Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
Hey there, Ryan Reynolds here. It's a new year, and you know what that means. No, not the diet. Resolutions.
A way for us all to try and do a little bit better than we did last year. And my resolution, unlike big wireless, is to not be a raging a**hole and raise the price of wireless on you every chance I get. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. $45 upfront payment required, equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes on unlimited. See mintmobile.com for details. WBUR Podcasts. Boston.
The universe has good news for the lost, lonely, and heart-sick. The sugars are here, speaking straight into your ears. I'm Steve Allman. I'm Cheryl Strayed. This is Dear Sugars. Dear song, won't you please share some little sweet days with me? I check my double eye for any sugar you send my.
Hi, Cheryl. Hi, Steve. Well, today we are going to do a rapid fire. I love those. Yes, I love them too. And they're about two of your favorite subjects, or at least I know one of these is your favorite subject. Oh, no, they're both my favorite subjects. Love and money. Yes.
And when I thought about this, I immediately went into my little lit nerd zone and thought, gee, our canon contains a whole literature of economic and romantic anxiety where those two are traveling together. All of Jane Austen's novels are about finding a partner and finding
the economic anxiety attendant with that. It's no coincidence that Darcy is described as handsome and all the rest from Pride and Prejudice, but also he gets 10,000 pounds a year. That is part of who Darcy is characterologically, and it is a big part of the math of that book. The Great Gatsby is a book about love and money.
little woman, just to take that as an amazing novel, but it has a kind of wish fantasy in it, which is Joe Alcott marries the poor writer, right? The immigrant. But it's okay because they'll be happy and poor. And it's a beautiful story. And I...
Believe it. But the economic circumstances and struggle and pressure of that actually does affect the calculus of love and erodes it and chips away at it. And that's what almost all these letters are struggling with, mostly in the context of romantic partnerships, but more broadly within family. It can be such...
point of contention because you can fall in love with somebody who has very different values than you about money. Also, I think our values evolve over time. When I was in my 20s, listeners might remember I was married to somebody before I married Brian, my husband, my last husband.
My husband forever. My final husband, as we think of him. Yes. So I never had any money really all of my life until recent years after the success of Wild. And in so many ways, I resented that growing up. I had this chip on my shoulder about growing up poor and having this student loan debt and all of this stuff. And I was at a dinner party with a dear friend of mine. We were a bunch of couples. And she...
And she took me aside. My first husband was a musician and a political organizer. And, you know, he had come from more money than I came from, but together we didn't have any money. And it seemed he had no intention of making any ever. That's a theme. And she pulled me aside and said, no.
You might be okay with this now, but you're not going to be in a few years. Right. And, you know, she was wrong about that. I never did turn into a person who felt like I needed my partner to provide me with lots of money. But I think she was right about it for herself and right about it for a lot of people. Right. And that's the rub, especially with romantic love, is you fall in love with somebody. Right. And then you have to, in all these ways, assess whether you can actually live with them. Right. And what
happens when your desires, your values, your means are mismatched. Will you read our first letter? I sure will. Dear Sugars, the last two years have been the happiest of my life. I'm easing into my 40s with a good career, a loving relationship, and for the first time ever, solid financial footing. I grew up the oldest child of a single mother who got into bad relationships but was unable to leave because she had no way to support herself and her children.
My aunts, uncles, and grandparents would routinely step in to bail her out and take me and my sister off her hands for a while. They were always very kind to us, but I felt like a charity case. And with that came shame that haunted me for years. I've worked hard all of my life to become successful, independent, and self-sufficient. I was always too afraid to put myself in what I perceived to be the vulnerable position of being a wife and a mother. But two years ago, I met the kindest gentleman I've ever known.
He was patient with me, even when I was reluctant to commit. Instead of getting angry or hurt, he vowed to love me on my terms. He didn't demand that our relationship have a label or a contract. Amazingly, his light, easy approach drew me even closer, and I found myself dreaming about a lifelong partnership with him. I had never felt so cherished, adored, and at peace. Then one day, I noticed the letters. Past due. Attempts to collect debt. Last and final notice.
I'm not proud of how I came to learn this, but the man I love owes over $150,000 in student loan and credit card debt. He doesn't know I know. He continues to send me flowers and gifts, but instead of bringing me joy, they make me feel sick. When we go out to dinner with friends, he always picks up the tab, which I know he can't afford. Worst of all, I find myself less attracted to him now that I know about his financial situation.
He's emotionally available, kind, loving, and generous, but terrible with money. Part of me wants to have a frank talk with him and help him get his financial house in order. The other part wants to run away. What should I do, Sugars? Signed, love or money.
So, as you know, Cheryl, this is one of a genus of letters that we got that really revolved around the same theme, which was women who were deeply concerned about men who they found to be financially irresponsible. It was really affecting their relationship and love and money, I feel for you.
So deeply here because you're haunted by a past that you are in touch with. And what strikes me about your letter is, you know, the circumstances here. And I want to just point out a few things that might be helpful in thinking about the right path here, because I don't think it's either running away or having a talk with him about how to get his financial house in order. I think there's a middle path here.
the first is to recognize that when you say i felt kind of like a charity case as a kid that's something you really have in common with your boyfriend right now as he's existing because part of the reason that he's hiding his debt from you is that he doesn't want to feel like a charity case and the problem here i would say cheryl isn't a problem of debt it's a problem of deceit
It's problematic that your partner, Love & Money, has run up all this debt, but
I believe he has enough good qualities as you describe them that if he were honest about it and if he knew what your particular history was, you guys could work through it. And so rather than thinking about instructing him to get his financial house in order, I think the first step is to talk about your own history and your fears when it comes to money and the anxieties that you carry around
And to get it all out into the open and say, look, you need to know the kind of childhood that I had and the role that money and economic insecurity played in
We can work through this. We have enough good stuff to work through this, but we can't do that if around this issue, you're not honest with me because that hits my buttons in ways that you can't really know, but it's really causing me to not feel as much trust in you. And you write that your lover vowed to love you on your terms. And so you need to announce to him that those are your terms.
Well, I agree with a lot of what you said. Ah, very a lot. Note that, listeners. I do, but there's a part, you know, you're using this word deceit. And I think if we really give this letter, you know, a very clear-eyed look, what we see here is actually somebody who may or may not be keeping this as a secret. We know that he has the debt. We know that he's generous with his money.
This isn't a situation, love or money, where your boyfriend is mooching off of you and expecting you to pick up the bill and pretending that he has money that he doesn't have. What we have are two facts. Well, he is pretending to have money that he doesn't have. I disagree with you. Yeah. You don't think picking up a big tab when you've got $150,000 in credit card and student loan debt isn't insufferable?
in some ways, pretending to have money you don't have? No. And you know why? Tell me. That's what I did.
Brian and I, when I sold Wild, we were in a wild amount of credit card debt. I was very generous with my money, often picked up the tab when it was going on a credit card where there was already 20 grand on it that I could barely make that minimum payment on. Can I just ask one thing, just to push back a little bit? Would you describe yourself as when you went out with friends, you always picked up the tab? No.
No, you know, that's what she's describing that he always it feels compensatory, like he's got to show that he's got a lot of money.
I am saying, Steve, you know, we do not know if this man is deceiving her or not. Okay. So maybe, maybe he's not actively deceiving her. I mean, I will tell you that there is a kind of familiar trope that where there is a man who, or a woman, somebody who is trying to conceal or in some ways distort their financial reality. Fake it till you make it. And that person is, you know, often, oh, you know, can I just borrow, you know,
100 bucks, I'm going to get a check next week, or I'm going to, and then that check never comes. And there are clear signs of deception. The only thing we know based on your letter, love and money is that your boyfriend is very generous, probably to a fault, it sounds. He has a lot of debt and doesn't always pay it on time. Those past due notices do give me some cause for worry. And he hasn't decided to share this part of his life with you. You invaded his privacy.
By examining his mail and opening things you probably shouldn't have opened. So it might feel like a deception, but we don't know that it is. And so this is the piece of Steve's advice that I really think is extremely wise. Begin the conversation and begin it not from a position of judgment and I'm going to help you get your financial house in order. Right. But from judgment.
Let's talk about money. Let me tell you about my past, my history. So what I encourage you strongly to do is try to the extent possible to set aside your judgment about his situation. My husband and I weren't in deep debt because we were bad people. We weren't in deep debt because we were irresponsible, though some people might say we were by doing things like picking up the tab.
And we weren't in debt because we thought that we were in a good situation. We were, it was the only way that we had to do things like keep, you know, health insurance for our kids. That shame that you feel about your past, I relate to, I grew up poor, I was a charity case, I understand. But I do think that, of course, you always have to, you know, remember what piece of this are you projecting onto your boyfriend? What piece of it is a story that's really more about you than him? Yes.
I would say two things. One, you're right. In a sense, this discussion needs to start potentially even or somewhere in there has to be an apology. You notice the letters, but then it's clear that you also open them. And you're right. That's an invasion of privacy. And that's not an active act of deceit on the part of this guy. And you notice that in the letter. And so I want to retract deceit. It sounds like too active. I think he's feeling shame. And I should just say for reference,
As I mentioned, we get a lot of letters like this. We got this letter from a woman who called herself, am I the breadwinner now? And she wrote about her boyfriend who is a musician who squandered his money on gaming equipment while she's like working 70 hours a week.
She writes, is it wrong for me to try to teach my partner to be more responsible with his money? I haven't laid out the ways he could save money because I'm afraid of hearing his excuses and making him feel bad. Should I do it anyway? We got a lot of letters that were sort of saying, should I have the financial planning discussion with my partner who's irresponsible with money? And I think we agree on the idea. You should have a discussion about money and what it means to each of you. Yeah. And I just want to quickly say a
quick word about gender from your sponsors, the patriarchy. Oftentimes, men are socialized to associate their economic power with how they're regarded in the world. And I think it's important to recognize that and to recognize that the reason that you don't know about the past due notices and the rest is
by design because it might be that even though this guy's easygoing and loving and supportive, he doesn't want you to know that he's in debt. Am I a breadwinner now?
uses that term, you know, I'm afraid of hearing his excuses and making him feel bad. And I understand that because if a man is in debt or is financially irresponsible, there's a special stigma associated with it. But you have to be honest when you feel anxiety or fear, especially love or money. You come by that honestly. And remember that there is no one very
value about money. One person's idea of what's irresponsible is different from another person's. And so I do think that that needs to be taken into account here, love or money. You write, part of me wants to have a frank talk with him and help him get his financial house in order. And what I would say is stop at the first half of that sentence. Have that frank talk with him that's not attached to your plan for his future.
Really, what you're doing is being honest in the hopes that this will bring you to a deeper understanding, a deeper intimacy about yet another aspect of your lives. Dear Sugars, I'm a 34-year-old male professional married to a 28-year-old woman.
My wife suffers from severe depression and anxiety. In our five-year relationship, she's spoken openly about suicide, although she's never attempted. She has panic attacks to the point of pulling out hair and scratching scars into her arms. She refused medication for a long time, though that has changed recently.
when we first got together she was a teacher though she quit to protect her health she started a small crafting business with my support she works at home but she doesn't make any profit and she does not contribute financially to our household she also doesn't have a plan for growth
she asks me for both advice and full support but she's crushed when i suggest that she should do anything differently i told her that although i can afford to support us both i expected us to have a two-income household even if she was only making minimum wage
I've never been confrontational with her, but we've been fighting more and more, and each fight leaves her crying and feeling worthless and makes me not want to broach important subjects anymore. I feel helpless and lost. I feel like I want to leave. I used to be a happy-go-lucky person, and my significant other has evolved into a weight around my legs. How do I shed this resentment without shedding her? Signed, Drowning in Someone Else's Depression.
Oh, this is a hard one, Steve, because of course it's not just about money. Money is a piece of it. And I want to say drowning in someone else's depression that, you know, I really do think you have a right to have your needs met in this partnership. And one piece of it is that you didn't expect to be the sole breadwinner. But I think the bigger piece of it is you didn't expect to have a partner who on every level, as you say, was a burden to you.
When somebody is in a relationship where their partner is a burden, there's only so long that you can keep swimming with that. And so when I read your letter, Drowning in Someone Else's Depression, you know, my first instinct is to say, you have bigger problems than the financial one. And this is about the fact that you're getting nothing from this relationship. It's also about the fact that your wife
has a disease, a serious one. You know, depression, anxiety, these are things that are extremely difficult when it comes to intimacy. And so my first piece of advice is to take this extremely seriously and get help. I do not think that the two of you are going to navigate this
alone together by having these conversations that end up in confrontations that you're not willing to have and it sounds your partner is incapable of having, I think you need to really seek professional advice. And it's beyond our ability, I think, today to say,
stay and work it out or leave or any of those things. But what I do want to say to you is that just as much as your wife has the right to be cared for and loved and to get the support she needs to see her way through her illness, you have the right to have a partner who
who isn't solely dependent on you for everything. You have needs too, and it's okay for you to meet them. You know, one of the things that's, I think, really hard when you're in a partnership for any number of reasons with someone who isn't meeting your needs, you feel like this all or nothing choice is to be made, that you either stay in it and suffer or you leave and that relationship is over. But I would encourage you to really think about
partner as a person you love, who you don't necessarily have to be married to, to continue loving and to continue supporting. And I know that's a very hard thing to do. It's very hard to break up with somebody and stay there for them and stay their friend. But that is a possibility. Yeah.
This phrase, she also doesn't have a plan for growth, really leapt out at me drowning in someone else's depression because you're talking about financial growth. But of course, really what matters here is her taking care of her mental health. Yeah. There is signs of hope, right? She's finally getting medication. But I think it's the problem sounds serious enough that it's going to require real management. And love is not social work.
She has to be able to have her own plan for growth, which you can help and support. What you describe in terms of her business is, well, I try to give her advice and support and she immediately rejects it and is crushed by it. Well, that's a double bind. You can't win in that situation. And if she has the same attitude about her mental health, which I think is really the underlying problem here, and it's just expressing itself as so many of these letters will, you know, money is just sort of, it isn't the root of all evil. It's the sort of
pathway to what's really the underlying issue. And that's that she's deeply unhappy and struggling with mental health issues. And before you can even really responsibly figure out the financial part of it, you have to figure out that part. You need to figure out whether she's somebody who's going to take charge of her mental health with your help and support.
or whether she's somebody who cannot do that in a way that is ultimately going to exhaust you. And five years down the line, you're going to leave and you're going to have been damaged by the relationship. And frankly, so will she. And I sense from you the kind of person, and I love this about you, but it's also a danger to you, who wants to take care of things and fix things. And you'll shoulder the load. You'll do the work of two people. Maybe the money and your concerns about that are signaling that
you don't want to have to keep doing that. And you need to let your partner know that it's the really compassionate thing to do because it's the honest thing to do. Okay, next letter. Dear Sugars, I'm a 35-year-old woman. My husband and I have been married for eight years and we have a four-year-old daughter.
Our income hovers near the median. When one of us is sick, there's enough money to see the doctor and fill a prescription. We can afford the occasional preschool class or long weekend away. We're not poor. There is much I should feel thankful for. The trouble is, I'm consumed by feelings of shame, anxiety, and envy. In the last five years, our hometown has experienced a boom. Housing and child care costs are through the roof.
Signs of ease and affluence are everywhere, while our hold on middle-class status feels increasingly shaky. We can't afford to have another baby. It's unlikely I'll ever live in a house with a backyard, go on a trip that requires a passport, or be able to pursue my passions. I know I'm not the only one who lays awake hoping the old car will last until the student loans are paid off, wondering if it will ever be possible to retire. But it's difficult to admit that without feeling like I've failed somehow.
I'm ashamed when someone else's good news reduces me to tears. My husband, by nature, doesn't worry much about the future or compare himself to others. He's content in his service industry job, and I resent him for that. I wasn't concerned with social status when we met, and I knew he'd never make much money when we married. But I'm disappointed in his low earning potential. My resentment is becoming toxic to our marriage.
It also prevents me from connecting with anyone I perceive as being more well-off than I am. You have three kids and only work part-time? Well, we obviously have nothing in common. You live in a nice house and just got back from Hawaii? Go away. I'm sick of living with this chip on my shoulder. How can I cultivate gratitude for what I do have? How do I learn to love what is? Signed, Wade Down.
Way down. One of the things I want to just say out of the chute is this is such an honest letter. And so many people feel this way, but they're not brave enough to say it. And I applaud you for recognizing that your resentment has become toxic, that it's not a healthy pattern to write people off and to sort of constantly have in your mind who has more money than me, who has less. It's a kind of prison ultimately.
And it's really also predicated on something that you can separate from status, which is your own sense of having the life that you want to have. You want to shed the anxiety that you feel about your economic circumstances. You want certain pleasures that you feel are out of reach to go on a trip overseas, for instance.
right, or to have a house with a backyard. You're not being greedy or unreasonable. You're just having those wishes, which lots of people share. But I will say that you have recognized at this point, and this is, I think, what's most important about it, that something has shifted within you. And that's what's most interesting to me, the sentences where you write, he's content in his service industry job, and I resent him for that. I wasn't concerned with social status when we met.
And so my question is, when and how and why did that change? And if you weren't concerned about social status when you met, what exactly has shifted that? Is it the burden of having kids and feeling concerned about that? Is it something within the crucible of your own upbringing, as we heard with love or money? Something has shifted within you. And it's not a criticism. That's not to say it's the wrong thing. That's what's really happening in your inner life.
Yeah, I think that that's absolutely a really important piece of this. Steve, this is ultimately a question, I think, about a marriage. Weighed down, you're saying very clearly your dissatisfaction with your financial status, which is...
basically comfortable, a little stressful, but comfortable. Like you say, you can go to the doctor, you can pay your bills, you can afford to do the occasional long weekend away. Okay. So it could be worse, it could be better, but for whatever reason, you're feeling that this resentment that you have is making your marriage toxic. So step into trying to solve that problem first. Okay. And often the way that we diffuse, I think, that kind of resentment is
It's to be vulnerable, to tell the whole truth, to say to your husband what you said to us. Money used to not matter so much to me. I wasn't worried before about your service industry job. I am now. But the most interesting thing to me about this letter, Steve, is that nowhere way down do you say what you do for a living.
And why, in the equation in your mind, that you're forever going to be held back because of your husband's contentment in his job and his lack of worry about the future, about whether you'll ever be able to retire and whatnot, that it all seems to be on him. You ask us to help you cultivate gratitude and to learn to love what is. But I also want to say, you're 35 years old. If you don't love what is...
Change your life. Yep. You know, I don't think that it's a bad idea if you want more money to think about changing your career.
to one that brings you more money. And your husband doesn't have to change his job in order to do that. And I think that that might be what part of this resentment and anxiety and envy is rising really from, you're projecting all of your feelings onto other people, right? You're unhappy about your husband's low-paying job. You're unhappy about the neighbors who get to go to Hawaii. But when I'm the most unhappy is when I feel like I am not the agent of my own life.
And so whenever I can get back into that space where I see, okay, well, it turns out I do want a retirement fund or I do want to take a trip that requires a passport. So what do I have to do to get that? Instantly, you move from resentment to a sense of empowerment because honestly, my read of your letter says,
is that you don't want to learn how to love what is. That you're already grateful for what you have and you want more stability. I don't see you wanting more stuff. I don't think you're a materialist. I think you want more stability and security.
And it's okay to get it. You know, when you're 35, that's a really interesting age. I think a lot of people move out of that kind of first adulthood, the one in which it sounds to me like you and your husband were like, well, money doesn't matter. And now you're becoming a different kind of grownup. And you're starting to think about that future that a lot of 20-somethings have the luxury of not pondering. And I just want to give you permission to go out and get it.
But the best path to that is not to rely on other people to do it for you. I want to push back a little bit because what I hear in weighed down, especially the beginning of your letter is that
partly you're reacting to signs of ease and abundance all around you. I agree that you reach a certain point. You're in your mid thirties. You're like, I don't want to live like a 25 year old anymore. Okay. And Cheryl's absolutely right. If you want a backyard, you should work to get a backyard and even enlist your partner, your husband. You guys have been married for eight years. You get a four year old.
You know, maybe he takes extra shifts or whatever it is. If you want a backyard, you should have a backyard. I always say to Aaron, if it will bring you great happiness in this short, blessed life that we have, then let's do it. But I will say that your letter is animated by the feelings you describe are shame, anxiety, and envy, and what's happening in the external world around you. This signs of ease and abundance are everywhere.
And it's important to separate what is a reasonable desire. I want a backyard from I'm consumed by feelings of resentment and envy. That feels like a deeper struggle.
I want to leave you with just one quote to think about in relation to your partner, because you might want a backyard, but he sounds like he feels less urgent about that. And this is what Henry James has to say in The Portrait of a Lady. And I love this formulation. He says, I call people rich when they're able to meet the requirements of their imagination.
Your partner might not be, you know, have a CEO and a high power job and pulling down six figures. But if he is meeting the requirements of his imagination, he's a rich guy.
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Okay, Steve, the next letter. Remember, this is rapid fire. I'm sorry. We're lingering. We're not naturally rapid fires. We're naturally yakkers. Okay, here we go.
Dear Sugars, I'm a relatively successful young professional who grew up in a working-class family. I've come to a point where I can afford things I want: a nice vacation, an expensive dinner, new clothes. My parents are still in a rocky financial situation, and as an adult I realize it isn't just because they live on a modest income, it's because they're poor at managing money.
When I speak with my mother, she'll ask about a vacation I took or something I've done to assess how much I've spent. Did I fly business class? What hotel did I stay at? What did I do over the weekend? Should I feel guilty telling her about things that she and my father can't afford? And should I feel obligated to share the wealth with them? Signed, Financially Fraught
Boy, do I relate to this letter. Yeah, I wondered about that. Yeah. Financially fraught. I've wondered about those same things because I have, over these last five or six years of my life, moved entirely into a different economic class, if you will, than my family members. And even though I don't have...
I'm not always interacting with my siblings. You know, I'm aware that they are often financially struggling. Right. In fact, all the time. And I've asked these same questions. How do I share my life with them? Does it seem...
like a bad idea to do that? And also, how do I share my money with them? Do I share my money with them? And there's no one answer to this question is the conclusion I've come to. So sadly, we're not going to be able to tell you exactly what to do. But my advice for you is first to say, yeah, I think it's okay for you to share stories of your travels and adventures with your parents. I mean, you don't
mention the nature of your relationship with your parents. But to me, it sounds like your mom might just be curious about your life. And I think that some of this guilt you're feeling when she asks you those questions might not be so much about her intention as the way that you feel maybe still a sense of apology about surpassing your parents when it comes to money.
And I know I struggled with this for a while. You know, the first few years that I had a significant amount more than my siblings have, I felt almost sheepish. And I had this sense of apology.
And I think that that's really the wrong way to go, because what happens when you feel that way is ultimately shame, right? And you close yourself off to people. The deeper, more complicated question is about the actual sharing of the money. And you don't say that your parents ask you for it. And...
I think that that sense of obligation you feel, you know, it's not a bad thing. I don't think it's a bad idea to sometimes help your parents when you can. But I think that that dynamic very much depends on that, you know, all of those other values we espouse on the show that have to do with boundaries, that have to do with,
it being a decision that you're making out of your own sense of rightness and generosity rather than one that you're feeling kind of manipulated into making. My siblings, I've given them both money. I have shared the wealth, but only because...
I felt really good about doing it, not because they were knocking on my door every month begging for money. That would be a dysfunctional pattern, not because I felt guilty that I had the money. I felt happy that I could help them out of a pinch because I know what a pinch feels like. And so, you know, I think that my read of what you're going through financially fraught is that you're feeling fraught about a problem that hasn't really happened.
arisen yet. This letter isn't about parents who are always holding their hat out. It isn't about parents who are shaming you about your money. It's about your own baggage probably left over from that ancient dichotomy. What do you do when you're more successful than your parents were? Right. Yeah. And it's profound. You know, we have this mythos in the United States in particular, but everywhere of the
job of parents is to give their children more opportunity, you know, more material good, more education, the means to do better than they did. It's kind of baked into at least our stories that we tell about how America is supposed to operate. Each generation should have more and so forth. And what so few people talk about is that that inevitably makes the young person who does well in the world feel guilty. There's a recoil on that and it boomerangs back as it is for you. And part of what you recognize is
is that your parents, that they're living on a modest income in part because they're poor at managing their money. And it's interesting that
At the end, you're saying, should I basically share the wealth with them? Should I subsidize them? The other response might be to say, actually, it's better than trying to give them a monthly subsidy might be for them to get their financial house in order and recognize, especially as they grow older and their earning power gets lower, that it's important for them to manage their money effectively. Now, I don't know if you have enough trust with them that you can help them with that, but that's the real solution when it just comes to the money part of it.
Mm-hmm.
And, you know, you and I, Cheryl, have talked a lot about the necessity of having the difficult conversation sooner rather than later. You're just beginning to sense that this dynamic is in play and it's making you feel uncomfortable. Trust me, 20 years down the line or 30 years down the line, if you haven't had the talk, it's going to be excruciating when there's a serious medical emergency and you are the person who either has to pay for it or not. Mm-hmm.
But the bottom line is that you recognize that you have been at least economically more effective in the world. That's not a defect on your part. That's not something you did to your parents. It's something that they set you up to do. And just a final word. I've thought about it, too, especially as my siblings grow.
get older. I mean, they're not there yet. We're all just in middle age. But as the only person they know with any money, I know that I'm going to be on the line. And I wouldn't at all be surprised if later in life I'm providing for not just my own retirement, but some of my siblings as well. And that's a very complicated thing for me, because I think that this question you ask at the
those family members we grew up with. And on one hand, that's...
I'm grateful that I'll be able to help them. And also it feels like a burden and it's not without its complexity. It is fraught, as you say. And I think that in every answer that we've given so far on this episode, we keep coming back to this baseline truth. That is, we have to talk as openly and transparently and honestly as we can with the people who would benefit from hearing that from us.
Dear Sugars, I'm 27 and I've been with my boyfriend for more than six years. We're very happy. We've spoken about marriage and kids and we know we want to end up with each other. Unfortunately, for the past several years, his dad has been homeless and living out of his truck. He works with his hands and has had trouble finding and keeping jobs. His parents are divorced and he's much closer to his mom since his dad left and was out of the picture for seven years. Both his parents live three hours away by car.
My boyfriend recently rekindled his relationship with his dad and puts a lot of pressure on himself to take care of his mother and his father financially. He's constantly working around the clock to make ends meet and sometimes finds himself struggling financially because of this. I'm afraid the situation will continue to worsen as we embark on our future together. I want to offer help, but I'm not sure what to do or say or what's appropriate.
I sometimes feel like he's putting our engagement and future on hold because he's not financially ready to start our lives together. Any words of guidance? Signed, Homeless Future Father-in-Law. Mm-hmm.
We're not in the land now of, I want to, you know, a backyard. It's a more dire financial circumstance. What I will say to you, homeless future father-in-law, is you must talk with your partner. I think you've written so beautifully and honestly here. You say, you know, how should I talk about this? I think just how you've talked about it with us. What is beautiful about your partner is that he is devoted.
And he wants to take care of his people, even a father who he was estranged from. And that makes him a beautiful guy. And it's undoubtedly part of the reason that you see your future together with him. So that's to be cherished and held on to. But so too are your feelings.
which are, I'm worried that that plan that we have is going to be delayed or in some ways, if not delayed, even hampered by obligations that he is shouldering that, you know, are good and fair obligation. You understand them, but you also have your needs. He has his obligations to you as you move forward and get married. Think about having kids.
And I think you're actually really wise to be looking ahead and saying, it's not just marriage, it's also kids.
because that's where the math could get really frightening for you. And this is our word of the day, fraught. If you feel that resources that rightly should go to your kids are going to try to, you know, help him with his parents and his father in particular, it's a reckoning for you and for him, for you to say, I want us to be together. And I know I choose you. I want to be with you. And I love your compassion and your caretaking.
But I feel that it might be out of balance in a way that at least is making me worry that the plan we're making together is going to be affected by this generosity. It's not that you want him to stop supporting and loving his parents, but that you fear that that support is delaying what you want. And you have a right to, and I think actually an obligation, to tell him that in an open-hearted way as soon as you can. Mm-hmm.
That's good advice. And we don't know. I mean, in some ways, this is like the first letter we read. There's your fear, which is that he's putting your engagement on hold for financial reasons.
But we don't know if that's true. And so the first thing is to ask the person involved, is money a piece of our puzzle here when it comes to our ability to marry now or soon? And I think that's absolutely a conversation you need to have. And certainly, no matter who you're marrying, whether their parents are financially struggling or not, as we've observed in really all of these letters this episode, it's a good idea to talk to your partner about his or her
values around money, hopes and aspirations around money, plans for the future. You can say, my value is I don't want your generosity towards your parents to impact our life. And he could say, okay, but I still want to help my parents. And that's where the negotiation begins. And this is how marriages are made. And we're always encouraging people to be honest about their
their sexual desires and their wishes when it comes to the way you communicate or love each other. And money is part of this. There is no disentangling love from anything in our lives. Everything we do and know and think and hope for and fear is present.
in love. And money is one of those things. Yep. And a lot of instances, money and disputes around money, I agree with you, are really standing in for expressions of love and consideration, power dynamics that are being experienced but not articulated. And for all of our letter writers, they need to, in a sense, recognize the love part of the equation and recognize the
the money part of it. What's money and what's practical and what's money as an expression of love or dominion, guilt, shame, achievement. And that's a hard thing to do. That's why people struggle so much and why money is so frequently linked to questions of really, am I being loved enough? Am I getting the love I deserve? Am I giving the love I deserve?
Right. We wish all of you the best of luck. Everyone who wrote to us, who was featured on the show today and all of the other letters in our inbox grappling with love and money. We wish you the best. We do. You're a rich girl and you've gone too far because you don't know better. Because you know it don't matter anyway. You can rely on your old man's money. You can rely on your old man's money. You're a rich girl. Yeah. Okay.
Dish Sugars is produced by the New York Times in partnership with WBUR. Our producer is Alexandra Lee Young. You know what? Let's be honest. She occasionally does pick up the tab. She's a bitch girl. She's a bitch girl. Our managing producer. She can rely on the New York Times money.
Our managing producer is Larissa Anderson. Our editor is Paige Cowett. Our executive producer is Lisa Tobin. And our editorial director is Samantha Hennig. Our mix engineer is Eddie Cooper. Our theme music is by Wonderly with vocals by Liz Weiss. Please find us at nytimes.com slash deersugars. And you can send us your letters at deersugars at nytimes.com. All
Also, please check out our column, The Sweet Spot, at nytimes.com slash thesweetspot.