[MUSIC PLAYING] Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. All right, today's question of the day comes from Shauna in Canada. Yeah, she says, I'm seeking advice on how to explain the benefits of combining our accounts to my husband. He brings in the majority of income, as I'm a part-time teacher and mom. He often has to electronically transfer money to me, which I've explained feels degrading. I want us to be a team, but he refuses to budge on linking our accounts. What should I say to him? I feel as if I'm a burden. I am so sorry. Oh gosh, I'm so sorry. It shouldn't feel that way. I have things I want to say, but John-- No, you say it. OK, I was going to say, I thought I saw a twinkle in your eye, but I'll get into it. It was rage. It was anger is what you saw. Yeah, you know, first off, I just want to affirm that, yeah, you're right. You should be combining accounts. And I love that you've-- it sounds like you've used a great vocabulary in explaining the way this feels. You're saying, hey, this is degrading to me. I feel like I'm a burden to you. It's not just like, we should combine our money. And you're keeping us from doing that. It doesn't sound like-- it sounds like you've expressed yourself well on this. And I hate that he has disregarded your emotions. This is a case for counseling and counseling alone. And I'll let John get into the rest. I mean, I just think any time you look at a romantic partner and say that this thing that you're doing is degrading to me, and they look at you and go, I don't care. Then your relationship has fundamental foundational issues. This isn't about money and savings accounts. Oh, you'll be on that. This is about power. And I feel like I'm just a bill that you have to pay every month. You are. You are. Well, then there's a part of me. And I don't like reading into people's situations when I don't have all the information. But I think we've done this long enough that we kind of start to know. For me, there's this piece of it that, OK, but then what are you hiding? It's always. What are you hiding? Always. If you don't want me to see this, if I can't have access to it, if I have to ask you, what is it that you're trying to keep me from? Or what are you spending money on that you don't want me to know about? That you don't want me to see. Yeah. And any time you're in a relationship with anybody, mother, daughter, father, son, romantic work relationship, if one person in that relationship feels like a burden, I mean, not to get too dark, but that's one of the three legs of the stool when you're doing a suicide assessment. If somebody says, I feel like the world is better, if I'm not here, the greatest gift I could give the people who love me is to not be here, because I'm a burden, right? So I'm super sensitive to that word. And when somebody has to keep asking their husband, hey, I'm taking care of all the kids, and I'm teaching, we need some grocery money. Yeah. Well, hold on. Let me electronically send it over. Let me Venmo it to you. Yeah, man, in my guts, that hurts, man. Well, you know, let's take a moment and talk about this on a grander scale, because obviously, Shauna, yeah, you guys got to get into counseling, and just to be clear, like, there's some very clear boundaries that need to be put in place. Jon, why don't you give her a couple more clues on what these boundaries need to be and kind of like timelines? Well, I think the conversation is, hey, I've looked you in the eye, the person that I said, I commit my life to till death to his part. I've told you that the way we are handling money and the way you are choosing to treat me is degrading. Yeah. And I've asked for a partnership here and you've said no. I'm unable to communicate this any further. I'm going to go see a counselor and I'm asking you to come with me, because we have some fundamental communication issues. He's going to say no. And if he says no, then you have to have your or what? Yeah. And most couples, those people don't like to go there, the or what, because here's what I promise you. She knows, Shauna knows, there's other things going on here. Yes, we know about that. Right, this is never just about the money. This is a part of a bigger picture, the way he treats you, the way he talks to you, the way he doesn't show up, the way he says, mind your business. This is an entire picture in this tiny little, this little, these few little sentences here. It is. And so, Shauna, you have to be willing to look in the mirror and say, I'm worth not living my life under the thumb of somebody that treats me like a burden. And that means I have to be worth shining the light on all this nonsense and shining that, turning that light on may cost you everything. Yeah. It may cost you the marriage. He may say, nope, I want my, I want to flex and I want to treat you like a child more than I want to be a partner with you. More than I want to be married to you, be your husband. And maybe she turns the lights on and he says, oh my God, I'm so sorry. Yeah. And he comes to you. That's my hope, right? I hope so. Well, let's, let's zoom this out to reach a little bit of a broader audience because there's something you talk about, a twinkle in your eye. When I see that a couple has to electronically transfer money to and from each other, like, I talked to couples all the time, John, that maybe they've just both agreed. Yeah, we don't want to share our money. We like doing our own thing and they're Venmo-ing each other for rent and Venmo-ing each other because they went out to a nice dinner and he paid and now I have to pay my half. That right there, nothing strikes me as more absurd than me laying in the bed with my husband at night and rolling over and say, Hey, did you remember to Venmo-me that 30 bucks you owe me? Yeah, the $18 we went to Arby's yesterday, 18 bucks, remember? I mean, nothing puts just the kibosh on romanticism because I've been saying, Hey, you owe me $30 for my roast beef sandwich. Or holding, holding, holding the, the human that y'all created together. Yes. And holding the baby and going, Hey, by the way, I need you to Venmo-me 30 bucks for the water bill because, uh, yeah, or what happened. It's so madness. It's madness. What happens if, okay, you, you have the worst possible day of your life, right? You get fired and you come home, you, you know, you, just all the confidence is drained out of you. And then on top of all of that, you have to realize, how am I going to pay my wife for rent? Right. How am I going to pay my wife for rent? Hey, I got you for the next two months, but you're going to have to be in the house. I mean, or what does it look like? Let's go a step further. He makes 200,000 a year. She makes 60,000 a year. He wants to go to Ruth's Chris. She orders a steak and she gets the side salad because she, what she can't afford. Like how does this work? Right. It's, it's, it's a paper mache home. It's not real. Nothing. I mean, I can't imagine anything more divisive and anything else that would just put so much separation and create almost like a class system in your own home than not combining your money where your money is your heart is also. And I think, I think ultimately Jade, that's the challenge and the chaos that is modern day marriage. I think it's never been more important for kids. I think it's never been more important for us as just individuals. The idea of marriage is becoming so, so important. Yeah. And I honestly think we don't know how to do it. No. I don't know how to do it. I don't think we understand the depths of what that covenant and what that commitment actually means. But I, I, I, dude, I get it. The people are like, whoa, you mean to go all all in? Yeah. It's like that's the only way that works. And people go part of the way in and then they're upset that it didn't work. And of course it didn't work because the only way it works is to go all in. And that's also the only way you get really, really hurt. And that's, that's the other side of it, right? That is true. You got to go all in. And it's hard and scary. And we don't have a lot of models for what that looks like. But at the same time, if, if you have the guts to look at your life, it was tears in her eyes after she gets home from teaching and taking care of the kids and looks at you and says, um, I need some grocery money and you're like, well, I'll see. Let me see if I can then mow it over to you. God help you, man. Man. I got help you. That's, that's horrible. That's all I'm going to say, create your free every dollar budget today, the simplest way to budget for your life.
