I Caught My Boyfriend Lying About His Financial Situation

Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. How do I protect my financial future and regain trust now that I know my partner has been very dishonest about his debt? Tell us more and here's what we want to hear. How dishonest and how long ago did you find out? Give us that detail. Sure, sure. So I found out it's been three sets of dishonesty, but the major one was this recently in December. I found out he actually has $65,000 in credit card debt. Okay. And finding this out... How'd you find out? Yeah. Yeah. So I thought he only had $10,000 and so I... Hold on. Did you make that number up or is that what he told you? That is what he told me. Okay. I am a very straight shooter. I'm older, so dating, I hit the high points very early on and he told me he had $10,000 in credit card debt. So I was like, okay, that's workable. So he lied to your face? Come to find out. Yeah. Okay. All right. Yeah. So I thought we were going to spend a future together and get married. So my Christmas gift was, I'm going to pay off your $10,000 credit cards. And so I went into his open desktop and found a spreadsheet that actually did not have $10,000, it was $65,000. Okay. And how long ago was this? This was December, because that was going to be my Christmas gift. Are y'all still together? We are still together. All right. When you confronted him, what was that like? Yeah, it was very awkward. He just said he was very embarrassed that he's not where he wanted to be in his life. And he knows I'm the person for him and he didn't want me to run after I found out that truth. And there's some truth to that because you would have. Yeah. Here we are three months later and you're calling us. Yes. But this was already a year into our relationship, I found this out. No, no, no. Like you said, when he told you the number $10,000, you thought, okay, this is manageable. I can settle for him in this way. And so his impulse, what he did was wrong. No question. But his impulse is right. She will judge me based on this debt number and will not give our relationship a shot. And here I am coming after you. Tell me about the integrity of going through his laptop and going through his financial numbers. It was a complete accident. No, my internet went down at my home. I work remote a couple days a week and I'm in an executive level. So I was like, I need internet. I need a quiet office. He was like, just go to mine. And so when I logged in, cause I mean, he gave me his password. I logged in to log into the internet for my meetings and the spreadsheet was there. Okay. So he gave you his computer. Yes. No, I'm not. I was not going, but I couldn't not look. I'm not going to lie once it was there. Yeah. But let's, let's just boil this down. What's what, what do you want John and I to weigh in on? Yeah. I guess a couple of things is one, I get the lie, but I'm very financially in a separate category. Like I pay off $150,000 in student loans. Hold on. You're very, very judgmental. Oh, thanks. That's not good. And you're, you're, you're, you have put yourself on a pedestal and you were looking contempt is one of the four horsemen of the relationship apocalypse, according to the government and contempt is a power hierarchy. I am better than, you know what I'm saying? Like that. I'm okay. You may be right, but I'd like to give her a little more latitude. Okay. Objection denied. Keep going. Keep going. You were going somewhere, but John may be right, but I want to play this out. Keep going. I was just trying to give a background. Cause again, I've met my, I thought I met my person and I'm willing to give up whatever it is to help him, but not when he's not being honest, but it's also being a 35 year old single woman that got her doctorate. I worked 80 hour weeks. I worked four jobs to have someone that's not willing to side hustle the same way. Now that's why John, I wanted to leave. Well, so now John's absolutely right. He got ahead of me, which is not surprising. He has two PhDs. I don't have a degree at all for anybody that's keeping score at home and I'm proud of it and never going to go get it. So I don't care what you think. However, John did catch it, but I think it's for a different reason. I don't think you're judgmental, but I think he's onto something. I'm going to say you're not judgmental, but I think you resent him because you're bringing up how much work you've done. You've busted your tail. You did everything the right way and he's not willing to at least go get a side hustle. I think you're judgmental on his effort and his just overall gumption. Is that right or wrong? Partially, especially when I gift you financial peace and you're not interested. So to me, that's just, then what are we doing here? There's the question. Pay off your credit card debt. I don't know why you're with the guy. Can I be honest with you? I don't know why you're with this guy and I'm going to, it's going to sound awful. I don't know why he's with you. Because here's the thing. Y'all have different beliefs and me and my wife have been married 23 and a half years. We have different beliefs on a thousand different things, but we share values. And y'all don't share values. And somebody can be a great hang. They can be super loyal. They could be somebody you fall in love with, but if you don't share values, you're going to end up starting your marriage in two separate boats, rowing as fast as you can and you're going to end up in separate harbors. I don't think this is the guy. And I don't know if that's why you called. I think I tried to ask you. I don't think that this is a good fit unless he, now listen, I would say this. I, if you haven't told him all of this, now's the time to do the old fashioned DTR, define the relationship, but tell him where your frustrations are and say, those frustrations are leading me to fears that you're not for me. I'd give the guy a shot. And if you want to give him a shot, here's how I would enter that conversation. I have judged you and your work ethic and I've compared it to mine. I've judged how much debt you have. I've judged your lack of caring about it. And I have made my values your problem. Well, again, I, I'm not so much worried about that. I've started counseling with him because again, I'm invested in him, in the relationship. My concern is if we get through the $65,000 debt, is there a way to regain that, that trust about finances? Because I'm Here's how you regain trust. It's very hard, but it's very simple. You give him a map that is 14 days long on what he needs to do to help regain trust. That might be, I want to see your credit report. That might be on all your social media accounts, any number of things. You get to make up the path and he gets to decide whether he wants to walk that journey or not. And after 14 days, y'all reconvene and you commit. If you walk this path, I'm not going to keep, keep your lack of the, you know, your dishonesty in my back pocket as an ace that I can play at any time. I'm going to commit to trusting you as we move forward slowly and slowly, step by step. So 14 days, then another 14 days and another 30 days, another 60 days, we're going to give him a roadmap and give him a chance to follow it. Create your free every dollar budget today. The simplest way to budget for your life.