Okay nobody talks about this honestly so I’m going to get straight to the point. Money and relationships. Money in relationships. Who pays for what? Do we go dutch? Does he pay for everything? I have apparently been getting the short end of the stick according to my friends. For most of my relationships I’ve gone half on everything.  I didn’t mind this at university (because the struggle is real) but now I feel that it should be different, here’s my story…

I was in a relationship with someone who had a good job but never spoke openly about how much he earned. Which honestly I didn’t care about but I would of preferred a general idea for expectation sake. We were dating for about a year before we planned a trip away. We had saved money and put an equal amount into a separate account that he would handle because you know, between the two of us, I thought I could trust him more with the money than my spontaneous arse

Long story short he had used most of that money to pay off his credit card without letting me know. When he mentioned we had no more money left I was so confused. But I let it go. It was weeks before he mentioned it again. He casually mentioned to me that he had used the money and that was it. He didn’t offer to pay me back or discuss if he was even planning to. My initial thought was ‘okay maybe he has financial problems and didn’t want to tell me’ (typical) but also ‘how the heck did this guy not run this by me?’ Someone I trusted?
This is the part where my friends cringe – I let it go. He had all the details and I trusted him to settle the account. It was literally 3 years later when I brought it up – post-break (totally awkward). We were on good terms according to him so he paid the money a few days after and that was it. Never heard from him again. But what really messed with my mind is that my then boyfriend (someone I supposedly loved and trusted) STOLE from me. He took my money, never asked me if it was okay, never offered to pay me back and just left it floating in the air hoping I would forget???? In retrospect that should have been one hell of a red flag.

Another crazy example is a guy who seemingly liked me and we were chatting. We didn’t know each other well, hadn’t met before but had mutual friends. And one day out of the blue he asks me for R200. Okay I was working and didn’t see his messages until later when he was already ‘sorted’ but it still was a red flag because ex-boyfriend vibes. Over the next couple weeks he seemed to place a lot of emphasis on material things which bothered me but I avoided questions as much as I could. Until eventually he mentioned he was in hospital and sent me a selfie (which could be against any random white wall if I think about it) and asked me for R2000. Are you serious? Another problem with this situation is…how many women is he doing this to, I mean I’m not his girlfriend but he is comfortable enough to ask me to pay his bills?

At this point I can’t help but to understand what TLC meant when they said ‘I don’t want no scrubs’. A friend recently explained how she physically had to put her boyfriend out of her place because he lied about having a job and just used her for a place to stay. He just bummed at her place for 3 months, eating her food, watching her DStv, not cleaning up after himself. Imagine that.

Don’t get me wrong I don’t need a millionaire (they come with their own sets of issues) but by no means am I trying to pay for everything, hell nah. If that was the case we would be at KFC for our date nights! I’m all about teamwork but he needs to make me feel like his got this on lock too, you feel me?  I keep asking myself especially amidst the ‘blesser’ generation what is the standard in terms of how money is and isn’t spent in a relationship? How are people dating in 2017? Is it just me having bad experiences regarding bill paying or are guys looking for someone to take care of them financially? For me personally it has been really difficult navigating this one. I mean aren’t they built to want to take care of us? I don’t think I’m asking for much, thoughts anyone?

For all the exes (and hangers on) catching feelings.

• Why are you even here? Still catching feelings I see
• This was never about you I’m just sharing my experiences hoping someone else gets something positive from it
• I have never nor will I ever mention names so if you can’t handle my truth – that’s your guilt and not my problem
• If you actually handled your business and didn’t show your shady true colours you would not even be featuring here so I guess it’s time you maybe took a hard look in the mirror and work on your damn self
• You still here???