Sorry I fucked up Mother's Day again...

The BBQ Pit
1

Dear,

I got $50 in tips on Friday, which I asked you to budget for me to use for Mothers Day. At your prodding I revealed what my plans were for Mother’s Day: after Sunday School we’d ride up into the mountains and have a wonderful picnic with our darling daughter (DD). Sounded great to you.

Then…

Saturday it appeared as though the whole area was going to get rained out for the weekend. No escaping north, south, east, or west. Plus, you weren’t feeling 100%, so a long day trip didn’t sound good. You suggested keeping other options open. OK.

You went off to your ad-hoc sewing club, and took $10 of my $50 (down to $40). You suggested that DD and I go to a local parade. It got rained out, but some nearby booths had fries ($3, down to $37). We split a lunch ($5, down to $32), went to a museum, then split a pretzel and soda ($3, down to $29). We then went to a small park and took a nap before we were to meet you for a church youth dinner.

At dinner, a rose that you wanted (that I specifically asked if you wanted) was $2 (down to $27). Since it was a fund raiser for the youth, we tipped $5 (down to $22).

You remembered that you needed flowers for your Sunday School class. $4 for those and $5 for cards from both me and DD. ($9, down to $13.)

Sunday morning you asked me to get you some Starbucks coffee and something for DD to nibble on. ($5, down to $8). Plus, I needed some new dress socks, so you suggested I buy a pair ($3, down to $5).

After Sunday School, you asked to go to a favorite restaurant. I mention that we’ll need your check card to pay for it.

What!? What happened to the $40!?

Trying to explain it just got you more pissed. Along the P&M you mentioned how I messed up Mothers Day again.

Last year: went to friends’ house, said I just rode on their generousity.
Year before: we were moving, and I was trying to save money by cleaning our house myself rather that hiring a service.
Year before that (1st one): you and DD just got out of the hospital, and we were broke because I had to ferry in take-out food for two weeks because hospital wouldn’t feed you because you weren’t the patient.

So please forgive me if because on one specific weekend of the year I can’t keep enough cash or time on hand to give you the queen treatment. Please consider everything I do every other weekend during the year as make-up for fucking up Mothers Day once again.

2

It sounds to me like this hasn’t got a thing to do with mother’s day, and has everything to do with how the two of you deal with money and with whose money it “really” is and who gets to make decisions about it.

I don’t know what system you are using ,and I don’t really care: there are a thousand different ways to deal with money out there, and some work for some people and some work for other people and it all depends on the personalities and hidden resentments nad expectations of hte people involved. Whatever system you are using now isn’t working ,and you guys need to wait til you both calm down and then figure this out.

On the surface (and there’s not much here to go on, so take this with a grain of salt) it sounds like oyu have fallen into a pattern whereby she is the “mom” about the money: she takes on the burden of making all the decisions, of stretching the money far enough that it goes everywhere it needs to go, and you do what she says. This system works for some people, but it has some downsides too: the person who makes no decisions feels emasculated and childlike and hates it, and the person who makes all the decsions feels burdened and stressed and weighed down by this massive responsbility: they are all that stands between the family and the cold, hard world of living on the streets, and the other person dosen’t even know all this stress exisits ,so they can’t even get kudos for bearing it.

If this is the case, then I suggest that your wife’s anger has to do with her wanting, just for once, to Not Have To Worry about money–to just have it not be an issue, butat the same time she feels guilty if she dosen’t worry, because it’s Her Job. The gift she really wants is the luxury of enjoying herself without counting the cost, and when she realized that $40 was gone (however legitimatly) she realized that she wasn’t gonna get that, becaus4e the money in the checking account is her job, her responsibility, and she has to justify using it–and splurging on herself isn’t a good enough justification.

Now then. that dosen’t make her being a bitch to you right–nothing excuses rude, mean belittling behavoir. She ought to apologize, not for feeling disappointed, but for taking it out on you–it wasn’t your fault, or her fault, just life’s fault.

For next year, if you want to blow her socks off, try saving up a little bit of money all year (like $2/week), and then give her a certificate ot a resturant or a day spa or something–it that case it really will be
“free money” and she can enjoy something without any guilt or responsibility.

Before you do that, however, i suggest that you to reexamine how you deal with money: the responsibility needs to be shared out a little more, and the expectations needto be more clearly laid out.

3

I second the spa idea.

And she owes you an apology. Big time.

4

Something tells me it wasn’t you who fucked up Mother’s Day here.

5

Well, I don’t mean to be a wet blanket here, but you did take money that was marked for Mother’s Day and spend it on things which have nothing to do with Mother’s Day. If you needed money to buy socks and lunch and coffee and other day-to-day things, you should have gotten it from wherever you get money when you don’t have $40 in your pocket, since that money was earmarked. Subtracting all the unrelated expenses from the Mother’s Day money was just thoughtless, and it rightfully got you in hot water.

All might not be lost, however. All you have to do is admit that you blew it. Something along the lines of, “look, I know I spent the earmarked money on other things, but that’s because I didn’t have cash to buy those other things and didn’t want to bother you about it. There is still $40 earmarked for your Mother’s Day, but it isn’t that $40 I had earlier today.” (hopefully you can still afford to get $40 from somewhere for Mother’s Day stuff. If you can’t, then you really blew it)

After all, it’s all the same money. Spending the $40 cash now on Mother’s Day and getting $40 later to spend on mundane stuff is no different than spending the $40 cash on mundane stuff now and then getting $40 more to spend on mother’s day. But it was thoughtless, because it shows that spending the earmarked $40 on Mother’s Day wasn’t necessarily a priority to you, and it forces her to go through the awkward “give me some money so I can buy you a present” scenario twice. Apologize a lot, do something extra nice, and don’t fuck it up next time. :slight_smile:

6

Am I the only one who noticed that the vast majority of times the Mother’s Day fund was dipped into, it was because AWB’s wife wanted something? That’s not to say the money should have been used. I personally would have put it aside and used it on Mother’s Day, while using my regular funds to pay for daily things. Though that still doesnt excuse her claim that you “ruined Mother’s Day”, even if it is supposedly her day. A long story short, I think she owes you an apology and you should try to get her something special/treat her to something nice as soon as you can. :slight_smile:

7

Sewing club: $10
Day out with DD: $11
Rose for wife: $7
Flowers for Sunday school kiddies: $4
Mother’s Day cards: $5
Coffee and a nosh: $5
Dress socks: $3

Realizing that your husband really can’t pull money out of his ass: Priceless

8

I have a friend with a similar money issue at home- every month she earns money, pays bills, buys groceries and such- then her husband looks at the bank account and rants and raves over where all the money could possibly have gone to. I don’t know the solution- money tends to be such a power trip of a thing between people. So far they’ve not resolved it and monthly bill paying ends up in a fight every damned month.

I don’t know how you solve it either, but I suggest sitting down at a calmer time and talking it out just the way you posted in the OP. Maybe even write her a letter to that effect or an e-mail. Let her know that you spent the money because she asked you to spend the money and it hurts you to be painted as irresponsible for it. If she was frustrated and disappointed to learn that the money was gone, that’s OK, but she cannot have a tantrum and take it out on you- that’s NOT OK. Sounds like you need a budget system- maybe using envelopes. (We’ve found this very valuable). We take envelopes and label them for food, bills, entertainment, etc. Every little item you can think of. Then when you need a Starbucks snack, you take it from the “Misc snack” envelope. Flowers for church? The “Church expenses” envelope, etc. The mothers day money would have gone right into a “Holiday purchase” envelope. That way everyone knows right at a glance how much money is available for what purchases.

Just a thought, but I fear it’s about a lot more then money.

9

Nah, nah. The perfect way to handle money is this:

My wife and I have Our Money. This is a joint checking account, into which we divert a set amount of money from every paycheck. We pay our bills, our mortgage (and before that, our rent), we buy groceries, and we go out to dinner, using this account. We never ever ever take cash out of this account, so every single purchase goes in the checkbook.

We also have My Money and Her Money. These contain the remainder of each paycheck. If I buy lunch, pay tuition, get new clothes, or buy her a present (or buy anyone a present), it comes out of here. My walking-around money comes out of here, too. Whatever I spend, I am responsible to no one but myself; whatever she spends, she is responsible to no one but herself. Only the joint account involves joint accountability (heh).

We never argue about money.

10

Nametag, that is the way I always hoped my future joint checking account would be. Isn’t that how most couples do it? If not, they should.

11

My husband and I just have the joint checking accounts, but we switch off doing the bills and finances every six months. That way, we both have a handle on where everything is and what’s coming in and out (and out. and out. and away it goes.)

12

I gotta disagree with you here: that’s one method, and a good method that works for a lot of people, butit’s certianly not the only way to deal with money.

13

My wife and I have a joint account with the necessary direct debits - utility bills, mortgage, savings accounts etc. We don’t bother with separate ‘my money, her money’ accounts - we just spend from the joint account without the need to consult each other. We never do the “you bought what??” thing and it works out fine. I suppose there is an ill-defined limit to what we would buy without talking to each other but we both know intuitively where that is and it hasn’t been a problem. Maintaining separate accounts is expensive and is only advisable if independence and privacy are particularly important in a relationship.

Having said that, getting the ‘system’ right only goes so far. Money hassles are generally caused by the lack of it rather than by how it’s organised. I am eternally grateful that we don’t have to worry too much about money. Having watched my parents snipe at each other endlessly about it, I know how corrosive money worries can be and how they can poison other areas of a relationship.

14

My husband and I have a joint checking account and a joint savings account. I pay the bills each week, we put $100 or so into savings, and cash a check or two each week for walking around money. When we want to buy something that’s more than $100, we consult each other, so we know what’s going on. He might want to buy something for his car, and then I remind him that we have such-and-such bill coming up and maybe we should wait on his purchase until next week. We rarely argue about money (phew!) and rarely do without stuff we want or need.

The best habit we’ve gotten into is the savings. I know some people say they can’t afford to save anything, but even if it’s $5 or $10, it’s something for a rainy day.

15

In these cases, you should look for the big message. The big message is “I didn’t get the attention I wanted/needed/expected.” The only thing that makes it worse is when both people feel that way at the same time.

16

Well, AWB, it’s not your fault, but I have a suggestion to keep it from happening again. How many of those incremental expenses were necessary to the point where mom would have approved of them had it been clear they were eating into the mother’s day fund? If it were me, I would have brought it up every time something came up that required swiping money from the fund. This was particularly important right about the time you split lunch, and IMO, went below the critical limit for dinner out.