To him, no. If I don’t join him right away, it’s immensely hurtful to him. When his dad is falling ill, he goes into some very emotional state and it’s difficult to reason with him. It’s also hard to reason when he even thinks of his dad getting sick. He always assumes the worst and would never forgive me if I did not join him right away and his father passed before I arrived.
You should encourage him to talk to a mental health professional. He is likely already grieving the loss of his father as someone with late stage Alzheimer's is often a shell of their former self.
The sad truth is that his father is going to die soon and any time he spends with his father before that is unlikely to be quality time.
Is it worth blowing up your career that you have worked so hard for? If it were me, then I would not go.
I've experienced this whole tragedy... last parent with dementia, 1000s of miles away. It absolutely sucks. The brutal truth is that it's not just not quality time, it's that the parent won't even know that you visited an hour after you left. They don't even know who you are. They died already and there's this shell of a former parent still walking around and _nothing_ you do can affect them. You can only choose to torture yourself more or less while you pre-grieve their death.
I know this must be a very hard time for your husband but imo he is not being reasonable. He can’t ask you to give up your job and uproot your family to maximize the chance that you can be there for your father-in-law’s final moments.
I agree. I know OP is asking about work, but I'm incredibly curious about how unreasonable the husband is being.
Death happens when death happens. It can be tomorrow or two years from now. To uproot the whole family for possible pending death isn't rational. Is this more about OP being there in support? Or is it about supporting FIL? Because, sadly, FIL won't know if she's there or not.
Agreed 100%. Academia isn't a traditional employment field. If you don't want to hamstring yourself for future positions, it's hard to make a jump to another part of the country this quickly. It's awful that his father is dying, but you also don't want to set yourself on fire (career-wise) just to keep him warm. There is the long-term to remember as well.
It might be difficult for him to see the logical elements here. The long-term impact, for example. Or, if you moved with him then had to fly out to complete your contracted obligations on a regular basis (while working some remotely), how much time, money, etc. that would cost you.
It sounds like he needs some mental health support. What you describe (his reactions), and his black-and-white thinking (never forgive you if you didn't arrive by the time his father passed) is highly highly problematic. Someone who does not understand that people do not die on our schedule is . . . detached from reality. He needs counseling.
And so if you did that - move now - and he is providing care for dad and you are out of a job & job hunting... Where is income for food, housing, healthcare, and raising a 2 yr old, coming from??
I feel like I'm on a different sub here. To me, your husband needs to get it together and be an adult. Essentially, he is emotionally manipulating you ("He goes into some very emotional state" and "He would never forgive me") to blow up your career for his dad's end of life care. I lost both parents in just over a year and I spent that time going back and forth to another state with my child; it was hard and awful, but I didn't throw away my career or expect anyone else to either. Your h. can take care of his father solo for a while, giving you a chance to keep working and apply for new positions. (I mean , there's absolutely no guarantee you'll get a job in/near that city.) You can join him on breaks. He can come back home to get away. FMLA for a short time, but don't leave your position without a new one lined up.
Right?
>"He would never forgive me")
And I would never forgive my partner for trying to force me to uproot our baby, pets, my own life, and abandon a TT job on the fly like that.
...and what exactly is the plan *AFTER* the father passes? That's the follow-up question. Uprooting lives permanently versus taking a leave of absence (if necessary) is not the rational choice. Grief makes people act in irrational ways, but the husband here really needs to talk to someone.
I may be reading it wrong… but husband isn’t even providing care for his father. He just wants to be there for the last moments. He’s ok with moving a plane ride away, so it’s not like he plans to provide daily care. So he’s not even asking OP to uproot her career so he can provide care… he’s asking her to do it so he can have a better chance of being there when his dad dies. But it’s still just a chance.
Have you talked to your department head? Is sabbatical an option? Is relocating your FIL an option?
Because frankly, if things are so dire you must move *right now,* it sounds like you might be relocating for less than a year.
Can you all handle the financial/security hit of losing a TT job + income?
You guys would really benefit from talking through this with a therapist. They can act as a referee and help point out some hard realities for your husband and help him learn how to have his emotions *and* be able to have a conversation anyways.
As gently as possible - this is unreasonable & irresponsible. Sometimes we have to make hard choices because they’re the most responsible choice. When I got my job, my husband got an offer but then a freeze went into place. He wouldn’t have a job. So he moved me and our kids here, went back to our home town, and kept working and finishing packing up our house to put on the market while I got the kids enrolled in school & got myself set up in my new job. No one wants to live apart, but it was necessary.
I’d imagine FMLA would apply here, although I don’t know the details for this kind of situation. You could also ask your chair about options for teaching remotely or even leave without pay, which you might want to do if the family health insurance is through you.
I was going to suggest looking into FMLA. I have colleagues who had to do so for similar reasons. Better to look into it ASAP with your chair/dean/HR so (hopefully) red tape won’t compound your situation.
I am at R1, NTT. Broke my arm at beginning of semester and couldn’t drive. They gave me an option to do Remote Synchronous. This allows you to hold the class “online” at the same time it would be in the physical classroom via Zoom or whatever.
Converting in-person classes to “remote synchronous” also does not affect students’ financial aid. Finaid has regulations about how many “online” (remote asynchronous) courses a student can take per semester, but remote synchronous skirts that. There is precedence: Covid.
Dept. head told me they’ve also done that for faculty with other medical/emergency issues. In fact many universities now offer RS courses.
Perhaps that can buy you at least a semester, if not a year as a TT.
Well to clarify — at least at my school, but I’m assuming the same for all since it’s a Fed rule — for an emergency case, the in-person course isn’t changed as the official mode of delivery, say in their course registration; it’s basically an acceptance by dept and your notification to students that it will be remote sync for the majority of the semester. You’d need to have a couple in-person meetings to “officially” keep it as in-person on the books, and in that way, the fin-aid isn’t affected.
Good luck!
Many universities, colleges and community colleges also have unpaid leave available - this is kind of like a sabbatical in that it holds your position for you (they hire adjunct(s) to cover you) and it counts towards your years of service. It does not provide any pay, insurance or contributions to your retirement. It is requested through HR and your Dean has to approve it- then it goes to the Board (or whatever governing Board/Dean oversees hiring/firing) for approval. Taking this kind of Leave is unusual because people need to earn money and keep insurance usually- but if you ARE good on money and insurance via his job- this could be the thing to ask about before quitting anything at all!
Usually you have to take either a full semester or the year in order to allow for adjunct coverage. Good luck and my advice is to do whatever it takes to not quit this job in haste.
Sadly, reading the FMLA faq it does not appear to apply here. OP should still check it out with their HR to see if there is not a state level leave program, but not get her hopes up.
[https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/28f-fmla-qualifying-reasons](https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/28f-fmla-qualifying-reasons)
>**Parent** means a biological, adoptive, step or foster parent, or any other individual who stood in loco parentis to the employee when the employee was a child. **This term does not include parents “in law.”**
Ugh, I was afraid the “in law” part would be problematic. Thanks for looking up the exact policy. Also, how frustrating, given that many adults help care for their partner’s parents.
I was department chair (R1 public) when colleague had a similar situation with his mother, but he wasn't eligible for FMLA (on a technicality). We were still able to get him leave for a semester by using accumulated sick leave. There can be creative solutions if you have the right administrators working on your behalf
Yes, be careful about benefits. If you're on 100% leave, you'll probably lose eligibility for health care.
At my U, if you're on 100% leave you can't do a lot of stuff - vote, oversee defenses, etc.
Do you think search committees would view FMLA use as unfavorable in my application? You might not be able to answer this, but does leave without pay or FMLA mean I can’t use campus resources such as for writing grants?
I agree with the above advice about if someone is to go, it would be your husband. Moving an entire family for one parent's final moments is madness. How many applications and job interviews did it take to land your current gig? What's the job market like for you now? This is utter, utter madness.
If you leave your current job, you and your husband won't be eligible for FMLA for the new (if you can get one) jobs until after you've worked for a year.
This is not a reasonable plan. Do not do this to your yourself and your career.
Personally, I would not view FMLA as unfavorable. If you felt comfortable, you could potentially disclose it when applying, but it’s really no one’s business and it’s meant for short-term care.
Whether you can use campus resources, I’m guessing leave without pay means no access to resources, but there might be levels of how “away” you are—talk to your chair.
Or, as someone else suggested, perhaps your husband goes now and you stay and work/go on the market this fall.
Although it differs by institution, in general when someone is on FMLA they cannot work, and writing/putting in grant applications is work. Nobody will stop you from writing papers (nobody knows), but the institution itself submits grant applications for you and could put itself in a legal trouble.
You can be an R1 TT professor, or you can choose where you live. It’s very difficult to do both. You say your husband knows this, but he’s sure not acting like it.
I think it’s time for some relationship counseling with the goal of coming up with a plan that works for everyone.
Sister, I get where you are coming from. I have a marriage where one set of parents is a continent away, and managing an Alzheimer's demise is mourning their death every visit.
But I'm awfully worried about your husband's insistence on torpedoing your career. Leaving an R1 TT abruptly, prioritizing only his feelings/birth family above your shared family, unwilling to consider any compromises .... This gives me serious pause. You don't work for Macy's. Landing a comparable job elsewhere isn't as simple as filling out a few sheets of paper. This means that you need to handle leaving and starting with some care and finesse, not in a rush of feelings.
I have very little advice outside of "marriage counseling, yesterday." I sincerely empathize and wish you the best outcome of a crummy situation.
Your FIL sounds likely to pass somewhat soon, and I'm sorry about that. It's completely unclear from what you wrote here, though, how a full and permanent relocation of your family benefits you all in the long run. I understand that it's devastating for your husband, but he can't dictate these terms, nor is it all right for him to "go into some state" where your only choice is to go along with whatever he wants. Look into FMLA, as others have said, but if you want to continue in academia, you'll have to be able to talk with your husband--and, regardless of his feelings, he'll have to be able to hear you.
Does your husband even understand how these jobs work?
Can you afford to take unpaid leave? (this would likely be unpaid for the most part)
Can you work remotely next academic year?
Are there any R1s in family's city? Any universities at all? Industry positions? If you leave research, it is hard to get back.
What happens when your FIL dies?
Is your husband your FIL's only family?
It seems like there are dozens of options outside of what your husband is suggesting (demanding?).
He does, and he’s also in denial that there is no other “fast track” option I think.
I need to think about the unpaid leave. The big hold up to being remote is my teaching responsibilities. There is an R1 university in location B, plenty of industry but not my area. And when FIL dies, husband wants his mom to move closer to use or us closer to her so she’s not alone. So this problem would still be there in a way.
Messing up your career and earning potential seems at odds with supporting his mom in later years. Maybe worth framing the idea in these terms with your husband.
You can’t disrupt your career and then be able to just put the pieces back together where you are in a few years. It will not work like that, regardless of your husband’s intentions.
This seems really questionable then.
You could ask your chair if you can switch to remote for the next academic year because of the FIL situation. See what they say.
Unpaid leave and no benefits is a lot to swing, so be sure to discuss this with your husband.
You may not be eligible for FMLA (the policy specifies parent, spouse, child—in-laws are not included).
An unpaid leave is an option if your university agrees to it. How do finances and health insurance work if you take an unpaid leave?
I don’t think it would really affect how you’re seen as a candidate. However, in your shoes, I would ask myself what the end game is: if your husband wants to stay in location B as long as he has to care for his parents, and he wants you to be there, it means you have zero geographic mobility. While you mention there is a university there, the odds that they have a position in your field, and that you get hired, are low. So I’d consider this before going on the market—what if you get a great position but cannot take it because you have to stay with your husband (at his behest)? What happens then? You might need to have a conversation about all this.
Do you actually want to live in B long term? It would be pretty terrible if you went through the cost (money and time) of finding a new job and moving and then your FIL passed away and you’re in a job/city that is not a good fit.
What about a scenario where you continue living in A long term, and in the short term your husband can split time in some way between A and B while you, your child, and your dogs stay in A?
I went through a similar situation with my mom who also had Alzheimer's. We were within about 500 miles away for our jobs, so it was drivable in case something came up, but I felt bad not being around her and helping out the way my sister who lived very close to my parents was doing. I was tempted at times to just quit my job so I could be with her more, though I knew it wouldn't make much of a difference for her, and there were no job options for me where my parents lived. Ultimately, I ended up getting laid off anyway about a month before she passed, which was in June, so I was able to spend her last couple of weeks at home and was there when it happened. It's hard seeing close family members dying, but you also have to still live your life and especially be responsible for your new family if you've started one. If I'd been single, it might have been a bit different, but I knew my decisions would affect my wife as well. All in all, it's a terrible situation to be in, but I hope you can find something that works for both of you.
There are other issues with location A so in general I’m open to moving to a bigger city. Not sure location B is where I’d love to live but if it’s the only option I get after going on the job search, I would take it.
I’ve asked my husband about the split option and he always fires back with why does he have to do the split and not me. I.e. why can’t we move to location B and I be the one to fly back and forth to A for teaching responsibilities.
He has to because his position is flexible and yours isn't. He can then take care of father, and you stay at job while you search for new position and juggle single parenthood for a time. No one's getting off easy, and it's the only thing that seems like an actual compromise and not your husband dictating what will happen and when.
Why should you have to do everything and him nothing but “be there”. He isn’t even planning to be a caregiver? Just move everything and everyone so he can wait for his father to die so he can be there and avoid feeling guilty?
He needs to ask himself why being there at the end it’s what’s so important and why he would feel guilty not being there. Because it’s very strange to me he’s focused on being there for death, and not apparently being there before then.
The idea that you fly back and forth for teaching is just insanity.
Then it sounds like you should split the split. He does the split first (for one semester), then you move over winter break and you do the split during the spring semester.
This would also put you conveniently in town for interviews etc. if you get local interviews, and in a more connected city that makes it easier to make day trips to other R1s if you get interviews elsewhere
Good luck. I cannot imagine leaving thinking that I must land a TT gig at a specific R1 in a particular city. That would be better than finding the needle in the haystack. Do you have any ins in that department? Do you know that they will even have an open line to fill? There is no way I would have done this, but I am lucky; there is no way my wife would have asked me to do it.
I think this is a marital issue more than a job one. I don't think it is fair for him to expect you to give up your career. If you're willing to cover the house while he's with his dad that is already a big sacrifice on your part
This was my thought. I can’t imagine my husband mandating that I give up my job to move half way across the country because of his parents health. Granted we’ve been long distance before but having him move temporarily to city B by himself to get things sorted out seems like such a logical option. Blowing up your entire life and quitting your job and relocating your kids to brand new schools for someone who (however unfortunate this is) sounds like they are not going to live much longer seems…not like a good choice.
I hope I’m not overstepping, and I’m not married, so maybe I’m wrong here, but I feel like your husband is being unfair and expecting everything on his terms. You are willing to find a new position, fly at a moment’s notice, ect, and now he’s demanding that you potentially sabotage your employment.
I don’t have an answer for what you should do, but maybe think about if this attitude is a one-off, or how be approaches other areas of your life as well.
Take care, and best of luck!’
This is a temporary problem; his dad won’t be around for long. The solution to this temporary problem is NOT to relinquish a good TT job. Assuming his job allows it, he should go to B for an extended amount of time and spend time w dad. Meanwhile, you stay at A and do your job.
And if your husband demands that you give up your good TT job for this short term personal problem, then I would respectfully suggest that you’ve got long term problems w your husband.
Have you considered moving your FIL to town A? That might solve any number of issues in the shorter term, and give you enough time to earn tenure and then figure out where you both want to live.
At this point, he’s so late stage that it is not advisable to move him. Plus the medical care available in location B is miles better than location A so he’s safer staying where he is. The first 2 years we lived in B, we seriously considered this and did a lot of research but now it does not seem like a viable option.
Your husband seems to be insisting you give up your career so he can be near his father for the last year or so of his life. That seems exceptionally unreasonable. I think it would make a lot more sense for him to rent a pied-a-terre in the city and go back and forth while his father is still alive.
I wanted to echo some of the sentiments I've already read: your husband is not being reasonable. Part of the reason why living so far away from family is difficult is because it involves being away for milestone events. Neither of my parents lived in the same country as their own parents when they ultimately passed away. (My father's siblings buried their dad in the morning and my dad arrived via airplane in the afternoon, but there was some family disputes at play as well.) My parents did what they thought was best, but it did mean that I didn't/don't have much of a relationship with my extended family. So I do understand the feelings that underlie this issue.
But your husband is not being reasonable. He is the one who is changing his mind, he is unwilling to wait the full year for the move, he is unwilling to live there on his own while you take care of your career, and ultimately, he is asking you to sacrifice your career for his wishes. I could make a commentary on how common it is for husbands to do this to their wives, and I could make a commentary on how, globally, there are still places that women need their husband's permission to even work a job, but I think I'll just point out that you're not the only one who has faced this and that your husband is making your life harder than it has to be, on purpose. Because ultimately he sees you as less important than he sees himself.
>your husband is making your life harder than it has to be, on purpose. Because ultimately he sees you as less important than he sees himself.
This is exactly how it appears to me. Your husband also sees your child as less important, apparently. Is it good for your child to have mom abandon her career? I understand that your child is still very young, but there are long-term implications for acceding to your husband's demands, and it isn't clear that your husband is considering them.
The husband is being extraordinarily blinkered and selfish. Grief does funny things to people, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt... to a point. But it's entirely unreasonable to pull up stakes and move cross-country permanently for what is ultimately a temporary reason. It'd be one thing if he needed to step in as a caregiver, but that doesn't seem to be the situation here.
What he's trying to do here is extremely manipulative and it's not okay, grieving/stress or not. No matter how this resolves, some couples counseling is probably on order, because his approach is a speed-run towards bigger relationship problems.
I was just thinking this. My department just had like 6 hiring committees. We won’t have any more job listings go up until probably December for August 2025 starts.
From your other post it just sounds like this is his latest reason to uproot you because he doesn’t like your current city and he thinks you can’t argue against this reasoning. Is emotional manipulation and refusal to compromise his MO in all disagreements?
This is going to sound really cold but uprooting your entire life for someone who isn’t long for this world seems rash. Foolish even. Why can’t he just move to be with his father and then come back?
Read through some replies. Your husband needs some mental healthcare.
I'm traveling back and forth between my home town and my parent's town (a day's travel) as I watch my own parent in the final throes of Alzheimers. It's a difficult situation that I shoulder alone (no spouse, kids or pets). My story is different from yours, but I would like to share about what I did, when I first found out, a few years ago -
I spoke to my Chair and Dean, and received accommodation to teach remotely. This continues to this day and I am so very, very grateful for the accommodation even if I am located in a city in which I am not comfortable.
What I would do, if I were you - I would speak to my Chair about the situation. Evaluate options within the university where you now teach. Teaching remotely could be the simplest of accommodations. Is there any harm in asking? And once the finality of the FIL's situation is clear, I would only then ask for the weeks (semester?) of family leave.
And I hope I am not overstepping in any way here - but yes, I agree with the suggestions of couples therapy as well as individual therapy for your husband, and may I also suggest for you as well. Your family and you are dealing with several facets of grief: your husband grieving as a son, and you grieving the loss of your FIL as well as the relationship pressure with your husband's grief as well. It sounds to me that by pressuring you, your husband is taking his grief out on you, and that is not fair to you. Again, I hope that I am not overstepping OP. Grief can be an opportunity to grow closer as a family, whereas his current actions are tearing into what you have.
I am so sorry to read about this very difficult situation. There is so much pain all around for you and your family. I hope that you all find the help and solace that you need and grow closer together instead of apart.
Thank you very much for sharing. I’m so sorry you’re experiencing a loved one go through Alzheimer’s as well. It’s a tragic disease.
Thank you for your insights and recommendations. I don’t disagree with the fact that my husband is being unreasonable, likely due to his grief. Lots to unpack here as a family.
"If I don’t join him right away, it’s immensely hurtful to him." Husband's attitude is going to trash your long term career.
You need to stay where you are, it is very unlikely you get a TT job in the place you want to be, and you're stomping on the bird you have in the hand. Husband needs to go be with his family and not ruin your professional life.
This is not a normal job. This is the kind of once in a lifetime thing that you DO NOT FUCK UP IF YOU WANT TO WORK IN THE FIELD AT ALL.
Lots here and I’m sorry for your situation. Your husband’s demands are borderline ridiculous. As others have said, death happens when it happens and, with Alzheimer’s, it’s no surprise at that. Suggesting everything is uprooted for someone who, for all intents and purposes, doesn’t know what’s happening sounds like he’s running on pre emotion. I’d stand my ground and let him go alone or travel regularly on his own rather than lose a hard earned job in a difficult market. Critically, it sounds like he needs therapy ASAP to deal with his past and current feelings.
Good luck, this isn’t an easy situation.
This is going to require a hard conversation because your husband just isn't thinking about this the right way.
A husband has a responsibility to his children. A husband has a responsibility to his wife. Compared to this, any responsibility he has towards his parents is secondary.
It doesn't sound like your husband is the primary caregiver for his father. While it's sad that he might miss out on every moment of his father's journey into death, he choose to prioritize you and your child when he got married. He needs to honor that choice.
Knowing someone tanked their career just so their spouse could be nearer to an aging parent would turn me off from hiring them. And if I were at your old uni, asked the universal question of “would you hire this person again”, the answer would be no. It’s not going to matter how “marketable” you made yourself. Everyone’s going to know your unreasonable husband is the real employer. You need a couples’ therapist, not a move.
Yes, and a couples therapist who had some knowledge of the likely progress of Alzheimer's Disease. The reality is that the last days/weeks/months of life for an Alzheimer's patient, they will not know who is there or not there for the last moments. And the reality is also that the last moments may come completely unexpectedly when no-one is in the room. And may I add, the couples therapist may very well recommend individual therapy for your husband.
From what I’ve heard from hospice nurses, people often seem to wait to die until they are alone. OP’s husband could be there for weeks and weeks then step out to make a cup of coffee and the father dies. Death is not predictable in these situations where someone is slowly declining.
I was advised to take 15 minutes out of every hour in another room when I was sitting with my dying sister, so that in case she was one of those types of people, she could die peacefully. I was told this by her best friend, an Episcopal priest who had attended many deaths. Sure enough, she died while I was out of her room.
I just (sort of) did this 3 years ago but it was *in anticipation* of aging parents. It was also a natural transition point in my career and my husband also got a dream job offer. It was a very thought out plan and was in no way a rash decision like
OP’s husband is making. This situation sounds very volatile and ripe for resentment.
Leave of absence could be tricky- why would they give you a leave if you’re leaving? That doesn’t sound right.
FMLA is only 10 weeks, I think.
I don’t see how you could be in city B without quitting your job.
Good luck. It’s a pickle.
I’m not sure why your current institution would grant you a leave, is what I’m saying. They have no real reason to.
And be careful - at my uni there is a requirement that faculty return for a year after a sabbatical- and are penalized/must pay back salary if they don’t. I don’t know if LOA has the same requirements.
At many institutions taking unpaid leave comes with no obligations to return / penalties for not returning — of course there is the significant loss of income to consider, too. Good luck.
You have probably, on some level, already given your husband a “grief pass” for suggesting something so unreasonable, so I will do the same.
That said, If you have calmly and clearly laid out the (solid) case for not relocating ASAP, and he cannot at least begrudgingly accept it after a week or so of mulling it over, there are serious problems that need to be addressed.
Let your husband move, with the dogs and kid, and set up the family home in the new city. You stay where you are — you are TT at an R1, and that is impossibly difficult to find on a moment’s notice, if at all. You can go on the market this season, but if you don’t find something you will still have the position.
...If the husband is as single-minded about his dad's imminent passing as reported, I'm not sure I'd entrust him with the care of the kid and dog. Let those stay with OP, the husband can put himself 100% into watching the vessel that used to be his dad (Alzheimer's suuuucks) cross that threshold if that's what he so desperately wants/needs.
What a tough situation! Can your family afford you to take unpaid leave? Because many places would grant a limited amount of unpaid leave. You can also meet with your administrators and ask them if they can accommodate remote teaching. I have seen this happen at my university; if they want to keep you, they often will accommodate you, and usually they want to keep you as long as the costs of replacing you are higher. They won't accommodate your forever, and it's harder to do when the time period for needing a remote accommodation is indefinite.
Your husband is being unreasonable imo. I get that he loves his dad, but every employer has an expectation that you will do the job you were hired for, and jobs like yours are not easy to get or to keep (until you are tenured, after which keeping it becomes easier but is still not guaranteed). And it's not like anyone can predict when your FIL's last moments will be. Also, as a person who has lived through the deaths of too many loved ones, I can attest that your FIL's last moments may or may not be enhanced by the whole family being there. Sometimes dying people seem to choose to die when they are alone. Sometimes they express a wish to die when they are alone. Of course you won't know what is best until it happens, and if you aren't there you don't have the option of being there . . . but still. It is hard for me to believe that your decision is really "in the best interest of the family" vs "indulging your husband's unreasonable demands." I recognize that is my unsolicited opinion and not an answer to your question.
ETA: I didn't even consider the implications of Alzheimer's diagnosis in my previous paragraph. Someone dying from Alzheimer's will likely not even recognize the people who are there.
Great idea. I was thinking how the dynamic might be very different if the gender roles were reversed. How many wives (and society in general) would expect their husbands to quit their jobs to move halfway across the country like this?
Seems like husband should really go alone, immediately. They he can fly back to see OP when things are stable/OK. Lots of families have been through similar-- including mine --and nobody was expected to quit their job or derail their career unnecessarily. I know dozens of academics who have essentially "commuter marriages" and it usually works out, at least for a few years. It sounds like OP's situation may not be long term (sorry, but that was the takeaway) so why uproot entirely?
It's certainly fine to explore accomodations with chair/dean, if that's available to you. Remote and living with husband away seems like a good one-year solution if viable. Then you can navigate extended time after based on some experience.
Husband needs to understand that his father cannot be the center of the world, no matter how sad the situation. We've lost three parents at a distance, inlcuding one in memory care. It's hard. But it can't overrule the rest of your life, nor your *partner's* life, and I doubt many parents would want it to in any case.
Soon your FIL will be dead. And you will be unemployed and will never find another academic job. As a consequence of which your husband will most likely lose his marriage.
Maybe if you are in a very hot field in STEM you have options but getting a TT line in most places, esp R1 is so hard it’s like winning a lottery. Not sure your husband realizes this. Be mindful of the resentment factor. After you sacrifice everything, it could do major damage to your relationship, which you attempted to save by moving in the first place.
Most academics I know have a non academic spouse who follows them to where they end up, not the other way around. Good luck.
I’m so sorry you’re going through this, OP. Honestly I think the best option right now is to strongly encourage your husband to see a therapist who can help him with his emotions about his father’s illness. It’s not okay for him to take his grief out on you.
We are looking into moving my FIL with Alzheimers to our small college town. Could that be an option? (Other people have covered my broader concerns about what is happening here.)
My strong recommendation would be for your husband to go alone while you finish up your commitments at your current institution and job hunt. I see a lot of people are recommending FMLA but that only gets you 12 weeks. Also since I assume your husband would be taking on the primary caretaker role, he will like need to take FMLA himself, so you would have no income in that case. And please, I hope he would not expect you to be the primary caregiver.
If you walk out on your academic commitments, you will be in a very difficult situation for job hunting.
Does your husband understand what you went through to get to the place you are now, career-wise? Does he actually appreciate the sacrifice?
Does he understand that you don’t just move and get a job wherever?
I’m thinking he doesn’t, or he wouldn’t even suggest this.
That's a really difficult situation and I don't think your husband is entirely reasonable about this. When one of my parents got seriously ill, I spent as much time as I could with them. I live in a different country and I managed to do this with a combination of travel outside term time and compassionate leave. Looking back, it was a really tough time but I feel that I spent as much time there as I could this way. I can't imagine doing this with a small child.
In terms of your job situation, do you want to move there or is this a decision that should wait? I know there's such a thing as grieving someone who is terminally ill (I experienced this myself) and it's not a good time to make major life decisions.
This is one of the worst cases of emotional manipulation I've seen. Your husband has been extremely effective in manipulating you and derailing your career. I am so sorry but your father-in-law has already died. Alzheimer's takes people long before people realize what's happening and all that's left are the consequences. There's really nothing for your husband to return home for except palliative care. You should never give up your career in this situation. You're being emotionally manipulated by someone who needs to see a therapist immediately. Your husband is going to blow up his life regardless of the choices you make. Even if you destroy your career and do this move on the Fly, your husband will still try to blow up this relationship. I'm really sorry but you and your kid deserve better than an emotionally manipulative baby who needs to own his own s***.
Let me add: is it possible that your husband is feeling so strongly about being there at the moment of his father's death and for his last days, and believes that you must be there too in order to support him (your husband) partly because he feels badly that he was not able to spend enough time with his father when he was healthy, or even in the earlier stages of Alzheimer's Disease? In other words, is his anxiety about his father's last days really a displaced anxiety about having been absent earlier on? I have always been of the opinion that since you don't know when someone might die, it's important to spend time with them earlier on, but time flies when someone is seemingly healthy, and the opportunity to be with them may pass us by.
I simply can't believe all the advice here that's encouraging you to abandon family. It's well meaning and protective, but as a person who has made sacrifices for his family, I've never once regretted it. Ever. But then I take my values seriously, and my values are that family > job every day of the week. That might not be others' values.
Having said that, this is definitely an FMLA thing. As a matter of fact, this is what it was created for. Just have a conversation with the folks responsible for it at your institution and they often have far better options than we would have even considered.
Sorry for this rough patch, OP. I hope your family fares well through the stress. It's a hard time for everyone.
The husband is able to go to stay with his father (who since he has had late stage Alzheimer's Disease for TEN YEARS probably does not recognize anyone or remember that they have visited) and mother (who is the one in need of support, to my way of thinking). What additional benefit the OP could provide to the father or mother is questionable. If either parent had a chronic disease that required ongoing support (heart disease, arthritis, MS, etc and there was time for the OP to find a job in location B, that would make sense. But it does not make sense, given that the father could die at any time, to abandon a job -- any job, not just an academic job -- that is needed to support the family. Fanily does come first, but the demand from OP's husband that she abandon her job to, basically, make him feel better for the short time that the father has left, is not realistic.
You frame this as a choice between "family" and "job". But not talking a "job". We're talking a 40 year career. Which \*supports her family.\* You think she should give up a 40 year career which supports her family so that she can be in close proximity to her dying father-in-law for, say, a month? How is this a wise choice even from the standpoint of protecting her family? Her husband is asking for things that don't make sense and aren't even in his \*own\* self-interest, because he is grieving. She needs to be the adult here and do what is best for everyone.
Ugh, that is so tough. I'm sorry. I would look into FMLA, see if there's any online courses you could teach, and try to at least make it through the fall semester if possible. There are jobs that open for spring (generally rare) but they do exist.
I’d ask about remote teaching option or something where you only have to fly back once a month or every other week for a day or two. My institution offered this when my mom needed some extra care. I ultimately didn’t take it and we worked out an alternative, but as a few others have mentioned, a lot of places are willing to allow remote teaching as a general rule, and particularly as an exception to keep people from having to take leave. Might be worth asking about or trying to sus out.
Is it at all an option to have your husband go by himself first?
To him, no. If I don’t join him right away, it’s immensely hurtful to him. When his dad is falling ill, he goes into some very emotional state and it’s difficult to reason with him. It’s also hard to reason when he even thinks of his dad getting sick. He always assumes the worst and would never forgive me if I did not join him right away and his father passed before I arrived.
You should encourage him to talk to a mental health professional. He is likely already grieving the loss of his father as someone with late stage Alzheimer's is often a shell of their former self. The sad truth is that his father is going to die soon and any time he spends with his father before that is unlikely to be quality time. Is it worth blowing up your career that you have worked so hard for? If it were me, then I would not go.
I've experienced this whole tragedy... last parent with dementia, 1000s of miles away. It absolutely sucks. The brutal truth is that it's not just not quality time, it's that the parent won't even know that you visited an hour after you left. They don't even know who you are. They died already and there's this shell of a former parent still walking around and _nothing_ you do can affect them. You can only choose to torture yourself more or less while you pre-grieve their death.
I know this must be a very hard time for your husband but imo he is not being reasonable. He can’t ask you to give up your job and uproot your family to maximize the chance that you can be there for your father-in-law’s final moments.
I agree. I know OP is asking about work, but I'm incredibly curious about how unreasonable the husband is being. Death happens when death happens. It can be tomorrow or two years from now. To uproot the whole family for possible pending death isn't rational. Is this more about OP being there in support? Or is it about supporting FIL? Because, sadly, FIL won't know if she's there or not.
Agreed 100%. Academia isn't a traditional employment field. If you don't want to hamstring yourself for future positions, it's hard to make a jump to another part of the country this quickly. It's awful that his father is dying, but you also don't want to set yourself on fire (career-wise) just to keep him warm. There is the long-term to remember as well. It might be difficult for him to see the logical elements here. The long-term impact, for example. Or, if you moved with him then had to fly out to complete your contracted obligations on a regular basis (while working some remotely), how much time, money, etc. that would cost you. It sounds like he needs some mental health support. What you describe (his reactions), and his black-and-white thinking (never forgive you if you didn't arrive by the time his father passed) is highly highly problematic. Someone who does not understand that people do not die on our schedule is . . . detached from reality. He needs counseling.
And so if you did that - move now - and he is providing care for dad and you are out of a job & job hunting... Where is income for food, housing, healthcare, and raising a 2 yr old, coming from??
I feel like I'm on a different sub here. To me, your husband needs to get it together and be an adult. Essentially, he is emotionally manipulating you ("He goes into some very emotional state" and "He would never forgive me") to blow up your career for his dad's end of life care. I lost both parents in just over a year and I spent that time going back and forth to another state with my child; it was hard and awful, but I didn't throw away my career or expect anyone else to either. Your h. can take care of his father solo for a while, giving you a chance to keep working and apply for new positions. (I mean , there's absolutely no guarantee you'll get a job in/near that city.) You can join him on breaks. He can come back home to get away. FMLA for a short time, but don't leave your position without a new one lined up.
Right? >"He would never forgive me") And I would never forgive my partner for trying to force me to uproot our baby, pets, my own life, and abandon a TT job on the fly like that.
It reads like a primer in 'How to quickly foster a lifetime of resentment.'
...and what exactly is the plan *AFTER* the father passes? That's the follow-up question. Uprooting lives permanently versus taking a leave of absence (if necessary) is not the rational choice. Grief makes people act in irrational ways, but the husband here really needs to talk to someone.
Right... What happens then? They all are stuck in City B. What effect will that have on both husband & wife's career & income? The 2 yr old?
I may be reading it wrong… but husband isn’t even providing care for his father. He just wants to be there for the last moments. He’s ok with moving a plane ride away, so it’s not like he plans to provide daily care. So he’s not even asking OP to uproot her career so he can provide care… he’s asking her to do it so he can have a better chance of being there when his dad dies. But it’s still just a chance.
Is he expecting OP to handle his father's care, too?
Have you talked to your department head? Is sabbatical an option? Is relocating your FIL an option? Because frankly, if things are so dire you must move *right now,* it sounds like you might be relocating for less than a year. Can you all handle the financial/security hit of losing a TT job + income?
You guys would really benefit from talking through this with a therapist. They can act as a referee and help point out some hard realities for your husband and help him learn how to have his emotions *and* be able to have a conversation anyways.
Full sympathy....his option is not feasible in reality at the moment. A major moves takes months.
Been in this situation and frankly, your husband needs to get his shit together.
As gently as possible - this is unreasonable & irresponsible. Sometimes we have to make hard choices because they’re the most responsible choice. When I got my job, my husband got an offer but then a freeze went into place. He wouldn’t have a job. So he moved me and our kids here, went back to our home town, and kept working and finishing packing up our house to put on the market while I got the kids enrolled in school & got myself set up in my new job. No one wants to live apart, but it was necessary.
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My twisted sense of humor is giggling at the inappropriateness of haikubot. Lightens the heaviness of the debate.
I’d imagine FMLA would apply here, although I don’t know the details for this kind of situation. You could also ask your chair about options for teaching remotely or even leave without pay, which you might want to do if the family health insurance is through you.
I was going to suggest looking into FMLA. I have colleagues who had to do so for similar reasons. Better to look into it ASAP with your chair/dean/HR so (hopefully) red tape won’t compound your situation.
Thank you!
I am at R1, NTT. Broke my arm at beginning of semester and couldn’t drive. They gave me an option to do Remote Synchronous. This allows you to hold the class “online” at the same time it would be in the physical classroom via Zoom or whatever. Converting in-person classes to “remote synchronous” also does not affect students’ financial aid. Finaid has regulations about how many “online” (remote asynchronous) courses a student can take per semester, but remote synchronous skirts that. There is precedence: Covid. Dept. head told me they’ve also done that for faculty with other medical/emergency issues. In fact many universities now offer RS courses. Perhaps that can buy you at least a semester, if not a year as a TT.
Thanks so much for sharing!
Well to clarify — at least at my school, but I’m assuming the same for all since it’s a Fed rule — for an emergency case, the in-person course isn’t changed as the official mode of delivery, say in their course registration; it’s basically an acceptance by dept and your notification to students that it will be remote sync for the majority of the semester. You’d need to have a couple in-person meetings to “officially” keep it as in-person on the books, and in that way, the fin-aid isn’t affected. Good luck!
Many universities, colleges and community colleges also have unpaid leave available - this is kind of like a sabbatical in that it holds your position for you (they hire adjunct(s) to cover you) and it counts towards your years of service. It does not provide any pay, insurance or contributions to your retirement. It is requested through HR and your Dean has to approve it- then it goes to the Board (or whatever governing Board/Dean oversees hiring/firing) for approval. Taking this kind of Leave is unusual because people need to earn money and keep insurance usually- but if you ARE good on money and insurance via his job- this could be the thing to ask about before quitting anything at all! Usually you have to take either a full semester or the year in order to allow for adjunct coverage. Good luck and my advice is to do whatever it takes to not quit this job in haste.
Sadly, reading the FMLA faq it does not appear to apply here. OP should still check it out with their HR to see if there is not a state level leave program, but not get her hopes up. [https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/28f-fmla-qualifying-reasons](https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/28f-fmla-qualifying-reasons) >**Parent** means a biological, adoptive, step or foster parent, or any other individual who stood in loco parentis to the employee when the employee was a child. **This term does not include parents “in law.”**
Ugh, I was afraid the “in law” part would be problematic. Thanks for looking up the exact policy. Also, how frustrating, given that many adults help care for their partner’s parents.
I was department chair (R1 public) when colleague had a similar situation with his mother, but he wasn't eligible for FMLA (on a technicality). We were still able to get him leave for a semester by using accumulated sick leave. There can be creative solutions if you have the right administrators working on your behalf
Yes, be careful about benefits. If you're on 100% leave, you'll probably lose eligibility for health care. At my U, if you're on 100% leave you can't do a lot of stuff - vote, oversee defenses, etc.
This is helpful, thank you!
Do you think search committees would view FMLA use as unfavorable in my application? You might not be able to answer this, but does leave without pay or FMLA mean I can’t use campus resources such as for writing grants?
I agree with the above advice about if someone is to go, it would be your husband. Moving an entire family for one parent's final moments is madness. How many applications and job interviews did it take to land your current gig? What's the job market like for you now? This is utter, utter madness. If you leave your current job, you and your husband won't be eligible for FMLA for the new (if you can get one) jobs until after you've worked for a year. This is not a reasonable plan. Do not do this to your yourself and your career.
Personally, I would not view FMLA as unfavorable. If you felt comfortable, you could potentially disclose it when applying, but it’s really no one’s business and it’s meant for short-term care. Whether you can use campus resources, I’m guessing leave without pay means no access to resources, but there might be levels of how “away” you are—talk to your chair. Or, as someone else suggested, perhaps your husband goes now and you stay and work/go on the market this fall.
Thank you!
Although it differs by institution, in general when someone is on FMLA they cannot work, and writing/putting in grant applications is work. Nobody will stop you from writing papers (nobody knows), but the institution itself submits grant applications for you and could put itself in a legal trouble.
You can be an R1 TT professor, or you can choose where you live. It’s very difficult to do both. You say your husband knows this, but he’s sure not acting like it. I think it’s time for some relationship counseling with the goal of coming up with a plan that works for everyone.
Sister, I get where you are coming from. I have a marriage where one set of parents is a continent away, and managing an Alzheimer's demise is mourning their death every visit. But I'm awfully worried about your husband's insistence on torpedoing your career. Leaving an R1 TT abruptly, prioritizing only his feelings/birth family above your shared family, unwilling to consider any compromises .... This gives me serious pause. You don't work for Macy's. Landing a comparable job elsewhere isn't as simple as filling out a few sheets of paper. This means that you need to handle leaving and starting with some care and finesse, not in a rush of feelings. I have very little advice outside of "marriage counseling, yesterday." I sincerely empathize and wish you the best outcome of a crummy situation.
Your FIL sounds likely to pass somewhat soon, and I'm sorry about that. It's completely unclear from what you wrote here, though, how a full and permanent relocation of your family benefits you all in the long run. I understand that it's devastating for your husband, but he can't dictate these terms, nor is it all right for him to "go into some state" where your only choice is to go along with whatever he wants. Look into FMLA, as others have said, but if you want to continue in academia, you'll have to be able to talk with your husband--and, regardless of his feelings, he'll have to be able to hear you.
Does your husband even understand how these jobs work? Can you afford to take unpaid leave? (this would likely be unpaid for the most part) Can you work remotely next academic year? Are there any R1s in family's city? Any universities at all? Industry positions? If you leave research, it is hard to get back. What happens when your FIL dies? Is your husband your FIL's only family? It seems like there are dozens of options outside of what your husband is suggesting (demanding?).
He does, and he’s also in denial that there is no other “fast track” option I think. I need to think about the unpaid leave. The big hold up to being remote is my teaching responsibilities. There is an R1 university in location B, plenty of industry but not my area. And when FIL dies, husband wants his mom to move closer to use or us closer to her so she’s not alone. So this problem would still be there in a way.
If this is the eventual plan, why not move the FIL and mom closer to you both now?
This is the most sensible suggestion I’ve seen in this thread.
Messing up your career and earning potential seems at odds with supporting his mom in later years. Maybe worth framing the idea in these terms with your husband.
You can’t disrupt your career and then be able to just put the pieces back together where you are in a few years. It will not work like that, regardless of your husband’s intentions.
This seems really questionable then. You could ask your chair if you can switch to remote for the next academic year because of the FIL situation. See what they say. Unpaid leave and no benefits is a lot to swing, so be sure to discuss this with your husband.
You may not be eligible for FMLA (the policy specifies parent, spouse, child—in-laws are not included). An unpaid leave is an option if your university agrees to it. How do finances and health insurance work if you take an unpaid leave? I don’t think it would really affect how you’re seen as a candidate. However, in your shoes, I would ask myself what the end game is: if your husband wants to stay in location B as long as he has to care for his parents, and he wants you to be there, it means you have zero geographic mobility. While you mention there is a university there, the odds that they have a position in your field, and that you get hired, are low. So I’d consider this before going on the market—what if you get a great position but cannot take it because you have to stay with your husband (at his behest)? What happens then? You might need to have a conversation about all this.
FMLA is also a maximum of 12 weeks per year.
Do you actually want to live in B long term? It would be pretty terrible if you went through the cost (money and time) of finding a new job and moving and then your FIL passed away and you’re in a job/city that is not a good fit. What about a scenario where you continue living in A long term, and in the short term your husband can split time in some way between A and B while you, your child, and your dogs stay in A?
I went through a similar situation with my mom who also had Alzheimer's. We were within about 500 miles away for our jobs, so it was drivable in case something came up, but I felt bad not being around her and helping out the way my sister who lived very close to my parents was doing. I was tempted at times to just quit my job so I could be with her more, though I knew it wouldn't make much of a difference for her, and there were no job options for me where my parents lived. Ultimately, I ended up getting laid off anyway about a month before she passed, which was in June, so I was able to spend her last couple of weeks at home and was there when it happened. It's hard seeing close family members dying, but you also have to still live your life and especially be responsible for your new family if you've started one. If I'd been single, it might have been a bit different, but I knew my decisions would affect my wife as well. All in all, it's a terrible situation to be in, but I hope you can find something that works for both of you.
There are other issues with location A so in general I’m open to moving to a bigger city. Not sure location B is where I’d love to live but if it’s the only option I get after going on the job search, I would take it. I’ve asked my husband about the split option and he always fires back with why does he have to do the split and not me. I.e. why can’t we move to location B and I be the one to fly back and forth to A for teaching responsibilities.
He has to because his position is flexible and yours isn't. He can then take care of father, and you stay at job while you search for new position and juggle single parenthood for a time. No one's getting off easy, and it's the only thing that seems like an actual compromise and not your husband dictating what will happen and when.
Your husband needs intervention. He is clearly not thinking clearly.
Why should you have to do everything and him nothing but “be there”. He isn’t even planning to be a caregiver? Just move everything and everyone so he can wait for his father to die so he can be there and avoid feeling guilty? He needs to ask himself why being there at the end it’s what’s so important and why he would feel guilty not being there. Because it’s very strange to me he’s focused on being there for death, and not apparently being there before then. The idea that you fly back and forth for teaching is just insanity.
Your husband sounds really unreasonable.
Is your husband the primary caretaker for your child and dogs?
We both work full-time so we split the duties. Our son goes to daycare and we share dog duties.
Then it sounds like you should split the split. He does the split first (for one semester), then you move over winter break and you do the split during the spring semester. This would also put you conveniently in town for interviews etc. if you get local interviews, and in a more connected city that makes it easier to make day trips to other R1s if you get interviews elsewhere
Good luck. I cannot imagine leaving thinking that I must land a TT gig at a specific R1 in a particular city. That would be better than finding the needle in the haystack. Do you have any ins in that department? Do you know that they will even have an open line to fill? There is no way I would have done this, but I am lucky; there is no way my wife would have asked me to do it.
I think this is a marital issue more than a job one. I don't think it is fair for him to expect you to give up your career. If you're willing to cover the house while he's with his dad that is already a big sacrifice on your part
This was my thought. I can’t imagine my husband mandating that I give up my job to move half way across the country because of his parents health. Granted we’ve been long distance before but having him move temporarily to city B by himself to get things sorted out seems like such a logical option. Blowing up your entire life and quitting your job and relocating your kids to brand new schools for someone who (however unfortunate this is) sounds like they are not going to live much longer seems…not like a good choice.
I hope I’m not overstepping, and I’m not married, so maybe I’m wrong here, but I feel like your husband is being unfair and expecting everything on his terms. You are willing to find a new position, fly at a moment’s notice, ect, and now he’s demanding that you potentially sabotage your employment. I don’t have an answer for what you should do, but maybe think about if this attitude is a one-off, or how be approaches other areas of your life as well. Take care, and best of luck!’
This is a temporary problem; his dad won’t be around for long. The solution to this temporary problem is NOT to relinquish a good TT job. Assuming his job allows it, he should go to B for an extended amount of time and spend time w dad. Meanwhile, you stay at A and do your job. And if your husband demands that you give up your good TT job for this short term personal problem, then I would respectfully suggest that you’ve got long term problems w your husband.
Have you considered moving your FIL to town A? That might solve any number of issues in the shorter term, and give you enough time to earn tenure and then figure out where you both want to live.
At this point, he’s so late stage that it is not advisable to move him. Plus the medical care available in location B is miles better than location A so he’s safer staying where he is. The first 2 years we lived in B, we seriously considered this and did a lot of research but now it does not seem like a viable option.
I am sorry to hear that - sounds like an impossible situation all the way around, and I hope you can find a solution that works for all of you.
Your husband seems to be insisting you give up your career so he can be near his father for the last year or so of his life. That seems exceptionally unreasonable. I think it would make a lot more sense for him to rent a pied-a-terre in the city and go back and forth while his father is still alive.
I wanted to echo some of the sentiments I've already read: your husband is not being reasonable. Part of the reason why living so far away from family is difficult is because it involves being away for milestone events. Neither of my parents lived in the same country as their own parents when they ultimately passed away. (My father's siblings buried their dad in the morning and my dad arrived via airplane in the afternoon, but there was some family disputes at play as well.) My parents did what they thought was best, but it did mean that I didn't/don't have much of a relationship with my extended family. So I do understand the feelings that underlie this issue. But your husband is not being reasonable. He is the one who is changing his mind, he is unwilling to wait the full year for the move, he is unwilling to live there on his own while you take care of your career, and ultimately, he is asking you to sacrifice your career for his wishes. I could make a commentary on how common it is for husbands to do this to their wives, and I could make a commentary on how, globally, there are still places that women need their husband's permission to even work a job, but I think I'll just point out that you're not the only one who has faced this and that your husband is making your life harder than it has to be, on purpose. Because ultimately he sees you as less important than he sees himself.
>your husband is making your life harder than it has to be, on purpose. Because ultimately he sees you as less important than he sees himself. This is exactly how it appears to me. Your husband also sees your child as less important, apparently. Is it good for your child to have mom abandon her career? I understand that your child is still very young, but there are long-term implications for acceding to your husband's demands, and it isn't clear that your husband is considering them.
The husband is being extraordinarily blinkered and selfish. Grief does funny things to people, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt... to a point. But it's entirely unreasonable to pull up stakes and move cross-country permanently for what is ultimately a temporary reason. It'd be one thing if he needed to step in as a caregiver, but that doesn't seem to be the situation here. What he's trying to do here is extremely manipulative and it's not okay, grieving/stress or not. No matter how this resolves, some couples counseling is probably on order, because his approach is a speed-run towards bigger relationship problems.
Does he understand how academics works and how the job market is unlike any other?
I was just thinking this. My department just had like 6 hiring committees. We won’t have any more job listings go up until probably December for August 2025 starts.
From your other post it just sounds like this is his latest reason to uproot you because he doesn’t like your current city and he thinks you can’t argue against this reasoning. Is emotional manipulation and refusal to compromise his MO in all disagreements?
This is going to sound really cold but uprooting your entire life for someone who isn’t long for this world seems rash. Foolish even. Why can’t he just move to be with his father and then come back? Read through some replies. Your husband needs some mental healthcare.
I'm traveling back and forth between my home town and my parent's town (a day's travel) as I watch my own parent in the final throes of Alzheimers. It's a difficult situation that I shoulder alone (no spouse, kids or pets). My story is different from yours, but I would like to share about what I did, when I first found out, a few years ago - I spoke to my Chair and Dean, and received accommodation to teach remotely. This continues to this day and I am so very, very grateful for the accommodation even if I am located in a city in which I am not comfortable. What I would do, if I were you - I would speak to my Chair about the situation. Evaluate options within the university where you now teach. Teaching remotely could be the simplest of accommodations. Is there any harm in asking? And once the finality of the FIL's situation is clear, I would only then ask for the weeks (semester?) of family leave. And I hope I am not overstepping in any way here - but yes, I agree with the suggestions of couples therapy as well as individual therapy for your husband, and may I also suggest for you as well. Your family and you are dealing with several facets of grief: your husband grieving as a son, and you grieving the loss of your FIL as well as the relationship pressure with your husband's grief as well. It sounds to me that by pressuring you, your husband is taking his grief out on you, and that is not fair to you. Again, I hope that I am not overstepping OP. Grief can be an opportunity to grow closer as a family, whereas his current actions are tearing into what you have. I am so sorry to read about this very difficult situation. There is so much pain all around for you and your family. I hope that you all find the help and solace that you need and grow closer together instead of apart.
Thank you very much for sharing. I’m so sorry you’re experiencing a loved one go through Alzheimer’s as well. It’s a tragic disease. Thank you for your insights and recommendations. I don’t disagree with the fact that my husband is being unreasonable, likely due to his grief. Lots to unpack here as a family.
"If I don’t join him right away, it’s immensely hurtful to him." Husband's attitude is going to trash your long term career. You need to stay where you are, it is very unlikely you get a TT job in the place you want to be, and you're stomping on the bird you have in the hand. Husband needs to go be with his family and not ruin your professional life. This is not a normal job. This is the kind of once in a lifetime thing that you DO NOT FUCK UP IF YOU WANT TO WORK IN THE FIELD AT ALL.
Lots here and I’m sorry for your situation. Your husband’s demands are borderline ridiculous. As others have said, death happens when it happens and, with Alzheimer’s, it’s no surprise at that. Suggesting everything is uprooted for someone who, for all intents and purposes, doesn’t know what’s happening sounds like he’s running on pre emotion. I’d stand my ground and let him go alone or travel regularly on his own rather than lose a hard earned job in a difficult market. Critically, it sounds like he needs therapy ASAP to deal with his past and current feelings. Good luck, this isn’t an easy situation.
This is going to require a hard conversation because your husband just isn't thinking about this the right way. A husband has a responsibility to his children. A husband has a responsibility to his wife. Compared to this, any responsibility he has towards his parents is secondary. It doesn't sound like your husband is the primary caregiver for his father. While it's sad that he might miss out on every moment of his father's journey into death, he choose to prioritize you and your child when he got married. He needs to honor that choice.
Knowing someone tanked their career just so their spouse could be nearer to an aging parent would turn me off from hiring them. And if I were at your old uni, asked the universal question of “would you hire this person again”, the answer would be no. It’s not going to matter how “marketable” you made yourself. Everyone’s going to know your unreasonable husband is the real employer. You need a couples’ therapist, not a move.
Yes, and a couples therapist who had some knowledge of the likely progress of Alzheimer's Disease. The reality is that the last days/weeks/months of life for an Alzheimer's patient, they will not know who is there or not there for the last moments. And the reality is also that the last moments may come completely unexpectedly when no-one is in the room. And may I add, the couples therapist may very well recommend individual therapy for your husband.
From what I’ve heard from hospice nurses, people often seem to wait to die until they are alone. OP’s husband could be there for weeks and weeks then step out to make a cup of coffee and the father dies. Death is not predictable in these situations where someone is slowly declining.
I was advised to take 15 minutes out of every hour in another room when I was sitting with my dying sister, so that in case she was one of those types of people, she could die peacefully. I was told this by her best friend, an Episcopal priest who had attended many deaths. Sure enough, she died while I was out of her room.
>people often seem to wait to die until they are alone. Yes, I have experienced this phenomenon firsthand.
I just (sort of) did this 3 years ago but it was *in anticipation* of aging parents. It was also a natural transition point in my career and my husband also got a dream job offer. It was a very thought out plan and was in no way a rash decision like OP’s husband is making. This situation sounds very volatile and ripe for resentment.
Husband should rent an apartment near Dad or stay with family. You do not have to go with him at this point.
Leave of absence could be tricky- why would they give you a leave if you’re leaving? That doesn’t sound right. FMLA is only 10 weeks, I think. I don’t see how you could be in city B without quitting your job. Good luck. It’s a pickle.
Yea, I would have to ask for the leave before I discuss leaving for good I think.
I’m not sure why your current institution would grant you a leave, is what I’m saying. They have no real reason to. And be careful - at my uni there is a requirement that faculty return for a year after a sabbatical- and are penalized/must pay back salary if they don’t. I don’t know if LOA has the same requirements.
Oh thank you for sharing!
At many institutions taking unpaid leave comes with no obligations to return / penalties for not returning — of course there is the significant loss of income to consider, too. Good luck.
You have probably, on some level, already given your husband a “grief pass” for suggesting something so unreasonable, so I will do the same. That said, If you have calmly and clearly laid out the (solid) case for not relocating ASAP, and he cannot at least begrudgingly accept it after a week or so of mulling it over, there are serious problems that need to be addressed.
Let your husband move, with the dogs and kid, and set up the family home in the new city. You stay where you are — you are TT at an R1, and that is impossibly difficult to find on a moment’s notice, if at all. You can go on the market this season, but if you don’t find something you will still have the position.
...If the husband is as single-minded about his dad's imminent passing as reported, I'm not sure I'd entrust him with the care of the kid and dog. Let those stay with OP, the husband can put himself 100% into watching the vessel that used to be his dad (Alzheimer's suuuucks) cross that threshold if that's what he so desperately wants/needs.
This. He can go and focus on his dad. OP can stay and salvage her job and income until there is a final decision to be made or a job opportunity.
What a tough situation! Can your family afford you to take unpaid leave? Because many places would grant a limited amount of unpaid leave. You can also meet with your administrators and ask them if they can accommodate remote teaching. I have seen this happen at my university; if they want to keep you, they often will accommodate you, and usually they want to keep you as long as the costs of replacing you are higher. They won't accommodate your forever, and it's harder to do when the time period for needing a remote accommodation is indefinite. Your husband is being unreasonable imo. I get that he loves his dad, but every employer has an expectation that you will do the job you were hired for, and jobs like yours are not easy to get or to keep (until you are tenured, after which keeping it becomes easier but is still not guaranteed). And it's not like anyone can predict when your FIL's last moments will be. Also, as a person who has lived through the deaths of too many loved ones, I can attest that your FIL's last moments may or may not be enhanced by the whole family being there. Sometimes dying people seem to choose to die when they are alone. Sometimes they express a wish to die when they are alone. Of course you won't know what is best until it happens, and if you aren't there you don't have the option of being there . . . but still. It is hard for me to believe that your decision is really "in the best interest of the family" vs "indulging your husband's unreasonable demands." I recognize that is my unsolicited opinion and not an answer to your question. ETA: I didn't even consider the implications of Alzheimer's diagnosis in my previous paragraph. Someone dying from Alzheimer's will likely not even recognize the people who are there.
You're getting good advice here but I'd also post this in the tenure-track moms Facebook group.
Great idea. I was thinking how the dynamic might be very different if the gender roles were reversed. How many wives (and society in general) would expect their husbands to quit their jobs to move halfway across the country like this?
I didn’t know that group existed! That sounds amazing.
Seems like husband should really go alone, immediately. They he can fly back to see OP when things are stable/OK. Lots of families have been through similar-- including mine --and nobody was expected to quit their job or derail their career unnecessarily. I know dozens of academics who have essentially "commuter marriages" and it usually works out, at least for a few years. It sounds like OP's situation may not be long term (sorry, but that was the takeaway) so why uproot entirely? It's certainly fine to explore accomodations with chair/dean, if that's available to you. Remote and living with husband away seems like a good one-year solution if viable. Then you can navigate extended time after based on some experience. Husband needs to understand that his father cannot be the center of the world, no matter how sad the situation. We've lost three parents at a distance, inlcuding one in memory care. It's hard. But it can't overrule the rest of your life, nor your *partner's* life, and I doubt many parents would want it to in any case.
Soon your FIL will be dead. And you will be unemployed and will never find another academic job. As a consequence of which your husband will most likely lose his marriage.
Maybe if you are in a very hot field in STEM you have options but getting a TT line in most places, esp R1 is so hard it’s like winning a lottery. Not sure your husband realizes this. Be mindful of the resentment factor. After you sacrifice everything, it could do major damage to your relationship, which you attempted to save by moving in the first place. Most academics I know have a non academic spouse who follows them to where they end up, not the other way around. Good luck.
I’m so sorry you’re going through this, OP. Honestly I think the best option right now is to strongly encourage your husband to see a therapist who can help him with his emotions about his father’s illness. It’s not okay for him to take his grief out on you.
We are looking into moving my FIL with Alzheimers to our small college town. Could that be an option? (Other people have covered my broader concerns about what is happening here.)
I know two people who temporarily left academia for family reasons. Neither ever found another full time academic position.
My strong recommendation would be for your husband to go alone while you finish up your commitments at your current institution and job hunt. I see a lot of people are recommending FMLA but that only gets you 12 weeks. Also since I assume your husband would be taking on the primary caretaker role, he will like need to take FMLA himself, so you would have no income in that case. And please, I hope he would not expect you to be the primary caregiver. If you walk out on your academic commitments, you will be in a very difficult situation for job hunting.
Does your husband understand what you went through to get to the place you are now, career-wise? Does he actually appreciate the sacrifice? Does he understand that you don’t just move and get a job wherever? I’m thinking he doesn’t, or he wouldn’t even suggest this.
That's a really difficult situation and I don't think your husband is entirely reasonable about this. When one of my parents got seriously ill, I spent as much time as I could with them. I live in a different country and I managed to do this with a combination of travel outside term time and compassionate leave. Looking back, it was a really tough time but I feel that I spent as much time there as I could this way. I can't imagine doing this with a small child. In terms of your job situation, do you want to move there or is this a decision that should wait? I know there's such a thing as grieving someone who is terminally ill (I experienced this myself) and it's not a good time to make major life decisions.
Why not move the father to an assisted living facility near you?
Get a divorce your career is more important
This is one of the worst cases of emotional manipulation I've seen. Your husband has been extremely effective in manipulating you and derailing your career. I am so sorry but your father-in-law has already died. Alzheimer's takes people long before people realize what's happening and all that's left are the consequences. There's really nothing for your husband to return home for except palliative care. You should never give up your career in this situation. You're being emotionally manipulated by someone who needs to see a therapist immediately. Your husband is going to blow up his life regardless of the choices you make. Even if you destroy your career and do this move on the Fly, your husband will still try to blow up this relationship. I'm really sorry but you and your kid deserve better than an emotionally manipulative baby who needs to own his own s***.
Best of luck in this difficult situation. Please keep us updated on how things go.
Can the father come to you? That makes more sense since when he passes, this will all have been for naught.
Let me add: is it possible that your husband is feeling so strongly about being there at the moment of his father's death and for his last days, and believes that you must be there too in order to support him (your husband) partly because he feels badly that he was not able to spend enough time with his father when he was healthy, or even in the earlier stages of Alzheimer's Disease? In other words, is his anxiety about his father's last days really a displaced anxiety about having been absent earlier on? I have always been of the opinion that since you don't know when someone might die, it's important to spend time with them earlier on, but time flies when someone is seemingly healthy, and the opportunity to be with them may pass us by.
I simply can't believe all the advice here that's encouraging you to abandon family. It's well meaning and protective, but as a person who has made sacrifices for his family, I've never once regretted it. Ever. But then I take my values seriously, and my values are that family > job every day of the week. That might not be others' values. Having said that, this is definitely an FMLA thing. As a matter of fact, this is what it was created for. Just have a conversation with the folks responsible for it at your institution and they often have far better options than we would have even considered. Sorry for this rough patch, OP. I hope your family fares well through the stress. It's a hard time for everyone.
The husband is able to go to stay with his father (who since he has had late stage Alzheimer's Disease for TEN YEARS probably does not recognize anyone or remember that they have visited) and mother (who is the one in need of support, to my way of thinking). What additional benefit the OP could provide to the father or mother is questionable. If either parent had a chronic disease that required ongoing support (heart disease, arthritis, MS, etc and there was time for the OP to find a job in location B, that would make sense. But it does not make sense, given that the father could die at any time, to abandon a job -- any job, not just an academic job -- that is needed to support the family. Fanily does come first, but the demand from OP's husband that she abandon her job to, basically, make him feel better for the short time that the father has left, is not realistic.
You frame this as a choice between "family" and "job". But not talking a "job". We're talking a 40 year career. Which \*supports her family.\* You think she should give up a 40 year career which supports her family so that she can be in close proximity to her dying father-in-law for, say, a month? How is this a wise choice even from the standpoint of protecting her family? Her husband is asking for things that don't make sense and aren't even in his \*own\* self-interest, because he is grieving. She needs to be the adult here and do what is best for everyone.
Ugh, that is so tough. I'm sorry. I would look into FMLA, see if there's any online courses you could teach, and try to at least make it through the fall semester if possible. There are jobs that open for spring (generally rare) but they do exist.
I’d ask about remote teaching option or something where you only have to fly back once a month or every other week for a day or two. My institution offered this when my mom needed some extra care. I ultimately didn’t take it and we worked out an alternative, but as a few others have mentioned, a lot of places are willing to allow remote teaching as a general rule, and particularly as an exception to keep people from having to take leave. Might be worth asking about or trying to sus out.