Discuss Finances Openly, Honestly

“Though I love Jon dearly - have, in fact since I was 13 - I don’t trust a thing he tells me anymore,” says Evelyn, 43, the mother of Daniel, 18, and Anna, 15.

“About five years ago, our world caved in,” Evelyn recalls. “Jon told me we were deeply in debt, his family’s once successful department store was teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, and our savings were wiped out due to his poor business decisions.” A large out-of-town firm took over the store and offered Jon a low-paying managerial position.

Meanwhile, Evelyn pulled herself together, found a clerical job that led to several promotions and drastically reduced the family’s expenditures. Then, recently, just as they were beginning to regain their financial footing - Jon announced he received a big promotion, suggested they rejoin the country club, and insisted they could afford to send their son to an Ivy League college - the whole nightmare began again.

“Daniel’s tuition bill arrived last week, and Jon told me he didn’t have the money to pay it,” she says. “It was deja vu.”

When they first married, Jon assured Evelyn he was doing brilliantly. “He told me he was saving for the children’s education as well as our retirement,” Evelyn notes. She never saw, nor did she ever ask for any bank statements or insurance policies. Now she insists the marriage is over: “I don’t think I can ever forgive him,” she states emphatically.

Jon, 45, will do anything to save his marriage: “My family is the only part of my life that is remotely successful,” he sighs, “I can’t lose that, too.”

Evelyn was the only person with whom he could ever share his deepest feelings: “No one else ever made me feel good about myself, appreciated what I enjoyed and my accomplishments. I was so grateful for her love, I swore I’d do anything to make her happy.”

Jon’s grandfather discouraged him from pursuing his love of literature and music in favor of a retail career. “I despised working there, but I never felt I had a choice,” Jon says. Jon doesn’t know why he began to lie to his wife. “Perhaps I felt humiliated by her success, or perhaps I wanted to prove that I was a man.” Humiliated and defeated, he knows that convincing Evelyn he is worthy of her trust will be a herculean task.

Avoiding Money Disasters

“Jon and Evelyn have many issues to hammer out in their marriage, but the stress of financial woes is magnifying their problems,” says Ellen Deckoff, M.S.W., a marriage counselor.

These two are not alone: When financial insecurity looms, tension does, too. Many couples, like Jon and Evelyn, never talk about money. Like sex, it’s a taboo subject and, as a result, when a crisis occurs, they don’t have the solidity of honest communication to get them through it. To keep fights over finances from sabotaging your marriage, or sinking it entirely, keep the following in mind:

Identify your money styles. We all bring to marriage a different set of operating systems when it comes to money. Some people spend money as soon as they make it, or save for months only to splurge when stress strikes. If you can characterize your money styles, you will better understand each other as well as determine which part of your personality may be causing a current problem.

Talk about money - often and in detail. Marriage is a romantic as well as an economic partnership, and brushing financial problems under the rug doesn’t make them disappear. Instead, set aside time for a series of discussions to define your common financial objectives and design strategies to meet them.

Trace the roots of money matters. Together, think and talk about what money meant in your respective childhoods. In the home where you grew up, was money synonymous with love, power, security, self-worth or dependency? Did your parents have a lot of money, or were they barely making ends meet?

This suggestion lies at the root of Jon’s problems. With his self esteem already low, the loss of his job felt like he’d lost his identity, too. As he and Evelyn talked to the counselor about his deep insecurity, Evelyn realized that Jon’s actions had been the last hope of a desperate man, her anger softened and she was more willing to work on the communication and problem-solving roadblocks that were the real reasons for the breakdown in their marriage.