Regrets: Not Sharing

We talk about everything. I can't think of a topic that doesn't come up in our household. There's very little that is uncomfortable, including money.

Right now, however, I'm regretting the way we've handled our finances.

For the first few years he did everything. I paid "my" bills, which were few, and he handled all the household stuff.

Then I took everything over. He bounced a check or something and I got pissed and took it all over.

When he was running the show I never had any idea how much recreational money we had. I'd ask to go out and he'd say yes. Later he revealed that the money wasn't there but he didn't want to feel like a tool for telling me we couldn't eat out. Another time he bought a wii for us and an ipod for me within two weeks of each other because there was a surplus in the account.

When I was running the show I kept a tighter fist but it was all about my decisions. I figured out how much we could spend on (insert item here) and that was that. I told him the basic outlines of things and kept him appraised.

This time around we're going to work on this collectively. I think we're going to both have a say in the budget, our goals, our plans, and go from there. Maybe we'll have a meeting twice a month (around paycheck time, perhaps?) to check in and see how things are going.

Many of the mistakes we made could have been avoided if we were both more involved.