After The Wedding: The Unlikely Love Story of Financial Planning and Therapy

It All Starts With A Baseball Game

The bat cracks as the baseball goes flying. Financial planning runs down the first baseline. Only to be tagged out by Therapy in a call that was too close. As Financial Planning looks up, they recognize Therapy from years ago at college. They had seen each other at a few parties. 

Financial Planning and Therapy were invited by their friends to a birthday party in the park. There was a spark between Financial Planning and Therapy at first base.  Later in the afternoon, they start to catch up and share a few of their stories since college. Financial Planning shares how they left college and went to work for an investment company. Therapy, on the other hand traveles the world, working for the Peace Corps before going back to get their graduate degree in Marriage and Family Therapy. 

Financial Planning asks Therapy out for coffee later that week. Therapy is shy about going out with Financial Planning. Therapy is uncertain what they will have to talk about. It seems to Therapy, they are living in two different worlds. 

The Cute Coffee Shop

Financial Planning gets to the coffee shop 15 minutes early. They don’t like being late and always want to make an excellent first impression. Therapy shows up on time and sees Financial Planning sitting there, both anxious and excited. Therapy knows how to read people well. 

Both Financial Planning and Therapy have preconceived ideas about each other. Financial planning has always thought that Therapy was a bit “woo woo,” and Therapy has always believed that Financial Planning could be a bit cold and just about the numbers. They are both curious about each other and a bit skeptical. 

The conversation opens over a cup of coffee with a bit of cream and a Chai Latte. You can guess who ordered what. Before they knew it, two hours had passed and they shared some deep belly laughs and moments of wow, I had that wrong about you. 

Financial planning asks Therapy out for dinner for the following Friday night. 

The Dating Story

Dinner the following night turned into eight months of dating. Financial Planning and Therapy are discovering more and more of what they have in common and differences in how they see themselves and each other. 

Therapy loves how organized Financial Planning is with numbers and how Financial Planning has a plan for the future with their finances. Therapy has always felt like money is mysterious and overwhelming.  Financial Planning loves how at ease Therapy is with themselves and their understanding of people. Financial Planning loves to feel understood by Therapy and feels safe in their company. 

On a beach trip weekend together, Financial Planning and Therapy got very vulnerable with each other. Financial Planning disclosed that their father had used money to control the family and questioned everything that money was spent on. Financial Planning felt as if they could never make their father happy. Financial Planning shared that is why they went into the work they did. They wanted to understand how money works and how to use money well. Not in such a destructive way. 

Therapy shared with Financial Planning that while they were at college, they had been the victim of a rape. Therapy confessed that before they became Therapy they always felt insecure and inadequate. Therapy’s mother was often critical and cold. Often leaving Therapy at school long after pick-up hours had passed. Therapy knew some other things were off with their family but could never put their finger on it until they became a therapist. 

They would both remember the beach trip years later as the one where they knew they wanted to spend the rest of their lives together. It was the first time they told an intimate partner about more vulnerable parts of themselves. 

The Engagement

Financial Planning was ready, with the engagement ring burning a hole in their pocket. Therapy looked terrific, and they returned to the first restaurant they had dinner together. It was a special place to them. Financial planning was even able to reserve the table where they had their first dinner date. Over a beautiful and delicious dark chocolate cake with raspberry sauce, Financial Planning gets down on one knee and proposes to Therapy. Therapy with tears of excitement says YES!!!!!!

Over the next year leading up to their wedding, Financial Planning asks Therapy more questions about their financial life. Financial Planning has moments of frustration when Therapy doesn’t want to make a budget or financial plan for the wedding. Every time Financial Planning asks Therapy about their savings and how to merge their financial life, Therapy gets emotionally overwhelmed and collapses into tears. Financial Planning retreats and says we will just deal with this later.

On a trip home for the holidays to Financial Planning’s family, Therapy meets their parents, who live in a large and fancy home. Therapy can feel the breath being pulled out of them as they walk into the home. Over family, dinner therapy watches and feels Financial Plannings father subtly control their Mother over how much money is spent for the holiday. Therapy confronts Financial Planning that night, and Financial Planning minimizes it as not that big of a deal. 

Therapy asks Financial Planning if they are open to counseling after this family holiday. Financial Planning agrees on one condition. Will therapy go-to financial planning to help them sort through their shared financial life together? While they are both nervous about it, they know it is also vital to the health and well-being of their relationship and money.  Therapy does not think it is weird that they would need their own therapist. Therapy accepts that as people, we can not see ourselves clearly, and it helps to have someone outside of yourself holding up a mirror in an empathic way so that you can see what is happening. On the other hand, Financial Planning has long done their own financial planning and has yet to really think about hiring an outside financial planner to help. Therapy explains to Financial Planners is not just a financial planner to therapy; they are friends, lovers, and partners, and it is too hard to hear them more neutrally than an outside financial planner, where that is the primary role to both of them. 

A Beautiful May Wedding Day

Financial Planning and Therapy are a modern couple bringing their two worlds together. It is a blending of two different worlds not commonly matched before. Some even consider it to be taboo. But for them, Love is Love, no matter their different backgrounds that have shaped them. They can see the good in each other. 

Therapy and Financial Planning picked a local botanical garden to have their small and intimate wedding with family and a few close friends. Financial planning was concerned this their father would make a big stink about the expense of the wedding, but that was kept to a minimum. Therapy was worried whether her mother would cause a scene, and while there was a small incident with the wedding planner, it got smoothed over quickly. 

Financial Planning and Therapy decided that instead of a traditional wedding cake they would have a dark chocolate cake with raspberry sauce much like the one they had on the night of their engagement. 

Three Year Later, The First Child Comes

There they are in the maternity ward with their new baby in their arms and they are asking what we should call them. They looked at each other and knew instantly. Therapy Informed Financial Planning. How did they come up with this name, you might be asking yourself.

Both Financial Planning and Therapy took their commitment to each other seriously. After their wedding, they found a Fee-Only Financial Planner and a Therapist they could enjoy working with. Over the last three years, both Financial Planning and Therapy have learned, healed, and grown so much. 

Financial Planning has healed from some of the emotional pain of his father's controlling ways with money. Financial Planning is now able to manage their financial anxiety and show up with more self-compassion around the shared finances with Therapy. Therapy no longer collapses in tears when Financial Planning brings up making a plan for the future. 

Financial Planning and Therapy could not have initially known when they first met on the baseball field all those years ago just how much they needed each other. They let their initial attraction and interest in each other guide them. They found ways to work through their differences so that they could form something far more significant than either of them individually could be, and that is why they named their firstborn child Therapy Informed Financial Planning. 

How can Therapy Informed Financial Planning help the two of you? Schedule a 30-minute free discovery call to talk with Ed Coambs - Therapy Informed Financial Planner.