Are These Checks Separate?

Credit

This is my favorite question at a restaurant.  Sometimes, it’s easy.  Other times, it can be awkward. 

When Mr. DDA and I go out on a date, we never get asked this question.  However, if we go out to lunch while he’s in uniform, we get asked the question almost every time.  Like a cop never takes his wife out or something…

I recently heard about a couple who was planning a vacation and I heard the wife say that she had to pay her husband back for her plane ticket.  When you’re married, it’s no longer his money and her money – it’s their money.    I’m a firm believer in this.  I don’t believe married people should have separate finances.

I can’t imagine having to bicker over who has to fill up the tank with gas, who has to buy the groceries, having to buy separate movie tickets.  Marriage isn’t about being fair. Marriage is about combining your lives.

Now, sometimes I understand there are outside circumstances.  Such as trust issues or financial infidelity. But 99.99% of all functional marriages, should combine their income. 

There should be one account that both checks go into and one account that all the checks are written out of. 

While Mr. DDA and I each have our own separate “fun” money, but we have one budget.  He doesn’t pay some of the bills with his check.  We pay them all. 

On the same note, there should be one debt.  Even if you had $0 debt when you were married and your spouse was up to their eyeballs in it – it’s now shared.  Money can go so much further when combined.  And burdens can be so much lighter when shared.

You’re one.  According to God, the law, and the government – you are one entity.   

As in the words of Melanie Smooter Carmichael (aka me,) “But honey, I thought you said, it’s our money.”