by Claire
As we work to get household expenses under control I sense the tension rising. You remember that I shared early on that my husband and I had an extremely difficult time combining finances when we married. There was silence and fights and more fights. As of late last year we seemed to get on the same page recognizing that we each had major flaws on our respective side of the fence. I told you that all of the debt was mine but what I didn’t tell you is the month after we married, his compensation set up at his job dramatically changed. When I say dramatically I’m talking about him not being able to make his house payment along with his regular living expenses and the raising of his two boys. Due to unhealthy patterns between us and basic communication styles, he didn’t tell me about the compensation change. To some extent, I “get” the secrecy–prior to meeting me he had been the sole breadwinner for his family and his first wife stayed home with their children. To suddenly find himself unable to make his bills (none of which were debt…except his mortgage) was very difficult for him to face. To suddenly find himself needing to rely on his wife for money to make monthly bills was impossible for him to face. So he spent 3 months “treading water” until I discovered the situation with a notice from his bank arriving in the mail…with a different color piece of paper showing through the window. I did not open his mail but this certainly alerted me to things not being okay. I gently inquired and that was when he told me that his monthly pay had dropped by a huge amount and he was not okay. We then spent a good 6 months of 2010 trying to right the situation in a “triage” sort of way—just trying to stay ahead of the tidal wave.
In the next few days I will be sharing this part of the journey. The tension I’ve noticed this weekend reminded me of this part of our history and I want to share it as much as for you to know the background and for me to remember that part of our history– so we don’t find ourselves repeating it.
Born and raised in Texas. I’ve at least driven through every state in the US courtesy of a roadtrip loving Dad.
I’m single with two children and a good parenting relationship with their father.
I am a “life is just half full of funny” kinda gal. Humor is my saving grace and I am thankful for it every single day. I have a strong Catholic faith and am thankful for that foundation.
I read a lot for a living but still enjoy a good book. I love biographies but in recent years have found the need for fun fictional books–sadly, for a long time I just didn’t enjoy fiction!
I love live theatre of any kind–from local productions to Broadway.
I love to scrapbook and pride myself in my kids’ albums.
I love being a mom but also love my career. I’m blessed to have found a balance allowing me to be at everything my kids need and want me to be at–while also having a career.
Favorite Quotes: Well behaved women rarely make history.
Behold the turtle. He makes progress only when he sticks his neck out. -James Bryant Conant
Do you consider all of the car debt “my” debt or “our” debt?
You’ve mentioned a few times that all of the debt was your debt but I would consider the $40k+ in auto loans marriage/”our” debt.
You are correct Nadia–and I just started drafting part II of this so I will be sure to point that out. The cars are “ours” and the $55K or so on CC’s also contain about $5K that was incurred during this time period of job change.
That does sound like a tough situation for your husband to face. He’d really have to push aside his pride to accept that he is not carrying his weight financially. Hopefully you are able to get by with that drop in pay or he has some other options to balance that out.
I think the good news is that once you are both on the same page, things will be much better overall. I think you’ve come a long way already since the beginning of the month and that is something to be proud of.
It would be interesting to have a conversation to see what the “ideal” situation would be money wise for each of you to see if your goals are really the same. It’s not enough to say you want to be debt free, but rather to have some conversations about what that would look like. Does that mean no car payments, no mortgage payments or no credit cards? Those are things you need to define. Once you agree on a common goal, you can begin to have conversations on what needs to transpire to meet those goals. Total honesty is a start. It’s no longer his or her debt but it’s your debt together now and you have to create some new rules and boundaries on what that new money relationship will be. The old days of hiding debt, income and money issues are in the past but it’s probably going to be a little bumpy until you both are on the same page for the long haul. I think in the end, it will bring you much closer. You can do this.
while i think it’s clean and simple to write the blog from your point of view – your income and your debt, and your efforts to pay it off, i can’t tell you how critical it will be for you and your husband and your entire family to be on the same page – no, page isn’t enough – the same mission here. if not, the tension will build and you will start to resent him when he spends money on something he doesn’t “need.” he will start to resent you for stupid stuff like generic toilet paper in place of his precious charmin mega roll. you absolutely, positively must support each other in this. you must have a teammate for when you are tempted to spend, or for when the neighbors pull up in their brand new Texas Edition Silverado. Or for when the kids gang up on you.
A couple people have mentioned Dave Ramsey here. I recommend finding some sort of interactive program like financial peace university, or a book, or video series, that you and your husband can go through together. Before my wife and I did the DR program, we were going in 2 completely separate directions and my plan for securing our financial future wasn’t her plan, and we were failing. Even if it’s not Dave R, following some independent plan that you can both study and commit to together will go a long way on this one.
I have to agree with Adam on this one. I would encourage you, really, really, encourage you to do Financial Peace together. The beauty of it is it’ll force you to have those tough conversations together. It’ll make you spell out how you think and feel about money, compromise and become united in your financial goals.
I also see caution signs when I hear you saying his/my debt – its all your money. What’s his is yours and what is yours is his. That is what marriage is all about – becoming one together.
I think you will find that becoming debt free can, if you both allow it, to bring you into a closer relationship and therefore a better marriage.
Thank you for sharing openly. I look forward to reading part 2!
We haven’t ever had any financial issues since we’ve married. One thing we did do 2 years ago though that helped control things even more was to give ourselves an allowance. Each week we each get $100 for our spending money. It covers clothes, lunches out, music etc. doing something like that may help ease the tension a bit even if it’s only $10 each. Neither of you wants to feel controlled by the other or by what each seems important as you work to pay off your debt. If I want to spend $80 on a tube of lipstick it’s my $ and we don’t criticize the other for how we spend it.
Claire, just one suggestion.
Please keep your posts short.
Longer essays dont make a good read.
I like the longer posts.
Love the longer posts too.
Number one – I don’t agree that you should keep your posts short – I like more detail.
That being said, do you think your husband might do a “guest blogger” post or two? I would love to hear his point of view. I think it would be instructive for all of us, and possibly very important for the two of you.
In my family – for years – my husband paid the bills. He didn’t do a great job at it, it turns out, but my apathy about it was even worse. When things got tough for us, I took over the finances (bill paying, negotiating credit cards, etc.). If decisions needed to be made, we always discussed them, however, it was really great to have a “leader” on the debt reduction front. He was so relieved not to have to worry about that on top of everything else. Simply put, it turns out that I was better at it than he is. We no longer have credit card debt, which is a great relief.
I guess my point is that if there is enough trust, and if you are the most motivated, perhaps you should see if you can be in charge of the family debt? It may be a huge relief for him and for you. Just a thought.
What ever you decide, it’s going to take a lot of work to deal with all the stress. Don’t let it build up too much. We took (and still take) long walks every weekend. Maybe an hour or so of talking without the kids around (or any other distractions) has really given us time to think and talk things through – not just financial issues. Perhaps we’re less likely to argue as we walk through our town. Anyway, it works for us and is cheaper than therapy!
I did read a Dave Ramsey book that I got out of the library, and found it inspiring. I didn’t do his plan, as he and I don’t agree on all fronts, but it really was helpful. No need to spend money to get his advice and inspiration though!
Best of luck!
I like the longer posts, too. Not that you need to keep up that level of writing every day, but it’s nice to be able to get the whole story in one setting sometimes.
My hubby and I haven’t combined our finances at all. He’s totally debt free and I have a huge amount of debt.
it’s me again. After 33 years of my second marriage which I came to as a widow with 2 children and my first husband’s debts hanging around my neck (Second had none except for college loan 1/2 paid off) everything has become “ours” but this can’t be rushed. Saying “his” and “Mine” is quite legitimate and you will find you are using it less and less as time goes by. My goodness–you should have seen us making a will together. “His” stuff had to go to his family members “My” stuff had to go to mine–it was pitiful. When we came to remake it (some years after my– now our–son’s death) we just laughed and made my/our daughter executor as being the most responsible family member and everything left to her except for a few special things.
We had gone back to graduate school and were dirt poor for 3 years on minimum wage jobs which came and went. The children were great and loved seeing us sweat over exams, just as they were doing.
This may have been why we went merrily wild with credit cards in later years–buying whatever we had had to do without.
Right now we have talked ourselves in a circle over buying a big garden shed (money saved) He wanted small I wanted large. We argued ourselves into he is now wanting large and I settling for small…where do we go now?!
But with 33 years of arguments under our belts we love each other so much still it is amazing.
Keep on the positive side of what you are doing and you will come through to the other side, stronger than before.
My goodness: Just ignore any silly criticisms! If you have the time to write long posts it is wonderful. You must be helping so many of us with them. Long or short the posts are your decision and your willingness to share is a gift to us all.
I think all couples have the same difficulty discussing sensitive or emotional issues. Blended families in particular face additional challenges, and when finances are at the root you’ve got all the elements for a relationship breakdown.
The problem, in my humble opinion, is that we don’t know how to fight.
If you think about it, most of what we know we learned when we were kids. Most kids see their parents resolve conflict one of two ways:
1) If their parents have a destructive or abusive relationship, or based on a certain cultures, they may see their parents frequently disagree and do LOUDLY and (sadly) possibly violently. That teaches “us” (as kids) that the way to solve problems is to either out yell the other one or resort to destructive failure.
2) If their parents (or parent; sorry, I can be a Pollyanna at time) have a fairly healthy relationship they will more than likely try to shield their children from conflict between themselves. As was the case for me, the few arguments I can remember I only knew about because I heard muffled voices get louder or I could sense the tension. Unfortunately, by shielding our children we deprive them of the opportunity of learning how to disagree with someone that their life is intertwined with.
If I may offer my humble opinion, I’d strongly encourage you to do two things. Both of these my wife and instituted several years ago when honestly we had one foot in divorce court and the other on a banana peel, and they literally saved our marriage and resulted in a better relationship than we ever imagined:
1) Learn how to fight. Create rules that both of you pinky swear to follow. These MUST include the ability for either party to “tap out” if they need a break, repeating back what you think you hear the other person saying, etc. There are several great resources that help with this. If you’re interested let me know and I’ll dig some up or find the name of the one we used in a class we took.
2) Fight in front of your kids. That’s right, sit down with the kids in the room and hash it out. Let them leave if they want, but if an issue will affect them (and all marital issues will), I personally believe it is important to hear you all work it out. Yes, it’s heavy for a kid to hear, but odds are they may face similar situations and who would you rather them learn from?
As an added bonus, if you teach them the rules for arguing it holds you more accountable to follow those rules when they’re around. Obviously this does not apply to issues involving the “bedroom” (ahem), but I would certainly include finances.
This worked out wonderfully for us as we found our kids understood our issues fully and were supportive. When they ask to do something, they’ll add “if it’s in the budget” because they’ve heard us work to make ends meet and discuss funds. Hearing my 10 year old say “Thank you for letting me take horse lessons. I know we had to do without other things to make that happen” tells me we’re doing the right thing.
Yeah, I know, I have an opinion about everything! I know we did things the hard way and my wife and I both decided if we can steer one couple down a better path then it was all worth it.
wow, what an intriguing bunch of comments here – i was speaking from our experience as a first marriage and young couple going at this. but there are so many more perspectives – with and without kids, first, second marriages, 33-year married couples. i encourage you to be make sure you are supporting each other but now i see how many different perspectives there could be.
Also, I say, you make your blog posts as short or as long as you want – it’s your blog. If Santosh wants something more interesting, i’m sure he can find it somewhere on the internet, or he can start his own blog.
My husband is from an old school family that valued the husband being the major breadwinner. They were considered “good” husbands. He also thought this way, and for a number of years he was unable to be the major breadwinner. (I still make more than him, but he is doing fine in his career.) Psychologically, though, this was tough. He felt “less than”. He is also ADHD and has difficulty with details, so we HAD to go to individual checking accounts early on or risk overdrawing due to his impulsivity. More “less than”. Quite a set-up for secrets about spending. When we decided to get serious about debt reduction, it took a lot of courage on his part to get “his” bills out there. It took non-judgement on mine when I saw the balances. We are where we are. Now what? The more we talked about “our plan”, the better he began to feel. He feels part of the plan now. We still have separate checking accounts, and he still pays “his” bills out of that account, but the plan is “ours”, and our budget is what “we” came up with. This helps him feel he is doing his part, and any money he doesn’t need for “his bills” gets transferred to my account for the “good of the family”. This journey of ours won’t be fixed quickly (didn’t get this way quickly either), but we are slowly making small changes as our confidence levels and comfort improve. Yes, I have read Dave Ramsey’s stuff, and even posted the baby steps on our bill corkboard in the office. We go over the budget every payday and discuss what needs to be paid, how much, etc. Everything is on the table, and at least we are TALKING. Hang in there. This is your husband’s life, too, and he will grow at his own pace. I’m right there with you, kid.
Has your husband learned how to manage his ADHD? My boyfriend has ADHD and it definitely hampers his career and it didn’t help that he wasn’t diagnosed until he was an adult. Fortunately he’s accepted the fact that he will earn less than anyone he marries, and he’s ok with that. But, I know from seeing my boyfriend that dealing with ADHD can really wear a person down.
Yes, he has learned. He wasn’t diagnosed until he was an adult either, but once diagnosed he read all he could find, saw a physician, and has medication that helps. The psychological toll took longer to heal, though. Decades of wondering why he wasn’t able to do what others do was taxing. Things are beginning to gel, though, and looking at dwindling balances and improving finances is encouraging and satisfying. We are better than we’ve ever been.
Wow. This is a really hot topic. I just split up with my boyfriend, but in the 3 years prior to that, we had a lot of money issues, and he was also ADHD. We never fully resolved them, and absolutely no way, ever, could I see us combining finances (we also were not married). Just getting him to pay his portion of the bills, even just a portion of rent (and often not even half) was a major undertaking. I wrote off the possibility of him ever contributing a fair share or half of expenses. He made less than me, he spent frivolously in areas that were not important (to me) which impacted him being able to pay halfsies on bills and other expenses. That’s just the tip of the iceberg.
I’ll just let it be said that it was a ginormous sore point in our relationship. It caused a lot of tension and resentment, and compounding that, we also had significant issues with communication styles.
I have heard one great suggestion that I think might work really well, outside of the ADHD issue: schedule a weekly budget talk between you both every week. That way, if there’s an issue, it can be brought up. We all get stressed and worried and feel shame and embarassment over our finances. This lets it be resolved quickly (no more than one week), and not linger for 3 months. Use it as a non-judgemental way to touch base with each other on incoming money, expenses, an unexpected bill, change in income, you name it. You can also use it as a way to tweak your budget and see if you are on track for the month; if needed, you may find you need to tighten your belt for the remainder of the month. Do it weekly and get into the habit of discussing money, opening, calmly, and non-judgementally, as a team.
I wish you both well on your journey. Communication on this subject is extremely important. And from personal experience, I know how challenging it can be. In my case, it never worked and I know going forward to be aware of this before I get into a committed relationship again.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts. I realize it can be difficult to work your way through budgets. I wish you the best with this and just do your best to keep the positive communication going with him.
You’ve hit on something – men are “supposed” to take care of it all so sometimes have trouble asking for help. DH & I had that exact problem when we moved in together – he was trying to cover everything (I was in school) but just couldn’t on his salary. It’s not necessarily a sign of trust issues or a problem, it’s just a reminder that we all have pride and emotions, and coaxing them out in a new relationship takes time. Just like the commenter above who wrote a will with mine/his, and then changed it years later!