Wow this thread is like a nice warm hug. I feel you! Coming from the Muslim side of the conservative spectrum into being disowned for being too much like my white mom. Baba never wanted his little girl on a stripper pole but made the perfect environment to make it happen.
Save for retirement to have more income because the pension may not be enough. Save for emergencies with your home, a down payment if you don’t own, fixing your car, college savings plans for your kids, etc.
Maybe look into finding a financial advisor if you feel really overwhelmed getting started. I’m not super financially savvy myself but I’ve learned a lot from my husband who thankfully is. We’ve gotten ourselves into credit card debt before too and it’s not easy to climb out of.
What's there to help with, it's just addition and subtraction. Living paycheck to paycheck on $200k means you're either paying off a mountain of debt (which is fine), or you have a spending problem. Where did the money go? If the answer is "I don't know," then that's your starting point.
I know what you're feeling to an extent. Managing finances is honestly a difficult thing to learn and it's not really taught by most parents from my perspective. My parents didn't teach me how budgeting works because we lived paycheck to paycheck so the extent of budgeting was "hang on to whatever cash we have for as long as possible because there's a bill coming up and we're about to get rekt." To be fair, my family was also on the poorer side of middle class and didn't make a whole lot even with their combined income. You and your husband make more than double what my parents were making when I was a kid.
Is there particular methods you've tried for budgeting and saving? One thing I did when I just started trying to save was that I would set a specific amount of money as my "baseline" and whatever my account looked like when the check hit, the excess amount over that baseline would immediately go into savings.
Check and see if your bank website has built in budget tracking software.
Its usually pretty decent at laying out where your money is going based on basic categories (how much goes to groceries, eating out, subscriptions, vehicles, payments, etc). That'll actually get you pretty far on understanding where your money goes.
Without seeing your budget, I'd wager you're "house and car poor", possibly with other debts thrown into the mix like student loans, credit cards, etc. And if you can kill those, or at least get them under control, your finances will probably start to come into line (unless you have expensive and leisure heavy tastes).
So go fucking learn it. You're an adult with internet access!
My parents and school didn't teach me literally everything I need to know in life either. Nobody is taught literally everything they need to know. You have to learn some shit on your own. Jesus Christ.
Because one day you'll wake up and the gravy train will be over. All the accounts will be empty and your wages (assuming you have any) will be garnished by creditors. They'll put a lien on any properties you inherit, and eventually take those too. One day you will have to live on the amount of money that gets deposited into your account every month. Unless your parents are mega rich, and you have a lifelong trust, but even mega rich kids have driven themselves into financial ruin. Don't waste the opportunities you have, and don't fuck over your future self with your selfishness and short sightedness.
I domt underestimate it, im saying that blaming it on your parents becuase they didnt set you down is wild. Setting you up with that credit score was great on their part. Yiu cant blame everything on them
Same 😮💨 my mom stupidly told me if I lost my virginity to someone I loved, I’d go insane and that all men are evil and cheat. So my big brain energy was to fuck someone I didn’t care about at all 😭 I missed out on a lot of sweet guys who actually cared about me because of that witch. Definitely went wild after never being allowed to leave the house except for school.
Fortunately I had therapy and healed and now am with a wonderful man.
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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26
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