I need a plan that I can get excited about that allows me to take care of my kids and not go broke doing it.
In 2013, I quit my job and moved myself and my children from Kentucky to Nebraska to stay with my mother-in-law while we hunted for a new house and a new job for my wife. I got a job fairly quickly, but everything else about that trip was a disaster. My wife's siblings who offered daycare had other plans and charged us as much as professionals, my new job didn't pay as much as my old one, the in-laws had split schedules so had somebody trying to sleep at all times (and I had two toddlers with me), my wife wasn't able to find work (and certainly not work that paid more than we would spend on daycare) and the house back in Kentucky didn't sell. Several months later, we returned to Kentucky to our old house and I went back to work for my old employer.
After the return, we had a bit of an upswing job-wise: I was moved out of the slowest store in the district and into one with good traffic and started to get some good paychecks, and my brother-in-law moved in and started helping repair the house, which was a fixer-upper when we bought it. However the work is subject to big seasonal fluctuations and when the busy season ended we had spent our extra on building supplies and didn't have money set back to pay bills during the slow season. In addition, my brother-in-law moved out after tearing out drywall, etc. so left us with more repairs than when he arrived.
The problem now is giving up. The busy season is upon us again and I am starting to get bills paid, but too much money is leaking away on higher utility bills. I fight every morning to get my wife out of bed, then do 12 hours at my job, followed by washing clothing, doing dishes and repairing whatever the kids destroyed while I was away. The construction bag full of old drywall is still in the back yard. We eat late night fast food far too much. I bought flea treatment for the yard and house (which I dare not use while everyone is asleep) but it sits unused while I am at work all day. And it is not just my wife that is giving up. I used to take clean laundry to work to fold when the store was slow, but I've stopped. I used to jump out of bed on my days off to get stuff done that I couldn't during the week. Now I watch movies with my kids.
I love my wife, but I have *no* plan to do what needs to be done without her active participation and we are feeding each others ennui. I see so many things that I could do if I was single instead of a married parent with two kids and a dog, but have no plan to get out of the spiral I am in.