What do you do if your spouse doesn't 'get it'?

[imadandylion]

Wow, lots of great advice here. Also appreciate the 2 cents from anyone who has experienced similar issues. In the personal FI world I always see a lot of advice on what individuals can do, or stories about couples that are already on board, so it's nice to know I'm not alone.

I think when I was writing that all up before in frustration, I made him out to sound very stupid, and I sound pretty unforgiving of his mistakes, which I can be, so that's something I'm going to work on. Totally agree that both our attitudes can change. With husband's new insurance, I think they may have the EAP benefit, so we talked about looking into counseling to help better deal with our problems once he starts.  Also, we have talked about financial expectations and responsibilities prior to marriage, which was why I was especially upset over the recent mistake, but the mistakes were reversible at least and he understands he needs to do better.

We worked on some positive steps to regain focus over the weekend:
- We agreed we'd do counseling, and also to try to work on reducing stressful communication styles/interactions. I will try not to relive the hits of his greatest mistakes ever, which he specifically expressed he hates.
- We spent some time on the weekend together discussing, reading, and watching about saving, investing, etc., which he'd already been doing before, but it just kind of revitalized his excitement over it. He's really interested in investing.
- We played with some calculators that help calculate how much money you'll have after investing for however many years, and it was eye-opening for him and makes him want to save and invest even more after knowing how much is needed to be relatively comfortable in retirement.
- We re-established the figure for getting the 'emergency fund' back to its prior glory.
- We watched a couple Dave Ramsey things, and I joked, "What if you/we called in??" and he just kind of looked a little melancholy and said, "I'm doing the best I can and have been changing," so I think I need to do a better job of celebrating any of his progress. Coming from a family that doesn't really get excited over things and just expects certain things can make it hard for me to be excited over things if I think people should be doing them in the first place, I guess. But I think it will help him especially to point out milestones he's reached.

He told me this morning his FICO store just reached the 'good' range now that he's been able to pay more debt off with his pay raise, and he's hoping to break 700 by the end of the year once the credit utilization continues to go down. His new job pays close to 6 figures and he will probably eclipse that figure in a few years, so it will help a lot with his debt reduction, savings, and investment. With his startup he's leaving, he may have the opportunity to do consulting, which he says should reduce his consumer debt to 1 year's time span instead of 18 months or longer. He wants to go the PSLF route with this new job, which will be beneficial for him because of the pension after working there for certain tiers of time. (And yes, totally agree on not refinancing his loans or otherwise doing anything that would make it my problem!) I think this would be especially helpful for him to catch up on saving for retirement and act as another income source, in addition to his future savings/investments. He wants to save for the taxes after the student loans have been forgiven. I've also encouraged him to monetize his writing, which he enjoys doing, and he's been getting some money from that (not much so far) but hopefully it'll gain some traction. One of his articles is regardings his mistakes in saving/investing. :)

I hope we can continue to talk about this positively and make progress. I think having the new higher paying job that can also lead to the loan forgiveness helps him see the light at the end of the debt tunnel, because now he feels like he more or less can identify a date to know when it all goes away.

[Laura33]

- We watched a couple Dave Ramsey things, and I joked, "What if you/we called in??" and he just kind of looked a little melancholy and said, "I'm doing the best I can and have been changing," so I think I need to do a better job of celebrating any of his progress. Coming from a family that doesn't really get excited over things and just expects certain things can make it hard for me to be excited over things if I think people should be doing them in the first place, I guess. But I think it will help him especially to point out milestones he's reached.

First, great job taking the advice in the manner in which it was intended -- there are a lot of people who hear something hard and then run away, so it's great that you really took the time to think and talk about it.

Less seriously, I can say with full confidence that if you have kids, the lesson above will be invaluable.  ;-)  My DD was, shall we say, extremely difficult -- that kind of over-the-top hard outer shell that masks a super-gooey interior that was looking for any sign at all that we didn't think she was perfect as is.  The only -- and I do mean only -- thing that worked with her was being 100% matter-of-fact and unemotional about negative behavior (just implementing the consequence with a kind-but-matter-of-fact tone), and then otherwise finding the smallest thing to praise her about.  And believe me, sometimes I had to look very hard!!  But, damn, it worked.

The thing is, most people want to please the people they love.  Conversely, when we know someone is mad at us, or irritated, or frustrated, or any other negative emotion, that triggers defensiveness, because we need to protect our own gooey center.  And when it's an area where someone is already sensitive -- say, because he knows he hurt you in the past and recognizes it was a mistake -- then the teeeeeeensiest little jab or hint will trigger a disproportionately large emotional need to defend himself, and the next thing to know you're off on the argumentative death spiral. 

On the other hand, the more unemotional you can be about the bad stuff -- the more you can treat it as a problem that both of you can and will solve vs. a personal failing on his part -- and the more you can praise him when he makes any kind of a good decision, the more he will be able to let down his guard so he can fully and openly participate in your conversations and plans, and the more confidence he will gain that he really can do this stuff.  When then breeds the virtuous cycle instread of the death spiral.