QUESTION: My second husband and I own and
work at our own mortgage business. My husband is cheap with most everyday
things, and I don't get a "salary." We usually shop together, because
I don't drive, and he pays. When I do want to go shopping with Mom or
Sis, he always wants to know what I want to buy and if I need it. I
feel that I work hard and am begging him for 20 dollars! He always gives
me the money, but has to say something about it first. (I was the money-earner
in my first marriage and did what I wanted with my money -- sometimes
to excess.) Should I take a "salary" of around 50 dollars a week?
ANSWER: You have astutely observed the
paradox that "opposites attract!" You admit to being a bit of an excessive
spender in the past, while you appraise your spouse as thrifty. Perhaps
you could each fare best by rubbing of a little on the other.
The challenge of many relationships which contain
opposite qualities is for each partners to learn from the other, therefore
achieving a middle (healthier?) ground. Perhaps you could both entertain
the concept that you were attracted to a partner that held some attributes
which would be good ones to balance in your own personality. Start
by respecting the tendencies in the other as possible avenues of growth
in yourself. But do not stop there! Continue to explore the emotional
meaning money plays in your relationship.
Consider that your role as the chief "money earner"
in your first marriage seemed to justify your complete freedom to
spend without accountability to your mate. Perhaps, for whatever reasons,
you and your first husband did not make decisions together about the
resources you earned, but followed the strategy that whoever made
the money had the power of decision-making to spend it. Now that the
roles are reversed in your present marriage, you may experience your
spouse's desire for accountability to one another about spending money
as "controlling." But this may also be, in part, a result of your
own interpretation that the person who makes the money in the family
is entitled to make the decision on how to spend it.
Perhaps your present husband does share this popular
interpretation. But whether or not he does, he gets credit for the
fact that he is not actually "controlling" your spending at all. In
fact, you find that you can get what you want or need from the joint
resources, but it is the fact that you have to "ask" him for money
and the reality that he wants to know what is being bought that creates
the relationship "snaggle."
Consider discussing the fact that in your marriage
you are both legally entitled to whatever income either spouse earns.
You are partners together in life, and there are many benefits of
this partnership that do not translate to economics alone. Place love
and nurturance in equal importance to moneymaking in the family and
proceed to address economic issues as a team. This does mean accountability
to one another, based on shared financial goals and mutual accountability.
Work out a budget together. Negotiate monthly amounts
allotted to various categories, including "miscellaneous" spending.
Maintain equal access to your accounts and leave it at that! You write
your own checks and consider taking on the responsibility of paying
monthly bills or at least sharing bill paying with your husband equally.
This will keep you in touch with your financial health and relieve
your husband from feeling overburdened and relegated to the role of
"limit-setter" with you.
You might also try being more proactive regarding
your own behavior to money in your relationship. Consider paying for
groceries when you go the store together, and make an agreement that
when each of you spends money from your joint resources, you need
not get consent of the other if it falls within the budget you designed
together. Some couples make agreements to consult one another for
purchases over a certain dollar amount. ($100 or more, for example.)
Create the agreements and rules by which you relate.
Finally, be careful that you are not being "lazy"
in allowing your husband to do all of the "worrying" in the family.
Take your fair share of bill paying and contribute to financial planning.
The fact that you already rely on your husband to drive may make you
vulnerable to letting him do things for you that later make you feel
passive or childlike in relationship to him.
Accepting equal responsibility for sharing resources
builds in accountability on both sides. You will not have to "ask"
one another for minute details of spending which would make any relationship
feel overly controlling. He is relieved of the "parental" role in
your relationship, and you are divested of experiencing yourself as
the "child" in your marriage.
The emotional meaning of your difficulty with money
in your marriage may have more to do with falling into "parent-child"
roles than true disrespect. And look out, passion can be dampened
by parental dynamics in any relationship. Freeing yourself of these
dynamics will prove refreshing, and may even revitalize your relationship
in other ways!
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