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[elena_2]

I am feeling a lot of resentment towards my partner because I feel like he hasn't handled our two body problem very well.  Here is our dilemma:
When we met, I was just out of law school, working full time and working on my library science degree so that I could pursue my dream job (academic law librarian).  He was in engineering grad school (phd).  We lived a comfortable happy life in Small City.
When the time came for me to graduate and apply for jobs (elsewhere), he told me that he would follow me after a year, as he thought he would finish his phd is one year.  He insisted that this would be the easiest way to go.  I informed him that I had to do a nationwide search, but that he had veto power over any region or city.
I got my dream job in Large Expensive City.  He did not exercise veto power, but encouraged it. I accepted it, thinking that Large Expensive
City would hold the best chance for him. (I know nothing about his field)
I moved to Large Expensive City and moved into a big place I could barely afford so that he could just move in with me when he finished.
Now, almost a year later, he has informed me that 1)it will take longer to finish phd (by several months) and 2) Large Expensive City would be terrible for his career, there are no postdocs here for him and that the best place for him to move would be on the other coast.
Now, we don't know what to do.  I can't move for at least another year 
if I want to keep my career path.

My resentment comes from the fact that I begged him to tell me what would be the best regions/cities for his career, before I accepted the job.  However, he did not do any "career research" until after I left.
Am I crazy for resenting him? How can I stop resenting him? Help?

[cackalacker]

The two body problem is really damn hard, and it's often difficult to separate out frustration over circumstance from resentment of one of the bodies.

To try to view it from his side, maybe 1) he didn't know it would take him a year longer than expected to complete his PhD; lord knows I perpetually underestimated how long my dissertation would take; or 2) he didn't have the heart to steer you away from your declared dream job.  But I don't know, I don't know him.

I guess at this point, you just have to voice your resentment (depending on how confrontational you want to be, it might be easier to say, "I'm frustrated by this situation" rather than "I'm really furious with you").  Then you have to figure out what to do next.  You can't leave your job after a year, so don't leave.  Maybe get a smaller apartment?  Maybe compromise by having your partner at least look for the unlikely postdoc in your town, but then get ready to settle into another year apart, at least.

And maybe have an honest conversation about whether each of your priorities will ultimately lie with careers or the relationship -- and make some concrete plans for how you negotiate that. Before that conversation, though, you might should explore whether your resentment stems from the fact that you feel you've been more accommodating than your partner has.  If so, do some serious thinking about how much more flexible you're willing to be.

Oy. I can offer more sympathy than helpful advice. Good luck.

[acrimone]

OK, I'm here to help you with your resentment.

It's just as much your fault as his.   If you were really serious about being with each other, you shouldn't have split up, geographically.  Relationships are at their most vulnerable when people are in different places. 

But you weren't really serious about being with each other.  You were more serious about being with your careers, and with risking all the uncertain things that can happen when couples split up for a long period of time, than you were with being with each other.  Sure, you thought, it would be nice to be able to split up to pursue your careers and then come back and have time to be with each other later, but you decided you'd rather take that risk -- a risk that could result in something as drastic as a "Dear John"-type letter if you were apart long enough.

So now you two find yourself not really able to have everything you wanted.  Aren't priorities a b*tch?  They're expressed in ordinal numbers, so there can really only be one "Number 1".

It's not too late to make a new decision, mind you... one (or both) of you can bite the bullet, but unless you do it's just that: a decision that you both made that didn't turn out as you hoped.  So you're both to "blame" (as much as anyone is, anyway) and there's no reason for resentment.

[elena_2]

Thanks for your comments.  Just putting myself in his place is a big help.  I have no idea what it is like to work towards a phd. He is certainly the kind of person who would not want to steer me away from my dream job. 

[polly_mer]

What you do now is ask "Where do we want to be in three years?"

It's very easy to get boxed into "But A is the only possible route for me and X is the only possible route for him so there's no solution to our problem.  Woe is us."  I won't bore you with the fifteen years of stories I could tell about life with my husband, but Acrimone is right.  You must prioritize and choose the path that most likely leads to something acceptable with trade-offs that you can accept. 

Remember life is not about getting the highest grade, it's purely participation-based and no one gets out alive.  For many people, a good family life combined with good careers will trump either a fantastic family life with no career or a fantastic career with no family life.  Deviating from the established path can be tricky, but a substantial fraction of people do it and go on to have successful lives.

[oseph]

Large Expensive City would be terrible for his career, there are no postdocs here for him and that the best place for him to move would be on the other coast.  Now, we don't know what to do.  I can't move for at least another year if I want to keep my career path.

In my experience (so exceptions may occur, but polly_mer is saying the same thing):

If your highest priority is staying together as a couple, you have to stop thinking in terms of "best for his/my career" and in terms of acceptable compromise.  If you want to do what is best for your career, you have to be single or married to/partnered with someone with no career aspirations of his own.  This applies to him too.  So what if the best place for him is on the other coast?  The important thing is that he find an acceptable way to stay in the game.  That may mean adjusting his definition of acceptable.  Best and acceptable are very different animals.  Same for you -- if you genuinely cannot move for another year and continue being an academic law librarian, then he should consider whether he can find something acceptable to do in your city for a year, with the agreement that you will go somewhere where he can get a postdoc the next year.  But do you absolutely have to stay where you are for another year, or you will never be an academic law librarian again?  Or is it a question of you need to stay another year if you want to secure an equally good job in the future?  I know nothing about your field, so perhaps there is some unwritten rule that two years is the minimum time for a first job or you're out for good, but make sure you're being honest with yourself about this.

Anyway, I know how hard this is, but if you want to stay together, both of you should remove "best for his/my/her career" from your conversations and thoughts.  "Best compromise for us" will have to replace it.  That is the trade-off you make for the joy of having personal relationships.  Trust me, I know.

[msparticularity]

First, I should acknowledge that I am very fortunate that MrP's work is pretty mobile - he's a writer/photographer who teaches a little English comp on the side to generate some steady income. So when I'm looking for jobs, I'm not looking for a TT, or even a full-time hire for him, just some adjuncting in English comp (nearly universally possible, in our relatively short experience of this). I am and always will be the major breadwinner in our marriage, and that works well for us because it has freed him to pursue the artistic work he loves.

However, I don't want to minimize the stresses that this arrangement caused in the earlier days of our relationship either. The biggest thing that I have learned is that the "danger" is not in making decisions or following or own desires - it is in the significance that we attach to our decisions and our mate's choices. Human beings are notoriously meaning-makers - we tell ourselves "stories" about our lives and their significance - and those stories are, I believe, the real source of danger in our relationships.

Here's what I mean: at one particularly rocky point in our relationship a few years ago, I later figured out that I had managed to simultaneously negotiate the arrangement that we now have, where I have the steady work and income and MrP is an artist with less income - all the while attaching the meaning that he was essentially sponging off of me, unaware of/uncaring about my struggles to generate enough income, and so on. I mean, I really had not internalized the fact that I cannot simultaneously expect him to remain completely flexible and put my career first, and also to pursue a career of his own that will generate significant income! It really wasn't the choice itself (in either direction) that was the problem; it was the significance that I was attaching to it.

[cackalacker]

Acrimone said more forthrightly what I said circuitously. 

Basically, y'all need to ask whether and how much you each are willing to compromise for the sake of the relationship.  Is both of your highest priority staying together?  Or is it launching a career?  Neither of you is a bad academic or human being, no matter how you answer that question.  But you do need to know where you stand before you make any more big decisions.

[normative_]

What Acrimone and PollyMer said.

Concretely, he's told you he's moving to the other coast and not to you, so you are less important to him than his career is, and you'll have to live with that, even if he would really like to have you both. You can look for work there, and see if anything comes of it, but I would get a firm offer first before moving.

[ramblinrose]

Not being aware of the state of your relationship, I can only comment based on my own experiences.  However, if I were asking this question, I would strongly resent acrimone, et al's advice.

It may be possible for you both to have the careers you want and to be together and it may not be, but I think it is worth trying.  Trying requires putting forth the effort to build your individual careers up front and working to keep your relationship going over the long distance, if necessary.  My partner and I have been together for 8 years.  We spent 5 of those years living apart.  It was not ideal, but the academic year is only 30 weeks long, and we made it work.  We were both able to pursue our career aspirations.  As a consequence, partner now has dream job.  I have a job that is sub-optimal, but we are in the same place, and I have a better position in this place than I would have had without spending the 5 years I did building my career.  I also know that I pursued the other avenues available and am therefore content with the situation, though we continue to look for a better situation for me. Eventually, I did make a choice to take a non-tenure-track job when I had tt offers so we could be together.  Luckily, though, it is in a fantastic place with very nice colleauges. 

Living apart puts a strain on a relationship.  So does living together in a constant state of resentment.  Relationships are hard, and it is up to your individual circumstances which of these would be harder.

I will say that one thing I learned in living apart for so long is that it is hard to have an argument and to discuss your resentments.  It doesn't work to discuss over the phone, and it doesn't work to discuss in your brief time together on weekends durign the school year.  These discussions really need to wait until you have a few weeks together to hash it out (I am not sure how much time off you get in summer in library science, but your partner should have a decent amount of time off).  Sometimes, that can lead to building resentment further.  I always tried to handle the wait to have a discussion as a way of trying to think about my perspective and partner's perspective and a good resolution.  Sometimes this worked and sometimes it didnt.

[comp_queen]

Another perspective (and admittedly I have a bias; I'm one half of an academic two-body couple, and I was the one to move for a job, and I envy greatly the life story of anyone who looks at this and says with a straight face that it was a "simple" matter of prioritizing my career over my relationship):

Years ago, on some Lifetime retrospective about "The Golden Girls" (stop laughing, there is an incisive point here), Estelle Getty was being asked about her life choices and how often her career kept her apart from her husband, and she said something like,  "Who's to say that because you're together it's a good marriage and because you're apart it's a bad marriage?"

[polly_mer]

Years ago, on some Lifetime retrospective about "The Golden Girls" (stop laughing, there is an incisive point here), Estelle Getty was being asked about her life choices and how often her career kept her apart from her husband, and she said something like,  "Who's to say that because you're together it's a good marriage and because you're apart it's a bad marriage?"

I don't think anyone is saying that living apart can't work out.  My husband and I have lived apart before and, if my husband's most exciting prospect comes through in the next month, we will be living apart again for awhile.

I think the point is to be clear about what you [generic] want, what you're willing to do to get it, and make sure you are both on the same page.  Make any trade-offs you [generic] think will be worthwhile, but be aware that you are making certain trade-offs regardless of what you choose.

Just make sure you [generic] have considered all the options.  Oseph is right that a good compromise (whatever that means for your particular situation) usually works out better than optimizing solely on one variable.

[normative_]

"Who's to say that because you're together it's a good marriage and because you're apart it's a bad marriage?"

I had to highlight this. I've experienced directly and through other couples that it is often more stressful, at least in some ways, to be within daily commuting distance than to be further apart. It certainly disrupts the life of the commuter more seriously, travelling 4 hours every day back and forth so that you can sleep in the same bed every night. Your work may suffer, your sleep patterns may be disrupted, and  you may suffer from exhaustion. And you will resent it to some degree.

I disagree with Ramblin Rose on the issue of long, drawn-out discussions. Yes, it's important to discuss these things, but unless both partners decide that they both want to draw this thing out, it's important to decide what your own bottom lines are, where room for improvement is, and to take advantage of concrete opportunities to make those improvements when they occur. Then is the time to talk, make a decision and then live with it. At other times, it can be wonderfully constructive to STFU. If you don't, you will talk about hypothetical things and never stop talking because there are no boundaries.

You have limited time on this planet, and it's too short to spend wallowing in your (rather negative) feeeeeeelings.

[mellonia]

I just wanted to highlight this bit from the OP:

When the time came for me to graduate and apply for jobs (elsewhere), he told me that he would follow me after a year, as he thought he would finish his phd is one year.  He insisted that this would be the easiest way to go.  I informed him that I had to do a nationwide search, but that he had veto power over any region or city.

Though this won't help you deal with your resentment, OP, I disagree with the sentiments expressed by many in this thread that you made your bed by leaving.  Yes that's true at some level, but I read the above part of your post as you involving your partner in an important life decision, and he didn't take his part of that decision too seriously (given his later thoughts), ie he didn't do any homework about the regions you were considering. 

Several good friends are academic couples who found that time apart building careers led to opportunities together (with reduced stress and resentment) that they feel they would not have been forthcoming had geographic constraints been paramount in their decisions.  That's why I don't agree that people who are 'really serious' don't split up geographically. My partner and I did wind up staying together (with some costs--and did consider some options that would have split us up temporarily) but used something like what I quoted above from the OP as a starting point--with the person with the most geographic constraints in their field leading in the job search arena and the other with veto power. 

But bottom line was well expressed by others, OP--you and your partner clearly need to be talking about your needs and wishes both as a couple and as individuals with careers, and hopefully you can use this experience to guide you, ie to take the time to better understand professional constraints and what compromises you are each willing to make.  It's also telling in your post that you "know nothing about his field"--it may be that better understanding about his constraints is needed not only by him, but by you?

[navelgazer]

My spouse and I started dating before either of us were graduate students (he was still an undergrad), and so we thought we knew what we were in for. We have always had a "one academic year apart only" policy--in part because of the difference in our degree schedules and his need for a post-doc as a scientist--but the first two times we thought this would happen, I ended up with no academic job.

I applied widely, but to no place where it was inconceivable for him to  1. get a research faculty position AND 2. have some sort of industry career to fall back on. My humanities field/subfield is such that this still allowed me to apply to at least 3/4s of the jobs (most of the more out-of-the-way jobs are for a kind of generalist that I just clearly am not).

My husband's career goals have also shifted since he started his post-doc, something neither of us realized until one of the many long talks we had before I accepted my TT post 1200 miles away from said post-doc.

Why did we decide to live apart (me with our infant child, him really, really missing our infant child much of the time)? Because we prioritized our relationship. My degree is almost 3 years old, I got a RU-VH TT position that will put in a good position to be a spousal hire, my new school hires in his field every year, and he will be able to do a second post-doc there if that doesn't work out. Neither of us could make the decision that after all of this, I should turn down this kind of career possibility because of a 9-month separation.

Oh, and we're seeing a marriage counselor to keep the discussion open.