The Hardest Decisions Are Often About Money & Relationships
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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create real, actual, amazing relationships. I'm Jade Warshaw, your host, your other host today, Dr. John Warshaw.

He is the author of Building a Non-Anxious Life. He is also the host of the Dr. John Deloney Show, which is popping off, if I do say so myself. We'll be taking your calls. The number is 888-825-5225. Get in where you fit in, and we'll give you the best advice

advice that we can muster up for you. Dude, get in where you fit in. Get in where you fit in. What's that from? That's a t-shirt right there. It is. I don't know where I got that from. I like that. All right, let's do it. Let's chop it up. We got Jacob in Dallas, Texas. What's going on? Hey, can you guys hear me? We can.

Awesome. I love your guys' show. John, absolutely love your show. Been a long-time listener. Thanks, man. Appreciate you, dude. What's up? Yeah, so got a two-part question for you. This might not be as much of a money question as it is a relational question, so...

Do with it what you will. My wife and I moved to Dallas around five months ago, and it's been super rough since we got here. We're finally getting our feet underneath us. We both got jobs. She got a job in marketing, and I'm in the end stages of my background investigation with a local police department in the area.

We are on track with the baby steps, doing all this stuff. And she's having a really hard time at her job and her boss is being a real jerk. And I don't know my place as her husband where it crosses the line for me to step in and speak to him. A little bit of background so you guys know what I'm talking about. He is a very...

stubborn guy. She's running a business for him or he's trying to market this new product and

essentially start up a business and he put a lot of trust in her from the beginning to hire a team and be that person for his business and he put it in her hands and he's been super indecisive this whole time and shortening the deadline of launch to now six weeks where it's supposed to take nine months and she's got her hands up in the air like what do I do do you trust your wife and Jacob I trust my wife so much all right stay out of this completely she's a grown-up and this is where she works

Like that's what I'm thinking. It's real tempting to take this back to like recess and be like, you talked to my girlfriend. This is a place of business. If she doesn't like it, she can walk out the front door. Right. That's what I think. That's what I just don't know the boundary because when he starts speaking to my wife in a way that is extremely dishonoring in front of her, she gets up and walks out the door. Exactly. Okay. That's what I was thinking. Why hasn't she? Yeah.

Well, we're in a little bit of a place where we need the money right now. So we're in a position where we hate it. We're like, I can't just have you walk out right now, which is what I want to be able to do. No, my dignity is not for sale. And my wife's dignity is not for sale either. Do you all have little kids? No. Okay. Then it may be that I'm going to put my enrollment in the academy on hold because I'm going to go work three jobs so that my wife can get out of this mess.

But y'all have created a world where you feel like we got to put up with this. When Jade and I, we're always talking about freedom, Dave. We're always talking about freedom, freedom, freedom. This is exactly what we're talking about. Because if y'all don't owe anybody any money, then you laugh and smile at this dude and be like, dude, we out, right? No one's going to talk to me that way. But y'all feel trapped. What would it take for you guys to financially for her to be able to walk out the door?

I think the smart choice is finding another job before she leaves because we've had little to no income since we've been in Dallas. No, I mean, it's so bad that you're about to do something stupid.

What do you mean? Like you're about to go confront another grown man at his place of business where he pays your wife. I want to in the fact that that's my wife, but I know that's not the smart choice. I'm not going to do that. No, no, but I'm saying like it's that bad. It's that bad. I mean, and you called in here saying, should you do that? So you definitely considered it. Let's be honest about that. What does she earn? What does she earn at that job? Around, she takes around $4,000 a month. Okay. Okay.

Is there something that she could find in her field to replace $4,000 a month? I'm thinking yes. No question in my mind.

Sure. We've had a long journey trying to find a job, though. She's had a lot of interviews and people just don't want to hire for some reason. So this is the first job that she's actually gotten hired. OK, but it's not the last job she'll get hired in. That's the thing you got to. Right. The other kicker is in a month I'm going to be on the police department's payroll. So it's like, OK, we only have one month to pledge this. You know, so what's the.

i don't know because i keep telling her i don't want to overstep you have your thing to do with your boss but also this would if she were to call in today what would she be telling us in what manner does she is she saying every is she coming home every day saying i want to quit i want to quit or is she coming home every day just being like gosh my my boss is such a jerk what a what a butthead

And is she not talking about quitting? She loves her job and the team that she works with. She just can't get anything done when she's at work because her boss is a jerk and he doesn't trust her to do the job that he hired her to do. This is you busybodying, brother. This is between her and her workplace. Okay. You see what I'm saying? Like if she loves her job, she loves the work, she loves the challenge, she just has an annoying boss.

Yeah, but I'm just sitting here listening to her talk and I'm like... Okay, so maybe that's the boundary, right? That might be a conversation. If she's coming home every day and she's, you know, trashing her job, it's making you feel confused. You can have that conversation with her to say, listen, if you love your job and you're happy, but you come home every day and complain, it makes me think that you need to move on. Or she maybe, yeah, she's using you as a garbage bin, right? For all the bad stuff. And if you don't want me to think that you need to move on, then I need to hear both sides of the story. I need to hear the positive stuff and...

And in that way, it's a little bit more balanced and we're just normal people talking about day-to-day life. And I, dude, I was bad about that. I'd come home and tell my wife all the stuff, the good, but also, man, this guy did this and this guy did that.

Until she finally said, hey, I can't solve any of these problems, but you're continuing just to come home and fill our communication with negative, negative, negative, negative. Either quit. And when she said that, I was like, I don't want to quit. And I realized, oh, all she's getting is the worst parts of the day. And that was on me. And I had to change that. But that took her drawing a boundary, a relational boundary, saying, I can't. If you have something awful that you want to share with me that we're going to.

that you want me to sit with you in it we're going to grieve it because we're getting ready to do something different awesome i'm all in but if it's just to complain i'm i'm kind of over that i don't want to hear that all the time yeah because if you're going to complain that much at some point you do have to take action right so it's like it's the old piss or get off the pot kind of analogy can i say that james that's all right well we just did and you're you're sitting there you're like you're about to get yourself kicked off the police force before you even join i know you cannot assault this guy and like cuss him out in the parking lot yeah

I do think a valid question is, are you asking for my advice or my wisdom or do you just want me to listen? I love that. That's good, John. And that's a question that will frame any of these conversations because if you want your opinion, she wants your opinion, you're going to give it to her. But otherwise, I'm just going to sit here and I'm going to listen. And dude, I get it when somebody talks to your wife, you get all riled up like it's middle school again. It's her job. She's a professional. You trust her. She's smart. Let her handle her business.

This is The Ramsey Show.

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fieldofgreens.com slash Ramsey. This is the Ramsey Show. I'm Jade Warshaw. This is Dr. John Deloney. Hey, give us a call. The number is 888-825-5225. We'll talk about your life, your money, whatever it is that's going on in your life. We'd be happy to share our opinions with you. All right, let's go to the phone lines. We got Elizabeth in Santa Cruz, California. What's going on, Elizabeth?

Hi, Jade and John. My question is, does it make sense to accept a gift of $1 million from my in-laws to purchase a house?

And I can dive into some more context. I'm happy to accept it on your behalf if you don't want it. One million dollars. Yeah, tell us more about it. I need to know more. My husband and I are in our late 20s. Our income is $194,000 per year. We have no debt. And we would like to start a family in a couple of years.

I would anticipate our income dropping down to $120,000 if I reduce my hours to take care of a baby.

If the gift didn't exist, we would just keep renting and saving for five more years while my husband finishes a PhD. And then we would move somewhere more affordable because we really don't ever anticipate being able to buy a house in Santa Cruz, California. However, yeah, my in-laws offered to give us this $1 million as a gift specifically to buy a house here in Santa Cruz in South Carolina.

That money is coming from my husband's deceased grandmother's truck. I guess I'm just concerned that a $1 million house in our financial context is just a little out of proportion and it really would be nearly 100% of our net worth.

Even though it's just a normal house, like a three bedroom, nothing too crazy. It's just that it's Santa Cruz. Right. You're in an inflated market for sure. My question is, okay, so this is from Grandmother's Trust. Was this money that was going to be his? They're just giving it to him early or it truly is a gift? No, it is theirs.

It is theirs and it would be a gift. And go ahead, John. What are the strings attached to this? Are they cool? I mean, if it has to be in Santa Cruz, if my yeah, if my in-laws said, hey, we would like to bless y'all with a million dollars to buy a house. My in-laws are amazing. There'd be no strings attached to it. I would I would gladly accept that gift.

Yeah. I know many who don't. Or like Jade said, I'm going to give you a million dollars to buy a house, but you'll buy it in the zip code I tell you you're going to buy it in. And if y'all ever get transferred or moved, that's our money that we're going to extract from the sale of this. You see what I'm saying? Yeah, I wonder about that. That's where it gets really, really messy. So I think it just depends. Right. How much of this trust is this million dollars? Is it a $50 million trust and this is just one of the millions? Yeah, I want to know that.

To be honest, I'm not sure the full amount, but I think it's less than a fifth. Less than a fifth of it? So it's a lot of money. So nobody's starving here? No. Okay. Let me ask you this. Just level with us real quick. How does that make you feel? Because I...

You know, this is a little bit different from what John said, but I don't even know what that looks like. And I feel like I would be so overwhelmed by a gift like that. It might be hard to take. How do you feel? Does it make you be like, yes, we hit the jackpot? Or are you like, oh, my, my, my. Like, I don't know. What do you think? I am intimidated. Just imagining our net worth, like, ballooning and exploding like that overnight fills me with some anxiety. Yeah.

I would just want to take care of that money very well. Be a good steward of it. Can I ask you where that anxiety comes from? Is it because those people, those people are the ones that have a million dollars? Not people like us. Right? Maybe. Maybe a little bit of a feeling of ill-gotten gain somehow. Yeah.

Well, can I interject? Because there is part of this that, and you can tell me at any point, Elizabeth, if you're like, no, that's not what I mean. But like, there is something to be said for when you walk step by step.

and you gain you're you know you're growing you're gaining your net net um worth little by little as opposed to it's like it's like it's like a toddler waking up and being 17 right as opposed to you know we see folks who win the lottery and they're like i just won the lottery and they're all excited but then you talk to them five ten years later and it's busted so i could see where there's some anxiety there um why is this different from that john

Well, I... Or is it different? I remember a great theologian once said that sometimes people can be as proud of the things that they don't have as people are of the things that they do. So there can be an ethos. I'm not that kind of... I would never spend that kind of money on a house. I'd never buy that kind of car, right? And if, like Davis used this example, you have $200 million...

in your net worth and you gave away $20 million last year and you buy a $200,000 car, that ratio is very similar. Sure. Right? To somebody who gave somebody $20, right? Or bought a $20 car. So all I have to say is if your identity is, I don't do stuff like that, then I would tell you maybe check that. And there's a pretty extraordinary gift and an opportunity to set your family up in a community where you're going to have family, et cetera. And also, if the thought of going to bed every night is,

Here we are. And by the way, y'all make 190 grand. Y'all are clearly smart and doing great. Right. Um, but this idea that I just can't go from zero to 75 that fast, like that's, that's too much for me to wrap my head around. Um,

Then gently decline and say, no, thank you. What if you just said, hey, a million feels overwhelming. Is there a way that we could, you know, we've been trying to save for a down payment. Can you help us get to the down payment that we've been trying to afford? Maybe there's somewhere in the middle. Or maybe they buy the house and you rent from them. Oh, no, I don't like that. You don't like that? No. All right. I don't know why. I just I feel like that's even more tangled because they're still renting.

I, if you have a great relationship with them, I wouldn't lose sleep over taking the money. But I'd want every, everything clear. Like if we decide to sell this house, is this a gift? Is this a loan? Is this a down payment? I want all that in writing on all that clear. I want everybody to have all hearts clear before we make a big decision like this. But if there's a second of hesitation when it comes to strings or I just feel gross about then, then just say no. Thank you. What's your husband think?

I think he's also a little bit anxious about being able to maintain and take care of a $1 million house on our income. Well, wouldn't you be paying cash for it?

So you wouldn't spend more than a million, right? And it's a Santa Cruz house, so it's probably 1,700 square feet, three bedrooms, one bath, right? Yep, that's correct. So you're just mowing the lawn. Yeah, you're mowing the lawn. The roof's going to be the roof, right? So you make $200,000 a year. Y'all could cover the repairs and things on a house like that. Okay. I'm feeling better about it already. Okay, good. But listen to your husband's intuition. If he knows his mom and dad...

And he knows, oh man, if they give us a million dollars, we're going to hear about this every Christmas, every Thanksgiving, for the rest of our lives. Basically, for a million dollars, they're buying our loyalty. They're buying their grandkids in proximity. I don't want to be on the hook to anybody. Listen, you can look back on the track record. Let's play that out. Are

Are they generous people? Are they always giving gifts? You know, big or small, how have they been, you know, whenever they've offered a gift? Or is this their first time? Because this is worth noting. If they are also receiving a windfall for a first time,

they may not know how they're going to be as gift givers. Does that make sense? Let's just pretend if I won the lottery today and I'm like, "Oh, I won the lottery. I'm going to help my whole family out." And I start giving away a million dollars to each of them, I might go into it thinking that I won't have any strings attached.

But because I've never tested that before, you might realize, dang, a million dollars, it does have an emotional hold on you and you do have an expectation for what they'll do. You're going to pick up the phone and be like, you're not buying that car. Yeah. It's like, whoa. Yeah. So there is part of this that you do need to consider. Like, were your in-laws already wealthy people and they've already been generous or is this new for them? So these are some, I like this conversation. I do too. It's a fun conversation and it's such an obnoxious amount of money, right? Uh-huh.

For most of us, it might happen at 10,000 or 2,000 or 500 or whatever. But I think that idea about strings and can y'all sleep at night is good. And I also like, man, if it's your ego holding you back, check that. Check that. I kind of, if it were me, she can do what she wants. This is not a right or wrong answer. I feel like I'd be comfortable with

Taking the down payment on the house that we would have bought, that we would have been able to afford, right? You're just getting there a little bit sooner. I feel like that's fair and the safe option. I'll take the million, Alex. This is The Ramsey Show.

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And you can join at any time, including open enrollment. Find out more and join today at chministries.org slash budget. That's chministries.org slash budget. 888-825-5225. This is the Ramsey Show. Give us a shout. We're talking money, mental health, marriage, whatever you got going on. We're here for you. Let's go out to Sarah in San Francisco. What's up, Sarah? Hi, how are you doing today? So good. How are you?

I'm good. What's up? Okay, so my question is, I went straight to culinary school from high school back in 2003. Thank you. My mom took out a loan for me because I was 17. Okay. The original loan was $30,000. We agreed to split it 50-50. Soon as I graduated, I was giving her...

every month. I was staying with her because I didn't have the money, but I was giving her money every month. I eventually realized that she was not paying on the student loan at all.

When I found out, she apologized and she said that she would start paying. I continued to give her money every month. As you can imagine, I wasn't making very much money at that time. And I then again discovered she was not applying any of that money towards the student loan. How much have you given her so far, Sarah? Yeah.

So I'm not sure exactly because I wasn't counting, but I do know that I gave her, when we talked, I gave her at least $5,000. Okay. How did you give it? Was it a check? How did you do that? I was giving her cash. I was giving her $200 every month for that. Oh, man. Every month for that. Well, I was making minimum wage. I was working at a...

Anyway. Is your name on the loan or your mom's name? Yeah. Your mom's name is on the loan? Only my mom. It's a parent plus loan. So the reason why I know now all this information is because recently she came to me and she brought up this loan because after a while I just stopped giving her money. How long has it been? So, 2003.

Oh, girl. Okay. So, recently, she brought up this loan, and she asked me for a lump sum of money. She asked me for about $20,000. I'm like, I don't have that kind of money. I can't give you that. And we didn't agree. I've been giving you money, blah, blah. Long story short, I looked into the loan. She owes over $70,000. Oh, God. Sarah, listen. Oh, Lord. This is...

Oh, gosh. I'm sorry. I had to let a little bit of my... I had to let it out a little bit. It's really scary, and I don't know what to do. Here's what's not scary about it, okay? There is some scary, but I don't think it's what you think it is, okay? Here's the scary. You and your mom's relationship is different from this point forward. Okay. Okay? And the sooner you come to terms with the fact that your mother...

Did not uphold your end of the agreement. I can tell you all day, I think the agreement was dumb. Y'all should never have set that up. It was destined to create a wedge between a mother and a daughter. But here we are. Okay. She has decided...

to not sit down and be the adult and say, I took out a loan. Here's every month for the next however many years. Here's what you're going to pay me. Here's how this is going to work. I'm going to keep a spreadsheet. I'm going to mark off every date, all that. Like a bank would do. You basically funded her lifestyle in a tiny little way

And then she comes knock on your door 20 years later asking for $20,000. Yeah. Do you know who's not on the hook for this money? You, Sarah. None. You. You're not on the hook. Look, you are not on the hook for this money. Now, this is your mom. And I know that you feel some level of guilt. I feel really bad. But you gave her the money.

You gave it to her. She's retired. It doesn't matter. Literally, at this point, anything you say about to try to make it better, I'm going to tell you it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. You gave her the money. She chose. She chose.

And now, for whatever reasons that she has, which don't matter, she wants that money back from you. Well, the loan is probably... Is it tripled? It's tripled. Is it $80,000 or $90,000 now? It's $70,000 and some change. And now she's making me feel like... No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Here's what you could do. She doesn't... Hold on. She doesn't get to...

You're allowing her to get inside you and to make you feel a certain way. You decide who has permission to hurt you, period. Now, that's harder when it's our mom because our mom should be the one person on the planet that's always got our side and yours doesn't. Okay? And I hate that for you, but she's not making you feel bad. You're choosing to feel bad on her behalf. Okay. You got to own that.

You got to own that. Here's what you could do. Now, you said to your you said if you were really interested in feeling very clean walking away from this situation, you said that the loan was 30,000 and you were supposed to split it. So that would be 15K on you. Now, if you're telling me, hey, I paid 5,000 towards this loan. I know that I paid 5,000. Give her another 10K and say, hey.

I paid my half and that would have been it. If you wanted to do that and just say, I know I paid 15. You didn't do your thing, whatever. You could do that. But you're not on the hook for this. So Sarah, if I'm in, if this is me, like I'm just, I'm fast. I'm thinking about this being my mom. Okay. And we sit down.

What I would say is exactly what Jade said, but I would add one extra layer. I would put a payment plan in front of her and say, I agreed to pay $15,000 of a $30,000 loan. I'm going to pay you 20 back and I'm going to already say I've already given you five and that's on the low end.

So I'm going to pay you $15,000 and here's what I can pay over the next 12 months, 15 months, 24 months. And you make the payment. Don't hand her any more money. Yes. Okay. So directly to the, if I, if I give it directly to the place, will they now want my information? Nope. Just get the login and pay it. Say, mom, the only way you're getting this money is I sit right next to you. We log in and we pay it because you're not handing her, you're not funding her payment.

Ridiculousness Because she has not been a good steward with money So that is ridiculousness And you're not going to hand her $15,000 To do whatever it is that she's been doing Which whatever that was Caused a student loan to triple So we're not participating in that Really bad Here's another thing we're going to do for you Sarah I'm going to give you A year of FPU Okay

And she might not, but she's still got $55,000 left to pay off after you write her a check.

And so if she wants to, you can sit down and put these videos on and y'all can come up with a plan. It's not too late for her either. We deal with folks all the time in the 50s, 60s who are figuring it out and it's not too late. But you get to make that choice. She gets to make that choice. Okay. So hang on the line here. We're going to hook you up and hope maybe even say, I'm going to give you $15,000, which is five grand more, but

You got to sit down and watch these videos with me because you got $55,000. And listen, if she starts hassling you, starts saying, oh, you're just going to leave your mama to whatever, you can always stand up and walk out the door. And that's hard, hard, hard. But remember this line, behavior is a language. And if your mom chooses to swear at you, get mad at you, send you on guilt trips that you can't afford, she's telling you through her language, I don't want you around here.

I don't value you. And so I'm going to hear what you're saying through your actions and I'm going to head out the door until we can have a grown-up conversation. It's going to be hard, hard treading. You're going to have to grieve the loss of your mom or your new relationship with your mom because things are different now. Dude, money does weird things to people, John. But this is why, I mean, I can't,

Money makes people act up, though. It does. But co-signing on loans, man, I've never seen it work well. It doesn't work. I haven't seen it work well. It doesn't work. Co-signing is stupid. And especially if you have, listen, if you've taken a loan out with your kids and y'all have car payment, you just pay me back. Or student loan. Put it in a spreadsheet, be adults, and say, you owe me this much on this date in this way. Yes.

And think about this. She said she was 17 when her mom signed that loan. Adults, be adults and understand that your kids were kids and you were adulting them at that time. Do not come after these folks for these Parent PLUS loans. You signed them. Parent. Parent PLUS. That means parent plus your money. That's who's paying it off. The bank looked at your kid and said, I'm not giving him money. And you said, well, you can give it to me. I'm trustworthy. Yeah. Be trustworthy. Be trustworthy. Be trustworthy. Be trustworthy.

And pay your bills. Parents, act like parents. Parents, act like parents. I'm going to have to get the Preparation H out. Hey, this is the Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Are you working the baby steps? One of the smartest and most impactful changes you can make is to ditch your cash value life insurance plan, if you have one, and replace it with a term life policy. Listen, the only thing a cash value policy is good for is overcharging you

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This is the Ramsey Show, 888-825-5225. I'm John Deloney, joined here by Jade Warshaw. Is your marriage going sideways? Give us a shout. Are you struggling with your mental health, or got money questions, or you just don't know what to do with your kids? Holler at us, 888-825-5225. Let's go out to Chris in Springfield, Missouri. What's up, Chris? How we doing?

Hey, man. Before I start, I just wanted to say thank you to you guys and everybody at Ramsey Solutions. Since I was younger, you've had a really positive impact on me and my financial decisions. So I just want to say thank you for that. Well, thanks, brother. I appreciate it, man.

What's happening? I think it would be important just to give you guys a little bit of context on me and just my background before I ask my questions. Basically, I've always been really good with my money. Over a few years, I was able to save up like $50,000. $40,000 of it was in my savings, and then $10,000 of it I had invested in mutual funds. I also...

and going to school, I like to say better than debt free because I'm going totally free. Good for you. That's awesome. And a work study and stuff like that. Um,

So with that though, um, during, uh, all of that time that I was accumulating those funds, I was in an abusive relationship. Um, pretty much like anything negative you could think of. Uh, I'm sorry. She dished all that out. So, uh, it kind of messed me up. And when I was finally able to get out of it, um,

As a way of coping, I guess, I started spending my money on a lot of stuff. Sorry. You're all right. Over like maybe eight months now, I've totally drained all my savings and I've pulled out

all my investments and I've just spent it all on crap. And, um, I probably only have like, I don't know, maybe a little under $2,000 now. Uh, so I just, I don't really know where to go from here because my plan originally was once I get my bachelor's, um,

The deal that I have with my parents is once I'm done with college, I'm out of the house. That's just what it is. I was going to go to grad school and everything, but I'm just not really sure how to go about doing that and just what to do financially anymore. I think Dave's been saying for years, your money is just a reflection of what's going on in your heart and mind and soul and life.

And so right now I want to move the money conversation over. It's a big neon sign letting you know that you're not all right right now. And I want to tell you, having sat with people, I can't count how many people I've sat across the table with or sat next to who are trying to figure out who they are after leaving an abusive relationship.

And the chaos of, I still love that person, but that person deeply hurt me in a number of different ways. I lost part of myself and I don't even know what that means and how to get that back. All of that stuff is all chaotic and a mess. And yeah, man, you got out your spending card and went bananas. What I would tell you is the sun came up today, right? That's true, yeah. You got $2,000. Yeah.

And I don't want to minimize. You're going to have some grief. And you're probably going to have some resentment. You're going to have all that stuff. All those feelings, dude, listen to me. They're right. They're fine. They're good. They're right. The only thing you can do from this moment forward, you can't go back and edit sentences that have already been written. They've got a period at the end of them. You were in love with somebody that hurt you deeply. You broke up.

You spent $48,000 in a spending spree to wallpaper over depression and grief and sadness. And here you are. And the things you told us leading up to those moments tell me that you are a strong kid.

and that you're a driven guy and you have accomplished a ton. Very few of the adults that call into this show have $50,000, access $50,000 cash, my brother. Very few people call in and say, hey, I figured out how to do college for free. And so you had a plan and that plan is going to be different now. You had a plan, you're just going to waltz into grad school, into your next job because you had a big nest egg. Well, you don't have that anymore, so cool. Nothing about what you've told me suggests that you suddenly have lost the ability to work really hard because I know that's who you are.

And nothing you've told me says suddenly you're dumb because you're not. What you have told me is you're going to have to spend a season grieving this. You're going to have to go spend some time with a counselor. Okay. And I would tell you that if you were my best friend or you're my brother.

Okay. Okay. And you're going to spend some time healing and you're going to spend some time. Here's the, here's the uncomfortable truth about abusive relationships that people often don't hear. It's real easy to be on the outside of that and to demonize the abuser. What people often fail to take into account is the person being abused loses trust in themselves. I don't even trust me anymore. And now you've got 48,000 reasons to further not trust you. Right. Right.

What you're going to have to do is learn to build trust in Chris again. That's just going to take some practice, my man. Okay. Okay? Yeah. So here's the deal. I want you to hang on the line here. You're still in school, right? Yeah, I got a year left. Okay. Here's why that's fantastic. I'm so happy because that means you have access to a student counseling center that's going to be outstanding.

And in a time when it's very hard to just call a therapist off the street and get an appointment, you're going to be able to do that. So I want you to make that call today in exchange for making that call. We're going to send you Ken Coleman's get clear assessment. We're going to send you his book paycheck to purpose. And I'm going to send you my book on your past change your future.

And that my whole book is what happens when you are sitting down and you realize you're in ash and how do you take that next step out? Okay. I'm grateful for the call, man. And we love you and we'll help you any, every step of the way here. I just need you to hear me say, you're not broken.

You're not dysfunctional. You didn't do anything wrong. I mean, you blew a bunch of money and I would laugh with you and high five you if we were sitting at the table. And also, I don't believe, Jade, I don't believe in the phrase too soon. That's just kind of me. But I'd high five you and then we would get on with, okay, what comes next? But you got some healing to do. Oh, yeah. That's tough. I think you covered it. I'm not going to add or take away. I'm trying to think of how I've wrestled with moments in my life, Jade, when I've just flat out

set my values on fire or I've fought out, done something that I said I wasn't going to do, or I've spent my time poking my finger at people who do things. And then all of a sudden I look up six months later and I'm that guy now. Right. Right. You know, it's tough. I was sitting here trying to think of a similar situation. I'm like, when have I been there? Like, what have I, and it's, you can really live in the past and wallow in like, man, what I did, I spent $48,000. How could I have done that? But then it's like, what are you going to do next? Yeah.

And I think as a culture, we have two narratives. One is you're always going to be the worst thing you've ever done, the worst thing that ever happened to you. You're always going to be the dumbest thing you've ever done. And then the other one is if you have feelings and you're a coward and a wimp and you're weak, you just suck it up and grind it. And I think that's nonsense. I think the world is desperate for a new third way, which is we're going to spend some time feeling sad and we're going to have some grief. You went through hell.

And you did some dumb stuff. Yeah. Let's just acknowledge it. Yeah. And then we're going to get the right people around us and because we can't do it alone, we get the right people around us and then we're going to take the next crooked wobbly step forward to wherever it is we're going. Yeah. Progress, not necessarily perfection. Nobody's out here doing things perfect. We're all just trying to

He's trying to make some kind of progress forward, right? I mean, George Campbell tells us he's perfect. His hair is perfect. His hair is perfect. It's high. It's high and tight. Well, you should see the hair dryer he has back there. I've never seen it. He actually converted an old air conditioner. It's really an extraordinary...

I need to get on that then. Well, they have a special plug in there. It's like a 220. It's incredible. But hey, that's another hour in the books here on The Ramsey Show. Be kind to one another. Pay off your debts. We'll be right back.

This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. Hey, it's that time of year, it's starting to get a little bit colder, it's getting a little bit dark earlier, and sometimes if you're like me, you just want to stay inside and get cozy. And for me, my perfect cozy night is me and all of my family piled under blankets, watching a movie, sitting by the fire, maybe even reading a book. Listen, whatever your perfect night in looks like, sometimes therapy can feel a bit like that. A time when you can settle in, finally relax,

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Find comfort this December with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com slash Deloney to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Deloney. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, get out of debt, do work that they love,

and create incredible relationships and speak clearly. We help with that too. I'm John Deloney joined here by my friend Jade Warshall and we have the lines open 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Let's run out to New Hampshire and talk to Dylan. What's up Dylan? How we doing?

Hey, I just had a quick question for you both. I'm assuming, John, you'll be able to answer this a little better, but you might. Hey, I'm just kidding. Way smarter than me. Roll the autogas. So it would seem that my mom is boycotting my rehearsal and my rehearsal dinner because I changed a small plan.

I don't know. I might be able to answer this one because I know about that. Dude, I'm laughing with you, man. So what did you do, Richard? What did you change that was so bad? So I'll run it quick. So, you know, back months ago when we gave them the opportunity to kind of plan the dinner, it's not what we wanted originally. We told them, you know, we just wanted to have pizza and go back to the Airbnb and just have a good time with the bridal party.

Well, my mom absolutely insisted on paying for this and making, you know, a big dinner and we go out and all this and that. And obviously, you know, listening to you guys, I try to save as much money as possible, but she wasn't on board with that. And, you know, I gave her the opportunity for months and months and months. And a few days ago I talked to her and told her, I'm like, Hey, we're really thinking about switching back to our original plan. And I was like, I'll give you a few days to figure it out. Well,

I just waited one day and I was like, you know what? I should do what I really want to do. It's my special day. You know, and of course my fiance's too. But, um, and I decided I'm like, Hey, this is what we're going to do instead. Um, so I didn't see this coming, but I didn't see this coming, but I want to lean on you a little bit and you push back. Okay. Of course. Why would you take this from your mom? It's like a dinner that she's paying for.

Well, just because it's originally not what we wanted. I should add to this, too. She started inviting a bunch of people that we didn't want there. There it is. There we go. Okay. Well, that, too. Lead with that, brother. Lead with that because that changes the game. That wasn't the biggest issue, I don't think. It's that she didn't really respect that we originally wanted to do something else. Sure. That's how I took it. Dylan, is there strings attached to this?

As in? As in, I'm doing this for you, so somewhere down the line, there's going to be an expectation of something I want from you. You know, I'm not going to go as far as that, but it's not a possibility. Oh, I know. I know. All right, so here's the deal. This is as heartbreaking and complicated as this is, this is very, very simple. You made a grown-up choice.

And with all grown-up choices, there always comes grown-up consequences to those choices. Unfortunately, your mom is choosing to act like a child. And I mean that with all due respect. I don't like talking about people's mamas, but here we are. Oh, I've said it a few times. Right. So one of the hardest things I think any of us will experience is when somebody we love opts out of relationship with us

Because they are choosing to be immature. Because they are making our whatever, how we're raising our kid, what school our kid goes to, our choice of diet, whatever you want to say. They make our lives about them. Yeah. And she is choosing to not be in relationship with you and your wife during your big day.

And that just hurts. And so it's a both end. I want you to spend time, even just for a few minutes, saying like, this sucks, man. I want my mom at my wedding. I hate that she's acting like this. And you and I both know she acts like this on other things too. This isn't isolated, right? No, not at all. Awesome. And can I add something? Of course. She's going to come to your dinner. Well, I'm hoping. I think she's going to come.

I'm hoping. I would write her a letter that she can go back to over and over and over again and say it would mean the world to us that you come. I know that you wanted a big thing and I'm so grateful that you're honoring us with this one. We really want you here. The thing is that she won't even come to the rehearsal, which is the worst part to me. I'm okay if she didn't want to come to the dinner. She's saying that and I don't know her so I may be totally off base.

I think that this is her last ditch effort to get her way on this. And Mike, I would probably be willing to put a couple, I put some chips on the table on this, that she's going to end up there. I don't think she's going to miss her son's major days over this. Now, maybe I don't know her and I'm completely wrong, but something tells me that when the rubber hits the road, she's going to be there. What about your old man? Have you talked to him about it?

Yeah, I actually spoke to him today and he just initially, you know, it's the first time. Also, keep in mind, my mother won't talk to me at all. She will not talk to me. Of course. Well, you ruined her life, jerk. Oh, you know. Yeah, absolutely. You're ripping her heart out. But I did speak to my dad this morning and he was saying that she just feels hurt and that it doesn't have anything to do with the dinner, which I don't believe because this kind of stuff has happened before, which she doesn't get her way in this, which I don't believe. Well, he's probably been covering for her for a long time too, right? Yeah.

Oh, of course. Yeah. I mean, obviously he has to take her side in most cases and I don't blame him. But yeah, no, I mean, yeah, no, I spoke to him. So if she will talk to you, the best, the best I can tell you is what I would do in your situation. And that would be, I would,

write a letter and I would do my best to deliver it by hand. If you all live in the same community, put it in her mailbox by hand. I was at her house yesterday. Okay. And let her have something. Because listen, if you call her, if you text her, she is going to hear that one time through her filter of Dylan is trying to ruin my life.

And Dylan's going to embarrass me because I'm in charge of the dinner and everyone's going to ask me why I just did pizza. And it's all about her. But if you write it down, people can go back to the letter and back to it and back to it. And sometimes, not always, but sometimes that truth has a way of distilling itself down and she can rest in peace.

He wants me there. Him and his wife are just trying to do things a little bit differently. It's not about me, et cetera. And you hope that's the case, but we all have family. I thought I was open, but that's not the truth. And tell your dad, we really, really want both of y'all there.

Oh, I told him that. I told him that this morning when I spoke to him. Like, if the worst case scenario happens, I'm like, please, Dad, be at my wedding. Yes. At the very least. I'm like, yeah, stuff. Yeah, no, it's pretty crazy. I hate it for you. I hate it for you. I appreciate it. Thank you, though. But yeah, that was pretty much it. I appreciate you guys. Yeah, I don't get to... It's not every day I get to talk to somebody who just willy-nilly rips his mom's heart out, right, Jay? Dude, look, when it comes to these weddings, it's like that. Like...

If I had done what all the parents had wanted, I would have been married in a different state. I would have gotten married on a different date. I would have gotten married in a different dress. They all have their preferences, but at the end of the day, it's your day. And sometimes it's just a dinner. Do the dinner. But if it is that big of a deal, you made a grown-up choice, and that comes with grown-up consequences. That's right. Hey, this is The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back.

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This is the Ramsey Show, 888-825-5225. If you're a new listener and you want to know what we're even talking about, when we talk about things like the baby steps and the snowball and all those things, go to ramsesolutions.com and click on the Get Started button. We're going to help you figure out the next best step for you in your financial journey based exactly where you are today. A lot of times people say, well, that call didn't have anything to do with me.

We can tailor make this thing for you, okay? RamseySolutions.com. Click on Get Started, and we'll walk you to debt freedom from there. Let's go out to Lane in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. What's up, Lane? Hey, John. Hey, Jade. How are you guys? We're good. How are you? Pretty good. Pretty good. Can't complain. Excellent, man. What's up?

So basically, I just wanted to, I guess, say thank you for you guys or to you guys just for teaching what you teach. I guess for some context, my wife and I are, I'm 23, my wife's 21. We have a 15-month-old daughter and like three, four days ago, our house got wiped out by a tornado. No, shoot. Oh, man. Y'all, everybody's okay? In Calgary? Wait, where are you? We actually live about an hour

hour north of Calgary near Gisbury. I don't know if that means anything to you. I didn't know they had that kind of weather there. Is that normal? We do now. This was the biggest tornado in Alberta in the last 36 years. There were quite a few farms taken out. We're rural. Thankfully, there were more people. No one was hurt, by the way. If anyone was in our house, they would have been

well, no more, we'll put it that way. Uh, but like we, we, we have most of our stuff, you know, um, we don't have a house. We're living with my mom for the time being and, uh, we'll transfer into other things, but I just, you know, when it happened, like we hightailed it over there, um,

And I guess to put it in a way that makes sense, like I don't care financially. Like we're on baby step four, five and six. We have an emergency fund. And like I was way more worried to make this call to talk to you guys than I was about our house being wiped out. Wow. And I just wanted to say thank you and means the world.

that you guys teach and stuff. My mother-in-law that actually introduced me to you guys. Man, I'm so grateful because I don't know where we'd be otherwise. Dude, that means the world that you took the time to call, Lane. Circle back and appreciate it. And I think it's important for everybody to know that Jade and I have no illusions. We know we're just a couple of knuckleheads on the radio. You did it. You're the one actually working, man. I'm sure it is.

Wow. Good for you. Good for you, man. I'm glad everybody's safe and okay. And I'm glad that y'all get to make the next step position, the next step move from a position of strength, not a position of desperation. That's, that's incredible, man. Wow. And, uh, well, dude, I'm really grateful that you circled back and gave us a shout, dude. That, that means the world to us. You know, John, people say all, you know, people call in and, and they, they thank us and they're happy with the results of the plan. Um,

And, you know, we said and we weren't joking around. He's the one that did the work there. And I think sometimes we've seen it on previous calls. I think sometimes with Financial Peace University, people kind of get it in their head that it's a magic trick. And then if I just take the class and.

the class will do its magic work and I'll be magically where I want to be financially. And that's not how it is at all. You get the information and you get to choose whether or not you're going to implement it. You get to choose whether or not you're going to go all in. Because I mean, when you really stop at like,

We know it's a plan that works for people who choose to work it. We know that it's helped millions of people get out of debt and change their lives and not just get out of debt, but go on to build wealth and become baby steps millionaires and things like that. But those are the people, they choose to show up every day.

every week right because it's nine weeks so they choose to say this is a priority for me for nine weeks I'm going to cut out and carve out this area of my time I'm going to show up whether it's in person or online because you get your choice and they're the heroes in this story it's not us we get to like you said be on here and and be goof offs on the radio and for some reason people listen to us and it's amazing but

They're the ones who carve out that time. They do the work and they're the ones that see the turnaround. They see that improvement. And it doesn't take long. Most of the people who really dig into Financial Peace University, man, they're seeing like $8,000 turnarounds, lickety split, you know, within the first 30 days and things like that.

So this that call was really a testament to not only it's not about the plan. It's about the plan plus the person. Right. And plus their involvement in it. And that's when it works. So if anybody's interested in going through the same plan that helped my guy out. Come on. Tornado blew down his house. And yet here he is. Financial Peace University. You can find that going to Ramsey Solutions dot com slash FPU. And one more thing. And this is for everybody listening.

We have a bad psychology where I'll forever remember right after 9-11 happened and all of the, I don't remember, it was the Senate or the House, the Congress was on the steps of the White House singing together and it was this moment. Yeah. And humans have an ability to come together in madness and make clear-headed next right decisions. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

But man, we make the stupidest decisions in times of, it's all good. It's all good. We just pretend reality doesn't count. Yeah. And so. Short memories. Yes. And so I don't mean this in a caustic way at all.

But what happened to Lane will happen to all of us. Life will come at us. Moms will get sick. Kids will have issues. Tornadoes will hit houses. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. And so this plan...

and I say this plan, living a life where you don't owe anybody anything. You said it earlier, living a life where I am fully empowered to be as free as possible in my health, in my relationships, in my finances, in where I work, an ability to stand up tall in a culture that is so disempowering. Man, chopping you down. When it comes-

The most annoying thing will be who's going to call to the air conditioner person. I want to call and say thank you, and I'm nervous about that. That's the hardest part of losing my house. It will come. Do you have a group of people with you that you can weep with? Do you have an emergency fund? Do you have these things? Because it's going to come. And we had thousands and thousands of years of farmers who knew this. Don't go through all your grain. You're going to have a couple of years where it doesn't rain. That's life. And in two short generations, we've just...

Thought we're smarter than nature. Yeah. And we can beat it all with our smarts and our technology. It doesn't work, man. It will come for you. You make a great point because it's true. And I don't say this to be like a fatalist or to be negative. It's life. But you cannot.

cannot plan your life based on best case scenarios. Like so many times people call in and I've been guilty of it. It's like you have this idea of something you can do, but if you really stop to break down your plan, everything has to be perfect in order for it to work. Not one domino can fall in order for it to work, right? And then what happens that one domino falls that you never perceived could fall and you're like, holy crap, everything's caving in on me. And I don't, and that's,

That's why things like this are so important. I mean...

One call we had, the girl's got diabetes, right? And she's trying to get her medication. How great would it be if that's never an issue for her again? She's just got the money piled up. She's got the financial piece. I heard you talking about your electricity problems. And it's like to just be able to up, I mean, you can just up and pay that bill. But I know there's plenty of people listening who if something happened and the electrical went out on their house, they'd be up a creek because there's no margin there. There's no room for error. My AC went out the other day.

It happened to be one of the hottest days, and my husband was out of town. It was like, no big deal. All right. Nobody likes to pay for things. But do you know what I'm saying? Just to have that peace of, we're good. It's that peace. It's the peace. But life's coming. The tornado's coming. And again, it's not a fatalist thing. It's not a, ooh, we're fear mongers. No. It's just life. We just do life with people who are hurting. We wouldn't have a job if everything went right all the time. All right. And so-

Live a life where you're connected with other people. Live a life where you enjoy going to work. Live a life where you don't owe anybody anything. And like I said a minute ago, in a world that is telling you, you can't survive without us, stand up tall and say, yeah, I can. As for me and my house, yes, we can. We'll be right back.

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This is the Ramsey Show, 888-825-5225. I'm John Deloney, joined by Jade Warshaw. Let's go out to Destin, Florida and talk to Josh. What's up, brother Josh? Hey, how you doing? Good, man. How are you? I'm okay. I appreciate you taking the call. You got it, man. What's up? I guess I'll cut right to it. So, I've been following you guys for a little while, trying to get my finances on track. I've come to a...

I need to start handling my life and get some stuff on track, and I want to go to rehab so I can quit my drinking. Dude, I'm proud of you, man. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Don't blow by that. That's huge. What led you here? There are millions and millions of people in the United States that need to make this decision, and I want them to hear where you landed. You'll be a gift. Well, I mean...

In the past, I battled with other substance abuse issues, and I let that go. I've been clean from all that, and I just kind of picked up the bottle. And I'm just tired of it. I'm tired of doing the same things over and over again. I'm tired of relying on something to feel like I need it to function. Awesome. I'm proud of you, man. I'm proud of you. So how can we help?

Well, pretty much my insurance situation, the only way to get into treatment, it covers most of it except for about $6,000. Okay. $6,000 to $10,000, depending on location. So, really not trying to get into any more debt. Sure. But I want to take care of this. The first question I would ask is...

Often, and I'm talking about rehab places that are not like go to Malibu or you're in Destin, not like a beachfront place that's going to be a resort. Okay. Yeah. Often, if you sit down, places will wave the gap between the insurance and the cash out. Okay. It's the equivalent of a scholarship program. So I would have that conversation with the place. Have you done that? I've been calling and asking for scholarships. I've called.

Hundreds of places, probably. You haven't called hundreds. Maybe a slight exaggeration, but I've been on the phone. And nobody will wave the gap? No, that'll cover my insurance. What do you mean? Because the cheapest thing I've been able to find is a $6,000 copay. Is that your deductible? Cheapest.

Yes, that's the cheapest thing I can get. I've applied for scholarships. They're saying they're not doing it. So do you have guns or guitars or a truck? Do you have something you can sell? No. I mean, I've got a truck, but it's my work truck. Can you go down in value on it? What's it worth? No, I'm upside down in it. What's it worth? Probably about $11,000. What do you own it? I've got about 200,000 miles on it. $12,000.

What would happen? You owe 12, it's worth 11. What would happen if you sold that and went down half the value and just bought yourself a little truck that'll get you? Is there anything? Do you see what I'm saying? Like this is temporary. I get what you're saying, but it's a truck with 200,000 miles on it and not that many people are going to spend $11,000. Well, if it's worth 11,000. There's a whole bunch of people, Will, my friend, because they're in your situation too. What about a parent or family member?

Nope. Unfortunately, no. Okay. So here's what I would tell you. I would start, if I'm you in this situation, I would start with a couple of different areas. Number one, I would walk in this evening to the local AA meeting. Have you done that yet? Yeah. Okay. I would ask around and tell them I've got a gap.

And my guess is there's people who would say, I know X, Y, and Z. I know this person. My church has a sponsorship program. There's a gap payment here. We can help figure this out. I would start there. Okay. And this is you being super, super vulnerable. It sounds like you're so sick of all this that you're kind of done giving a crap. Is that fair? Absolutely. Okay. The second thing is I'm going to give you three months of free BetterHelp.

I want you to talk to a licensed counselor. I want you to hang on the line here. And I want you to make sure that just full stop rehab is the right move, the right next move for you. Okay. Okay. They might say, hey, I want you to go every day to a meeting in the evening and in the morning for 30 days. And let's circle back before we make this list, this big leap. Okay. Okay. The third thing is I want you to be honest about

deeply honest with what you can part with right now. Because here's what I'm trying to avoid. I don't want you to come out on the other side of a 30-day in-treatment program or a 28-day outpatient program and have that clarity of mind, that sobriety, the light is on, and then that credit card bill hits you right in the mouth.

That's what I want to avoid at all costs. And that's another thing I'm worried about. Finances bills keep coming. They do keep coming. I've even been looking into detoxes and it's still about that same number. Just for like a week detox. They do. I want you to go to a meeting and I want you to be vulnerable and raise your hand and say, I'm stuck. Okay? Yep. If you tell me after 30 days,

of knocking on every door put your car on facebook marketplace and see if you can get six thousand dollars for it or seven thousand bucks or eleven thousand bucks that's going to give you six grand and you go buy a five thousand dollar car with 250 000 miles on truck i get it not pretty this is a band-aid i get it if you tell me you can't then i i would say then go to a local um uh a local uh

Credit union and figure out that gap. Or I would work out, before you did that, I would see if you could work out a payment plan with the rehab place. Probably they won't do that, but it'd be worth a shot. Oh no, no, they will. They will do that. That's why I was no interest, but that's why I was on the call because I've already got other debt racked up. Okay, I'm okay with that one.

If the last option, and listen to me, this is not a pass for you just to go, sweet, I can go. I want you to exhaust every avenue because my brother, Jade and I have sat with people, they walk out. And then reality is a cold dose of water and it's easy to fall right back into old habits when old fists hit you in the same mouth.

Yeah, because even if you can find a couple of thousand, like even if you can find a couple of thousand from selling things, you visit a local church and say, hey, is there any, like, is there a ministry here? What can I do? Can I serve to earn this money? Like whatever you can figure out, even if you're closing that gap with cash in some way, that's going to be worth it to you. Or if you got two weeks and you decide I'm going to wake up at five o'clock every morning and drive Uber and I am going to, I'm going to work like mad and earn this money, right? Yeah.

There's going to be some little victories there. But if you tell me, hey, man, I can't. I'm underwater right now. I'm wanting to go to rehab because I'm drinking every day and I can't stay clean. I get that. And I honor that. Okay. But I want you to go to a meeting tonight and I want you to raise your hand and ask that question. Okay. Okay. If you can, if the hospital where you are doing your inpatient rehab is willing to say there's an interest-free option here for the gap, okay.

then I'm okay with that as a last DEF CON resort option. If a clinical supervisor has said your only option is rehab. Okay. Okay. So I want you to hang on the line. I want you to walk through. I want you to, when you go through the better help, I want you to click on struggling with substance abuse, struggling with alcohol. And I want you to put in the notes, trying to make a decision on whether I need to go to rehab.

go to inpatient inpatient rehab counseling and then when they reach out they're going to walk you through an assessment and y'all can make that decision together is that cool yeah that's awesome thank you so much i appreciate everything you got hey i need you to hear i need you to hear me say i'm really proud of you me too thank you this is real hard much you've been you've been um drowning for a long time haven't you yeah yeah we're done okay are we done with all the drinking

Yes, I want to be. I mean, I'm tired of it. Good. Hey, I'm going to put a little star on this. I want you to call back in 30 days with your 30-day chip, and we're going to celebrate you on the air. All right? I'm proud of you, my man. This is The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back.

Hey guys, George Camel here. Let's be real. If I had a dollar for every time Ramsey Solutions gave away free money, I'd probably be rich enough to give out my own cash prizes. And here's another one for you. We're giving away $20,000 at the Take Control of Your Money livestream on January 23rd. I don't know about you, but I'm definitely signing up for this event. Plus, my friends Dave Ramsey, Jade Warshaw, and Rachel Cruz...

We'll be there too. We'll be talking about how you can make real progress on your money goals. Maybe you're wanting to knock out some debt. Maybe you're ready to start saving for a house. Maybe you want to build for the future. Or maybe you just want to stop cringing every time you need to buy eggs. This live stream is for you. It's your time to ask us whatever you want about money.

It'll be kind of like a New Year's party, money pep talk, and a live Q&A all rolled into one amazing event. Plus, if we're lucky, a little comedy on the side. And no, I will not be charging for my dad jokes. So listen, if you're ready to take back control of your money or you just want a chance to win some extra cash, join us. Go sign up now at ramseysolutions.com slash livestream. That's ramseysolutions.com slash livestream.

You're listening to The Ramsey Show. Next to me is Dr. John Deloney. I'm Jane Warshaw. We're taking your calls. We mostly take your calls. It's a live show. But today we have a question of the day that's coming to you from WhyRefi. Today's question of the day brought to you by WhyRefi. So now we don't recommend refinancing on everything, but for distressed private student loans, there is WhyRefi. We trust WhyRefi because they help you with low fixed rate

fixed interest rate. They help you get a low fixed interest rate you couldn't get anywhere else to help you stick to your budget and get out of debt. Learn more at YRefi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y-R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. May not be available in all states. All right. Today's question comes from Wyatt in California. Wyatt writes, my wife recently asked for a divorce.

But she wants to stay married until she finishes her MBA degree. Wow. To complicate things, my family... Oh, nice. To complicate things, my family had agreed to pay for her degree when she started the program as an early inheritance for me. This guy is an honor student. I think she only wants to stay for the free tuition. What should I do? Yes.

If I had a beard, I'd be stroking my beard on this one because this is ridiculousness. I don't mean this to be mean, Jade, but we're doomed just as a society. This is bananas. Bro, your wife left you. She asked you for divorce. There's a word. Oh, boy. Okay. It's not good.

If you say yes to this, you got to bounce with an ounce. You have to brush your shoulders off. She left you. She left you. And there's so much complexity here. Yes. Don't pay for the wife that's leaving you. It's divorcing you. Don't let her take part of your inheritance. This whole thing is such a mess.

Yes, I would stop tuition payments. How about that? Let's just start there, for God's sakes. Yeah, if you're not... The gravy train ends at that point. If you get divorced, you don't get to say, oh, and will your parents please still pay for my...

You know... It's like being at the Golden Corral and you cash out and you get your ticket and you walk to the parking lot and then you see them bringing prime ribs out. Yeah. You don't get to go back. Wait a minute, wait. Wait, wait, I'm going to back a truck up here and take all the prime ribs out. Dude, you cashed out. You cashed out. Somebody else gets the prime ribs. That's right, you left. It's Golden Corral, baby. Wow, yeah. You left. This is...

This is a boundaries conversation, I'm guessing, John. Yeah, there's clearly a lot here. You don't get both sides of it. You can't have your cake and eat it too. If she says, I want a divorce, all right, boom. And I definitely wouldn't drag the in-laws into it. No. That just makes it even more messy. And if your in-laws hear the story and they say, well, that's cool. We still want to pay for her degree.

A, they can do what they want to do. It's their money. And B, if it is part of an inheritance, then it will come out of a divorce settlement. So it's not just going to be free money. It will have to be disclosed as part of a divorce settlement. And y'all will figure that out in court. And I'm heartbroken for you, Wyatt, that your wife wants to divorce you. I hate that for you, man. I just hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. Yeah, this sucks. And if I could be ridiculous for a moment.

Her timing was terrible. I mean... She must feel some type of way. Like, if I'm like, gosh, let me... I want to finish my MBA, but I don't want to tell him. Well, there's also the other side of this that, like, Wyatt's cheated five times and she finally says, I'm out, but I'm getting my MBA. We don't know. That's the thing about these questions. We never know. You could, you know...

throw a lot of different wrenches into this subject but at the end of the day it's like if you say you're done you're done here's the best way to think of it the moment somebody says i'm divorcing you

From this point forward, this is no longer a romantic relationship. This is a business transaction, period. It has gone. We got married. We signed a marriage contract for this reason. This is how we're going to separate everything. It is a business proposition from this point forward when somebody throws the D word and says, I'm divorcing you. Cool. Then that's how we're heading along. That's moving forward. Can I ask you a question? Yep. Okay.

I'm not trying to trip you up in any way. So on the show, we talk a lot about money, obviously. And we always say that one of the main causes of divorce is money fights and money problems. You're a person who's in this knee deep all the time. Where does it start? I think it's both ends. So we say money is a symptom. And I'm saying that because we've had two of these in a row of just whacked out

Just what's going on here? We say that money is a symptom and I think it continues. So let's take abuse and let's take just evil and put off to the side. That's outside the bell curve in this conversation, right? There's abusive people and there's terrible people. We know that. I don't think most people are abusive. Most people are terrible. I think most people are unintentional.

and they have a picture about what they want their life to look like, and they just assume that the person next to them that they married is going to absorb into that picture, not knowing that that person has a picture of what their life is going to look like and vice versa. And so here's a good example in my house. It's something so tiny that happened recently. We have two dogs, and then we just, I got my daughter a little, it's like a gremlin dog. So now we have three, and they fight and scream and run around.

I got to where dinner time was frustrating for me. It just felt like so much. And I wasn't being the dad that I wanted to be. I was finding myself snippy. I was finding myself just like, hey, can y'all, once we backed out and my wife and I, and she's like, hey man, dinner's like a sacred time. We always just come here and exhale. It's where we laugh. It's these three dogs that we took from outside are running around underneath the table. We put them in a kennel now during dinner.

And man, you just made a clear choice, but it was unintentional. And what was happening was I didn't want to come to the table. My wife didn't want to be around a grumpy me. So it's easier. Hey, we're going to grab Chick-fil-A on the way home. Right. And so it happens by teeny tiny degrees. It turns out it's the dumb dogs running around at the table. So it's a lack of intentionality and a lack of saying, hey, this is a sacred thing for us. You want this? I want this. How do we choose to make this happen? Oh, we can just do that. That's easy.

It's a lack of intentionality. When you're not intentional about your money, then suddenly I'm buying this, you're buying this, you borrowed this, I want to buy this, and now we have two different worlds of

but we live on the same couch and then it implodes, right? So money fights are a symptom of two people that have not aligned their pictures and then not align their values and have not committed. We're going to, we're going to forego short-term pleasure for a long-term vision of what the world we want to build together. And it sounds like they've chosen the wrong enemy to direct their, their guns at, right? Yeah. And so going back to the previous call, um,

you make a choice, you make teeny tiny choices along the way that gets you this final choice. You do that with your money, you do that with your physical health, right? Like my buddy Lane Norton didn't just wake up one day and win worlds. He started 20 years ago lifting weights, right? Every day. Same with your marriage. I gotta believe it's the same thing getting back, right? The beauty is if you will own

You and I have both made choices to choose a miserable marriage. Then you can both make choices to choose something amazing. That's where the light and the darkness is. You can choose something else. Nothing is inevitable unless outside of abuse. Nothing is inevitable. You can choose something different together. It's amazing. I love that, John. See, you add a lot to the show, John. And I love picking your brain on stuff like this because you just have a different perspective on

And by the way, I believe in people. You do. I really do, man. I like that. I like getting to host with you. I have to, I kind of wanted to go to John for a minute, but I also want to let you guys know before this hour ends that this hour is about to end. If you're listening, you know,

on your favorite platform. But if you want to keep watching the show and keep finishing this specific episode, keep hearing from John, keep hearing from me. You got to head over to the Ramsey Network app in order to finish the show. If you're on the radio, you can just keep listening. It's still going to play. More calls are still coming up. We've got Christian from Madison, Wisconsin. We've got Carol from Sacramento. We've got a truck driver who's, you know, living out of his semi truck coming up.

We've got a woman, Ashley. She wants to know if she should use the money that she has to get a car or to pay off debt. So we've got really great calls coming up. I'm going to pick John's brain a little bit more. But again, the Ramsey Network app is the only place that you're really going to get the full episodes of the Ramsey show like you're used to hearing. So you've got to go over to the app. If you don't know where it is, you can search Ramsey.

Ramsey Network in the App Store or on Google Play. That's the way to find it. And by the way, we're still working on the app where every day we're doing things to make it better, make that experience the best we can for you. We just started this, so it's kind of cool. You guys are in on the ground level and we're here. We're happy you're here with us. But again, don't miss what's coming up next. Head over to the Ramsey Network app and it'll be me and John. We'll be in our same clothes, same shirt, same plaid, finishing up the show. Thanks for hanging out with us. This is The Ramsey Show.

What up, what up? It's Dr. John Deloney from the Dr. John Deloney Show with some amazing news. The latest episode of United States of Anxiety is available right now exclusively on the Ramsey Network app.

This docuseries follows real people from my show as they embark on a 90-day journey to transform their lives, and I personally walk alongside them every step of the way. Okay, now, here's a sneak peek of what the new episode is all about. And don't forget to click the link in the show notes to download the app.

What's up, Kelsey? So I've lived with crippling anxiety for as long as I can remember. How do I stop it from constantly coming up in different areas of my life? What does crippling anxiety mean? Paint me a picture of that. All right, so you're ready to jump in? I'm ready to jump in. We're going to check in with Kelsey 30 days, 60 days, 90 days. I cannot even function because I'm just crying.

My mom left us when I was four. I truly felt like for a while I had no family. She's experiencing things that really hurt a long time ago. Tell me about this boy. He triggers me a lot.

Scared of losing Paul, scared of doing the wrong thing, scared of not being enough. It just feels like it would be exhausting to be Kelsey. It is. Whenever somebody's playing whack-a-mole with their anxiety, when it just keeps moving, that tells me the underlying system's not okay. How do I get my inner child out of this relationship? Because I feel like she's running the show. One of two people that's supposed to never leave took off. How is this burdened? You're burdened, that's right. To the one person.

Who should carry it? All of it. Did you ever tell that little girl that it wasn't her fault? I don't know what to do. You either have to choose to let this guy love you or you got to choose to let this guy go.