Hey Ben

Thanks for sharing – it’s really very good to hear you & your wife had that conversation – the more you can feel together on working through this, openly and honestly, the better place you will get to , whatever the actual outcome may eventually be.  It is also good to hear you are open-minded about how it could work best, a lot of people do not have the strength or confidence to be able to resist the pressure of both society and family to “do what’s normal”.

The reason I was asking those kinds of questions is that the more you can show your wife you are serious, committed, have really thought through what changes it will mean and how you are ready and have planned to handle them, how she won’t be left being the responsible one it will be a true team effort etc etc, I suspect it will help reduce some of the fears she is facing in this area. Especially if that is her usual mode of operation, the more you can remove the distracting fears, the easier it will hopefully be for her to figure out if she does want this but is just scared or if it is just something she doesn’t want. Couldn’t agree more there is never a perfect time for anything but some people are better at handling risk and unknowns than others, it sounds like this is something you are used to helping her through.  When people are scared of change, they react quickly to protect themselves, something it sounds like your wife did with your RAF hopes, throwing them out without truly considering them as they were simply too much change for her to be able to handle. Hopefully her therapy will help her become better at handling change – since it’s one thing you can be guaranteed of in life.  I have similar people in my life and I have definately found the more I explain my dreams, how it will work, bringing it to life in a real, practical way, it seems to help people see it’s achievable and not so far out their comfort zone after all.  I say all this, not with the aim of how to convince your wife, but so that as you carry on talking it can help take away unhelpful fears to leave only true feelings, desires. Hope that makes some sense and is of some use. It sounds like you are doing a good job of being understanding as you work through this one together. I know it’s scary to go through something that if you are honest about what you want can split you up, but far better than in the long run being resentful to one another either way for not taking the time to work through the decision together. Hang in there.

Just one other random thought – it would probably be helpful to not discuss it with the rest of your family so much whilst you are working this through, these kinds of decisions in my mind are very much you/your wife’s and it can be difficult to ignore both the subtle and often way less than subtle pressure to continue to ‘confirm to the norm’ and meet parent’s expectations rather than what works best for the both of you. Once you are both in a place where you know your way forwards, that’s a good time to share as/when you feel the need to.

Hope helps.