The Ramsey Show - App - The Hardest Decisions Are Often About Money & Relationships

Episode Date: December 25, 2024

While we're out for the Christmas break, we've compiled some of our favorite John and Jade calls from the past couple of years. Enjoy your day and we'll be back with a live show in the new year! Merry Christmas! John Delony & Jade Warshaw answer your questions and discuss: ‘Should I talk to my wife's toxic boss?' 'Is it OK to accept $1M from my in-laws?’ ‘My mom lied about paying my student loans.’ ‘I blew $50K after leaving an abusive relationship.' ‘My mom is boycotting my wedding rehearsal’ 'Our house was destroyed by a tornado'

🎵 Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create real, actual, amazing relationships. I'm Jade Warshaw. Your host, your other host today, Dr. John Deloney. He is the author of Building a Non-Anxious Life. He is also the host of the Dr. John Deloney Show, which is popping off, if I do say so myself. We'll be taking your calls. The number is 888-825-5225. Get in where you fit in, and we'll give you the best advice that we can muster up for you. Dude, get in where you fit in. Get in where you fit in.

What's that from? That's a t-shirt right there. It is. I don't know where I got that from. I like that. All right, let's do it. Let's chop it up. We got Jacob in Dallas, Tejas.

What's going on? Hey, can you guys hear me? We can. Awesome. I love your guys' show. John, absolutely love your show. Been a long-time listener. Thanks, man. I appreciate you, dude. What's up? I love your guys' show. John, absolutely love your show. Been a long-time listener.

Thanks, man. Appreciate you, dude. What's up? Yeah, so got a two-part question for you. This might not be as much of a money question as it is a relational question, so do with it what you will. My wife and I moved to Dallas around five months ago, and it's been super rough since we got here. We're finally getting our feet underneath us. We both got jobs. She got a job in marketing, and I'm in the end

stages of my background investigation with a local police department in the area. We are on track with the baby steps, doing all this stuff, And she's having a really hard time at her job and her boss is being a real jerk. And I don't know my place as her husband, where, where it crosses the line, uh, for me to step in and speak to him, um, a little bit of background. So you guys know what I'm talking about. Um, he is a very stubborn guy. She's running a business for him where he's trying to market this new product and essentially start up a business. And he put a lot of trust in her from the beginning to hire a team and be that person for his business. And he put it in her hands. And he's been super indecisive this whole time and shortening the deadline of launch to now six weeks where it's supposed to take nine months.

And she's got her hands up in the air like, what do I do? Do you trust your wife, Jacob? I trust my wife so much. All right, stay out of this completely. She's a grown up. And this is where she works. That's what I'm thinking. It's real tempting to take this back to like recess and be like, you talked to my girlfriend.

This is a place of business. If she doesn't like it, she can walk out the front door. Right. That's what I think. That's what I just don't know the boundary because when he starts speaking to my wife in a way that is extremely dishonoring in front of her, she gets up and walks out the door. Exactly. Okay. That's what I was thinking. Why hasn't she? Yeah. Um, well we're in a little bit of a place where we need the money right now. So we're in a position bit of a place where we need the money right now, so we're in a position where we hate it, where it's like, I can't just have you walk out right now, which is what I want to be able to do.

No, my dignity is not for sale, and my wife's dignity is not for sale either. Do you all have little kids? No. Okay. Then it may be that I'm going to put my enrollment in the academy on hold because I'm going to go work three jobs so that my wife can get out of this mess. But y'all have created a world where you feel like we got to put up with this. When Jade and I, we're always talking about freedom, Dave. We're always talking about freedom, freedom, freedom. This is exactly what we're talking about.

Because if y'all don't owe anybody any money, then you laugh and smile at this dude and be like, dude, we out, right? No one's going to talk to me that way. But y'all feel trapped. What would it take for you guys financially for her to be able to walk out the door? Just I think the smart choice is finding another job before she leaves because we've had little to no income since we've been in Dallas. No, I mean, it's so bad that you're about to do something stupid. What do you mean? Like you're about to go confront another grown man at his place of business

where he pays your wife. I want to in the fact that that's my wife, but I know that's not the smart choice. I'm not going to do that. No, no, but I'm saying like it's that bad. It's that bad. I mean, and you called in here saying, should you do that? So you definitely considered it.

Let's be honest about that. What does she earn? What does she earn at that job? Around, she takes around $4,000 a month. Okay. Is there something that she could find in her field to replace $4,000 a month? I'm thinking yes. Yes.

No question in my mind. Sure. We've had a long journey trying to find a job, though. She's had a lot of interviews and people just don't want to hire for some reason. So this is the first job that she's actually gotten hired. Okay. But it's not the last job she'll get hired in. That's the thing you got to... Right. The other kicker is in a month, I'm going to be on the police department's payroll so it's like okay we only have one month to to pledge this you know so what's the i don't know because i keep telling her i don't want to overstep you have your thing to do with your boss but also this would if she were to call in today what would she be telling us

in in what manner does she is she saying every day is she coming home every day saying i want to quit i want to quit or is she coming home every day just being like gosh my my boss is such a jerk what a what a butthead and is she not not talking about quitting she she loves her job and the team that she works with she just can't get anything done when she's at work because her boss is a jerk and won't he doesn't trust her to do the job that he hired her to do this is you busybodying brother this is between her and her workplace okay why i mean you see what i'm saying like if she loves her job she loves the work she loves the challenge she just has an annoying boss and i'm just sitting here listening to her talk and I'm like okay so maybe that's the boundary

right that might be a conversation if she's coming home every day and she's you know trashing her job it's making you feel confused you can have that conversation with her to say listen if you love your job and you're happy but you come home every day and complain it makes me think that you need to move on or she maybe yeah she's using you as a garbage bin yeah right for all the bad stuff and if you don't want me to think that you need to move on, then I need to hear both sides of the story. I need to hear the positive stuff. And in that way, it's a little bit more balanced

and we're just normal people talking about day-to-day life. And I, dude, I was bad about that. I'd come home and tell my wife all the stuff, the good, but also, man, this guy did this and this guy did that until she finally said, hey, I can't solve any of these problems, but you're continuing just to come home and fill our communication with negative, negative, negative, negative. Either quit.

And when she said that, I was like, I don't want to quit. And I realized, oh, all she's getting is the worst parts of the day. And that was on me. And I had to change that. But that took her drawing a boundary, a relational boundary, saying, I can't. If you have something awful that you want to share with me that we're going to, that you want me to sit with you in it, we're going to grieve it because we're getting ready to do something different. Awesome. I'm all in.

But if it's just to complain, I'm kind of over that. I don't want to hear that all the time. Yeah, because if you're going to complain that much, at some point you do have to take action. Right. So it's like, it's the old piss or get off the pot kind of analogy. Can I say that, James? That's all right. Well, we just did. And you're sitting there sitting there you're like you're about to get yourself

kicked off the police force before you even join i know you cannot assault this guy and like cuss him out in the parking lot yeah i do think a valid question a valid question is are you asking for my advice or my wisdom or do you just want me to listen? I love that. That's good, John. That's a question that will frame any of these conversations because if you want your opinion, she wants your opinion, you're going to give it to her. But otherwise, I'm just going to sit here and I'm going to listen. And dude, I get it. When somebody talks to your wife, you get all riled up like it's middle school again. It's her job. She's a professional. You trust her. She's smart.

Let her handle her business. This is The Ramsey Show. Statistics show that half of Americans don't have enough life insurance or they don't have any at all. I don't understand this, John. Why don't people want to take care of their family? They think they're not going to die or something? Well, I used to be one of those guys. I didn't even think about it. And one of my buddies said, hey, the only reason to not have life insurance is if you hate your wife and kids. And I immediately went and got term life insurance.

That's a gut punch. For decades, Dave, I've sat across people who've lost a spouse. They've lost somebody important to them. Me too. They don't know what to do next. You're going to have a crisis here. You know, you got two options while you're sitting and talking to a young widow. She's concerned about how she's going to invest all this money properly and not mess this up. Or she's concerned how she's

going to eat tomorrow. That's exactly the two options. It's saying I love you to your family. Term life insurance. Jeff Zander and the team at Zander Insurance makes it easy and affordable. I've used them personally for 25 years. They're the only people I trust. Go to Zander.com or call 800-356-4282. This is The Ramsey Show. I'm Jade Warshaw. This is Dr. John Deloney. Hey, give us a call.

The number is 888-825-5225. We'll talk about your life, your money, whatever it is that's going on in your life. We'd be happy to share our opinions with you. All right, let's go to the phone lines. We got Elizabeth in Santa Cruz, California. What's going on, Elizabeth? Hi, Jade and John. My question is, does it make sense to accept a gift of $1 million from my in-laws to purchase a house and i can dive into some more context i'm happy to accept it on your behalf if you don't want it one million dollars yeah tell us more about it i need to know more my husband and i are in our late 20s our income is 194 000 per year we have no debt and we would like to start a family in a couple of years.

I would anticipate our income dropping down to $120,000 if I reduce my hours to take care of a baby. If the gift didn't exist, we would just keep renting and saving for five more years while my husband finishes a PhD. And then we would move somewhere more affordable because we really don't ever anticipate being able to buy a house in Santa Cruz, California. However, yeah, my in-laws offered to give us this $1 million as a gift specifically to buy a house here in Santa Cruz.

And that money is coming from my husband's deceased grandmother's trust. I guess I'm just concerned that a $1 million house in our financial context is just a little out of proportion. And it really would be nearly 100% of our net worth, even though it's just a normal house, like a three-bedroom, nothing too crazy. It's just that it's Santa Cruz. Right. You're in an inflated market for sure. My question is, okay, so this is from Grandmother's Trust. Was this money that was going to be his? They're just giving it to him early or no or it truly is a gift it is theirs and it would be a gift and go ahead what are the strings attached to this are they cool i mean if it has to be in santa cruz if my yeah if my in-laws said hey um

we would like to bless y'all with a million dollars to buy a house. My in-laws are amazing. There'd be no strings attached to it. I would gladly accept that gift. Yeah. I know many who don't. Or like Jade said, I'm going to give you a million dollars to buy a house, but you'll buy it in the zip code I tell you you're going to buy it in.

And if y'all ever get transferred or moved, that's our money that we're going to extract from the sale of this. You see what I'm saying? Yeah, I wonder about that that that's where it gets really really messy so i think it just depends right how much of this trust is this million dollars is it is it a 50 million dollar trust and this is just one of the millions yeah i want to know that to be honest i'm not sure the full amount but i think it's less than a fifth. Less than a fifth of it? Okay.

So it's a lot of money. So nobody's starving here? No. Okay. Let me ask you this. Just level with us real quick. How does that make you feel? Because this is a little bit different from what John said, but I don't even know what that looks like.

And I feel like I would be so overwhelmed by a gift like that. It might be hard to take. How do you feel? Does it make you be like, yes, we hit the jackpot? Or are you like, oh, my, my, my, like, I don't know. What do you think? I am intimidated. Just imagining our net worth, like ballooning and exploding like that overnight fills me with some anxiety um i would just want to take care of that money very well and be a good steward of it can i ask can i ask you where that anxiety comes from um is it is it because those people those people are the ones that have a million dollars, not people like us.

Right? Maybe. Maybe a little bit of a feeling of ill-gotten gain somehow. Well, can I interject? Because there is part of this that, and you can tell me at any point, Elizabeth, if you're like, no, that's not what I mean. But like, there is something to be said for when you walk step by step and you gain you know you're growing you're gaining your net net um worth little by little as opposed to it's like it's like it's like a toddler waking up and being 17 right as opposed to you know we see folks who win the

lottery and they're like i just won the lottery and they're all excited but then you talk to them five ten years later and it's busted so i could see where there is some anxiety there um why is this different from that john well i or is it different i remember a great theologian once said that sometimes um people can be as proud of the things that they don't have as people are of the things that they do so there is there can be an ethos i'm not that kind of i would never spend that kind of money on a house. I'd never buy that kind of car, right? And if, like Dave has used this example, if you have $200 million in your net worth and you gave away $20 million last year

and you buy a $200,000 car, that ratio is very similar. Sure. Right? To somebody who gave somebody $20, right? Or bought a $20 car. So all I have to say is, if your identity is,

I don't do stuff like that, then I would tell you, maybe check that. And there's a pretty extraordinary gift and an opportunity to set your family up in a community where you're going to have family, etc. And also, if the thought of going to bed every night,

here we are. And by the way, y'all make 190 grand. Y'all are clearly smart and doing great, right? But this idea that I just can't go from zero to 75 that fast, like that's too much for me to wrap my head around, then gently decline and say, no, thank you. What if you just said, hey, a million feels overwhelming. Is there a way that we could, you know, we've been trying to save for a down payment. Can you help us get to the down payment that we've been trying to afford?

Maybe there's somewhere in the middle. Or maybe they buy the house and you rent from them. Oh, no, I don't like that. You don't like that? No. All right. I don't know why. I just, I feel like that's even more tangled because they're still renting.

Yeah. If you have a great relationship with them i wouldn't lose sleep over taking the money um but i'd want every everything clear like if we decide to sell this house is this a gift is this a loan is this a down payment i want all that in writing i want all that clear i want everybody to have all hearts clear before we make a big decision like this but if there's a second of hesitation when it comes to strings or I just feel gross about it, then just say no thank you. What's your husband think? I think he's also a little bit anxious about being able to maintain and take care of a $1 million house on our income.

Well, wouldn't you be paying cash for it? So you wouldn't spend more than a million right and it's a santa cruz house so it's it's probably 1700 square feet three bedrooms one bath right yeah so you're just mowing the lawn so yeah you're mowing the lawn the roof's gonna be the roof right so you make a you make 200 grand a year y'all have y'all could cover the the repairs and things on a house like that okay i'm feeling better about it already okay good but but listen to your husband's repairs and things on a house like that. Okay. I'm feeling better about it already. Okay, good. But listen to your husband's intuition. If he knows his mom

and dad, and he knows oh man, if they give us a million dollars, we're going to hear about this every Christmas, every Thanksgiving for the rest of our lives. Basically, for a million dollars, they're buying our loyalty. They're buying their million dollars they're buying our our loyalty they're buying their grandkids like in proximity like i don't want to be on the hook to anybody listen

you can look at back you can look back on the track record let's let's play that out have they are they generous people are they always giving gifts you know big or small how have they been you know whenever they've offered a gift? Or is this their first time? Because this is worth noting. If they are also receiving a windfall for a first time, they may not know how they're going to be as gift givers. Does that make sense? Like if I, let's just pretend if I won the lottery today and I'm like, oh, I won the

lottery. I'm going to help my whole family out. And I start giving away a million dollars to each of them i might go into it thinking that i won't have any strings attached but because i've never tested that before you might realize dang a million dollars it has it does have an emotional hold on you and you do have an expectation for what they'll do you're gonna pick up the phone be like you're not buying that car yeah yeah it's like whoa yeah yeah so there is part of this that you do need to consider. Like, were your in-laws already wealthy people and they've already been generous or is this new for them?

So these are some, I like this conversation. I do too. It's a fun conversation and it's such an obnoxious amount of money, right? For most of us, it might happen at $10,000 or $2,000 or $500 or whatever. But I think that idea about strings and can y'all sleep at night is good. And I also like, man, if it's your ego holding you back, check that. Check that. I kind of, if it were me, she can do what she wants. This is not a right or wrong answer. I feel like I'd be comfortable with taking the down payment on the house that we would have bought that we would have been able to afford, right? You're just getting there a little bit

sooner. I feel like that's fair and the safe option. I'll take the million, Alex. This is The Ramsey Show. There's a time in your life and the baby steps for renting, but you don't want to do it forever because when you rent, you're still paying for a mortgage, just somebody else's. Plus, rent means instability in your budget because it always goes up, never down. So when you're ready to buy, make sure you work with a mortgage partner you can rely on, Churchill Mortgage. Churchill is Ramsey trusted to help you make the move from renting to home ownership wisely. Churchill understands that when you buy a home the Ramsey way, your mortgage payment will be a consistent, manageable part of your monthly budget.

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1749 Mallory Lane, Suite 100. Brentwood, Tennessee 37027. Triple eight, eight, two, five, five, two, two, five. This is the Ramsey Show. Give us a shout. We're talking money, mental health, marriage, whatever you got going on. We're here for you. Let's go out to Sarah in San Francisco.

What's up, Sarah? Sarah. Hi, how are you doing today? So good. How are you? I'm good. What's up? Okay, so my question is, I went straight to culinary school from high school.

Cool. Back in 2003. Thank you. My mom took out a loan for me because I was 17. Okay. The original loan was $30,000. We agreed to split it 50-50. Soon as I graduated, I was giving her money every month.

I was staying with her because I didn't have the money, but I was giving her money every month. I was staying with her because I didn't have the money, but I was giving her money every month. I eventually realized that she was not paying on the student loan at all. When I found out, she apologized and she said that she would start paying. I continued to give her money every month. As you can imagine, I wasn't making very much money at that time. And I then again discovered she was not applying any of that money towards the student loan. How much have you given her so far, Sarah? So I'm not sure exactly because I wasn't counting, but I do know that I gave her, when we talked, I gave her at least $5,000. Okay. How did you give it was it a check how did you do that I was giving her cash I was giving her two hundred dollars oh man every

month that well I was making I was making minimum wage I was working yeah yeah yeah at um anyway is your is your name on the loan or your mom's yeah your mom's name is on the loan only my mom it's a parent plus loan so the reason why i know now all this information is because recently she came to me and she brought up this loan because after a while i just stopped giving her money how long has it been so 2003 oh girl okay so recently she brought up this loan and she asked me for a lump sum of money. She asked me for about $20,000. I'm like, I don't have that kind of money. I can't give you that.

And we didn't agree. I've been giving you money, blah, blah. Long story short, I looked into the loan. She owes over $70,000. Oh God. Sarah, listen. Oh Lord. This is, um.

Oh gosh. I'm sorry I had to let a little bit of my I had to let it out a little bit it's really scary and I don't know

what to do here's what's not scary about it okay there is some scary but it's I don't think it's what you think it is

okay here's the scary um your you and your mom's relationship is different from this point forward.

Okay. Okay. And the sooner you come to terms with the fact that your mother did not uphold your end of the agreement, I can tell you all day, I think the agreement was dumb. Y'all should never have set that up. It was destined to create a wedge between a mother and a daughter, but here we

are um okay she has decided to not um sit down and be the adult and say i took out a loan here's every month for the next however many years here's what you're going to pay me here's how this is going to work i'm going to keep a spreadsheet i'm going to mark off every date all that like a bank would do yeah it you basically funded her lifestyle in a tiny little way. And then she comes knocking on your door 20 years later, asking for $20,000. Yeah. Do you know who's not on the hook for this money?

You, Sarah. None. You. You're not on the hook. Look, you are not on the hook for this money. Now, this is your mom. And I know that you feel some level of guilt. I feel really bad. But you gave her the money you gave it to her retired that doesn't it doesn't matter

at this literally at this point anything you say about to try to like make it better i'm going to tell you it doesn't matter you gave her the money she chose she And now, for whatever reasons that she has, which don't matter, she wants that money back from you. Well, the loan is probably, is it tripled? It's tripled. Is it $80,000 or $90,000 bucks now? It's $70,000 and some change. And now she's making me feel like.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Here's what you could do. She doesn't, hold on. She doesn't get to, you're allowing her to get inside you and to make you feel a certain way. You decide who has permission to hurt you, period. Now, that's harder when it's our mom

because our mom should be the one person on the planet that's always got our side and yours doesn't. Okay, and I hate that for you, but she's not making you feel bad you're choosing to feel bad on her behalf okay you gotta own that you gotta own that okay here's what you could do now you said to your you said if you were really interested in feeling very clean walking away from this situation you said that the loan was 30,000 and you were supposed to split it so that would be 15k on you now if you're telling me hey I paid

5,000 towards this loan I know that I paid 5,000 give her another 10k and say hey I paid my half and that would have been it if you wanted to do that and just say i know i paid 15 you didn't do your thing whatever you could do that um but you're not on the hook for this all right so sarah if i was gonna say sarah if i'm in if this is me like i'm just i'm fast i'm thinking about this being my mom okay and we sit down what i would say is exactly what jade said but i would i would i would add one extra layer i would put a payment plan in front of her yeah and say i agreed to pay fifteen thousand dollars of a thirty thousand dollar loan um i'm gonna pay you 20 back and i'm gonna already say i've already given you five and that's on the low end so i'm gonna pay you fifteen thousand dollars and here's what i can pay over the next 12 months

15 months 24 months and you make the payment don't hand her any more money yes okay so directly to the if i if i give it directly to the place will they now want my information no no just get the login and pay it say mom the only way you're getting this money is i sit right next to you we log in and we pay it because you're not handing her you're not funding her uh ridiculousness because she has not been a good steward with money so that is ridiculousness and you're not going to hand her fifteen thousand dollars to do whatever it is that she's been doing which whatever that was caused a student loan to triple all right so we're not participating in that yeah really bad okay so here's another thing we're going to do for you sar Sarah, I'm going to give you a year of FPU, okay?

And she might not, but she's still got $55,000 left to pay off after you write her a check. And so if she wants to, you can sit down and put these videos on and y'all can come up with a plan. It's not too late for her either. We deal with folks all the time in the 50s, 60s who are figuring it out. And it's not too late. But you get to make that choice. She gets to make that choice. Okay, so hang on the line here.

We're going to hook you up. And maybe even say, I'm going to give you $15,000, which is five grand more. But you got to sit down and watch these videos with me because you got fifty five thousand dollars and listen if she starts hassling you start saying oh you're just gonna leave your mama to what you can always stand up and walk out the door and that's hard hard hard but remember this line behavior is a language and if your mom chooses to swear at you get mad at you send you on guilt trips that you can't afford she's telling you through her language i don't want you around here i don't value you and so i'm going to hear what you're saying through your actions and i'm going to head out the door

until we can have a grown-up conversation it's going to be hard hard treading um you're gonna have to grieve the loss of your mom or your new relationship with your mom because things are different now. Dude, money does weird things to people, John. But this is why, I mean, I can't. Money makes people act up though. It does. But co-signing on loans, man,

I've never seen it work well. It doesn't work. I haven't seen it work well. It doesn't work. Co-signing is stupid. And especially if you have, listen, if you've taken a loan out with your kids and y'all have like car payment well you just pay me back or you know put it in a spreadsheet be adults and say you owe me this much on this date in this way and and and think about this she said she was 17 when her

mom signed that loan adults be adults and understand that your kids were kids and you were adulting them at that time. Do not come after these folks for these Parent PLUS loans. You signed them. Parent. Parent PLUS. That means parent plus your money. That's who's paying it off. The bank looked at your kid and said, I'm not giving him money.

And you said, well, you can give it to me. I'm trustworthy. Yeah. Be trustworthy. Be trustworthy. Be trustworthy. Be trustworthy. And pay your bills. Parents act like parents. Parents act like parents. I'm going to have to get the preparation H out. Hey, this is the Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Hey, you guys, health insurance costs are only moving one way, and that way isn't down.

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Let's go out to Chris in Springfield, Missouri. What's up, Chris? How we doing? Hey, man. Before I start, I just wanted to say thank you to you guys and everybody at Ramsey Solutions. Since I was younger, you've had a

really positive impact on me and my financial decisions. So I just want to say thank you for that. Well, thanks, brother. I appreciate it, man. What's happening? I think it would be important just to give you guys a little bit of context on me and just my background before I ask my questions. Basically, I've always been really good with my money. Over a few years, I was able to save up like $50,000. $40,000 of it was in my savings, and then $10,000 of it I had invested in mutual funds. I also am going to school i like to say better than debt free because i'm going totally free good for you that's awesome and a work study and stuff like that um so with that though um during uh all that time that i was accumulating those funds, I was in an abusive relationship.

Pretty much like anything negative you could think of. I'm sorry. She dished all that out. So it kind of messed me up. And when I was finally able to get out of it as a way of coping, I guess, I started spending my money on a lot of stuff. Sorry. You're all right. Over like maybe eight months now, I've totally drained all my savings and um i've pulled out all my investments and i've just spent it all on crap and um i probably only have like i don't know maybe a little under $2,000 now. Okay. So I just, I don't really know where to go from here

because my plan originally was once I get my bachelor's, you know, the deal that I kind of have with my parents is like once I'm done with college and I'm out of the house and that's just what it is. And I was going to go to grad school and everything, but I'm just not really sure how to go about doing that and just what to do financially anymore. So I think Dave's been saying for years, your money is just a reflection of what's going on

in your heart and mind and soul and life. And so right now I want to move the money conversation over. It's a big, it's a big neon sign letting you know that you're not all right right now. And I want to tell you, having sat with people, I can't count how many people I've sat across the table with or sat next to who are trying to figure out who they are after leaving an abusive relationship and the chaos of i still love that person but that person deeply hurt me in a number of different ways i lost part of myself and i don't even know what that means and how to get that back all of that stuff is all chaotic and a mess and, man, you got out your spending card

and went bananas. What I would tell you is the sun came up today, right? That's true, yeah. You got 2,000 bucks. And I don't want to minimize, you're going to have some grief and you're probably going to have some resentment.

You're going to have all that stuff. All those feelings, dude, listen to me. They're right. They're fine. They're good. They're right. The only thing you can do from this moment forward, you can't go back and edit sentences that have already been written. They got a period at the end of them. You were in love with somebody that hurt you deeply. You broke up. You spent $48,000 in a spending spree to wallpaper over depression and grief and sadness. And here you are. And the things you told us leading up to those moments tell me that you are a strong kid and that you're a driven guy and you have

accomplished a ton. Very few of the adults that call into this show have $50,000, access $50,000 cash, my brother. Very few people call in and say, hey, I figured out how to do college for free. And so you had a plan and that plan is going to be different now. You had a plan, you're just going to waltz into grad school, into your next job because you had a big nest egg. Well, you don't have that anymore, so cool. nothing about what you've told me suggests that you suddenly have lost the ability to work

really hard because i know that's who you are and nothing you've told me says suddenly you're dumb because you're not what you have told me is you're gonna have to spend some see a season grieving this you're gonna have to go spend some time with a counselor okay and i would tell you that if you were my best friend or you're my brother okay okay and you're go spend some time with a counselor. Okay. And I would tell you that if you were my best friend or you're my brother. Okay. Okay. And you're going to spend some time healing and you're going to spend some time. Here's the, here's the uncomfortable truth about abusive relationships that people often don't hear. It's real easy to be on the outside of that and to demonize the abuser. What people often fail to take into account is the person being abused loses trust in themself.

I don't even trust me anymore. And now you've got 48,000 reasons to further not trust you, right? What you're going to have to do is learn to build trust in Chris again. That's just going to take some practice, my man. Okay. Okay?

Yeah. So here's the deal. I want you to hang on the line here are you you're still in school right yeah i got a year left okay here's why that's phenomenal that's fantastic i'm so happy because that means you have access to a student counseling center that's going to be outstanding and in a time when um it's very hard to just call a therapist off the street and get an appointment, you're going to be able to do that. So I want you to make that call today. In exchange for making that call, we're going to send you Ken Coleman's Get Clear Assessment.

We're going to send you his book, Paycheck to Purpose. And I'm going to send you my book, Own Your Past, Change Your Future. And my whole book is what happens when you are sitting down and you realize you're in ash and how do you take that next step out okay i'm grateful for the call man and we love you and we'll help you any every step of the way here i just need you to hear me say you're not broken you're not dysfunctional you didn't do anything wrong i mean you blew a bunch of money and i would laugh with you and high five you if we're sitting at the table and also I don't believe Jade I don't believe in the phrase too soon that's just kind of me but I'd high five you and then we would get on with okay what comes next but you got some healing to

do oh yeah that's tough I think you covered it I'm not gonna add or take away how I'm trying to think of how I've wrestled with moments in my life jade when i've just flat out set my values on fire or i've set flat out done something that i said i wasn't going to do or i've spent my time poking my finger at people who do things and then all of a sudden i look up six months later and i'm that guy now right right you know it's tough i was sitting here trying to think of a similar situation i'm like when have i been there like what have i and it's you can really live in the past and wallow in like man what i did i spent 48 000 how could i have done that but then it's like what are you going to do

next and i i think as a as a culture we have two narratives one is you're always going to be the worst thing you you've ever done the worst thing ever happening you're always gonna be the dumbest thing you've ever done and then the other one is if you have feelings and you're a coward and a wimp and you're weak you just suck it up and grind it and i think that's nonsense i think the world is desperate for a new third way which is we're gonna spend some time feeling sad and we're gonna have some grief um you went through hell and you did some dumb stuff yeah let's just acknowledge it yeah and then we're gonna have some grief um you went through hell and you did some dumb stuff yeah let's just acknowledge it yeah and then we're gonna get the right people around us and because we can't do it alone we get the right people around us and then we're gonna take the next

crooked wobbly step forward to wherever it is we're going yeah progress not necessarily perfection nobody's out here doing things perfect we're all just trying to just trying to make some kind of progress forward, right? I mean, George Campbell tells us he's perfect. His hair is perfect. His hair is perfect. It's high. It's high and tight.

Well, you should see the hair dryer he has back there. I've never seen it. He actually converted an old air conditioner. It's really an extraordinary... I need to get on that then. Well, they have a special plug in there. It's like a 220.

It's incredible. But hey, that's another hour in the books here on The Ramsey Show. Be kind to one another. Pay off your debts. We'll be right back. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth. get out of debt, do work that they love, and create incredible relationships and speak clearly.

We help with that, too. I'm John Deloney, joined here by my friend Jade Warshall, and we have the lines open, 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Let's run out to New Hampshire and talk to Dylan. What's up, Dylan? How we doing? Hey, I just had a quick question for you both. I'm assuming, John, you'll be able to answer this a little better,

but you might. Hey, I'm just kidding. Way smarter than me. Well, we'll be able to answer this a little better, but you might. Hey, I'm just kidding. Way smarter than me. Roll the autogas. So it would seem that my mom is boycotting my rehearsal and my rehearsal dinner because I changed a small plan. I don't know. I might be able to answer this one because I know about that.

Dude, I'm laughing with you, man. So what did you do, Richard? What did you change that was so bad? So I'll run it quick. So, you know, back months ago when we gave them the opportunity to kind of plan the dinner, it's not what we wanted originally. We told them, you know, we just wanted to have pizza and go back to the Airbnb and just have a good

time with the bridal party. Well, my mom absolutely insisted on paying for this and making, you know, big dinner and we go out and all this and that. And obviously, you know, listening to you guys, I try to save as much money as possible, but she wasn't on board with that. And, you know, I gave her the opportunity for months and months and months. And a few days ago I talked to her and told her, I'm like, hey, we're really thinking about switching back to our original plan. And I was like, I'll give you a few days to figure it out.

Well, I just waited one day and I was like, you know what? I should do what I really want to do. It's my special day, you know, and of course, my fiance's too. But and I decided I'm like, hey, this is what we're going to do instead. So I didn't see this coming, but I want to lean on you a little bit and you push back, okay? Of course. Why would you take this from your mom? It's like a dinner that she's paying for.

Well, just because it's originally not what we wanted. I should add to this too. She started inviting a bunch of people that we didn't want there. There it is. There we go. I should add to this too. She started inviting a bunch of people that we didn't want there. There it is. Lead with that, brother. Lead with that. That wasn't the

biggest issue, I don't think. It's that she didn't really respect that we originally wanted to do something else. That's how I took it. Dylan, is there strings attached to this? As in? As in? As in, I'm doing this for you, so somewhere down the line,

there's going to be an expectation of something I want from you? You know, I'm not going to go as far as that, but it's not a possibility. Oh, I know about it. All right, so here's the deal. This is as heartbreaking and complicated as this is this is very very simple you made a grown-up choice and with all grown-up choices there always comes grown-up consequences to those choices unfortunately your mom is choosing to act like a child and i mean that with all due respect i don't like talking about people's mamas but here we are oh i've said it a few times right so one of the

hardest things i think any of us will experience is when somebody we love opts out of relationship with us because they're choosing to be immature because they are making our whatever how we're raising our kid what school our kid goes to our choice of diet our whatever you want to say they make our lives about them yeah and she is choosing to not be in relationship with you and your wife during your big day. And that just hurts. And so it's a both end. I want you to spend time, even just for a few minutes, saying like, this sucks, man.

I want my mom at my wedding. I hate that she's acting like this. And you and I both know she acts like this on other things too. This isn't isolated, right? No, not at all. Awesome. And can I add something? Of course.

She's going to come to your dinner. Well, I'm hoping. I'm hoping. So I would write her a letter. I want her there so bad. Hey, I would write her a letter that she can go back to over and over and over again and say it would mean the world to us that you come. I know that you wanted a big thing, and I'm so grateful that you're honoring us this one we really want you here yeah i mean

the thing is that uh i mean she won't even come to the rehearsal which i which is the worst part to me i'm okay if she didn't want to come to the dinner she's saying that she's saying that and i don't know her so i may be totally off base i think that this is her last ditch effort to get her way on this and my yeah i would probably be willing to put a couple i put some chips on the table on this that she's going to end up there i don't think she's going to miss her son's major days over this now maybe i don't know her and and i'm completely wrong but uh something tells me that when the rubber hits the road, she's going to be there.

What about your old man? Have you talked to him about it? Yeah, I actually spoke to him today, and he just initially, you know, it's the first time. Also, keep in mind, my mother won't talk to me at all. She will not talk to me.

Of course, well, you ruined her life, jerk. Oh, you know, yeah, absolutely. You're ripping her heart out. But I did speak to my dad this morning, and he was saying that she just feels hurt and it doesn't have anything to do with the dinner which i don't believe because this kind of stuff has happened before which she doesn't get her way in this which i don't believe but uh well he's probably been covering her for her for a long time too right oh of course yeah i mean obviously he

has to take her side in most cases and i don't blame him uh but yeah no i mean yeah no i spoke to him so if she will talk to you the best the best I can tell you is what I would do in your situation. And that would be, I would write a letter and I would do my best to deliver it by hand. If you all live in the same community, put it in her mailbox by hand. I was at her house yesterday. Okay. And let her have something. Because listen, if you call her, if you text her, she is going to hear that one time through her filter of Dylan is trying to ruin my life.

And Dylan's going to embarrass me because I'm in charge of the dinner. And everyone's going to ask me why I just did pizza. And it's all about her. But if you write it down, people can go back to the letter and back to it and back to it. And sometimes, not always, but sometimes that truth as a way of distilling itself down and she can rest in.

He wants me there. Him and his wife are just trying to do things a little bit differently. It's not about me, et cetera. And you hope that's the case, but we all have family. I thought I'm open, but that's a great idea.

And tell your dad, we really, really want both of y'all there. Oh, I told him that. I told him that this morning when I spoke to him. I'm like, if the worst case scenario happens, I'm like, please, Dad, be at my wedding. Yes. At the very least. I'm like, yeah, stuff. Yeah, no, it's pretty crazy.

I hate it for you. I hate it for you. I appreciate it. Thank you, though. But yeah, that was pretty much it. I appreciate you guys. Yeah, I don't get to, it's not every day I get it for you. I appreciate it. Thank you, though. But yeah, that was pretty much it. I appreciate you guys. Yeah, it's not every day I get to talk to somebody who just willy-nilly rips his mom's heart out, right, Jay? Dude, look, when it comes to these weddings, it's like that.

Like, if I had done what all the parents had wanted, I would have been married in a different state. I would have gotten married on a different date. I would have gotten married, you know, in a different dress. Like, they all have their preferences. But at the end of the day, it's your day. And sometimes it's just a dinner. Do the dinner. But if it is that big of a deal, you made a grown-up choice.

And that comes with grown-up consequences. That's right. Hey, this is The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Hey, you guys, I'm not a fan of the big banks, and you probably already know which ones I mean. But I do like credit unions because they're nonprofit organizations that focus on their members.

And I'm proud to endorse Fairwinds Credit Union because they share the Ramsey mission of helping people get out of debt and live generously in fact they design products to help keep you from going into debt in the first place fair winds has been in business for over 75 years and they serve hundreds of thousands of members worldwide you can feel secure because your deposits are federally insured by the NCUA up to $250,000. It's easy to join and Fairwinds partners with more than 5,000 credit union locations around the country so you can bank in person wherever you live. But if you prefer the online experience, you can log on to Fairwinds and do anything you

could do at a physical location. So go to fairwinds.org slash Ramsey to learn more. And while you're there, look at the combined checking and savings account bundle they created just for Ramsey fans to help you take control of your finances. That's Fairwinds, F-A-I-R-W-I-N-D-S dot org slash Ramsey. This is the Ramsey Show, 888-825-5225. If you're a new listener and you want to know what we're even talking about when we talk about things like the baby steps and the snowball and all those things, go to ramsaysolutions.com and click on the Get Started button. We're going to help you figure out the next best step for you in your financial journey based exactly where you are today.

A lot of times people say, well, that call didn't have anything to do with me. We can tailor make this thing for you are today. A lot of times people say, well, that call didn't have anything to do with me. We can tailor make this thing for you, okay? RamseySolutions.com, click on Get Started, and we'll walk you to debt freedom from there. Let's go out to Lane in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. What's up, Lane? Hey, John. Hey, Jade. How are you guys? We're good. How are you?

Pretty good, pretty good, can't complain Excellent man, what's up? So basically I just wanted to I guess say thank you To you guys Just for teaching what you teach I guess for some context

My wife and I are, I'm 23, my wife is 21 We have a 15 month old daughter and like three, four days ago, our house got wiped out by a tornado. No, shoot, man. Y'all, everybody's okay? Yeah. In Calgary? Wait, where are you?

We actually live about an hour, hour north of Calgary near Gidsbury. I don't know if that means anything to you, but yeah. I didn't know they had that kind of weather there. Is that normal? We do now. This was the biggest tornado in Alberta in the last 36 years. There were quite a few farms taken out. We're rural. Thankfully, there were more people, but no one was hurt, by the way. If anyone was in our house,

they would have been, well, no more. We'll put it that way. Wow. But like, we have most of our stuff, you know. We don't have a house. We're living with my mom for the time being, and we'll transfer into other things. But I just, you know, when it happened,

like, we hightailed it over there. And I guess, to put it in a way that makes sense like i don't care financially like we have like we're we're on we're on baby step four five and six um we we have an emergency fund and like i was way more worried to make this call to talk to you guys than i was about our house being wiped out wow perspective and i just wanted to say thank you and means the world that you guys uh teaching stuff and my mother-in-law that actually introduced me to you guys and man i'm so grateful because i don't know where we'd be otherwise dude that means the world that you that

you took the time to call lane circle back and uh appreciate it and i think it's important for everybody to know that jade and i have no illusions we know we're just a couple of knuckleheads on the radio you did it you. You're the one actually working, man. For sure. Wow. Good for you. Good for you, man. I'm glad everybody's safe and okay, and I'm glad that y'all get to make the next step

move from a position of strength, not a position of desperation. That's incredible, man. Wow. Very blessed to be. Well, dude, I'm really grateful that you circled back and gave us a shout, dude. Wow. Very blessed to be here. Well, dude, I'm really grateful that you circled back and gave us a shout, dude. That means the world to us. You know, John, people call in and they thank us and they're happy with the results of the plan. And we said, and we weren't joking around, he's the one that did the work there. And I think sometimes we've seen it on previous calls. I think sometimes with

Financial Peace University, people kind of get it in their head that it's a magic trick. And then if I just take the class, the class will do its magic work and I'll be magically where I want to be financially. And that's not how it is at all. You get the information and you get to choose whether or not you're going to implement it. You get to choose whether or not you're going to implement it. You get to choose whether or not you're going to go all in. Because, I mean, when you really stop at like, we know it's a plan that works for people who choose to work it. We know that it's helped millions of people get out of debt and change their lives and not just get out of debt, but go on to build wealth and become, you know, baby steps, millionaires

and things like that. But those are the people they choose to show up every week right because it's nine weeks so they choose to say this is a priority for me for nine weeks I'm going to cut out and carve out this area of my time I'm going to show up whether it's in person or online because you get your choice and they're the heroes in this story it's not us we get to like you said be on here and and be goof offs radio. And for some reason, people listen to us and it's amazing. But they're the ones who carve out that time. They do the work and they're the ones that see the turnaround. They see that improvement.

And it doesn't take long. Most of the people who really dig into Financial Peace University, man, they're seeing like $8,000 turnarounds, lickety split, you know, within the first 30 days and things like that. So this that call was really a testament to not only it's not about the plan. It's about the plan plus the person. Right. And plus their involvement in it. And that's when it works. So if anybody's interested in going through the same plan that helped my guy out. Come on. Tornado blew down his house house and yet here he is financial peace university you can find that going to ramsey solutions.com fpu and one more thing and this is for everybody listening we have a bad psychology um where i'll forever remember right after 9-11 happened and all of the i don't remember it was

the senate of the house the congress was was on the steps of the white house singing together and it was this moment yeah and humans have an ability to come together in madness and make clear-headed next right decisions um but man we make the stupidest decisions in times of it's all good it's all good we just pretend reality doesn't count yeah and so short memories yes and so i don't mean this in a in a caustic way at all but what happened to Lane will happen to all of us. Life will come at us. Moms will get sick. Kids will have issues. Tornadoes will hit houses. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. And so this plan, and I say this plan, living a life where you don't owe anybody anything. You said it earlier, living a life where i am fully empowered to be as free as possible

in my health in my relationships in my finances in where i work an ability to stand up tall in a culture that is so disempowering man chopping you down when it comes the most annoying thing will be who's going to call to the air conditioner person who's good i want to call in and say thank you, and I'm nervous about that. That's the hardest part of losing my house. It will come. Do you have a group of people with you that you can weep with? Do you have an emergency fund?

Do you have these things? Because it's going to come. And we had thousands and thousands of years of farmers who knew this. Don't go through all your grain. You're going to have a couple of years where it doesn't rain. That's life. And in two short generations, we've just thought we're smarter than nature. And we can beat it all with our smarts and our technology.

It doesn't work, man. It will come for you. You make a great point because it's true. And I don't say this to be like a fatalist or to be negative. But you cannot plan your life based on best case scenarios. Like so many times people call in and i've been guilty of it it's like you have this idea of something you can do but if you really stop to break through break down your plan everything has to be perfect in order for it to work right not not one domino can fall in order for it to work right and then what happens that

one domino falls that you never perceived could fall and you're like holy crap everything's caving in on me and i don't and and that's that's why things like this are so important i mean one one call we had the girl's got diabetes right and she's trying to get her medication how great would it be if that's never an issue for her again she's just got the money piled up she's got the financial peace you know that you i heard you talking about your electricity electricity problems and it's like to just be able to up i mean you can just up and pay that bill but i know there's plenty of people listening who if something happened and the electrical went out on their house they'd be up a creek because there's no margin there's no room for error my ac went out the other week it was

happened to be one of the hottest days and my husband was out of town the you know it was like no big deal all right nobody likes to pay for things like but you know i'm saying like just to have that piece of yeah we're good it's that piece it's the piece but life's coming the tornado's coming and again it's not a fatalist thing it's not a ooh we're fear mongers no it's just life we we thing. It's not a ooh, we're fear mongers. No. It's just life. We just do life with people who are hurting.

We wouldn't have a job if everything went right all the time. All right. And so live a life where you're connected with other people. Live a life where you enjoy going to work. Live a life where you don't owe anybody anything. And like I said a minute ago,

in a world that is telling you you can't survive without us. Stand up tall and say, yeah, I can. As for me and my house, yes, we can. We'll be right back. This is The Ramsey Show, 888-825- 5225. I'm

John Deloney, joined by Jade Warshaw. Let's go out to Destin, Florida and talk to Josh. What's up, brother Josh? Hey, how you doing? Good, man. How are you? I'm John Deloney, joined by Jade Warshaw. Let's go out to Destin, Florida, and talk to Josh. What's up, brother Josh? Hey, how you doing? Good, man. How are you? I'm okay.

I appreciate you taking the call. You got it, man. What's up? I guess I'll cut right to it. I've been following you guys for a little while, trying to get my finances on track. I've come to a decision. I need to start handling my life and get some stuff on track, and I want to go to rehab so I can quit my drinking.

Yeah, I'm proud of you, man. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Don't blow by that. That's huge. What led you here? There are millions and millions of people in the United States that need to make this decision and I want them to hear where you landed

you'll be a gift in the past I battled with other substance abuse issues and I let that go, I've been clean from all that and I just kind of picked up the bottle and I'm just tired of it tired doing the same things over and over again tired of relying on something to feel like I need it to function awesome I'm proud of you man I'm proud of you so uh how can we help well pretty much my insurance situation the only way to get into treatment uh it covers most of it except for about

six thousand dollars okay six to ten thousand dollars depending on location so really not trying to get into any more debt sure but i want to take care of this um the first question i would ask is um often and I'm talking about rehab places that are not like go to Malibu or you're in Destin, not like a beachfront place that's going to be a resort. Okay. Yeah. Often, if you sit down, places will wave the gap between the insurance and the cash out. It's the equivalent of a scholarship program. So I would have that conversation with the place.

Have you done that? I've been calling and asking for scholarships. I've called hundreds of places probably. You haven't called hundreds. Maybe a slight exaggeration, but I've been on the phone. And nobody will waive the gap? No, that'll cover my insurance. exaggeration, but I've been on the phone. And nobody will wave the gap? No. That'll cover my insurance.

What do you mean? Because that's the cheapest thing I've been able to find is a $6,000 copay. Is that your deductible? Yes. That's the cheapest thing I can get. I've applied for scholarships. They're saying they're not doing it. So do you have guns or guitars or a truck?

Do you have something you can sell? No. I mean, I've got a truck, but it's my work truck. Can you go down in value on it? What's it worth? No, I'm upside down in it. What's it worth? Probably about 11 grand.

What do you owe on it? About 200,000 miles on it 12 what what would happen you owe 12 it's worth 11 what would happen if you sold that and went down half the value and just bought yourself a little truck that that'll get you is there anything do you see what i'm saying like this is temporary i get what you're saying but it's a truck with 200,000 miles on it and not that many people are gonna spend eleven thousand dollars well if it's worth eleven thousand there's a whole bunch of people will my friend because they're in your situation too what about a parent or family member? Nope. Unfortunately, no. Okay.

So here's what I would tell you. I would start, if I'm you in this situation, I would start with a couple of different areas. Number one, I would walk in this evening to the local AA meeting. Have you done that yet? Yeah. Okay. I would ask around and tell them I've got a gap. And my guess is there's people who would say, I know X, Y, and Z. I know this person. My church has a sponsorship program.

There's gap payment here. We can help figure this out. I would start there. Okay. And this is you being super, super vulnerable vulnerable it sounds like you're so sick of all this that you're kind of done giving a crap is that fair absolutely okay the second thing is i'm going to give you three months of free better help i want you to talk to a licensed counselor i want you to hang on the line here and i want you to make sure that just full stop rehab is the right move, the right next move for you. Okay. Okay. They might say, hey, I want you to go every day to a meeting in the evening and in the morning for 30 days.

And let's circle back before we make this big leap. Okay. Okay. okay the third thing is i want you to be honest deeply honest with what you can part with right now because here's what i'm trying to avoid i don't want you to come out on the other side of a 30-day in treatment program or a 28-day um um outpatient program and have that clarity of mind, that sobriety, the light is on, and then that credit card bill hits you right in the mouth. That's what I want to avoid at all costs. And that's another thing I'm worried about. Finances bills keep coming.

They do keep coming. I've even been looking into detoxes, and it's still about that same number. Just for like a week, detox. They do. I want you to go to a meeting, and I want you to be vulnerable and raise your hand and say, I'm stuck. Okay? Yep.

If you tell me, after 30 days of knocking on every door put your car on facebook marketplace and see if you can get six thousand dollars for it or seven thousand bucks or eleven thousand bucks that's going to give you six grand and you go buy a five thousand dollar car with 250 000 miles on truck i get it not pretty this is a band-aid i get it if you tell me you can't then then I would say then go to a local credit union and figure out that gap. Or I would work out, before you did that, I would see if you could work out a payment plan with the rehab place. Probably they won't do that, but it'd be worth a shot. Oh, no, no, they will. They will do that.

That's why I was, no interest, but that's why I was on the call, because i've already got other debt racked up okay i'm okay with that one if the last option and listen to me this is not a pass for you just to go sweet i can go i want you to exhaust every avenue because my brother jade and i have sat with people they walk out and then reality is a cold dose of water, and it's easy to fall right back into old habits when old fists hit you in the same mouth. Yeah, because even if you can find a couple of thousand, like even if you can find a couple of thousand from selling things, you visit a local church and say,

hey, is there any, like, is there a ministry here? What can I do? Can I serve to earn this money? Like whatever you can figure out, even if you're closing that gap with cash in some way, that's going to be worth it to you. Or if you got two weeks and you decide, I'm going to wake up at five o'clock every morning

and drive Uber and I am going to, I'm going to work like mad and earn this money, right? There's going to be some little victories there. But if you tell me, hey man, I can't, I'm underwater right now. I'm wanting to go to rehab because I, hey, man, I can't, I'm underwater right now. I'm wanting to go to rehab because I'm drinking every day and I can't stay clean. I get that. And I honor that.

Okay. But I want you to go to a meeting tonight and I want you to raise your hand and ask that question. Okay. Okay. If you can, if the hospital where you are doing your inpatient rehab is willing to say there's an interest-free option here for the gap, then I'm okay with that as a last DEF CON resort option. If a clinical supervisor has said your only option is rehab. Okay. Okay. So I want you to hang on the line. I want you to walk through. I want you to, when you go through the BetterHelp, I want you to click on struggling with substance

abuse, struggling with alcohol. And I want you to put in the notes, trying to make a decision on whether I need to go to rehab, go to inpatient, inpatient rehab counseling. And then when they reach out, they're going to walk you through an assessment and y'all can make that decision together. Is that cool? Yeah, that's awesome. Thank you so much. I appreciate everything. You got, Hey, I need you to hear, I need you to hear me say, I'm really proud of you. Me too. Thank you. This is real hard. Thank you very much. I appreciate everything. Hey, I need you to hear me say I'm really proud of you. Me too. Thank you. This is real hard. Thank you very much. You've been drowning for a long time, haven't you?

Yeah. We're done? Okay. Are we done? With all the drinking? Yes, I want to be. I mean, I'm tired of it. Good. Hey, I'm going to put a little star on this. I want you to call back in 30 days with your 30-day chip, and we're going to celebrate

you on the air. All right? I'm proud of you, my man. This is The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. You're listening to The Ramsey Show. Next to me is Dr. John Deloney. I'm Jane Warshaw. We're taking your calls. We mostly take your calls. It's a live show. But today we have a question of the day that's coming to you from YRefi. Today's question of the day brought to you by YRefi. So now we don't recommend refinancing on everything, but for distressed private student loans, there is YRefi. We trust YRefi because they help you with low fixed rate, fixed interest rate. They help you get a low fixed interest rate you couldn't get anywhere else. To help you stick to your budget and get out of debt, learn more at YRefi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y-R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. May not be available in all states.

All right. Today's question comes from Wyatt in California. Wyatt writes, my wife recently asked for a divorce, but she wants to stay married until she finishes her MBA degree. Wow. To complicate things, my family.

Oh, nice. To complicate things, my family had agreed to pay for her degree when she started the program as an early inheritance for me. This guy is an honor student. I think she only wants to stay for the free tuition. What should I do? If I had a beard, I'd be stroking my beard on this one because this is ridiculousness.

I don't mean this to be mean, Jade, but we're doomed. Just as a society. This is bananas. Bro, your wife left you. She asked you for divorce. There's a word oh boy okay dude it's not good if you say yes to this you got to bounce with an ounce you have to uh brush your shoulders

she left you she left you and um there's so much complexity here yes don't pay for the wife that's leaving you that's divorcing you don't let her take part of your inheritance this whole thing's such a mess yes I would stop tuition payments how about that let's just start there for god's sakes yeah if you're not the gravy train ends like at that point like if you if you get divorced you don't get to say oh and will your parents please still pay for my you know it's like being at the golden corral and you cash out and you get your ticket and you walk to the parking lot and then you see them bringing bringing prime ribs out yeah you don't get to go back wait a minute wait wait wait i'm gonna back a truck up here and take all the prime rib dude you cashed out cashed out somebody else gets the the prime

that's right you left it's golden corral baby wow yeah this is this is a this is a boundaries conversation i'm guessing john i mean there's clearly a lot here she can you don't you don't get both sides of you can't have your cake and eat it too if she says i want a divorce all right boom and i definitely wouldn't drag the in-laws into it. That just makes it even more messy. And if your in-laws hear the story and they say, well, that's cool. We still want to pay for her,

for her degree. A, they can do what they want to do. It's their money. And B, if it is part of an inheritance, then it will come out of a divorce settlement. So it's not just going to be free money. It will have to be disclosed as part of a divorce settlement. And y'all will figure that out in court.

And I'm heartbroken for you, Wyatt, that your wife wants to divorce you. I hate that for you, man. I just hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. Yeah, this sucks.

And if I could be ridiculous for a moment, her timing was terrible. I mean, she must feel some type of way like if i'm like gosh let me i want to finish my mba but i don't want to tell him well there's also the other side of this that like why it's cheated five times and she finally says i'm out but i'm getting my my my that's all we don't know we that's the thing about these questions we never know you could you know throw a lot of different wrenches into this subject. But at the end of the day, it's like if you say you're done, you're done.

Here's the best way to think of it. The moment somebody says, I'm divorcing you, from this point forward, this is no longer a romantic relationship. This is a business transaction, period. It has gone. We got married. We signed a marriage contract for this reason this is how we're going to set separate everything it is a business proposition from this point forward when somebody throws the d word and says i'm divorcing you cool then that's

how we're hanging along that's moving forward can i ask you a question yep um i'm not trying to trip you up in any way so on the show let, on the show, we talk a lot about money, obviously. And we always say that, you know, one of the main causes of divorce is money fights and money problems. You're a person who's in this knee deep all the time. Is,

where does it start? I think we, I mean, I think it's both ends. So we say money is a symptom. And I'm saying that because we've had two of these in a row of just whacked out, just what's going on here. We say that money is a symptom and I think it continues.

So let's take abuse and let's take just evil and put off to the side. That's outside the bell curve in this conversation, right? There's abusive people and there's terrible people. We know that. I don't think most people are abusive. Most people are terrible. I think most people are unintentional. And they have a picture about what they want their life to look like.

And they just assume that the person next to them that they married is going to absorb into that picture. Not knowing that that person has a picture of what their life is going to look like and vice versa. And so here's a good example in my house. It's something so tiny that happened recently we have two dogs and then we just i got my daughter a little it's like a gremlin dog so now we have three and they fight and scream and run around i got to where dinner time was frustrating for me it just felt like so much and i wasn't being the dad that wanted to be i was finding myself snippy i was

finding myself just like hey can y'all once we backed out and my wife and i and she's like hey man dinner's like a sacred time we always just come here and exhale it's where we laugh it's these three dogs that we took from outside are running around underneath the table we put them in a kennel now during dinner and man you just made a clear choice but it was unintentional and what was happening was i didn't want to come to the table my wife didn't want to be around a grumpy me so it's easier hey we're gonna grab we're gonna grab chick-fil-a on the way home right and so it happens by teeny tiny degrees and turns out it's the dumb dogs running around at the table so it's a lack of intentionality and a lack of saying hey this is a sacred thing for us you want this i want this how

do we choose to make this happen oh we can just do that that's easy it's a lack of intentionality and a lack of saying, hey, this is a sacred thing for us. You want this. I want this. How do we choose to make this happen? Oh, we can just do that. That's easy. It's a lack of intentionality. When you're not intentional about your money, then suddenly I'm buying this, you're buying this, you borrowed this, I want to buy this, and now we have two different worlds, but we live on the same couch, and then it implodes, right? So money fights are a symptom of two people that have not aligned their pictures and then not align their values and have not committed we're going to we're going to forego short-term pleasure for a long-term vision of what the world we want to build together and it sounds like they've chosen the wrong enemy to direct their that's right their guns at right yeah and so going back to the previous call

you make a choice you make teeny tiny choices along the previous call, you make a choice. You make teeny tiny choices along the way that gets you this final choice. You do that with your money. You do that with your physical health, right? Like my buddy Lane Norton didn't just wake up one day and win worlds. He started 20 years ago lifting weights, right? Every day. Same with your marriage.

It's the same thing getting back, right? The beauty is if you will own, you and I have both made choices to choose a miserable marriage, then you can both make choices to choose something amazing. That's where the light and the darkness is. You can choose something else. It's nothing is inevitable unless outside of abuse.

Nothing is inevitable. You can choose something different together. It's amazing. I love that, John. See, you add a lot to the show john and i love picking your brain on stuff like this because you just have a different perspective um and by the way i believe in people you do really do man i like that i like getting to host with you um i have to i kind of wanted to go to john for a minute but i

also want to let you guys know before this hour ends that this hour is about to end if you're listening on your favorite platform. But if you want to keep watching the show and keep finishing this specific episode, keep hearing from John, keep hearing from me, you got to head over to the Ramsey Network app in order to finish the show. If you're on the radio, you can just keep listening. It's still going to play. More calls are still coming up. We've got Christian from Madison, Wisconsin. We've got Carol from Sacramento. We've got a truck driver who's, you know, living out of a semi truck coming up. We've got a woman, Ashley. She wants to know if she should use the money that she has to get a car or to pay off debt. So we've got really great calls coming up. I'm going to pick John's brain a little bit more. But again, the Ramsey Network app is the only place that you're really going to get the full episodes of the Ramsey show like you're used to hearing. So you got to go over to the app. If you don't know where it is, you can search Ramsey Network in the App Store or on Google Play. That's the way to find it. And by the way, we're still working on the app where every day we're doing things to make it better, make that experience the best we

can for you. We just started this. So it's kind of cool. You guys are in on the ground level and we're happy you're here with us. But again, don't miss what's coming up next. Head over to the Ramsey Network app and it'll be me and John. We'll be in our same clothes, same shirt, same plaid, finishing up the show. Thanks for hanging out with us. This is The Ramsey Show. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love,

and create actual, amazing relationships. I am your host, Jade Warshaw. Your other host for the day is Dr. John Deloney to my right. Give us a call. The number is 888-825-5225. We will talk about the things that are concerning to you about your life and your money. I'm here as kind of the money expert, and my guy John is here as your mental health and wellness. I still don't know why I'm here. We're thinking about it.

We're figuring it out as we go. But give us a call. Like I said, the number is 888-825-5225. We'll chop it up with you. Let's go directly to the phone lines. We got Laura in Phoenix, Arizona. What's going on, Laura? Laura? Are you there? Did I get her? Are you there? Okay. It was you there okay it was my nails i blame my nails are you there hello okay what's going on laura jade's nails got in the way again what's up laura yeah so i need help on so currently we're on 30 000 in debt so we always sit down and talk about our debt say like we sit down on the Monday everything goes good and then the weekend starts we have an issue where my husband likes to drink like Friday sometimes Friday through Sunday. Wow. And then during that time, he, like, he forgets about our, like, budget. Well, I would think so.

Yeah. So then that goes out the window. And then Monday comes, and it's like... He's ready to start again. Yeah, and he's like, what happened? I thought we had sat down and talked about our budget. How long has that been going on? I would say like six months.

We've tried to get together and try to pay off our debt, but it's just not working. Yeah, you're married to somebody who's really struggling with alcohol this has this is not a budgeting issue at all yeah this is a you love um someone who's an alcoholic yeah and it sucks because he doesn't see it that way so it seems like i'm the nagging wife. Right. And here's what you've got to do. Unfortunately, there is no healing in your marriage. There's no healing in your financial life. There's no healing in underneath your marriage and underneath your financial, all that, all that leads to this moment where you don't feel safe in your own house. Do you?

No, no, none of that changes until he chooses to get clean. And so no matter what the issue is, when somebody comes in and says, hey, I'm struggling with X and Y and Z, and I'm drinking, and I can't quit doing X, Y substance, nothing happens on the mental health side, the marriage side, the emotional, until somebody says, I'm willing to go get clean. And what that means is you have to take care of you because you're not safe. And I don't even doubt that this guy loves you, but this guy's got some significant struggles that he at this time is unwilling to deal with. And so you have to make your safety priority number one. What does that mean? It

probably means you need to find somewhere for him or for you to go for 30 days and say, hey, I'm not going to live with somebody who's unsafe anymore. I'm tired of being on eggshells in my own house. I'm tired of not knowing where all our money goes. I'm tired of not knowing where you go. And then you come home on Monday and kind of make it my fault. And I thought we had all this. He's got to decide to do something different. And that means going to a meeting starting tomorrow morning, even though tomorrow's Thanksgiving. See what I'm saying?

Like this is a, this is a way bigger deal than budgets. Yeah. And can I just be honest with you? Yeah. You know this, right? Yeah. I mean, he doesn't get upset about it and he just says like like what's going on like we sit down and then i'm like well this is what happens and then he's

like oh you know what yeah you're right i'm gonna work on it so listen behavior is a language and what he's telling you is, I don't care what you and I agreed on. I don't care what you and I, I don't care about our marriage fidelity. I don't care about our agreements. I don't care about our financial health. I care about going on Friday and Saturday nights

and doing whatever the crap I want to do, period. I don't care how you feel in my own house. I don't care if you feel like I'm a liar. I don't care how you feel in my own house. I don't care if you feel like I'm a liar. I don't care if you can't trust me. I get to go party on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Well, he doesn't go party. He drinks at home. Okay. Well, he's going to

disappear on his own house on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Behavior's a language. And he's talking to you loud and clear. Yeah. So this is the point when you go get a friend, you go get a pastor, you go get a therapist, and you sit down and come up with some really ironclad boundaries that are going to be brutal for you to enact. It's going to break your heart.

Yeah. And that might be, there is no alcohol in my home anymore. Period. and that might be there is no alcohol in my home anymore period if you lie to me and commit financial infidelity again then I'm out I'm going to go move in with my sister you have to go to AA your boundaries have to be pretty tough at this point

is that fair? yeah I can hear it on you you're worth more than the life you're living right now. Yeah. Jade, am I crazy? No, you're not crazy. I hate this for you.

It's tough. And, you know, people all the time, they call in and they're talking about issues that aren't, they're not money issues. And here we're always telling people like combine your money combine your money but there are times where it's like there are situations there's like no don't combine your money like you said you seek counsel and i tell people all the time like there's this acronym i use about keeping your money safe and it's like if you're in these situations like you know our friend calling in here, Laura, where you're concerned, the first thing is you need to seek counsel. Like that's the S you got to seek counsel.

And the A is if there's abuse and if there's addiction, that's when you got to do it. Or the F financial infidelity that that's what we're looking at. And then they're going to give you the E, which is you can evaluate your options based on the boundaries you have, because I'd like to say that it's as easy as, all right, move out tomorrow. But it's not, it's never that easy. And there's always a wake. You know what I'm saying? And so I would just encourage anybody who's in that situation, like I said, abuse, addiction, financial infidelity. Yeah, you're not, like you said, you're not safe in your own home. And that person cannot have continued access to the things that make you safe in your family that keeps your kids safe. Because if you have somebody who's spending all the money on substance and your kid can't have groceries and your kid can't eat and you can't get to work because there's no money for gas.

Yeah, you got to put some boundaries in place. And you have to say, like you said, that in my home, there will be none of this. And until this happens, you will not have access. And that's probably the toughest line that you can lay down. But that's loving yourself well. And honestly, that's loving them well. And it's loving this thing that we decided to create together, which is called a marriage. That's right.

That's right. Oh, it's so tough. I hate that she's going through that. I hate that it's happening, you know, during a time like this, the holidays where you're supposed to be able to come together with the ones you love. Sometimes you have to create that distance, that separation and create that boundary so that ultimately things can get better and you can find healing. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, what's going on? You're listening to The Ramsey Show. By the way, on you're listening to the ramsey show by the way thank you for listening

to the ramsey show i'm your host today jade warshaw i am joined by my buddy best-selling author host of the dr john deloney show the guy's name is dr john deloney if you were not sure about that we are going to take your calls all afternoon give us us a call. The number is 888-825-5225, and we will help out sort out your situation. Let's go straight to the phone lines. We've got Anthony in Anchorage, Alaska. What's going on, Anthony? Hey, how you guys doing today? Doing good. How can we help? I'm calling. I've been struggling with making my payments every month to try and get out of debt. I've never missed a payment since I've had started building my credit, but I can't afford to make more than the minimum payments,

and I'm never able to catch up. And that's the problem I'm facing. How many payments are you trying to make? Like, how much debt do you have? Between me and my wife both, we've got about $30,000 in consumer debt and another $5,000 in student loans. Okay, so can you sort out for me what the $30,000 is?

It's all credit card, debt bills, furniture, credit cards, just bad decisions. So various credit lines. Correct. And can you tell me what you guys are earning each month combined? What you're taking home? Monthly take home after taxes. I get about $5,000 from my job after paying for benefits and everything. Okay.

Currently, I'm a full-time student, so I get another $2,200 a month for my veteran benefits. Okay, cool. What about your wife? My wife just started her own business back in July. Right now, she's only making enough income to sustain her business, to pay her rent, pay for her supplies and stuff like that. So she can't pay herself yet. Correct. Okay. Is there a trajectory on that business?

Like after half a year, is there like an honesty reckoning? Like, is this a really nice hobby or are we headed somewhere? We've had that conversation a little bit. We pay for her to go to school and then she just started the business in July. Ideally, she needs to be able to help contribute once I am no longer a full-time student is the plan right now. What's the nature of the business that she's doing? She is an esthetician. Okay. My question is, is there a way that she can do that business and also bring in some part-time income as well?

That's a discussion we just had last week in regards to her looking into some part-time work to at least be able to help me pay some of this stuff down because I don't have the time to pick up any extra shifts between working full-time and going to school full-time. Right. I don't have any extra income. And what does she feel about that? She is open to it. Unfortunately, she doesn't, nothing against my wife. She doesn't have any college or post-school secondary training. So I don't think she needs it.

I don't think she needs it to pick up part-time work. And when I say part-time, like go make 20 bucks an hour. Like, I don't care. I just want her bringing in some form of income. And I think that's going to help in many ways. A, it's going to help you guys get more income in. But two, it's going to help take a little bit of the heat off of her in this thing that she's trying to build right now. She can still feel like, all right, I'm building this thing for myself, but I'm also

contributing in another way that my family really needs right now. And that's going to help everybody. So that's kind of something, put it on the shelf, you and her, think about it, pray about it, whatever. But the reason you called in is you've got this debt here, $35,000 of debt. And you're feeling the crunch of that because, I mean, it's a lot. It's a lot of payments that you're throwing away. You mentioned it's $30,000 of various credit lines. So each month you're having to keep track of that. And I can tell $30,000 of various credit lines. So each month you're having to keep track of that. And I can tell you firsthand when you've got all those debtors that you've got to pay, it's just frustrating. It's just a lot to keep track of. And I think you're feeling that. The advice is the same that I would give anybody, regardless of the amount of debt,

regardless of how many debts. What I would tell you to do is list these debts from smallest to largest. So those 30,000, I'd go through each one and be like, all right, what is the smallest balance? And list them from smallest to largest via balance. All right. And then it's like, okay, now we know what it is. We got to pay these off. And the method to pay that off is simple. You got to get cash on it. Do you have any cash saved anywhere? That's not retirement money. I don't. All the cash I've had in savings has kind of dwindled over the last year between my wife going back to school and me kind of supplementing everything. I've been doing the snowball method a little bit. I had about $40,000 in debt just earlier this summer, and I paid off some small $1,500, $2,000 bills, whether it's to

the vet or for furniture or whatnot. So I've kind of taken care of all the small stuff that's now coming towards the bigger credit card. I was going to say, is this the time? It sounds like you got two people in school, you got a wife launching a business and you're working full time. Either one of two things might just have to be true this season that you're gonna finish school and you're gonna pause that your goal is gonna be to get out of school debt-free and then y'all gonna attack this when you get your full-time gig or i just need to take six months off from school i need to take a leave i've had students do that every single semester i took a number of leaves across all my degrees for various things that happened I had a kid wife got sick had to go do this wanted to make some

more money whatever the thing was yeah and just saying I'm gonna go earn 10,000 extra bucks in this semester and get this stuff paid off or 15,000 bucks or whatever I'm like I've got to do or your wife takes full-time work and says I'm just doing the anesthetician stuff on the side as a hobby until that's right but y'all are all trying they're all trying to do everything all the dreams and dude you're i don't want to i don't want to kick you while you're down but 30 000 bucks isn't a ton of debt that's like you and your wife really making some hard calls for a very short 18 months max see what i'm saying like right so tell me what's your world look like if you quit school for a semester?

You pause school. Well, part of the reason why I went back to school is because I get that monthly tax-free stipend. Yeah, but is that just going to school? No, and it goes directly into my bank account. I'm a veteran, so I get a GI Bill housing benefit. It pays me $2,200 a month tax-free and income directly into my bank account. What's happened to that other $5,000 then? I have a very large mortgage.

I owe $470,000 on a mortgage. I've only been in the house for a year and a half. What's the monthly payment? $3,200. Dang it. Okay, now there's the problem right there. Lead with that next time. Well, John, you detected that. Okay, there's your problem right there. Lead with that next time. Well, John, you detected that.

Okay, there's your problem right there. Sell your house, homie. You can't. You're so far above the percentage. I feel like I'm stuck. If I sell my house, I'm going to lose money and go into a rental. That's going to cost me. Well, let's not just be scared of that.

Let's see if that's actually true. So what'd you buy the house for? And what do owe on it and what would it sell for let's let's actually ask those real questions and see if that's true we were renting i was paying $2,500 a month in rent right this was the beginning of 2022 okay i looked into purchasing our home. We found a home, purchased it in May of 2022. Four and a half percent interest. It was roughly all the fees ended up being close to $500,000. Okay. So what do you owe on it? $472,000.

And what can you sell it for? I don't have a locked in estimate. According to my mortgage broker, I need somebody to come out and reevaluate the home to get it up to date. If I'm you, I'm starting to get those numbers and I am holding on as tight as I can for the next few months

because I want you to own it two years so that if you do have a windfall on this, that you're not hit with capital gains. And I want you to seriously consider, like if I was your mama, I'd be like, you better do it. Sell this house. Because it's half of, it's half. It's so much. And you're not, there's not a trajectory that you have shown us that gets you there in the next, even five years. Your wife's building a business, you're in school, the business is not making money

yet, and you're in debt. And I just think that when you get out from under this house, you are going to take a giant deep breath. You don't have any kids yet, right? I have a six-year-old. Okay, you have a six-year-old. So we're finding something, honestly, at this point, anything that's less expensive than the over $3,000 that you're spending right now is going to help you. And you're a veteran brother. So think of it through those eyes, through that lens. When you're faced with a whole bunch of variables and they don't all add up, let's begin to pull variables off the table. Things that we thought were absolutes, they're not. Your wife doesn't have to start a new business right now. You don't have to be in school.

You don't have to be in a big $500,000 house. All these things can come off the table. Let's seek freedom. Let's don't seek to try to make, duct tape this chaos together. Let's seek freedom over all else right now. Today's scripture of the day is Romansans 12 9 love should be shown without pretending hate evil and hold on to what is good the great and powerful jimmy hendrix says when the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace dynamic the best uh all right let's go to Alexandra in San Diego. What's up, Alexandra? Hi, Dr. John.

How's Jay? Thank you guys so much for what you do. Thank you so much for calling. What's up? Hi, so I just have a question about kind of like the mindset issue I'm having with combining finances. So my husband and I have actually been together for a long time. We've been together for 12 years, married for seven. But we never joined our finances.

You know, we were young and we just thought it was smarter to just keep it separate, to avoid any sort of issues. Everything was great for a while. But, you know, the way I was raised is no matter how little you make, you always save, even if it's $5, $10, $20 a paycheck. And the way he was raised was pretty much opposite. They had a lot of money. They blew through it.

He didn't learn how to save. He just learned how to get into debt. So here we are, you know, 11 years into being together. We started having some issues with our marriage where he was just drinking a lot, spending a lot of money even behind my back, racked up credit cards, things like that. So then we came to a point about a couple, maybe like seven, eight months ago to where we had a separation for a little bit. We thought we were done, thought we were getting divorced. But, you know, I guess God brought us back together.

We talked it through. He decided to get sober on his own. Thank God. So it wasn't me telling him like an ultimatum or anything. So now we're at a point where I found Dave Ramsey and I've binge-watched everything. And I want to get to the point where we can kind of start fresh and kind of like almost like renew our vows and what we're going to, you know, have our finances be combined. But my biggest struggle is I've been trying to, I don't have too much money saved. I only have about $25,000 saved, but it's taken me a long time to get it to this point. And I just feel like when I take on his debt, I feel like he committed a crime and I am having to serve the sentence for it. And

I don't know how to get out of that mindset. So that's what I'm calling you for. So number one, thank you for being honest and brave. Okay. I'm grateful for you. Okay. It's been, y'all been through it. Okay. I know y'all are technically still married. You are not ready to be fully committed to doing this thing again yet. Here's why. I'm telling you, you're not. You want to go, you want to get back in the boat, but you want to keep one foot on shore because you're not fully trusting that he's all in.

Or maybe you know that he's all in or it feels like he's all in but your body is reminding you on a daily basis hey we've been through hell before why are you getting back in that boat and the scary thing about loving somebody who struggles with any sort of addiction is that's the one time i might tell you to have your own account is if somebody is struggling with an addiction and they're draining your money. And right. So that's a terrifying moment. And at the same time, I'm telling you, you cannot have a marriage that works long-term unless you go all in, unless you risk getting hurt again. That's the only way marriage works. And you look at, that's what at that's what the word vulnerability means.

I am giving you permission to hurt me. Please don't. Yeah, and I think that's why we kept it separate for so long because he could make all the mess he can want and it never affected me financially. But it did. It affected you in so many ways. It took your soul from you.

It's true. It took everything from you and by the way if y'all are married and he dies it's you can't be like no no no that's his side of the house take that half the couch this is how it works so you were living in a fantasy you wanted the best part of being married you love being around that guy but you didn't want to deal with the worst part is this guy's not trustworthy and he's not safe. Right. Right. And so here you are.

You've got a moment. The deck is clear. You've got to decide, am I going to go all in? And if I do go all in, what are my parameters for going all in? And that is I will not be in a situation where I'm ever scared again. And one of the things that scares me is not knowing how our money works, what you're spending stuff on, where we're going to end up financially. Am I going to have to work when I'm 92 years old because my husband drank our money away or spent our money away, right?

So it's a matter of, I won't be in a situation where I don't feel safe anymore. And if I don't know where the money is, I don't feel safe. Right. Yeah. And I guess I'm just scared of the future because who knows? I mean, as far as the last six months have been, he's been completely sober and doing so good. He finally got on board with me with the whole Ramsey thing, and we're about to start that together. But you never know when, you know, if in a year,

he might do something behind my back or, like, start drinking again. Yeah, but that's all marriages. The great Esther Perel says the worst part about a marriage is every day is a risk. Every day. You've been married 70 years. You wake up and you're both 90 and I wake up and say,

I love you. Will you love me today? That's marriage. My wife can do something crazy in a year. I can do something crazy. Like that's life. That's it. I've got a close buddy of mine

that was driving his family home from a family weekend and their car rolled over a bunch of times they got out he didn't that's marriage that's life yeah and so i'm also emotionally attached to my money to where like i feel like i'm about to you know i've been saving for like almost 10 years to get to these like lousy 25 000 i'm about to drain it to $1,000 just so he can, you know, I could pay off all of his stupid decisions. It's yours. It's yours. It's not his. And as long as you use that language, then stay

separated. When you're ready to say this is our money, because you can't expect him to join accounts with you, but you're not joining with him on the other side of this thing. If you're in, you gotta be in. And if you're in, it's his debt, and it's your debt. It's y'all's debt.

Okay, well, I think I'm going to – I think I'm – I really want to be all in, but I guess you're right. I just have to just take the risk. Otherwise, there's no other way to find out. Jay, tell me if I'm wrong here. I can't think of another way of going all in than going all in. You've got $25,000. Call your own bluff.

Yeah. How much does he owe? The things I've been looking at, not too much actually, about $11,000 on his car, $2,000 in credit cards left and about $15,000 in student loans. Is he still actively creating debt?

Like is he in the face of you paying these things off? Is he going to go spend more on a credit card? He's been really good. Since he got sober and we had this whole conversation, he started doing Uber. So we both go to school, we both work full time, but he also started doing, you know, the Uber and Lyft at the same time. So he's working 14 hour days and he got his credit card down

from like $15,000 down to $2,000. So he's helping. He's busting it. down from like 15,000 down to two. And you know, so he's helping, he's busting it. He's helping. You're just afraid. Isn't the, the drinking you're afraid he's going to go back to fall back into that. Or actually surprisingly not worried about him.

Relapse relapsing. I'm more, this is about your money time. This is Alexander. This is about your, this is about your money. It is. I'm just so attached to it because I worked so hard to earn it that i don't want to you know just pretty much see it all go are you is it worth your marriage no absolutely not i i gotta say i feel like we're

talking a lot about him but i feel like now it's you alexander it's you i feel like now you're i hate to say it like this but i feel like now the problem has shifted over to maybe now you're the problem. Y'all both are the problem, but you're both the solution. You've got to decide is this is holding your secret, holding your little pacifier blankie that you feel like keeps you safe is worth your merit. And if it is, have the courage to look him in the eye and say, you're not worth $24,000 and be done with it let him let him go and otherwise say i'm all in i've been asking you to be all in i'm looking at a changed man you changed your entire life he changed his friend

circle he changed his is the way his body copes with stress and rejection and fear he's working 17 jobs to pay his debts off. Why don't you join him and be all in? Because he sounds like he is now. Yeah, no, it's totally worth it. I'm definitely leaning towards that way. It just sucks to have to come over from scratch. Hey, you can't lean.

You can't lean at the altar. You jump. You jump. I go all in. And no one here is saying it's easy. No one here is saying it's easy. No one here is saying it's easy. Hey, you could call us back in three weeks and this could have ended terribly. That's a risk.

That's what love is. That's what marriage is. That's what friendship is. That's what work is. It's all a risk. You just got to ask yourself, is he worth that risk? And more importantly, are you worth that risk? And I think the answer is yes.

I do too. I do too. I think the answer is yes. I do too. I do too. I think the answer is yes. Alright, I want to thank Jade and all the guys in the booth. Jade, it's a good time. I feel like we're best friends now. I was about to say. I've got a new best friend. And I only have zero best friends, so I've got one now.

That's fantastic. And America, I want to thank you for listening. Thanks for being with us. Be kind to one another. Take care of your money. Take care of your neighbors. We'll see you soon.