The number of times that people tell me – or I overhear them telling someone else without them realizing – that they don’t have the money to invest in their marriage –
Too many.
I stopped counting.
If you are sitting there, thinking to yourself – yeah – but it’s true —
Here’s what I’d want you to ALSO know.
I’m not talking about the phone company here.
The ATT stands for – Alone Time Together.
You plan your vacations.
As you should (I feel like I harp on this all the time)
You like going to extraordinary places which is great.
The problem is – you go there together, only to spend most of your time apart because you can’t handle being in the same room together for one more minute.
He eats at a different time, you stay by the pool, pretending you’re not hungry or that you’re into your book so much.
You go for a walk on the beach or around the historic part of town while he goes to the gym.
And I mean – ON PURPOSE – you do this to AVOID each other.
To make the time spent together as little as possible because of what happened two nights ago.
The thing you haven’t known how to recover from as of yet.
Because you forgot your tool box.
Or – you don’t even have one that you might have brought along.
As a result, you end up not being able to enjoy the wonders of this planet together – as you should – when you are there, together.
All the times you go out to eat – and I don’t just mean the fanciest of date nights that it takes you hours to get ready for –
I am talking all the dinners and lunches and coffees.
Planned way in advance and last minute, spontaneous ones.
Holes in the wall with amazing dishes on their menus.
And restaurant venues that get articles written about them in fancy magazines because they won some Michelin-star-like award.
The money you have been paying for food you don’t eat because you can’t sit in the restaurant long enough after one mean comment from each other.
Or – even if you sit it out – you can’t actually fully enjoy the food because of what’s going on in your head about how terrible this date is.
Think of all the times that a well-meaning event like that went sideways that you didn’t know how to resolve fast enough for you to still enjoy the crud out of dessert together.
That is – if you are the kinds of people that eat dessert.
The Cab rides/Ubers that you had to get because you two getting home together – in the same car – was out of question after the evening you had.
Or one of you wants to stay longer and drink and be merry – and the other can’t manage even the sound of that after what was just served to you on a platter of non-compliments offered with a taste of truthfulness and “real talk”.
When nobody even asked.
Breaking all the rules of public engagement.
Alternately, the shoes you ruined because you decided the only thing to do here is for me to walk home.
Forget the cold, the rain or the snow.
Or the fact that you forgot your coat and it so happens that it’s the middle of winter.
“I’m WALKING!!!”
Cause I’m so mad I can’t imagine being in the same car with this person for 25 minutes – or however it would take you to get home from downtown.
Think of ALL the events – concerts downtown, plays or Orchestra hall events – that you attended together because – well, we have these tickets and somebody’s gotta use them –
But the whole time you were sitting there, stewing about the collection of unresolved things that your spouse has done or has said over the last month.
Ain’t nobody enjoy music when that’s what’s swirling in their head.
No music is “music to your ears” when you keep having the argument in your mind.
But you go.
Because we can’t waste it.
And neither one of you can find a friend this last minute to take your spouse’s place.
So you proceed, again, pretending.
All the happy hours that are the very opposite of “HAPPY”.
This isn’t even you two going together.
You enlisted your girlfriends or guy friends to go because you have to spill the beans.
You sit there, complaining.
The more that you have to drink, the more you complain and be unHAPPY.
The more you complain, the more you drink.
And guys – I know – before you start pushing back – you aren’t complaining as much.
Or at all, in some cases.
Your happy hours are more about distraction.
And because you feel like they are helping you out – or you inconvenienced your friends that particular Tuesday night, you offer to pay for every round.
Either way – there is no movement.
No movement – and no improvement.
If anything – you need to get a ride home and then ask your spouse to drive you to work the next day because your car is still parked at the bar. (As it should be)
Time spent away with other people instead of spending it with the one person that would actually have the potential of creating movement in the right direction.
But you don’t.
Because you don’t know how.
So your marriage keeps costing you this way for weeks on end.
All of that costs money, too.
What is it on average?
You do the math.
Think of all the SY trips that you have taken over the years.
And no, I am not referring to the Sun Country Airlines when I say that.
That would be nice.
I am talking about the ‘Screw You’ trips that you have taken, or money you have spent to spite each other.
You know the ones, right?
“Oh, yeah? You’re gonna spend on that without telling ME? Well, I am going on a trip around the world without telling YOU then.
I can do that, too.
Watch me!”
Those ones.
It’s the trips you take that you are then trying to enjoy yourself on – Because this IS paradise after all – but you are so distracted and low level anxious at all times, with frustration percolating day and night.
What motivate this trip – Sucks.
And the awareness of that – It’s always there.
So you end up being there but having a hard time pushing back tears knowing what initiated the ‘adventure’ in the first place.
Those trips is what I’m talking about.
How many of those have you taken in the life of your marriage?
Count them all up.
Or don’t – But know that’s a cost your marriage is accumulating also.
The frequent liquor store stops on your way home to supply you for the evening, for the 100th time this year.
The “I’m-on-a-first-name-basis-with-the-store-owner-situation’ (or the bartender that has your drink order committed to memory, for that matter) because it ends up being that frequent of a stop.
The supply of booze you need for the weekend because you know you need that buffer between the two of you, the distraction.
Because you know you couldn’t be around each other for that long in one day otherwise.
That’s the seventh one.
The Bens and Jerrys and Lindts and Hersheys and all their other cousins and extended relatives.
You know what I am talking about.
What your marriage is costing you already in terms of the food to help hold you over to the next day or week when the ick seems unbearable.
To numb a little.
To create a teeny bit of short term pleasure when the air seems so incredibly thick.
Or any other shopping sprees for that matter.
Clothes, shoes, purses, stuff you don’t need at Target or Macy’s or Amazon – all that.
Buying all that stuff to help you feel better instead of resolving this – and then together – going and spending money happily, the two of you, with good reason.
If number eight were the ‘small’ purchases, here I want to talk about the big ones.
Here’s what your marriage is costing you already, too and you have no idea.
I’m talking about purchases big in amounts and big pains in the butt, too.
Because the size of resentment they cause on top of the dollar amount you spent.
Here I’m talking about the new SUV that you announced to your spouse that you purchased because you deserve it.
And you haven’t talked about anything in months – so no, haven’t talked about the car either – but you couldn’t wait anymore.
Here I’m talking about the down payment you made, single-handedly, on a property or a cabin or a house without consulting one another beforehand.
A big loan you took out for a remodel that you might have been talking about BUT haven’t closed the loop on together.
These and all other similar big decisions you made because you don’t know how to talk about money or spending it or saving it.
The big cost that comes – apart from the $ attached to them – from the long-term resentment that will linger for years to come because you weren’t on the same page or weren’t having the conversation you needed to have.
Last, but not least – You making unilateral decisions of any kind, really.
(Now, if you are single or unmarried – this isn’t for you. Go knock yourself out making all the unilateral decisions you want.)
I’m talking about decisions you make about your family, unilaterally, that end up costing you money.
Signing your kids up for an activity that you two didn’t agree on.
Buying into a membership that in theory may even seem like a good idea.
But you didn’t clue each other in on it.
And because time is money – it includes unilateral decisions about how you spend your time.
As a couple.
As a family.
What your kids do and don’t do.
What you sign the two of you up for with no input from your spouse.
It’s all of those things.
Because it then dictates how many rides you give to whom, how far across town or country or world – that you had no say in.
How you spend your time and your energy.
Your two most precious resources.
And on top of it – it costs you actual money, too.
If reading this list hit a spot with you somehow, or more than one – I imagine it will be painful.
And it will likely be a bit more painful still for the two of you to look at together.
YET – I encourage you to bring this up with your spouse.
Pull up the list, and have them take a look.
See if your pain spots overlap with theirs.
And then start the conversation.
Use this as the starting point.
What one thing of these do we want to eliminate – or minimize at a minimum?
What is it that would serve us best?
AND, if you two have been sitting in the knowing of “yes, we need help, we need to work with someone, but we can’t afford this?” –
May have been sitting there for quite some time now – I ask you this:
Do the math.
How much money are you literally throwing in the trash, year after year, because this has been the state of the affairs?
And then ask yourselves this:
Can you afford NOT to?
Moneywise –
But otherwise too.
Can you?
