Before I begin my ridiculous and long story, I am hoping for gentle responses and advice as I already feel beat down and stupid for the long line of mistakes I’ve made. DH and I met in 2002 and fell instantly in love. As he was living with his dad and I was in an apartment, we decided to look for a house in 2003 and in comes our first mistake. We decided we had to have a house in the latest development on a golf course no less as the market was well on it’s way up. It wasn’t out of our reach but on the upper end of our income. He worked mainly winters in the winter sports industry (summers off), I worked in a health profession and picked up a lot more hours, working 50-60hr per week to add to his savings for a down payment. Then he had to have a golf club membership, selling me on the idea that it was an investment…haha. Then we decided at some point we would want a bigger house on a large lot and bought a custom home site and started house plans. Now we had 2 mortgages, over our heads, working constantly.
 Then he found a nifty plan at a winter sports convention in 2005, let’s start a business in outdoor clothing. So we did…used the rest of our savings, found partners who we knew had lots of money but we didn’t like or trust and moved boldly forward with little planning or knowledge about running a business. 3 years later, 3 stores later, partners bought out for a ridiculous sum of money, loan from FIL, equity line on our house, DH working the stores, me working 60hr/week and doing our business books/paperwork, we were done. Foreclosed on the lot, then the house, closed the stores, sued by landlords, sued by ex-partners, went bankrupt, had DS, moved back to FIL’s property as all we could afford was to pay him back. At this point, I felt we had made a serious turnaround in our priorities, we downsized, minimized expenses, kept life simple and small and worked less. I was working part-time and DS worked a few hours a week at a minimum wage retail job. FIL decided he didn’t like the intrusion on his property, kicked us off and said he didn’t want our money so we moved to another state to start fresh.
 To the crux of the story, while living with FIL, DH found another money-generating plan to day-trade with a program we had to pay for that guaranteed small, but positive gains. When DH actually followed the rules, it worked but he tried to outsmart it and lost several thousand dollars. Then he did a great song and dance, wrote out a list of rules he would read every day before trading to ensure he never strayed again, obviously I should have blocked him from any more activity but I was overwhelmed with an infant, upcoming move and work. About that time in 2009 my parents offered to finance a home for us but keep it in their names since we obviously could not finance anything. DH had weak plans for another outdoor sales job in the spring and I was working part-time. And then, I checked my IRA account one day to find that it was half what it used to be…confronted DH who admitted that he had made a very stupid move with both our IRA’s and his day-trading account and lost about $50k. The loss had been growing for about 5 months and he never said a thing to me. DH has a crappy track record…before we met he lost about the same amount in some other investment scheme, he then convinced his mom to invest some money in a business he partly-owned with another guy. Lost his money and her money before we met and about a year ago, gave her back some of the money without telling me and she agreed to keep it “quiet.” This was now our money, not just his to give away and I was the only one actually bringing in an income in the first place.
 So here we are, I am angry and do not trust him, not sure how I ever will. I still work part-time and make barely enough to pay all of our bills and refuse to work any more because I feel that DS needs his mom around a lot the first few years, at least. DH still wants to day-trade!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And now he is reluctantly looking for work because he is tired of my holding it over his head that I make all the money. Funny, though, I’m the only one who has consistently brought in an income to support our family and yet cannot protect it from ours, and now his financial mistakes. His latest job idea is a commission-only contract sales job he found online which requires 12 weeks of training, no guaranteed income unless he makes sales during that time. If I give up my shifts for 3 months, I may not get them back if…more likely when I need them. I wake up every night while DH sleeps soundly…I go to work while DH watches movies and plays with our money online. I will admit that he takes decent care of DS, cooks dinner and makes lunches, washed clothes/dishes, cleans the house but with this latest mistake, it doesn’t seem like enough.
 I feel like a complete idiot, taken advantage of, betrayed. I don’t want to go through the drama of divorce (he would probably get primary custody since he’s always at home while I work and would likely get child support or alimony from me because of my income) but I’m not sure what to do anymore. I feel like we are a financial cesspool and together are incapable of a peaceful existence. Our relationship is crap and I am particularly worried about the effect on DS who is now 16mos. For those who had the patience to read this, any ideas? Thank you.
