Money shows up in almost every relationship. Underneath the arguments about parenting, about time, about feeling unseen. Money is almost always part of the story. And the data tells us about how we’re walking into those relationships. 86% of couples married five years or less started their marriage already in debt. We plan the wedding, we pick the flowers, we write the vows — and we walk down the aisle carrying debt we rarely have real conversations about.
And it runs deeper than debt. In my work as a psychologist, often money is never really just about money. It is about power. It is about freedom. It is about the choices we get to make and the ones we don’t. The wage gap is real — women still earn roughly 84 cents for every dollar a man makes. We live five to six years longer on average, which means we need more money, not less. And yet many women still leave financial decisions to someone else, avoid conversations about money, or assume they need to know more before speaking up.
And yet, women are better investors than men. Not by a little — studies show we earn between 0.4 and 1.8 percent better returns on our portfolios, and it compounds significantly over time. We are more patient, more research-driven, less likely to panic when the market drops, and better at playing the long game. That is not a small thing and not the story we have been told.
Its time to talk women and money.
I sat down with Christine Wiskochil, Vice President at Baird and a wealth manager with over 30 years of experience, to finally have the conversation most of us have been avoiding. We talked about the money myths we’ve been carrying since childhood — the ones that told us money was complicated, that men were better with it, that asking questions would make us feel stupid or uniformed.
We talked about what to actually do with your money in your 20s, your 30s, your 40s and beyond. We talked about what recovery looks like when you feel behind. And we talked about why your relationship with money is really a relationship with your own freedom.
The feeling that you don’t belong at the financial table — that someone else is better equipped, more qualified, more entitled to be there — has a name. It’s what I talk about in The Day I Became Real: Imposter Syndrome and Authentic Living. Because the woman who walks into a financial conversation already apologizing for being there is often carrying the same thing as the woman who walks into any room that way. Go back to that one if this episode stirred something.
And if the voices around money sound familiar — the ones that say it’s too late, that you’re not smart enough for this, that someone else should handle it — that’s exactly what we get into in The Voices in Your Head: Whose Are They Really? Those money scripts didn’t come from nowhere. They came from somewhere. And you get to decide whether they still deserve authority in your life.
Money doesn’t have to be a dirty word. It is choices. It is options. It is the ability to wake up and decide how you want to live. Go listen. Christine’s resources and links are in the section below and are filled with a lot of information!
Until next time — stay real.
Keep going:
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If someone in your life needed to hear this today — you already know who she is — please send it to her.
Christine Wiskochil Resources:
6 Important Financial Strategies for Your 20s and 30s
Baird’s Retirement Guide for Women
