He Is Whining Today

I understand that my knight is stressed over starting his masters program this week. I understand that he is mildly upset that he has not heard anything from the interview last Friday. But.......whining at me, trying to talk me into buying him a new laptop, and complaining about the structure (or lack of it) in his on-line classes is annoying. Since Monday, he's spent most of our time together complaining about how disorganized is classes are, and how bad the technology is. Some of his complaints are valid. His school email won't hook up to his Gmail account because of a problem on the school server side..that's valid. But some of his complaints are not valid. For example, he spent most of Monday complaining that his instructor gave them a huge website to review, and gave no idea of exactly what information they were supposed to concentrate on. Yet, when I read the assignment it was pretty clear what the instructor found important,and what she wanted them to learn. I offered to help and was told, "no, I've got it." Then he complained and whined for 2 full days about how he had no idea what he was supposed to be doing.

My knight is an above average intelligence type of guy. There is no reason for this kind of behavior from him.   I realize he is whining because he feels overwhelmed and is nervous about going back to school, but come on.. Seriously? He's not juggling 90% of the housework, 100% of the homeschooling, and running a small business like I did when I earned both my Bachelors and Master's degrees. All he's got to do is go to work, and come home, and do his schoolwork. I've even reduced his household responsibilities so they don't interfere with his school. He's got it about as stress free as college gets unless you're a teenager.

Then.. Over the last two days or so, he's been trying to convince me that he needs a new laptop. Yeah. he does. His laptop died about 2 years ago, and we have not replaced it yet. We have a desktop that the whole family uses, and we have "my" laptop.. which the whole family is allowed to use unless I am actively working. I've told him that multiple times. But.. he refuses to use the laptop because it's "mine." Which I think is dumb. He has my blanket permission to use "my" laptop when ever he needs it.  I am not spending money on a new, or even a used laptop out of his severance check when he does not have a new job lined up. In fact, I've told him repeatedly, there will be no unnecessary spending until he lands a new job. And yet, he keeps suggesting we buy this.. or that.. or hey, look at this cool computer I found for such a great price. Yes.. we will be getting a fairly good sized severance check tomorrow. No. I am not spending it on big purchases.. not even to pay off smaller bills. I will continue to make payments on things like we have been. When he lands another job that will support us, I will take the remainder of that severance package and invest it. In the mean time, it's not getting spent on extras.

Why is this so difficult for him to understand. It's basic, it's simple. Don't spend money you don't have. Yes, I am putting in applications and am willing to go back to work part time.. full time, if necessary.. but, again.. that does not mean that severance check will be spent.

...........and ........I guess this is why I took control of our finances to begin with. I'm going to have to be firm with him,and not allow his whining to convince me to spend money I'm not ready to spend.