A Psychotherapist On Whether We Can Blame Parents For Our Money Habits, Too

We Spoke To A Psychologist To Find Out If Our Parents Are To Blame For Our Poor Spending Habits

You know what’s kind of fun in a ridiculous way? Getting to blame our parents for things that go wrong in our adult lives. Goodbye responsibility for our own actions, hello parents who crafted us this way, therefore, removing any fault of our own. You know what else we can plop squarely on their shoulders, maybe, but probably not? Our money habits.

When Your Parents Never Talked About Money

I remember the day I did the first ‘meeting the parents’ thing in any real way and being absolutely shocked about how openly his parents just chatted about finances. My parents were incredibly tight-lipped. Even now, in my very late 20s, it’s just not something we really mention. I thought this was just how everyone did it.

Did it screw me up? Well no, actually. According to Dan Auerbach, Psychotherapist with Counselling Sydney, it’s quite common.

Some parents feel that exposing children to talk about money can overburden them with a responsibility that they are not ready for. This is especially common for parents who in their own childhood experienced and worried about their parent’s financial worries.

But he does note that at a certain point your parents probably should have opened up a bit more about it.

Beyond a certain age, kids naturally become aware of money. At that point being open and teaching them about money helps them develop the confidence to manage money throughout their life.

When Your Parents Had An Attitude About Moolah

You know when parents talk about something with a real ‘TUDE? It’s why I never tried goats milk cheese until I left the nest, I believed the hype from the ‘rents and assumed it actually was disgusting. Now? My absolute favourite. Can’t get enough. Silly parents.

Cheese aside, same goes for all of us in terms of how our parents talked about money, if and when they did.

Young children make sense of their experience by listening to their parent’s emotional tone in any given situation,” explains Dan, “If our parents usually sound confident, calm, rational and positive about money it’s going to leave you with a different association to money than you would have if your parents regularly speak about money in a stressed or negative way.

When Your Parents Were Scrooge-Like, Or Spent $s Like It Was Going Out Of Style

Looks like there are no definites for blaming here, sorry guys. It’s all about how we personally felt about our parents’ money behaviours.

If we have positive associations with our parent’s behaviour we are more likely to follow their lead. If it’s a negative experience, then it’s less predictable,” says Dan, “Some people will try and be different from their parents, they successfully de-identify, but others will fall into similar patterns.

So if you like the way your parents did or didn’t spend their earnings, then you probably tried to copy it. If you didn’t, things get complicated.

“If we have a hard time with any aspect of our parent’s behaviour, be it financial irresponsibility or a lack of responsibility generally, we may grow up being motivated to be different from them,” Dan explains.

Even if you hated how your parents did or didn’t spend their money, you may still be drawn to the same behaviours, probably because of emotions, those pesky things. Dan gives the example of delayed gratification. If your parents were spending money they probably shouldn’t just to get that immediate rush, then there’s a good chance you will too.

When Your Parents Didn’t See Eye To Eye

It’s pretty common to see people in couples have very different ideas about money, and our parents are people too. So when one wanted to save and the other spend, who do we follow?

Wellll seems this all depends on who you are and which parent you loved more. Joking about the love thing, of course, that wouldn’t be a very psychology-ie thing so say.

“We may more strongly identify with one parent over another, depending on who we are more bonded with around a given aspect of our personality,” says Dan, obviously the professional one and not I, “Some kids are more expansive and seek stimulation which can make them more likely to be spenders. Whereas others favour the parent who helps them to regulate or slow down their experiences,  they could possibly become savers.

When Your Parents Tried Pocket Money And/Or Gave You All The Treats

My parents always had really grand ideas about pocket money. Even as a kid I could tell they really wanted it to be a ‘lesson’. But, bless their hearts, I’m not sure they ever stuck to it long enough for that lesson to sink in? Although maybe they did, because *spoiler* I’m actually pretty good at saving when I want to be.

Ignoring my long-winded personal stories, pocket money could be great or useless on who you are today as a spender of dollars depending on the plan your parents had behind it.

“Pocket money, like any other tool or concept, is neither good or bad. If the pocket money idea is backed by the parents’ true values, if the parent can teach the child how to use the money and if the parent lovingly helps the child negotiate the experience, it’s likely to have value,” Dan reckons.

And if we were that lucky spoiled kid, drowned in gifts from our adoring parents? Are we going to be a little pig-headed about money now?

“It’s not necessarily so simple. We may have come to dislike or devalue our parent’s spoiling us and may choose a very different path. It’s really pretty complex and not so easy to predict.”

girl knows.

How To Change Bad Habits In Case You Do Decide To Take Responsibility

“Our relationship to money is very charged with emotion. For some people, it triggers a lot of fear, guilt, shame and so on,” Dan explains.

“If you want to loosen up it’s really about identifying the fears to do with spending and seeing if you can overcome these. Speaking to a trusted friend or maybe doing some writing around this can help you formulate and get clear on your experience.”

Learning to tighten up can be about learning to regulate emotion and delaying gratification. That can be tricky if we are the type of person who looks for stimulation to keep us buoyant. It may be about exploring what you need in order to calm yourself or feel satisfied.”

Moral of the story, it’s probably not all about your parents. I literally cannot wait for my parents to read this. I can hear mum using my full name already.

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