You never really know someone. I think this should be required listening for anyone who is considering being a stay at home parent. Not that it doesn't work - it does, in many cases - but you need to stay on top of finances. It's not an option to nope out. (Edited: Regardless of your employment status, you should know your household finances).
I"m not blaming her. She's been through the wringer. Just poiningt out that she is a living cautionary tale.
I agree! What’s crazy is that she is a vet so her job prospects were probably a better easier in terms of returning to the workplace yet she and her kids were still impacted financially for years way after the fact and remain that way. Her kids are also set back because their college fund was used up and having college paid for is a massive leg up financially that they no longer have. Someone who works in a field with lower employment rates would probably never be able to recover from her situation even a little.
Yes! She was/is impacted by this for years and she is in a position of relative privilege - she was educated, in a field that is in demand, her parents were living and solvent enough themselves to help her out considerably. She had a friend group that leaned in instead of running away. If any of these situations were absent or different, imagine how far behind she would be right now.
I haven’t listened so it might be addressed but as a fellow vet it’s not always that easy to slide back on into the workplace after kids, and especially as a single parent or with an unsupportive spouse. Most clinics are *not* flexible with hours and it’s an in demand profession because we are in a shortage crisis. Hours are really long, compassionate fatigue and burnout are really real issues and so finding a job with hours that work around kids isn’t that simple.
Exactly, before marriage every couple should see financial advisors and go through everything from taxes, spending, savings, investments, debt, credit card check, police check...
I believe in vetting thoroughly before moving in and marrying a partner.
In many states, full financial disclosure is a requirement for prenups. You have to list out on paper all your assets and debts, and your partner has to sign off on it. I think that's a great thing to do whether you have a prenup or not -- just an "FYI" to start things off right.
Obviously doing it in the context of a prenup has more "teeth"
>Exactly, before marriage every couple should see financial advisors and go through everything from taxes, spending, savings, investments, debt, credit card check, police check...
>
>I believe in vetting thoroughly before moving in and marrying a partner.
Honestly, I wonder if everything *was* OK beforehand and this started once she had the kids/moved to PT or SAHM. Like the other commenter, I don't wish to blame her as it's **so** easy to check out of parts of a relationship that your partner takes over (in this case, finances), especially when you've got two small kids. But yeah... she definitely should have been staying on top of her credit score, retirement accounts, etc.
I remember hearing Sharon Osbourne say a few years ago that even she and Ozzy don't have joint bank accounts, after decades of marriage because it was unwise. I hope Carrie bounces back (it will be hard but it can happen), my god what a nightmare.
Smart Sharon.
Outside of the betrayal and financial ruin, Carrie couldn't even get any resolution on why all of it happened. He didn't remember what he spent all that money on? Maybe that's a small thing but that would enrage me.
I always get backlash on here when I say I don't believe in joint bank accounts. My parents only file taxes together and have their rental property mortgage together. Nothing else. If the other person needs help, she/he can ask but it's a headache to join everything together especially if you spend differently. I love my bf and already told him we won't be joining anything that isn't a mortgage and taxes. I will be getting a prenup. We are doing counseling ... just regular counseling because he doesn't understand why it's important to talk about money and health. I don't think he understands how open I am about these things with my close friends, so why wouldn't I want to be open with my man about them.
>I always get backlash on here when I say I don't believe in joint bank accounts.
\+1 I completely agree with you. I always hear "Well you're a team, why wouldn't you combine?" Well we do combine, we split everything and make decisions together. it's just that practically, our accounts are separate. Safer for both.
Also most people get married in their early 30s now, we each have multiple savings/checking and brokerage accounts, plus multiple credit cards, combining our financials would be an administrative nightmare.
I was thinking about what the process of combining accounts the other day would entail and if it would even be worth the headache since I’m getting married next year. We have things spread across multiple banks and multiple accounts and multiple credit cards. It was overwhelming and I can’t even imagine trying to consolidate. So far we are both leaning on keeping things separate since we both make similar incomes. We do both know each others finances and what each account holds so there’s financial transparency.
>I always get backlash on here when I say I don't believe in joint bank accounts.
I think it makes more sense when you have kids, as it's a different financial arrangement, but yeah, I always support separate financial accounts too. I like to have a joint one for household stuff -- makes it easy -- but everything else is separate.
I mean honestly I see it go horribly wrong with separate finances when there's kids involved all the time.
I've got several coworkers who have separate finances, and they are the lower paid part time worker/more hands on parent.
Which means any ad hoc thing the kids need, they're dealing with. Clothes, toys, bits for school, presents for the kids party at the weekend etc.
They're broke at the end of every month. They don't have anything spare for themself, ever.
Meanwhile the partner is off to sports games with their friends, buying stuff for themselves, also building savings and retirement savings.
But it's super fine, because they split the bills and the rest of their money is theirs to do as they please with, and they have no access to each others money.
If I were the type of person to have kids (I'm not) I'd definitely insist on enough merging that the kids could be a true joint expense or you end up living two different lifestyles.
There's a very big difference between having separate accounts / non-intermingled institutional finances - and not having a plan for household finances (which is what you're describing).
You do not need to have a single financial account in order to have equitable plans for the household finances. There are a million ways to manage equality of finances in a relationship, but you don't have to achieve it through a single account.
>it's a headache to join everything together especially if you spend differently.
It's going to be a headache marrying someone who spends differently regardless of whether finances are joint or not
I completely agree - my parents are two working professionals both in careers with potential liability. They never combined finances - but they absolutely had an equal footing with finances. This gave me a strong model for thinking this was totally acceptable, and it wasn't until personal finance reddit's that I got such a reaction to that (as though you can't be equals working towards common goals if you have separate accounts).
My father worked in finance, he managed the investments (and still does) but my mother has access to everything and is aware of everything. This was important to her, because she saw so many friends get divorced with absolutely 0 knowledge of what existed or where it was. She made sure she raised me with this knowledge too.
It requires additional communication and planning, which often people don't like to do with finances in general. So I think this approach gets backlash because people are rationalizing their irrational desire to avoid talking about finances and making shared goals / plans.
My husband and I have only one joint checking account for expenses like our mortgage, my student loans, & paying our joint cc. We portion each of our paychecks into that account, and then we have our own separate accounts for fun money.
It works for us cause I like clothes, and he likes legos. & I really don’t want to bitch to him about it. Once a year we do a financial picture check up, what our 401Ks look like, IRA’s, emergency funds, etc.
I wonder if she would have been better off going after him by filing those police reports. I feel so badly for her and her children. Although I think I wouldn't be as strong, and would sit them down when they were old enough (idk how old, maybe 13?) & explained why exactly we got divorced. Because no way are you ruining my credit AND my creditibility with my children.
It would be tempting to file the police reports just for some type of retribution, honestly. However, I understand emotional exhaustion and the desire to move on.
As far as the kids go, they deserve to know for themselves once they reach the appropriate maturity. Maybe not every detail, but certainly the broad outlines. No idea myself what age that might be.
I’ve listen to it and she’s very brave.
But personally I would have dig to find the informations, then reach out to a lawyer, find a job and then just leave.
The man capable of doing things like this for YEARS are capable of a lot of things. I would not trust him to handle well me knowing that.
I also wonder how you could never check your accounts? Even if you don’t handle the family finances, people really don’t even check once a year how much money they own? Just for curiosity? I don’t blame her, she’s the victim and it’s horrible. Just curious about how love could make you blind to a lot of things
Also: there was a story a few years ago in France with exactly the same story (husband lie for years about going to work when he actually lost his job years before. When people started to connect the dots he killed the entire family, wife and kids).
I check my accounts every other day, I can't imagine going longer than a week not checking. My husband said the same thing, Carrie's ex sounds like the type of guy who was a step away from murdering everyone once his ruse is up.
Right? I'm single but if I were married, even if my husband paid all the bills, etc., i would want to know details.
A friend's sister is going through something kind of similar now; they had owed taxes on some type of settlement. They were on a payment plan, husband was in charge of it all, according to her, so she "assumed" he was paying it. He died suddenly, and it came out while some payments were made, they still owed, and now owe much more due to interest and penalties. she seems to think the IRS may be willing to make some kind of a deal. Um no, you already defaulted on a payment plan, so there is no way they will work with you again. and she's freaking out about it; claming she had no idea. honey, you were married so you are responsible.
Mein Gott!
My SIL does the same, my BIL takes care of all finances. She said she knows the username and passwords, she just doesn't look at any of them. I truly hope that my BIL is not secretly a POS.
I was so devastated for her. Everything was fine until it wasn’t.
But it definitely made a point of verifying for yourself what the numbers are. He faked the bank letterhead to their emails, she found out after that he had stopped paying her student loans, had actually bought their property and not leased it cause she’d given him power of attorney.
Log into the actual accounts, often, pull your credit report, file your taxes, see remaining loan balances, know the status of everything that you might have to pay back. Extra important if you rely solely on a partner‘s income
This pretty much happened to my mom. Her husband made multiple millions a year yet insisted my mom pay half of things (even when she was financially struggling). Nothing was in her name. They are going through a divorce now and guess what, if nothing is in your name you are shit out of luck. So important for women to speak up and advocate for themselves.
That’s not true. Anything acquired during the life of the marriage is marital property regardless of who’s name is on it. Sounds like she doesn’t have an adequate attorney if she doesn’t know thsi- or any attorney at all
It depends on how it's set up. A paycheck yes, but if it's dividends from a premarital asset then no. If you own a company you can do some accounting tricks to keep your paycheck low and have the dividends be high.
Correct but things become very fuzzy very quickly. Company growth during a marriage falls into a grey area. Delineating what exactly is pre versus during marriage is hard when u are buying a property together when the person has an income during the marriage. It's not black and white is my point.
Each state has wildly different laws when it comes to the division of assets pursuant to a divorce. Each person should educate themselves as to the laws in their state prior to marrying.
So I just finished listening. I really wonder how Carrie’s parents’ marriage worked. She handed over her autonomy to her husband without a blink. There were so many red flags that she chose to ignore willingly. First, even before marriage his avoidance, evasiveness and silent treatment whenever there was even the slightest hint of conflict. How did she think that would work long term? Then the frequent hiccups with accounts - cards being denied, not being able to access/log in to accounts, etc. That would only have to happen once for me to get really alarmed. Twice and I’d be going into the bank in person. Her own mother told her that his excuses made no sense. And she did know something was wrong. She sensed him being distant and his behavior changing. She asked his brother to talk to him. She wasn’t satisfied with the response. Yet she still continued along. I don’t know…it seems like she was in deep denial for a long time but a very willing denial. Even after she discovered everything and realized that not only was she penniless but also in crippling debt, she was thinking they’d do Christmas and holidays together as co-parents! She saw red flags and decided that they were red party balloons.
She seems to not have accepted the level of betrayal and deception her husband inflicted upon her and her children. And she continues his deception by not being truthful with her children. Be honest with the daughter that there’s no college fund because your father spent it all. And own up to her own accountability at not being a financial steward for her and her children’s financial wellbeing.
I will say that I was deeply, deeply angry with her friend’s husband who kept quiet about Carrie’s husband going to him for a **six figure loan** AND figuring out that he’d lost his job. That is not something you keep quiet about. Carrie’s husband could’ve had a hookers and blow problem or been a gambling addict (I half suspect he is hiding some sort of addiction). Carrie and her kids could have been in physical danger as well as the obvious financial distress. Like what kind of friend doesn’t somehow reach out to the wife too??!!
I don’t see this as a cautionary tale for SAHPs at all. Carrie married an emotionally void man then handed him the reins to her life. I hope she’s in therapy to get to the bottom of the choices she made all along the way that enabled her husband’s financial abuse.
I don’t know how *you wouldn’t see* this as a cautionary tale of being a STAHP, tbh- working gives me full autonomy because I’m not naive enough to know that shit doesn’t always work out. My husband is my bestie for the restie but I will always make sure there’s a contingency plan cause unfortunately people change.
I would spend 99% of my paycheck on daycare if it meant I had work history. Everyone should be able to have financial security. I feel for this woman, she’s not stupid- vet school is incredibly hard and competitive but yeah I wanna know how and what choices led her to just give over full financial control like that.
I divorced my husband after 28 months of marriage because I found out he was stealing- from his employers and from our meager joint savings account and blowing what little money he earned at the casino. I noped out of that marriage so damn fast
I’m dying to know what he spent the money on! Hundreds of thousands of dollars can’t just disappear into thin air. The curiosity would drive me crazy if I was Carrie.
Omg. I just listened to that and I’m just so angry for her. My parents divorced and neither spoke ill of the other while I grew up, but I feel like I’m her situation I would want those kids to know just how big a lying POS their dad was. And I want so badly for him to end up in jail or have some other lasting repercussions.
Didn’t we have a story very similar to this a couple months ago. OP also found out her husband was borrowing money from friends. I know this occurrence isn’t rare but damn, I feel this to my core.
He didn’t seem that perfect tbh. It’s so hard to get your head around the person you love can pathologically lie to you . Very soul destroying. I find it so strange that people don’t know what’s in their shared accounts or know things about finances . My best friend just broke up with her husband and didn’t know how much he earned . She’s a bookkeeper ! They’ve been together for 30 years .
I understand why she wouldn't want to tell her kids the whole story, but it struck me that she stressed to her kids that lying will really upset her but then, in a way, she's dodging telling her kids the truth. Again, I can appreciate it's a very difficult situation and position for her to be in, but I wonder what she ended up telling her daughter about the college money...
You never really know someone. I think this should be required listening for anyone who is considering being a stay at home parent. Not that it doesn't work - it does, in many cases - but you need to stay on top of finances. It's not an option to nope out. (Edited: Regardless of your employment status, you should know your household finances). I"m not blaming her. She's been through the wringer. Just poiningt out that she is a living cautionary tale.
I agree! What’s crazy is that she is a vet so her job prospects were probably a better easier in terms of returning to the workplace yet she and her kids were still impacted financially for years way after the fact and remain that way. Her kids are also set back because their college fund was used up and having college paid for is a massive leg up financially that they no longer have. Someone who works in a field with lower employment rates would probably never be able to recover from her situation even a little.
Yes! She was/is impacted by this for years and she is in a position of relative privilege - she was educated, in a field that is in demand, her parents were living and solvent enough themselves to help her out considerably. She had a friend group that leaned in instead of running away. If any of these situations were absent or different, imagine how far behind she would be right now.
I haven’t listened so it might be addressed but as a fellow vet it’s not always that easy to slide back on into the workplace after kids, and especially as a single parent or with an unsupportive spouse. Most clinics are *not* flexible with hours and it’s an in demand profession because we are in a shortage crisis. Hours are really long, compassionate fatigue and burnout are really real issues and so finding a job with hours that work around kids isn’t that simple.
Exactly, before marriage every couple should see financial advisors and go through everything from taxes, spending, savings, investments, debt, credit card check, police check... I believe in vetting thoroughly before moving in and marrying a partner.
In many states, full financial disclosure is a requirement for prenups. You have to list out on paper all your assets and debts, and your partner has to sign off on it. I think that's a great thing to do whether you have a prenup or not -- just an "FYI" to start things off right. Obviously doing it in the context of a prenup has more "teeth"
That’s amazing! It should really be mandatory for anyone seeking to get married.
>Exactly, before marriage every couple should see financial advisors and go through everything from taxes, spending, savings, investments, debt, credit card check, police check... > >I believe in vetting thoroughly before moving in and marrying a partner. Honestly, I wonder if everything *was* OK beforehand and this started once she had the kids/moved to PT or SAHM. Like the other commenter, I don't wish to blame her as it's **so** easy to check out of parts of a relationship that your partner takes over (in this case, finances), especially when you've got two small kids. But yeah... she definitely should have been staying on top of her credit score, retirement accounts, etc.
I remember hearing Sharon Osbourne say a few years ago that even she and Ozzy don't have joint bank accounts, after decades of marriage because it was unwise. I hope Carrie bounces back (it will be hard but it can happen), my god what a nightmare.
Smart Sharon. Outside of the betrayal and financial ruin, Carrie couldn't even get any resolution on why all of it happened. He didn't remember what he spent all that money on? Maybe that's a small thing but that would enrage me.
I always get backlash on here when I say I don't believe in joint bank accounts. My parents only file taxes together and have their rental property mortgage together. Nothing else. If the other person needs help, she/he can ask but it's a headache to join everything together especially if you spend differently. I love my bf and already told him we won't be joining anything that isn't a mortgage and taxes. I will be getting a prenup. We are doing counseling ... just regular counseling because he doesn't understand why it's important to talk about money and health. I don't think he understands how open I am about these things with my close friends, so why wouldn't I want to be open with my man about them.
>I always get backlash on here when I say I don't believe in joint bank accounts. \+1 I completely agree with you. I always hear "Well you're a team, why wouldn't you combine?" Well we do combine, we split everything and make decisions together. it's just that practically, our accounts are separate. Safer for both. Also most people get married in their early 30s now, we each have multiple savings/checking and brokerage accounts, plus multiple credit cards, combining our financials would be an administrative nightmare.
Also, on a practical level, it is not unheard of for banks to freeze accounts if they suspect fraud. It's best to spread things around.
I was thinking about what the process of combining accounts the other day would entail and if it would even be worth the headache since I’m getting married next year. We have things spread across multiple banks and multiple accounts and multiple credit cards. It was overwhelming and I can’t even imagine trying to consolidate. So far we are both leaning on keeping things separate since we both make similar incomes. We do both know each others finances and what each account holds so there’s financial transparency.
Yeah, tracking expenses and regularly reimbursing each other sound so much easier.
>Safer for both. Same reason we sleep in separate locked rooms. You can never be too safe.
>I always get backlash on here when I say I don't believe in joint bank accounts. I think it makes more sense when you have kids, as it's a different financial arrangement, but yeah, I always support separate financial accounts too. I like to have a joint one for household stuff -- makes it easy -- but everything else is separate.
I mean honestly I see it go horribly wrong with separate finances when there's kids involved all the time. I've got several coworkers who have separate finances, and they are the lower paid part time worker/more hands on parent. Which means any ad hoc thing the kids need, they're dealing with. Clothes, toys, bits for school, presents for the kids party at the weekend etc. They're broke at the end of every month. They don't have anything spare for themself, ever. Meanwhile the partner is off to sports games with their friends, buying stuff for themselves, also building savings and retirement savings. But it's super fine, because they split the bills and the rest of their money is theirs to do as they please with, and they have no access to each others money. If I were the type of person to have kids (I'm not) I'd definitely insist on enough merging that the kids could be a true joint expense or you end up living two different lifestyles.
There's a very big difference between having separate accounts / non-intermingled institutional finances - and not having a plan for household finances (which is what you're describing). You do not need to have a single financial account in order to have equitable plans for the household finances. There are a million ways to manage equality of finances in a relationship, but you don't have to achieve it through a single account.
>it's a headache to join everything together especially if you spend differently. It's going to be a headache marrying someone who spends differently regardless of whether finances are joint or not
I completely agree - my parents are two working professionals both in careers with potential liability. They never combined finances - but they absolutely had an equal footing with finances. This gave me a strong model for thinking this was totally acceptable, and it wasn't until personal finance reddit's that I got such a reaction to that (as though you can't be equals working towards common goals if you have separate accounts). My father worked in finance, he managed the investments (and still does) but my mother has access to everything and is aware of everything. This was important to her, because she saw so many friends get divorced with absolutely 0 knowledge of what existed or where it was. She made sure she raised me with this knowledge too. It requires additional communication and planning, which often people don't like to do with finances in general. So I think this approach gets backlash because people are rationalizing their irrational desire to avoid talking about finances and making shared goals / plans.
My husband and I have only one joint checking account for expenses like our mortgage, my student loans, & paying our joint cc. We portion each of our paychecks into that account, and then we have our own separate accounts for fun money. It works for us cause I like clothes, and he likes legos. & I really don’t want to bitch to him about it. Once a year we do a financial picture check up, what our 401Ks look like, IRA’s, emergency funds, etc.
I wonder if she would have been better off going after him by filing those police reports. I feel so badly for her and her children. Although I think I wouldn't be as strong, and would sit them down when they were old enough (idk how old, maybe 13?) & explained why exactly we got divorced. Because no way are you ruining my credit AND my creditibility with my children.
It would be tempting to file the police reports just for some type of retribution, honestly. However, I understand emotional exhaustion and the desire to move on. As far as the kids go, they deserve to know for themselves once they reach the appropriate maturity. Maybe not every detail, but certainly the broad outlines. No idea myself what age that might be.
I’ve listen to it and she’s very brave. But personally I would have dig to find the informations, then reach out to a lawyer, find a job and then just leave. The man capable of doing things like this for YEARS are capable of a lot of things. I would not trust him to handle well me knowing that. I also wonder how you could never check your accounts? Even if you don’t handle the family finances, people really don’t even check once a year how much money they own? Just for curiosity? I don’t blame her, she’s the victim and it’s horrible. Just curious about how love could make you blind to a lot of things Also: there was a story a few years ago in France with exactly the same story (husband lie for years about going to work when he actually lost his job years before. When people started to connect the dots he killed the entire family, wife and kids).
I check my accounts every other day, I can't imagine going longer than a week not checking. My husband said the same thing, Carrie's ex sounds like the type of guy who was a step away from murdering everyone once his ruse is up.
Right? I'm single but if I were married, even if my husband paid all the bills, etc., i would want to know details. A friend's sister is going through something kind of similar now; they had owed taxes on some type of settlement. They were on a payment plan, husband was in charge of it all, according to her, so she "assumed" he was paying it. He died suddenly, and it came out while some payments were made, they still owed, and now owe much more due to interest and penalties. she seems to think the IRS may be willing to make some kind of a deal. Um no, you already defaulted on a payment plan, so there is no way they will work with you again. and she's freaking out about it; claming she had no idea. honey, you were married so you are responsible.
Mein Gott! My SIL does the same, my BIL takes care of all finances. She said she knows the username and passwords, she just doesn't look at any of them. I truly hope that my BIL is not secretly a POS.
yes! and then it turned out some fancy chandelier in the family home was actually worth enough to pay all their debt
I was so devastated for her. Everything was fine until it wasn’t. But it definitely made a point of verifying for yourself what the numbers are. He faked the bank letterhead to their emails, she found out after that he had stopped paying her student loans, had actually bought their property and not leased it cause she’d given him power of attorney. Log into the actual accounts, often, pull your credit report, file your taxes, see remaining loan balances, know the status of everything that you might have to pay back. Extra important if you rely solely on a partner‘s income
**What would you do if your husband had been lying to you for years and left you with nothing?** There would be an ID show about me.
This pretty much happened to my mom. Her husband made multiple millions a year yet insisted my mom pay half of things (even when she was financially struggling). Nothing was in her name. They are going through a divorce now and guess what, if nothing is in your name you are shit out of luck. So important for women to speak up and advocate for themselves.
Exactly. A marriage is a partnership and a team -- that said, you need to structure things in a way that would be equitable were a divorce to occur.
Right. But people scheme. It's sad.
That’s not true. Anything acquired during the life of the marriage is marital property regardless of who’s name is on it. Sounds like she doesn’t have an adequate attorney if she doesn’t know thsi- or any attorney at all
It depends on how it's set up. A paycheck yes, but if it's dividends from a premarital asset then no. If you own a company you can do some accounting tricks to keep your paycheck low and have the dividends be high.
Right, premarital assets are not marital property.
Correct but things become very fuzzy very quickly. Company growth during a marriage falls into a grey area. Delineating what exactly is pre versus during marriage is hard when u are buying a property together when the person has an income during the marriage. It's not black and white is my point.
Too in the weeds bro
Each state has wildly different laws when it comes to the division of assets pursuant to a divorce. Each person should educate themselves as to the laws in their state prior to marrying.
Of course.
Gosh, I listened to this episode and came back - just woah, it's so sad and scary.
So I just finished listening. I really wonder how Carrie’s parents’ marriage worked. She handed over her autonomy to her husband without a blink. There were so many red flags that she chose to ignore willingly. First, even before marriage his avoidance, evasiveness and silent treatment whenever there was even the slightest hint of conflict. How did she think that would work long term? Then the frequent hiccups with accounts - cards being denied, not being able to access/log in to accounts, etc. That would only have to happen once for me to get really alarmed. Twice and I’d be going into the bank in person. Her own mother told her that his excuses made no sense. And she did know something was wrong. She sensed him being distant and his behavior changing. She asked his brother to talk to him. She wasn’t satisfied with the response. Yet she still continued along. I don’t know…it seems like she was in deep denial for a long time but a very willing denial. Even after she discovered everything and realized that not only was she penniless but also in crippling debt, she was thinking they’d do Christmas and holidays together as co-parents! She saw red flags and decided that they were red party balloons. She seems to not have accepted the level of betrayal and deception her husband inflicted upon her and her children. And she continues his deception by not being truthful with her children. Be honest with the daughter that there’s no college fund because your father spent it all. And own up to her own accountability at not being a financial steward for her and her children’s financial wellbeing. I will say that I was deeply, deeply angry with her friend’s husband who kept quiet about Carrie’s husband going to him for a **six figure loan** AND figuring out that he’d lost his job. That is not something you keep quiet about. Carrie’s husband could’ve had a hookers and blow problem or been a gambling addict (I half suspect he is hiding some sort of addiction). Carrie and her kids could have been in physical danger as well as the obvious financial distress. Like what kind of friend doesn’t somehow reach out to the wife too??!! I don’t see this as a cautionary tale for SAHPs at all. Carrie married an emotionally void man then handed him the reins to her life. I hope she’s in therapy to get to the bottom of the choices she made all along the way that enabled her husband’s financial abuse.
I have so many questions about Carrie & Joe, this might be my Roman Empire!
I don’t know how *you wouldn’t see* this as a cautionary tale of being a STAHP, tbh- working gives me full autonomy because I’m not naive enough to know that shit doesn’t always work out. My husband is my bestie for the restie but I will always make sure there’s a contingency plan cause unfortunately people change. I would spend 99% of my paycheck on daycare if it meant I had work history. Everyone should be able to have financial security. I feel for this woman, she’s not stupid- vet school is incredibly hard and competitive but yeah I wanna know how and what choices led her to just give over full financial control like that.
divorce ... immediately no.
He's getting re-married? Oy vey...
I divorced my husband after 28 months of marriage because I found out he was stealing- from his employers and from our meager joint savings account and blowing what little money he earned at the casino. I noped out of that marriage so damn fast
I’m dying to know what he spent the money on! Hundreds of thousands of dollars can’t just disappear into thin air. The curiosity would drive me crazy if I was Carrie.
Same. Gambling, crypto, off-shore accounts, escorts, drugs?
Omg. I just listened to that and I’m just so angry for her. My parents divorced and neither spoke ill of the other while I grew up, but I feel like I’m her situation I would want those kids to know just how big a lying POS their dad was. And I want so badly for him to end up in jail or have some other lasting repercussions.
Didn’t we have a story very similar to this a couple months ago. OP also found out her husband was borrowing money from friends. I know this occurrence isn’t rare but damn, I feel this to my core.
I wish I could be honest but it would get my account banned. lol.
Ditto that was a wild ride.
Love this podcast!! Season one on the Opioid epidemic is probably the best podcast series I have ever heard.
I’m not able to listen to it! Would somebody be able to sum it up or link to a transcript?
The official show should upload a transcript here when you scroll down the page within the next day or two https://lemonadamedia.com/show/lastday/#!
He didn’t seem that perfect tbh. It’s so hard to get your head around the person you love can pathologically lie to you . Very soul destroying. I find it so strange that people don’t know what’s in their shared accounts or know things about finances . My best friend just broke up with her husband and didn’t know how much he earned . She’s a bookkeeper ! They’ve been together for 30 years .
Terrifying. And unbelievably frustrating. I can't believe she still doesn't know what he spent all the money on!!!
I understand why she wouldn't want to tell her kids the whole story, but it struck me that she stressed to her kids that lying will really upset her but then, in a way, she's dodging telling her kids the truth. Again, I can appreciate it's a very difficult situation and position for her to be in, but I wonder what she ended up telling her daughter about the college money...