There are lots of intelligent, sane people who believe in stuff like that. I really don’t think “buying crystals and talks about energy” means she’s nutty. I mean, it might. I’ve certainly seen people who went nutty in that kind of way. But I don’t think it’s a valid assumption based on what’s been posted in the thread.
No, I don’t see this as her trying to create a profitable business, either. But again, if she perceives the household as having enough money, there’s nothing inherently wrong with wanting to share, and helping the unfortunate.
What she needs to understand is that her husband’s health, happiness, and positive energy depends on his feeling financially secure. My husband and I have some of this tension. He grew up poor, and thinks we should be giving away most of what we aren’t immediately using. I grew up expecting to have enough money, and want to continue living that way, even when I stop being able to earn money. (I have been the primary breadwinner for most of the marriage, although he currently earns more.) Honestly, he makes me a better person by pushing me to donate more money and time to good causes. And he’s come to appreciate the value of having some money in the bank.
So my perspective is that this might be a solvable problem, with communication and understanding.
Akaj is clearly more concerned that Mrs. A’s hobby is using money that he wants to save for retirement/rainy days than he is concerned about her being attracted to woo-ish nonsense. People are allowed their wacky personal interests, the hobbies that cost money to pursue. The foolish endeavors, like the gym they don’t go to, or a business idea that doesn’t work out, or buying a guitar that is gathering dust, as long as those pursuits don’t endanger your financial health.
A friend of mine went to a salon to get her hair colored and was quoted a price north of $400, she walked out, but other people routinely have these services done, it’s not a lunatic thing to do… if you can afford it. The problem here, as I see it, is not inherently “she is spending money on nonsense”. It’s “she is spending money we can’t afford to lose on nonsense”.
Very well said. I’d amend your last bit just a touch.
The problem here, as I see it, is not inherently “she is spending money on nonsense”. It’s “she is spending money we he thinks they
can’t afford to lose on nonsense”.
You’re right the nonsense qua nonsense doesn’t really matter as to finances. She could be spending it on knitting or gardening. Or he could be spending it on collecting in-game swag for his online-game addiction. Or on a massive collection of DIY tools, some of which occasionally even get used.
We still don’t know how miserly or sensible Mr. A is. Nor whether she’s exceeding his idea of a reasonable discretionary budget by 10% or by 10x. Nor what the spending trajectory has been and is becoming.
Nor do we know what happens when he brings these issues up to her. Simple denial? Arguments about priorities? Abject uncomprehension? Blinking silence?
I think we actually heard about this, in the prior discussion:
In other words, sort of an argument about priorities, where her priority seems to be ineffable and unfalsifiable “energy”. And the whole discussion is dismissed (or shut down) in those terms. It’s literally “why are you even talking about money, you’re killing my energy.”
… she said when I bring my negativity about money into her awareness, it weakens her energy, and these days she’s all about energy. Every time I try to discuss money she dismisses it like it’s a personal neurosis.
Thanks, everyone! I can’t tell you how much I appreciate all your insights. I was going to respond to quotes individually, but there are just too many good ones. So consider this a general response and invitation to keep the conversation flowing.
I do not think Mrs. A is on a slippery slope to nutball-land. About 15 years ago she announced, based on little more than a comment from a friend, that she’d like to pursue massage therapy as a career. I supported the decision 100% and we paid for her education. She became an excellent massage therapist at a top clinic in a wealthy suburb, with a slate of loyal customers. Pre-Covid, she was making good money. So it’s not completely crazy to think that she can do so again.
While I don’t personally buy into Reiki, sound therapy and other woo, I’ve seen them have a positive effect on people who do. Days after the Highland Park shootings we set up in the square near the memorial and she did an hour-long sound bath with gongs, Tibetan and crystal bowls, flutes, drums and other instruments. (I should mention she has absolutely no musical training. She’s completely self-taught.) People gathered around and were visibly moved.
She’s also that person who connects with perfect strangers at concerts and bars by offering a quick healing session – a shoulder rub or such. You can actually see tension leaving people’s faces.
All that said, I don’t see her having any great drive to create a viable business. She calls me her CMO/CFO – and I am a marketing professional – but rarely follows my advice. She’s just not comfortable marketing herself. She could easily have massages scheduled four days a week (she now visits people in their homes) but only takes clients referred by people she knows. So I take all her talk about being close to figuring out a way to market her new skills with several grains of salt.
And we don’t really need her to make a ton of money. Right now, with the meager amount she brings in, we live comfortably, eat out 2-3 times a week, see concerts, travel a bit, buy lots of new music. We could (and probably should) rein in some of that spending, too.
But the crystals and other whatnot bug me because, unlike the dining out and concerts and such, they are exclusively about her and her passion, which is bordering on obsession. I spend very little on stuff just for me – basically just new clothes when old stuff falls apart, and the occasional poker game (which I sometimes even win). Her “personal” spending is 10X mine, and all these tarot decks and wall hangings and instruments and crystals crystals crystals stare me in the face every time I look around – or see the Visa bill.
And this is almost exactly what she says when I try to discuss this with her.
TLDR: I love her and support her pursuit and want her to be happy, but I’d be a lot happier if we controlled our spending a little better – which means she needs to control hers a lot more than I need to control mine. And I can’t get her to take my POV seriously.
If she has decided you don’t matter, then well … you don’t matter.
So now you need to decide whether you want to be the second class go-fer in your family or not.
I think it’s reasonable to assume you’re not going to change her mind or her attitudes at this point. You may feel there’s still room to sand away at her POV ref your POV to reach a comfortable accomodation.
But once you do conclude it’s her way or the highway, well …
The good news is you get to choose. The bad news is you have to choose. No great choices here, that’s for sure.
I have no experience with couples counseling. But that might also be an avenue to try, if she’s willing. If not, well … that’s one more brick in the wall of evidence that you. don’t. matter.
Best of luck. Meant with heartfelt compassion, not snark.
Yeah, this is something I noticed with my own wife. She grew up in a relatively poor household with parents who are kind of dimwitted and inept at most things. So this completely frames pretty much everything in life. Now part of that is why she’s been financially successful, because it’s driven her to work very hard. But it’s also why my wife is very obsessive and compulsive and often exhibits traits like hoarding, anxiety, hysterics over minor shit and other annoying traits.
Everyone is always like “oh you should sit down and talk to them and yadda yadda they will change their behavior.” Well if it were that easy to just “ask them to stop” it wouldn’t be an issue, would it? The point being is with someone like that, you can’t “reason and logic” them into changing their behavior. It’s something that is deeply rooted in their psyche. For whatever reason, the OP’s wife feels compelled to spend money on magic rock bullshit. That’s not something I get a sense she can be talked down from.
So the OP’s options really are:
Have that frustrating conversation that will probably go nowhere.
Deal with it
Get a divorce
Actively sabotage this magic rock hobby / take steps to hide or otherwise secure your assets from her
Or try counselling. It didn’t work in my marriage because by the time we started we were already done and it was just a perfunctory check the box thing. In this situation it is far from too late. The therapist directs the conversation so that the couple doesn’t keep going down the same old rabbit holes. Ideally, an accommodation/compromise could be worked out. In my experience, the woo woo people love therapy.
Therapy ain’t cheap, either. Another expensive trick to feed her woo.
If it goes her way, she’ll be fine. When it doesn’t go her way it will be “I can’t go because it’s ruining my aura”
I don’t think this will help.
Stop the blood loss, first. He already resents the stuff being around the house. No way it’s ever gonna be ok, now.
I cannot believe there’s no way to curtail this. What if he was stopping by the track and blowing their money on the ponies. Couldn’t she take action to at least buy food?
There’s nothing the op has written to suggest they are having trouble buying groceries. Nor to indicate that he needs to take immediate steps to “stop the bleeding”.
It looks to me like the issue is that she isn’t taking his concerns (his energy) seriously. It sounds like they haven’t tried basic budgeting tools (each one has $x of personal money each month) yet, nor therapy. Both seem like steps worth taking before trying forcibly to protect his share of the money.
It sounds to me that they have plenty of money, but he just doesn’t like the way she spends it. If they can eat out 3 times per week, go to concerts, buy $350 crystals and he can play in a poker game which he only sometimes wins, while still saving something for retirement, they have enough money.
Also, Akaj doesn’t seem to mind the woo, and even accepts that she has some kind of ‘healing’ gift. So that’s not the problem.
The problem seems to be that he sees her as spending money on herself, while he sees his own spending as money spent on ‘them’ (going out together, eating takeout, etc). It’s grating to see all the woo paraphernalia clogging up the credit card and the house. - doubly so if you’re the one earning the money.
I have to ask if this is really any different than a wife getting mad at her husband for spending their money on his boat or giant Gundam collection, or a husband getting mad at his wife’s shoe collection. We are focusing on the woo aspect, but this might be a more mundane problem of someone earning most of the money but watching the spouse spend that money on herself instead of ‘them’, and it’s making him very angry.
Also bear in mind that in these threads we only hear one side of the problem, and everyone is biased or even oblivious to their spouse’s perspective. So we may not be seeing the whole picture. Temper advice accordingly.
I’m not quite sure that’s fully true. What he said in the OP was:
IOW, between the joint frivolities (e.g. eating out) and the woo paraphernalia they are now spending 100% of take-home and saving is not really happening. And he perceives her spending is still accelerating. While also perceiving that his own spending for himself is already (almost) crowded out, and they’re not far from needing to stop all joint frivolities too.
Said another way, as I understand his view (admittedly just his) they’re as close to the bone as they can be without feeling pinched or needing major reductions in fixed expenses (i.e. move to cheaper housing, get cheaper cars, etc.) to support ongoing frivolities and maybe enable some saving.
This is very perceptive. There’s a lot of entitlement embodied in the old Fred Flintstone trope that “His job is to earn it and her job is to spend it.” There totally are people who still believe in that model. Works fine as long as both partners do. And as long as both partners conform to the rest of the social expectations that go with that model.
“What’s yours is ours and what’s mine is mine” is not a happy idea for either member of a couple to have. I see both of them doing some of that, albeit in very different ways. Things tend to go South quickly once that attitude is made explicit.
This is true for sure. Been said upthread before, but bears repeating.
It’s that simple! People are making it so complicated. They first pay the household bills then they pay their future selves by setting aside $$ for their retirement.
And nothing wrong with delaying gratification by holding off on impulse purchases.
I’m not against therapy at all. Had lots of it myself.
But this new agey thing feeds off that stuff.
And it is expensive. No way around that unless you have good insurance.
I guess there’s free clinics around, tho’.
Maybe he could find one of those and wait 6mos for an appointment. Wow, that’s a lot of time to buy crystals and tarot cards.
This is nothing but an addictive process. She’s buying into a load of crap. More power to her if it helps her ‘feelings’. It’s not helping his or he wouldn’t be worried about losing his mind and savings.
He said it, not me.