How to Pay Off All Your Debt: Marriage and Finances, Part 1 - Queen of Free (2024)

When I speak to MOPS and Moms’ groups, at libraries, and churches, I hear a lot of common themes.

My husband is the spender, I’m the saver. How does that work?
How do I get my spouse excited about paying off debt?
My wife spends and I like to save. How can we get on the same page?
Who should be responsible for paying the bills?
How can we come together about our finances?

Ahhh, marriage, the blessed union that can tear us apart if we’re not intentional. Many, many times, people end up in the King of Free’s office {he’s an attorney; hence the piles of student loan debt} for one of two reasons – sex or money. Sex and money make people cah-razy, I tell ya.

While I’m not going to dive into your sex life {although about a month ago, I did tell a group of women to have their first budget meeting naked}, I will give you a few tips on effective communication when it comes to finances and marriage.

1) You have to get on the same page. One of you might be the spender, one might be the saver. Or sometimes it can even oscillate back and forth between the two of you. But at some point, you have to come together and identify common goals. Not having a plan is still a plan {and it’s not going to get you where you’d like to be, I promise you that}. We were on the “not having a plan” plan for about the first 8.5 years of our marriage. It led to more debt, a lack of fulfillment, and no hope for the future.

2) To get on the same page you HAVE to talk to each other. Your spouse is not Carnac the Magnificent. He or she cannot read your mind. Just because you shared your frustrations with a girlfriend, it doesn’t mean he magically now knows all about them. Initial conversations about money, if you’ve never had them before, feel a lot like working out for the first time. You’re going to be uncomfortable. You’ll have to stretch. You’ll probably pant. You’ll watch the clock obsessively. You might cry out in pain. You could swear. By the end of it, you’ll certainly be sweating. And the next day you might be sore. But we both know that if you continue on a regular regimen of both working out and communicating about finances, it comes more naturally and you get stronger. Plus you’ll see results from your labor.

3) You have to bring it up at the right time. The absolute worst time to bring up finances is in the middle of a fight. Or at a time when you want to make a major purchase or after your spouse has just made a major purchase without your knowledge. If you really want to have an effective and intentional conversation, make sure the kids have been asleep for an hour. The tv, laptops, and phones should be off. And no one should be hungry {being hungry just makes you angry}. Communicate in a non-accusatory, loving manner, and express what you’d like to do financially. No nagging, no kool-aid stuff {old fights rehashed}, no you shoulda/coulda/wouldas. Just plain and simple, here’s what I’d love for us to have and why.

4) Remember your spouse married YOU. He loves you. She said yes to you. When you walked down that aisle, it was for a reason. Those rings on your fingers mean something much more than a jewelry fashion statement. Your spouse is not out to get you nor is she/he playing for another team. Together, you are a dynamic duo. You are crimefighters in the making. You are debt slayers, extraordinaire. You are a blessed union. You are one. And deep at the heart of your marriage, you both want what’s best for the other person. Again, because it bears repeating, your spouse is not out to get you.

Because this topic is so expansive, I’ll have a part two rolling your direction soon. But please promise me if you’ve never had a conversation with your spouse about your debt or your finances that you’ll begin that journey soon. The sooner you start the journey, the sooner you can have victory over your debt and peace in your marriage and finances.

I so wish that the two kids in that photo would have had a conversation about how they were going to handle money on their honeymoon. It took close to nine years for the conversations to begin regularly. And while I wholeheartedly believe there were divine reasons for that, I don’t want you to waste a day.