a hard time relating with the real world in this issue.

Sorry, I wasn't trying to imply that your marriage needs mediation. I meant to suggest that you seek professional guidance if your feelings about the issue are causing you distress. HN isn't really intended to be a venue for this kind of discussion, nor does it seem to be a good one (in my experience).

"This is more of a "does anyone else get this way?" because I'm having a hard time relating with the real world in this issue."

I don't - moving generally fills me with excitement, even when it was to a new country. But I have friends that react in such a way, so it definitely isn't just you. I'd say the other reply here is correct, however. I think the best course of action is to talk to a professional - therapist, psychiatrist or medical doctor. If you can get rid of the anxiety that leads to a near-panic attack, it'll make the decision making and the stress involved in such a decision easier to navigate and talk through.

You may not be wrong.

It costs a lot to move. Not sure about US but here we have stamp duty. For me it's a year's salary. Another half years salary for agent fees. A month's salary for removalist costs. The only way to make it feasible financially is to do a reno project but that's more stress.

Selling stuff and being creative with space may solve issues. Living with "lower class" people isn't necessary a bad thing it may be good to prevent living in a bubble.

Yeah moving is stressful. If you do go ahead I wonder if there are services to manage everything for you. If you have the money maybe get the new place furnished ahead of the move.

> Living with "lower class" people isn't necessary a bad thing it may be good to prevent living in a bubble.

Those are my thoughts exactly. I see moving away and letting someone else "deal with problems" is a great way to devalue a neighborhood. It seems more and more people are buying new instead of fixing up the old.

I intend on paying movers to do as much as I can afford.

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