Mudfisher

She is visciously accusing me of being over controlling and not trusting and treating her unfairly. As if I chose this.

Much wailing and gnashing of teeth today over changing my online passwords so she can't access our bank accounts. I gave her $200 cash yesterday. She demands full access to our accts. I will figure out some kind of plan to put money In her acct, but I'm working a 14 hr shift today followed by 6 hours off and then back for another 18 hr double shift on Monday. There is no way I'm going to give her access to our main accts again. I can't keep getting burned. But she is VERY angry about taking away her access. We have a counseling session set up in 10 days.

I need to see a shrink? Or I need to go with her??? The church counselor we were seeing is a licensed psychotherapist who Initially started seeing my wife for post partum depression and anxiety after our last child. The spending was a pre existing issue, but the depression and anxiety were new issues. 10+ years of marriage has shown me she is not interested in saving a dime for the future. If there is ANY money in our acct she already has a "plan" or two in her head on what to spend it on, down to the last penny, even if she doesn't actually spend it. Trips to Disneyland, furniture, new cars, inviting family to fly out and stay with us, etc.

This was a hot topic of the argument today: We recently sold a bunk bed set we no longer needed after moving, and got $350 for it. She has been wanting to buy a new computer desk with that money. We have a computer table already, we don't need a new one, she admits she just wants a nicer one. I have resisted because we don't NEED to buy brand new furniture for our rental house. Especially considering our credit card debt. This really upsets her even though we've talked about it a lot. She argues she worked really hard to sell the bunk bed set on craigslist and she deserves to have something nice for once seeing how it won't "cost" anything. Basically a trade. I asked her if for one second she considered using that $350 to pay off part of the credit card debt we owe. She said she had not, and she does not think the money should be used to pay down the debt. Then I explained that the only way for us to pay down the debt is for me to do it. When she screws up, I am the one that pays the price to fix it, literally, and also physically and emotionally (working two full time jobs and never being home). She immediately got defensive and said I'm equally to blame and that it's just as hard for her because when I'm gone working 2 full time jobs she is basically a single parent also working twice as hard. She also accused me today of having an affair. She did this last year too when I first started my 2nd full time job and worked crazy hours. Somehow me working my tail off equals, in her mind, me having an affair. ??? I have read a lot of other posts here about the behavior of spouses with addictions. It seems it's very common for the addict to lash out and accuse the responsible spouse of all kinds of things, including being controlling and not trusting. It's like my wife is trying to find a fault in me so that she can justify her behavior. With my wife's relapse, do we start over at step one controlling access to money? Or do we start half way somewhere? Taking away her access to our money and accts is like performing an exorcism, she is fighting it and grasping and lashing out at me.

Our counselor had me completely remove my wife from every acct at first, new passwords, etc. I gave her caSh only, per the counselor. After a month the counselor had my wife open her own separate bank acct so I could transfer money to her debit card. After a few months my wife started transfering money herself from my acct to hers for family related expenses as long as she notified me immediately, approved by the counselor. Next step was she was allowed to borrow my card for gas, and school clothes shopping because it was easier than all these silly transfers between accts when I was working so many long hours. She was doing good. Then we short sold our house (due to the housing market bubble) and moved. She did good the first month, then started spending more than necessary last month and we had an argument over it. She started taking my card out of my wallet without telling me at all, and transfering money from my acct to hers like crazy. And here we are. Our lds counselor's plan was to ease my wife back into a trustful partnership, and each step was approved by her when I went to her sessions once a month. I'm no expert at this. I do not want these restrictions. I hate being a parent to her. I hate fighting. Am I doing this right? I don't know, I'm not supposed to have to do it this way, I have no idea! I'm just trying to do what our counselor and pretty much every expert ssys to do. I came home today and she was very upset with me because I changed all my passwords again etc. She says I am controlling and make her beg for money. She puts the blame on me for not being a partner etc, basically emotionally kicking and screaming for taking away her access. The argument went just like all the other ones. She blamed ME for being so busy working all the time, and said I should worry more about fixing her than fixing the $12,000 in credit card debt. She wants us to both go back to our old lds counselor 1.5 hours drive each way. While I'm not against it, I really don't want to spend one of my only 2 days off next week doing that. I will of course if it will save our marriage, but at the same time we just go round and round in this cycle of spending and counseling. I have no intention of involving our kids, I just meant cutting waaaay back on Christmas. Should I cancel our anniversary bed n breakfast trip coming up? If I do, she will blame me for intentionally trying to hurt her emotionally and for punishing her. She will blame me. I worked 18 hours yesterday, came home to argue, and only ended up with 4 hours sleep. That's about 8 hours sleep over 3 days of back to back double shifts. Yesterday I had to get up extra early to go to the bank and undo the hold on my acct due to too many transfers (from my wife).

I worked so much the past two months, and she was previously doing well not spending, I thought I would surprise her with something nice, an anniversary gift: new upgraded smartphones and a planned overnighter at a nice bed and breakfast with a babysitter arranged for the kids at home. I made all the arrangements and told her a few weeks early. Only now to discover she wasted $1900 in the last 3 weeks. I'm discusted now at the thought of spending even more money on her.Am I justified cancelling the reservations? Should I cancel Christmas gifts for the family this year since gifts are a luxery and paying off her debt is a necessity? I am SO ANGRY!

I wrote here a year ago about missing 4 months of tithing due to my wife's financial recklessness. Married 12 years, several kids. Basically she spent all my money, maxed our credit cards, and even obtained secret credit cards totaling $12,000. We saw the bishop and worked the tithing out. He set us up with an LDS counselor and encouraged us to pay for part of the cost. We attended counseling together a few times and then she went alone for 9 months. Things improved. We separated finances etc per the therapist. I pay all the bills etc and I transfer $ into her separate acct for gas etc. We got back on track financially, with some minor setbacks. We since moved to a new area and she has attended the church addiction recovery class every week (spending addiction). Fast forward to today. I work two jobs now to pay off our debt burden do I am very busy and rarely home, often too exhausted to attend church. I just realized my wife spent $1900 from Nov 1 to Nov 20 (yesterday). She has been taking my debit card without permission and going shopping for completely unnessesary stuff. And she has been logging onto my acct online and transfering money into her acct. Zero of that $1900 was for groceries or bills. When confronted she could not tell me what she spent it on. No major purchases. I did not notice the spending because I was working so much I didn't have time to keep up. That $ was going to be used to pay off her credit card debt and go towards our "savings". Besides the obvious betrayal of trust, I am beyond livid that she blew so much money that I worked so hard for. I love her. But I can't go on like this. I'm working 2 full time jobs to support her addiction, and I'm done. We didn't have time to really discuss this yesterday because I had to work back to back double shifts. We argued for a half hour and I had to leave. I don't even know where to go from here. I have never spoken of divorce because that's not what I want, but I think it's time to have that discussion. I am dreading going home tomorrow and having to deal with this. I'm so tired of this. I have forgiven her for her faults repeatedly, but this repetitive cycle of her messing up and I have to pay the consequences (literally) has got to stop. I've already wasted far too much of my life working overtime to correct her overspending. This has been the direct cause of many arguments over and over again. I have missed large portions of my children's childhoods (holding babies, attending little league games, FHE, tucking kids into bed, being home for dinner, etc) because I'm always at work. Meanwhile I usually sacrifice my needs and wants so I can work overtime. I HATE living this way. Pray for us!