I lurk around these parts occasionally and was curious what others think about this incident.

As background, married 10 years, two kids, live in an apartment in an ultra-high COL area. I've been wanting a house for a long time--I want my kids to grow up in one, and I have a dream of building myself a music space/home studio in a basement or attic. Houses have been out of reach but in the last couple years I've started to crush it in my career and now it's looking like we will be able to do it comfortably (i.e. without financially stretching) in a year or two--basically we could afford a small detached house in a nice area with a good school while still maintaining some urban amenities and being able to walk to things.

We've talked about it a lot and usually were on the same page about wanting it, but suddenly recently my wife started to say she didn't want to move to a house anymore, she just wanted to stay in our apartment and renovate it, talking like she's "just not gonna do it" etc.

My first reaction was to get angry about this, and I basically told her "staying in this apartment forever is off the table for me. I want a house. " At first I'm thinking "I'm handling this right, this is the new, more assertive me, not taking shit anymore." I was, in fact, pretty angry about her attitude, because she knew this had been my dream for a long time, and I am the one working in the high-earning field so that we can afford it, so it seemed really flippant and spoiled to just dismiss my dream because she felt like having a house would be a hassle. We had a whole dumb argument about it that led to nowhere, and I started to feel like my assertiveness was futile.

Then suddenly it hit me: it was futile. I was getting sucked into a pointless hypothetical debate with my wife WHO CHANGES HER MIND ABOUT THINGS EVERY WEEK. Only three months ago she was talking like she wanted to leave the area entirely and move somewhere rural. So why the fuck am I even wasting my time on her? Because deep down I am not actually being assertive, I am being a whiny bitch upset that he didn't get his feelings validated.

The reality is: right now we are not ready to buy a house. In a year or two, when we are, THAT'S when I can assert myself, putting out a concrete plan and pushing the plan forward. In the meantime, it's silly to waste energy arguing with someone who will probably change her mind about the whole thing seven or eight more times.