Welcome to Ghost of a Podcast. I'm your host, Jessica Lanyadoo. I'm an astrologer, psychic medium, and animal communicator, and I'm going to give you your weekly horoscope and no-bullshit mystical advice for living your very best life.

Jessica:            Duffer, welcome to the podcast. What are we going to be looking at today?

Duffer:            Well, thank you so much, Jessica. I'm going to read the question that I wrote. I started by saying and would love to say to you in person thank you so much for your activism, your humanity, and your deep, deep care. It's so appreciated, and I am very lucky and grateful for all you share with the world.

Jessica:            Thank you.

Duffer:            I wrote, "Can you help me communicate well with my brand-new"—we just got married; we eloped to Brooklyn two weeks ago yesterday—"wife"—

Jessica:            Congratulations.

Duffer:            —thank you so much—"about our money, finances, and just sort of melding our lives? We're both 50-plus. We're sort of late-in-life loves. We've been together a couple years. And we're navigating now blending families, moving in together. We're selling one house, going to go to another, maybe going to buy a different one altogether. And we have three teenagers, and we're going to have six cats between us. So it's a lot. And we're combining our forces but both bringing our hang-ups and habits from childhood and our lives. My sense is that we approach things really differently, and we've already bumped up against a few painful, difficult, fearful spots. So I'd love your take on how to compassionately address these sort of fraught areas of life without, in my case, dropping into defensiveness or shutting down and finding our way together through this joyful but difficult time."

Jessica:            Okay. So fucking congratulations.

Duffer:            Thank you.

Jessica:            And happy Pride, right? So how long have the two of you been together?

Duffer:            We got married on our two-year anniversary.

Jessica:            Okay. So two years.

Duffer:            Yep.

Jessica:            And were you living together before?

Duffer:            We have not yet been living together.

Jessica:            Oh, so you're not yet living together.

Duffer:            Correct.

Jessica:            Okay. Bold move. Okay. It's very bold. Okay. So you said—

Duffer:            And Gay.

Jessica:            —three kids. So Gay. So Gay. Three kids.

Duffer:            Yeah. [crosstalk]. Yeah.

Jessica:            Who's got how many kids?

Duffer:            I have one. He is age 19 in a few months.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            And she has two.

Jessica:            Okay. And are they—

Duffer:            17 and 19.

Jessica:            17 and 19. So your kids are the same age.

Duffer:            We're all in a range. Yep. Yep.

Jessica:            Wow.

Duffer:            Mine's in the middle of them. You know, about one year, one year, one year-ish between them.

Jessica:            That's amazing. Okay. And so are all the kids living with you? Because 19—I mean, I don't know. I moved out at 19, but it's a different time.

Duffer:            So my child splits time between his dad and me and just finished his first year of college, so living here some of the time. And her kids also split time with their other parent. And the eldest is low launching, and the younger has one more year of high school.

Jessica:            Okay, so is at home for at least another year.

Duffer:            Yep.

Jessica:            Okay. But it sounds like you and your wife are going to be living in a home that can accommodate all of the children with individual bedrooms.

Duffer:            That is the hope.

Jessica:            And within that, have you discussed the money part of you having a child and her having two children? And that is a very different expense bracket, right, one versus two human children?

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            Because it's radically different having late teens than 12-year-olds or 8-year-olds or something. You know what I mean?

Duffer:            Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yep.

Jessica:            This is a very—so have the two of you talked about the economics of co-parenting?

Duffer:            I would say we haven't really talked about it in relation to the kids. General discussions have been more around how we would share household expenses at-large, thinking about mortgage and taxes and all that stuff.

Jessica:            What about groceries?

Duffer:            And groceries. Yeah. We sort of talked about tying it to a ratio per our income ratio, and that would be something that we could change or scale as income potentially changed. I make more right now than she does, so we've always thought that I would pay a larger proportion of things like that.

Jessica:            Are you comfortable with that?

Duffer:            Yes.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            Yeah. That feels comfortable.

Jessica:            Okay. Great. Do you have a joint account?

Duffer:            Not yet.

Jessica:            But the intention is to have a joint account?

Duffer:            I think the intention is to have a joint account for all of the things that we deem joint expenses and then our own—

Jessica:            But you have not identified what those things are, given that she has two kids and you have one child?

Duffer:            Not in writing exactly like that. And her situation in regards to kids' expenses has also been shared with her ex, and mine is shared with my ex.

Jessica:            I see.

Duffer:            So, if we've approached the children, it has been sort of in the sense of, like, I will continue to take care of mine in a way that doesn't, hopefully, vastly or negatively affect the joint finances, and then she would do the same with hers in regards to their other parent. For example, I hadn't thought about my wife sharing any of my child's college expenses.

Jessica:            What about the reverse? Does she expect you to—

Duffer:            Same.

Jessica:            So—

Duffer:            No.

Jessica:            So her and her ex are going to be economically responsible for education?

Duffer:            Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            Yeah. That's all—

Jessica:            That's talked about?

Duffer:            I mean, I would say that's been implied or at least alluded to.

Jessica:            In my lived experience, implied is not communicated. Assumed is the seed that grows discontent and disillusionment. So what seems really obvious—and this is kind of even—you even put this in your question. What seems really obvious or really like, "Yeah, of course this is where we're going," to you may not seem that way to her because you're different people and not because one of you is right or wrong.

                        And so I am, I guess, an advocate for uncomfortable conversations that generate clarity. And there's no way that I'm going to be able to support you into having a comfortable conversation with money because, if it was comfortable, you would have already talked about it.

Duffer:            Sure.

Jessica:            Do either or both of you like taking notes or drawing on a dry erase board or something like that?

Duffer:            Yeah. I think both of us at different times, because we've been—she's got a dry erase board up in her [crosstalk].

Jessica:            Okay, because I'm seeing a dry erase board.

Duffer:            [crosstalk].

Jessica:            So I might recommend that the two of you set up a time where you're going to pull out the dry erase board and pen and paper, and you're just going to talk about a million different things. And whenever you come to an agreement—like let's say, "Okay, each of us are financially responsible with our exes for our individual children's education, and we are each completely responsible for the choices we make. And we don't have to check in with the other person about the choices we make economically for our children's education." Let's say you agree on that. Do you see how I added details to it than you did?

Duffer:            Yeah. Yep.

Jessica:            You would write that down on the dry erase board, or you would put it in something that would eventually be a document that you could refer back to in uncomfortable times. This might seem unromantic because it is unromantic. I mean, marriage is a business agreement. Anyone who says it isn't has never been divorced, right?

Duffer:            Right.

Jessica:            So I think it's really important to have these conversations. So I do want to encourage you to get there, but we're going to talk about more before we do. I have a few more questions.

Duffer:            Sure.

Jessica:            You make more. Does she own property that she could sell in order to then buy something together?

Duffer:            Her plan right now is for her to keep her home, which she owns outright, and to sell mine, which has a mortgage, in order to potentially buy a place together because neither of our current homes have the capacity that we would want—

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            —to have each of the kids have their own space We want more land—you know, a couple things.

Jessica:            Why is she keeping her home, and you're selling the home, and you're spending more money on the relationship in general? Why is that happening?

Duffer:            I am ready to move out of this area and move closer to where she is. She has felt strongly that holding on to her place—and it's been a rental before, so it was something that was owned previously, was rented out, and then she moved there and now lives there—and keeping that and potentially, we'd move into another place, and that becomes a source of income for her to increase her income. And I think she also has said that she feels having a backup in case—

Jessica:            Things go sideways. Yeah.

Duffer:            —whatever goes down goes down—having a place that you already own is valuable.

Jessica:            I mean, I agree with her.

Duffer:            Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            But you're selling your house.

Duffer:            For debt reasons. Debt reduction is kind of the major thing with that, but—

Jessica:            Okay. Okay. But then you're going to put the bulk of the money into the new house?

Duffer:            Correct.

Jessica:            So this is not a great debt reduction plan. Okay. So—question. And I feel like I already know the answer. Do you have a prenuptial agreement with your wife?

Duffer:            So we did talk about one. I offered it as a way to hopefully make her feel more comfortable with the arrangements. And then, as we looked into doing it and the cost of doing it, we decided not to. And I said that I fully would and I would pay for it, and—

Jessica:            Wait. Question. Question. You have more money. Why is she less comfortable than you? If there is a—

Duffer:            I have more debt. I have a lot of debt.

Jessica:            You have more debt, but you also have more liquid resources.

Duffer:            Sort of. Yeah. But I'm servicing debt, so I think it's—this is maybe where my question stems from.

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah.

Duffer:            Like, this is my question, is, how do we figure out what's at the base of that?

Jessica:            Yeah.

Duffer:            I mean, I think part of it comes from situations that she had found herself in in the past where people took advantage. And so our sort of verbal and very specific agreement that's something we never wrote down is that what we have, debt or assets, ahead of the marriage do not fully join together. Those are each our own to sort of deal with/manage, and then the things sort of beyond that—I think we do need to become a little more specific about that, as you've already [crosstalk].

Jessica:            Yeah. So I'm going to pull up your chart in just a moment, but I want to say you have told me that you have more debt, and you have one child and she has two children. And you're going to put the bulk of the money into expenses and the new home you will purchase together. And now I get why you have debt and she doesn't.

Duffer:            She's really good at money and doesn't think she is. It's very strange.

Jessica:            And it sounds to me like this is an inequitable setup which you are consenting to, which, again, may explain how you end up with debt. And I just want to—before we get into the chart, I do want to say I have a lot of red flags around this agreement.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            And you don't. And I don't want to create problems for you in your two-week-old marriage. Also, what I want to kind of ground you into is you don't need to do a whole expensive thing with a lawyer. You can have an agreement written down on a piece of paper and have it notarized. And then, when you're no longer—if, God forbid, you're ever no longer getting along, you can refer back to that piece of paper. And I, with all the power of my being, want to encourage you to get a prenup.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            I want to encourage you to get a prenup and to protect your income and for it to reflect that her economic needs are greater than yours. If the two of you are not getting along and you're trying to divorce, if you're making more money than her, she can access that money. And because this is not a newlywed's reading—this is a financial reading—I just want to say the best thing you can do is put it to paper when you are in love and getting along, "This is what I have moving into this marriage. This is what you have moving into this marriage." And have some sort of clear agreement. There are templates online.

Duffer:            Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            Do it cheap and easy. You know what I mean? Get it notarized.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            You don't have to do a whole thing, because if, God forbid, it comes to that, that notarized piece of napkin will be legally binding.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            And what you have now—it makes me a little nervous. So let's pull up your chart. We are not sharing your birth data, but this is your birth chart. You were born in 1976, so you've got that Pluto in Libra, Neptune in Sadge, Uranus in Scorpio mix—and Saturn in Cancer, right? So you're part of that cohort. There's a lot of things to say here. We're talking about money, so I'm looking straightaway for Venus. What's Venus doing?

                        Well, Venus is in your twelfth house. It's intercepted in Aquarius. And it's squared by Uranus. And so I wonder if, through the course of your life, you've had money and then no money, and then money and then no money—just dips and dives and twists and turns, eh?

Duffer:            For sure.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Duffer:            Yeah. Absolutely. My family, too.

Jessica:            Yeah. From your childhood onwards.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            I mean, you don't get intercepted Venus in the twelfth without that being in your childhood.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            It also indicates that you have really changeable values around money, and also, what is likely to have kind of fallen to anticapitalist or eccentric or outside-of-the-system ways of either navigating money, thinking about money, or making money—or all of them.

Duffer:            Sure.

Jessica:            And this is all great. You know what I mean? No harm, no foul. But what it isn't is linear. And so you're like, "Well, this emotionally makes sense, so I'll take on the burden," and the—what can be not super linear logic can come up for you around money stuff.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            And I would imagine that in your previous relationships, perhaps in your marriage, money was a real issue at times.

Duffer:            Oh yeah.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Duffer:            I mean, probably one of the primary—

Jessica:            Correct. Yes.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            And this is, in part, because you have got Uranus in your seventh house, and it squares that twelfth-house intercepted Venus/Mercury conjunction in Aquarius. And so what happens is you have these ideas about money, and they're kind of in your noodle. It's a noodle soup. There's a lot of different ideas you have, right? And they kind of all make sense to you until circumstances, a.k.a. your partner, does something you don't expect. And then, when they do something you don't expect, you're like, "Well, this fucks with my sense of reality. It doesn't just fuck with my finances."

                        And there is a way that this pattern is getting activated right now in a once-in-a-lifetime sort of way because Pluto is sitting on top of your Venus. Yeah. This transit of Pluto on top of Venus can coincide with a powerful love where you're just like, "This is fucking it. I am feeling the love. I am"—just like there's a chemical feeling with you and this person, right? It's powerful. It can also trigger money issues.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            And so, when I prepped your chart and I saw this, I was like, "Okay. We came to play hardball with this reading," because your patterns—this transit just started on March 21st.

Duffer:            Wow. Okay.

Jessica:            When did you decide to get married?

Duffer:            She proposed last October.

Jessica:            Okay. And then you scheduled it for—

Duffer:            Our plan is to have a bigger wedding in the fall with friends and family.

Jessica:            Oh, fun.

Duffer:            But we really wanted to have a little just—it's our own thing.

Jessica:            I love that.

Duffer:            And so we decided to do it on the date of the anniversary.

Jessica:            That's sweet.

Duffer:            She jokes that it's because I worry that she would forget if there were too many dates to remember.

Jessica:            That is really funny, actually. That's very good. So okay. So you are in this transit now, and then in February of 2027, you hit it for quite some time, right? So it's a two-year transit in total—

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            —off and on. It's a little off and on, as Pluto transits always are.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            And what happens when Pluto sits on top of Venus, which—because Pluto takes 250 years to move through the zodiac, it's not going to happen to everybody in their lifetime. And if it does happen to you, it's a once-in-a-lifetime. So it's a big fucking deal. And what's happening is it's triggering your twelfth house, which means your assumptions, your nonlinear conversations that things don't really get said—that whole thing that you have a tendency towards—and other things, but I'm just going to stay focused on the money part because that's really—

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            —what we're here to talk about. And so inside of all of this is a complex conversation about power, accountability, money, capitalism—messy topics for you because, for you, you would be a lot more comfortable if everybody just did what felt authentic, showed up, and handled their business.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm. And helped each other.

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah.

Duffer:            And just—you know.

Jessica:            Yeah. That's great. That's a great idea. That doesn't work, okay? So that doesn't work. You're old enough to know that shit doesn't work, right? It's—

Duffer:            I've tried. I've tried and failed.

Jessica:            Sure.

Duffer:            The system is stronger than I am.

Jessica:            The system is stronger than you are, but there's a deeper issue at play, which is, in capitalism, which is an inherently extractive and cruel system, everybody has trauma around it. Everybody has fucked-up experience because there's very few people whose parents had lots of money and they did it by doing really wonderful things for the world, and they managed it fluidly and easily. And even if you have that, how does that not make you have this idealistic understanding of the world, which makes you unaware of the rest of the world?

                        It's too complicated. Money is sticky. And so I am a believer, after counseling couples and individuals for so many years, that having money problems is not a bug; it's a feature of marriage, unless we are dealing with old-school patriarchy, in which it's a man and a woman, and the man has all the money, and the woman is property. Then money becomes quite simple, doesn't it? But outside of that, it's a feature. It's a feature of capitalism/patriarchy bullshit—blah.

                        That said, your idealism is not that Neptunian idealism, although you're also going through a Neptune transit, which we'll talk about.

Duffer:            Oh jeez. Okay.

Jessica:            Yep. It's not a Neptunian idealism of, "Oh, everything will be ponies and lollipops." It's, instead, the idealism of Aquarius, of Uranus. It's the idealism of, "This is how we should all aspire to be. This is how we should connect to community. This is how we should engage with systems. This is how we should engage with each other." And that idealism is like fixed energy, so it's hard for you to really clock it when people are doing something out of alignment with your ideal until they have stomped on your toes—not stepped. Stomped. Does that track with your lived experience in relationships?

Duffer:            I think, yes, in the sense that I can forgive a lot or take a lot until—

Jessica:            Yeah.

Duffer:            You know, it takes a pretty big transgression before I step.

Jessica:            Yeah. Stomp.

Duffer:            Stomp.

Jessica:            Stomp. Stomp. Stomp. Break your toes. Not step. You're like, "Oh, yeah, that hurts, but life is pain. That's okay. I can work with it."

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            Okay. Sorry. Sorry. So how do you talk to your wife about money is secondary to me because I was so interested in this question—I was like, "That's really—that's like a talker." And I'm a very direct person. I was like, "Huh. What an interesting question." And then I pulled up your chart, and I was like, "This is damn bizarre because you're a great talker. You can talk to anyone about anything."

Duffer:            Well, yeah. Maybe the problem is that I can talk, but she can sometimes not want to talk.

Jessica:            Ah.

Duffer:            The timing of the talking can be—

Jessica:            Sure. The emotions of it.

Duffer:            Our timelines are different, or our processing needs or the approach—I mean, if something comes up, I'm like, "Let's do this."

Jessica:            Yeah. "Let's talk about it immediately." Yes.

Duffer:            That's not always the way to do it.

Jessica:            Mm-hmm. So there's layers. I am a big fan of, when it comes to—not talking about, like, "You bought a swimming pool. We can't afford a swimming pool." That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about talking about money as a newlywed couple.

When you're going to approach a conversation like this, it's important to schedule it, to say, "We need to talk about this. Let's both really think about what we feel, what we need, and what we worry about, what we're clear about and what we're not clear about. And let's sit down when there's no human children in the space and set aside four hours where we can just be like, 'In this four-hour space, we will have a meal. We will sip on delicious drinks'"—whatever that means—"'We will talk about money. We'll have space for emotions.'" So it's not like, "We're going to talk about money for four hours." It's, "We're creating spaciousness to have a"—

Duffer:            Okay. Yeah.

Jessica:            —"conversation that is an investment in our marriage."

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            Does that feel like something you could say to her?

Duffer:            Yes. For sure.

Jessica:            Okay. And if she said no to that, that would be what I would consider a massive red flag, right? And she wouldn't say no to that, would she?

Duffer:            No.

Jessica:            She might put off scheduling it, but she wouldn't say no to it.

Duffer:            No. And I mean, I think that's one of the things that we sort of envision about living together because there will be these times that are less pressured, more like, "This is our time." And we have talked—we have a therapist. We have talked about, sort of, that—scheduling more relaxed time where there is maybe a topic, but also, there's other stuff.

Jessica:            Totally.

Duffer:            There's the flow of a meal together and eating.

Jessica:            So let me say this, though. I am advocating for this to happen before new housing is procured.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm. Okay.

Jessica:            So, if you need to do this on Zoom, do it on Zoom. That might even be easier emotionally for one of you. So we're just looking at the options, right? We're looking at the options. So, when I looked at your chart, I was like, "Okay. You can talk about anything to anyone.  I don't know what the problem is here." And then I looked deeper, and I was like, "Oh. The problem is you are at this crossroads, and you need to not make the same mistakes you made with your ex." And you're, right now, poised to do that. Sorry. So we're talking about it. So we're talking about it.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            My difficulty here is around the housing and your proposed agreement where you pay more. She keeps a home where she's getting rental income. You sell your home. So you're invested all-in with no backup. She's paying less, and she has a backup. That's not an equitable financial setup. Does that sound equitable to you?

Duffer:            I guess not, thinking about it in the abstract or if somebody else put it to me like that for themselves.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Duffer:            I mean, I feel like the home I live in would be the backup.

Jessica:            You're selling that home.

Duffer:            No, no, no. I mean if we moved into a new home together and—

Jessica:            So her name won't be on the deed?

Duffer:            Oh, it would be. Oh, you know, we would share that.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            So then it's half my backup.

Jessica:            So it's not a backup.

Duffer:            It's half a backup.

Jessica:            So, if—

Duffer:            [crosstalk] move out to the other place, and then I'd have that, could keep it.

Jessica:            So, if she owns 50 percent of the house and the two of you are breaking up, she's not going to be like, "You just keep the house. Everything's fine," because you're not going to be getting along, right?

Duffer:            Potentially. Yeah. Yes.

Jessica:            I mean, we're not—this is a problem. When we're thinking about the business side of marriage, you cannot think about being in love and treating each other well. You must think about money. And I mean, you definitely came to the right guy about that. I'm not the most romantic person in town, right? But—

Duffer:            I need that. I need that.

Jessica:            And I am here for you. But I will say that if you own the house, if you're paying most of the mortgage and you're putting down the down payment and she owns a separate house and she's keeping that house, why is she on the deed? What is she putting into the house? If you are selling your home to buy another home, why is she on the deed? Is there a reason other than romance?

Duffer:            Yes, absolutely. I mean, she would be putting in an amount that is in a ratio to our—

Jessica:            Give me a percentage.

Duffer:            I think it's like two-thirds, one-third. Currently, I think I make almost double, so it's approximately two-thirds from me, one-third from her. So that's the monetary side. However, she has the skills that I do not possess in home maintenance, in building, in upkeep, [crosstalk]—

Jessica:            So she's sweat equity sort of thing.

Duffer:            She is that and much more.

Jessica:            Question. Okay—because, again, I'm just thinking about money, right?

Duffer:            Yeah. Of course.

Jessica:            You're putting significantly more money into the down payment and into the monthly mortgage.

Duffer:            Not the down payment.

Jessica:            Oh.

Duffer:            That piece we would—

Jessica:            That's 50/50?

Duffer:            —split. Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            50/50?

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. Great. I did not understand that. So that is really meaningful.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            But she's paying significantly less in the mortgage, and she's going to have two kids to your one kid, right, that have rooms?

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            And so her sweat equity makes sense for that, right?

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            Okay. So that—

Duffer:            I think so.

Jessica:            Okay. Okay.

Duffer:            Yeah. What I also hope to get out of selling my house is enough or almost enough to do away with one set of—most of my debt is student loans, really. That's it.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            And my house. So I would hope to pay off, or mostly, one of my chunks of that and then have that monthly payment of almost $600 now more available to me. And the idea that, then, shared expenses also means I have less expenses—I mean, right now, I'm a solo homeowner paying a mortgage in a fairly high tax/cost-of-living area. And that's part of what I want to get out of—

Jessica:            I see, because it'll be—

Duffer:            —and move into something—

Jessica:            —less expensive where you're moving to.

Duffer:            It'll be less expensive for me. It'll be more expensive for her in that sense, actually.

Jessica:            I see.

Duffer:            What she's agreed to be putting in will be more for her.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            But then the idea is she has the income backup. But we're also just talking about sort of making it work at her house for a while before making that jump as another possibility. I think the conversations have been around, what is the most important thing to consider? Getting into a higher mortgage and having that, being house poor, but have the lovely house with the space that we want and the garden and the land and the location? Or save money, decrease our debt as much as we can, tough it out in a tighter situation? Because neither of our houses is big enough to house everybody.

Jessica:            Right.

Duffer:            But we could kind of work around it, and the location of the one isn't the best, and this and that. So we kind of bounce, like, well, this, that—

Jessica:            I see.

Duffer:            —and the other day, she was like, "I'm afraid. Aren't you afraid of getting into a mortgage that big and having that expense holding you prisoner, almost?" And I was like, "Well, yes, but also, I'm thinking about it from this other perspective of I really value the idea of having this place and this beautiful place to live in. We're making it our own, and we've got the kids, and we could have grandkids one day, maybe. Who knows?" You know. Like, what is the pathway to decide that?

Jessica:            I see.

Duffer:            That's [crosstalk] the issue.

Jessica:            So what you just told me, again, puts up little red flags for me because newlywed couple, three children, six cats—I'm guessing a three-bedroom house?

Duffer:            It's a three-bedroom house. Yes.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            One of them is very small but totally functions—

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            —as a bedroom.

Jessica:            So, theoretically—and one or two bathrooms?

Duffer:            One and a half. Yeah.

Jessica:            Oh shit. Okay.

Duffer:            And another toilet.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            And the shower could be fixed to work yet, but mm-hmm.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            Yes. There's work to be done [crosstalk].

Jessica:            There's work to be done.

Duffer:            There's work to be done.

Jessica:            So my red flag is that's a lot of pressure on your new relationship. And I would say a two-year-long relationship is still in the new years, right?

Duffer:            Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            Its early years.

Duffer:            Absolutely.

Jessica:            It's a lot of pressure. And the core issue that I'm hearing is not, "How do I talk about money?" It's, how do you stay focused on—how do you know yourself around what you need and then stay focused in conversation with her about that, because what she's saying is, "Money is tight. I want to keep on making the choice I'm making. I want you to bend into what I'm doing because I'm scared about money," which is fair and valid.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            And what you're saying is, "Money is tight. I'm willing to spend more money so that we can have a good life in this particular way. And I'm willing to take on the risks."

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            So what you're talking about is two different things. And what needs to be discussed instead of stay or go is, what kind of financial risks are you willing to take in 2026/2027? Because there is a risk that you could, to, quote unquote, "save money," move into her house, sell your house, and then what? You don't roll that money into another purchase. You're going to be paying major taxes on that money. And nobody wants to pay taxes to this fucking government anyways, right?

Duffer:            I try to not—yes. Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            Right. Right. But let's be very realistic, right—

Duffer:            Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            —about the laws and such.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            So you move into her house. What happens if she doesn't change her tune about this issue? "I don't want to spend all this extra money. It's working well enough." What happens then? You would not be happy with that. I mean, you would not be happy with that.

Duffer:            Not for the long term. I believe that we both feel that way, and it's difficult to make a change—

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            —if it's working okay for some of us.

Jessica:            So the sentence that you just used, "I believe that we both think"—I want—every time you think to yourself or you say in conversation, "I believe that we both think," I want you to put a red flag on that. I want you to highlight that sentence because that is your part of the pattern. "I believe that we both think," is your pattern, right? And you are perfectly reasonable. I'm not saying you're wrong, okay? But perfectly reasonable people who are not wrong can have completely different views on the same situation and completely different needs about the same situation.

Duffer:            As I have discovered in situations—

Jessica:            Endlessly. So many times before. So many times before.

Duffer:            Wait a minute. [crosstalk].

Jessica:            You know this. Okay. You know this, and yet you don't know this, right? And this is where I have, again, big red flags. Will you say your full name and then your wife's full name?

Duffer:            Okay. My name is [redacted]. She is [redacted].

Jessica:            She knows you're getting a reading right now, right?

Duffer:            Yes.

Jessica:            She does not want to be looked at.

Duffer:            I asked her by text because we didn't see each other for a couple of days, and I was like, "How do you feel about being sort of psychicked?" or whatever. And it just didn't get answered.

Jessica:            Sure.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            Do you know what that means yet? She's good at stonewalling things.

Duffer:            Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

Jessica:            So that's one of the—so, every once in a while, she doesn't respond to something because she's busy; she missed it—whatever. But consistently, she doesn't respond to things that she doesn't like and she doesn't want to take a stand on. She doesn't want to fight about it. So just get-to-know-your-wife stuff.

Duffer:            Yep.

Jessica:            So, when I look at her energetically, I mean, obviously, I can see her, but I can also see she doesn't want me digging around. So I'm not going to dig. I'm just seeing what's on the surface, and her amazing tenacity and also stubbornness is on the surface. I respect that a great deal.

Duffer:            If she's decided she's doing a thing, then she is doing the thing.

Jessica:            Correct.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            So "I believe we both feel" is a terrible strategy with somebody with that level of tenacity and stubbornness—

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            —who's also not super verbal about it, because she may have decided already, "I'm not spending more money. I'm not doing that. That doesn't make sense," and just not been really direct with you about it. And then you do this thing where you talk around, talk around, and then you kind of acquiesce. And so we have the risk of a pattern that's not good for you, and it comes out of your matrilineage. Do you understand what I'm talking about?

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            Good. So it's really important that you engage consciously with this pattern, understanding that if you say to her, "Listen. There's a million reasons to stay in your house, and there's a million reasons not to. At the end of the day, I'm willing to do it if we have a plan to leave. I don't think it's a good idea if we don't have a plan to leave. And if you want to keep your house and I feel ready to sell my house, I have to buy another house at that time," because you can't just put it in your savings account, right?

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            It's like there's, like, a tax.

Duffer:            [crosstalk] the capital lien situation, I got—yeah. Yeah. Not my favorite topic either, but [crosstalk].

Jessica:            Yeah. It's a terrible fucking topic, but again, you asked me to talk about money, so here we go.

Duffer:            Indeed.

Jessica:            Yeah. Indeed. I know. It's awful. It's awful. I apologize. I apologize. Okay.

Duffer:            I appreciate it, though.

Jessica:            So, if you're going to sell your home, you'll have to do something with that money. Now, maybe you're buying a home, and she keeps her home, and then it's your home. Can you do that, realistically? These are the conversations to have with her. You don't need to have this figured out. But what I do want to say as your astrologer and psychic is that you do not want to live in that house. You are willing to do it as a compromise for a limited period of time, but she has to commit to the timeline and the method of getting out. And I don't think she'll do that, to be honest. I don't think she wants to do that.

                        And so the conversation is going to be an uncomfortable and frustrating and sad one, and you will be fighting at one part of the conversation. And I still think it's a good conversation to have. I know I'm speaking to your Pisces. You've got a Pisces Rising. You've got Neptune square to your Rise. You hate fighting. You hate conflict. You hate being the bad guy. You hate discord. It's awful to you. And I want to just say the fights we have to better understand each other and come to consensus—and then there's the fights we have when we're stuck and we're trapped and we're not well. I'm going to encourage you to have the first kind of fight.

Duffer:            Yes.

Jessica:            And you have a habit to have the second kind of fight. You only fight at the end. You only fight when things are fucked. And at that point, there's not goodwill. There's not good faith. There's not mutual values. And there's built-up shit. And so the good news is there's not a lot of built-up shit here. There's a relationship that's two years old, but it's not like fucked-up patterns around money exist yet. They don't.

Duffer:            Right. Not between—no.

Jessica:            You have established patterns of poor communication. I mean, and let me again say every relationship—I can pick at any relationship and spend hours saying what's wrong with any relationship. I'm not saying, "Oh, this is a bad marriage," at all. I'm just saying this is your shit in the marriage, right?

Duffer:            Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            For you—because I'm only talking to you, Duffer—not being direct with this woman about your needs and your limits and where you're willing to compromise and where it will make you feel bad if you're asked to compromise—if you don't say those things explicitly to this woman, you will re-create the worst relationship patterns you've had in the past.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            So don't do that is my best advice. Don't do that. And then the question of, "Okay, but then how do we talk?"—I say write it out. Not a poem. Not an essay. So you might need to start with a poem or an essay and then extract bullet points, okay? Because if you use too many words and too many emotional qualifiers, she doesn't listen anymore.

Duffer:            I mean, I hadn't thought of it that way before. But I'm definitely—I come with a qualifier.

Jessica:            You come with a qualifier. And I want to say—

Duffer:            Too many clauses, too many tangents, too many [crosstalk]—

Jessica:            Totally. Totally.

Duffer:            It gets messy. Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            And so qualifiers and tangents—some of this is you're an academic, right? You have a history of learning and thinking and processing and talking about processes. And so you enjoy that kind of thinking and conversation.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            That's part of it.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            Part of it is you're like, "And I want to step on your toes here. And I want there to be a negative consequence there." Some of it is you're saying something and backtracking it in the same breath. Right?

Duffer:            Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Jessica:            And so that's a fear of conflict. That's a fear of accountability, ultimately, right? And that doesn't work well with her. She also doesn't do great with super direct. She is similarly avoidant, but it lands in very different ways inside of her. And where you're like, "Okay, let's talk about it for ten hours," she's like, "Let's never talk about it again." So you're perfect for each other in that a hand and a glove are perfect for each other. But this is going to be—it's not something you can fix. This has to be a group project.

                        And the group project is, "We are a team. We want to be a good team." And so then the question is, "How can we learn how to communicate about things that neither of us actually know how to communicate about that don't have clean answers?"

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            And one thing for you is, I think, sorting through the qualifiers to get to the kernel. That's really important for you. And so, when I look energetically at you, I see a number of things. I see you feel guilty about your debt, which to me is really, actually, kind of surprising because school debt I don't really consider traditional debt. You're an American with an education, so boom, you have debt—unless you're independently wealthy, right?

Duffer:            But I also feel like I did it wrong. I refinanced, and if I hadn't, I'd be done with it, you know, and so it's just sitting there. And then I also went to school once and then went to school again because I'd done the wrong one first, and then I got another degree, and now I'm even midway through another one. Now my kid's going to school, and it makes it harder to pay for him and try to do all the things that I want to do. I look at it as guilt, but that's an interesting—

Jessica:            It's guilt. What you just described is you have guilt about the choices you've made. And what I'm telling you is that that's compelling you to making choices that aren't quite right for you. You're not protecting yourself financially. You're not thinking, "Oh, yeah, I have school debt. I have lots of initials after my name, and I have school debt. And also, I make more money than my partner. And also, I am a hard worker, and I am navigating a capitalist hellscape." Right? And this is the thing, is, for our generation—we're the same age; we're Gen X, right?

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            We don't have that same—I feel like millennials and Gen Z talk about the capitalist hellscape, and there's a cultural agreement to give themselves a pass for debts and stuff like that because they really get the collective and how it hits them personally. Our generation and older, not so much. We have the sense of, "I should be able to pull myself up from my bootstraps. I should be able to handle this. This is my fault in some way."

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            I know you intellectually know that's not true, even though you—it's in there, right?

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            But I want to say that all of your relationship to debt and education and the choices you've made and how you've navigated taking care of yourself—a lot of it's been reactive, right?

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            And so you're putting yourself in a position with this woman where you're being reactive to her needs and to her preferences and to her finances and her willingness. And that will make you feel just as bad. You're also allowing your guilt over how you've handled money to be like, "Okay, well, I'll just pay for extra." "Okay, well, I'll just handle more." "It's okay that I'm getting rid of my safety net and you're keeping yours because I'm bad at money." And I want to say that's reactive.

Duffer:            But I also feel like money will find me. You know, that's always been the thing in the past.

Jessica:            Okay. Money will find you is a great way for you to practice living, but it's a bad way to negotiate money with your wife.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            Okay? So you can have this core belief that you do have the ability to let money find you. When you refinanced your loan, it was your way of letting money find you.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            Right? You could sell your home. Money will find you.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            But then what? Is it essentially the same thing as refinancing your loan? I'm going to say it's the exact same thing. It's doing something that gives you liquidity in the short term without thinking through the long-term implications of it. If you sell your house without a clear idea of what you're buying, when you're buying, how you're buying, how much of that home you own, then it's refinancing your loan all over again. And we do not want that for you.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            And is your wife open to astrology and all this kind of stuff?

Duffer:            Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. She hasn't done a lot of study, but totally.

Jessica:            But she's open to it. So you can also share this reading with her and pause it when I say shit like I just said and have a full hour-long conversation about, "Is that true? How is that true? Where is that true?" Feel free to use me. Feel free to talk shit about me. Feel free to be angry at me and be like, "This fucking Jessica—fuck her." I'm okay with that in the—I know you're very Neptunian, so you probably won't do that, but—

Duffer:            I won't.

Jessica:            No, you won't, but—

Duffer:            But we'll let her do it, maybe.

Jessica:            Okay. Cool. Cool. She can totally do it. I am okay with that. I consent because it is such a triggering, activating, and hard conversation to have inside of yourselves as individuals, let alone as a couple, that it is a little easier to have a third party to be annoyed by.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            And I would rather you be annoyed by me than you shut down and stop advocating for yourself. I wouldn't say you are bad at money at all. I mean, you have debts, and you make spontaneous, emotionally driven choices. And you don't always think things through.

Duffer:            Yeah. My sense of myself is more—sometimes the details are fuzzy in the little purchasing and things, but bigger picture, I've felt like, yeah, I don't have as much retirement as you're supposed to, but I have the ability to access resources, even if that's just loans and things. You know?

Jessica:            Yeah.

Duffer:            And we're in a little bit of a "What might happen to the economy?" phase. And so that's also playing in the background firmly for both of us.

Jessica:            Yes. Yeah. And is she your age, your similar age?

Duffer:            Yep. Yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. So you're—

Duffer:            We're just a couple years apart.

Jessica:            My advice to you is to get clear—so schedule this conversation with her, and let it be a week or two out. And set the intention that this is not a conversation where what your primary goal is is to make decisions. That's not the conversation you're having. The primary goal is to get assumptions, needs, fears, preferences on the table so that you're both empowered with a lot more information so you can recognize where you're actually at as a team. And you can then schedule another conversation. Give yourself—I mean, you could have that next conversation the next day. She would need a week or two, right?

                        So you're going to, let's say, have, a week later, ten days later—you're going to have another conversation where you've had time to digest the information. And then you start to come up with, "Okay, what is the next best choices we can make? What is the long-term choice we can make around each item?" which is why you're using the dry erase board or you're writing things down, so you can return to it and be like, "Okay. Ultimately, I don't see that she super wants to leave that house she's in." I don't think she's a mastermind trying to manipulate you, but I think she ultimately has every intention of convincing you to stay in that house with her. And I think that would make you really unhappy.

                        And so some compromises we can make, and some compromises we cannot make. I encourage you, as your psychic, to not make that compromise to live in her house. Now, I'm not saying if there is a clear express agreement that is made in good faith to stay there for six months and then move—you could make that work. And maybe, after living somewhere else for a number of years, you two could move back into that house when you're in downsizing mode or whatever.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            But this is not where you want to be.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            And so I want to just validate that for you because that is a sticking point that I can see that you and I are actually talking about. And because Pluto is conjunct your Venus, you are likely to be terrified about these conversations and be really triggered within them, okay? And I want you to know that I see that, and I'm still giving you this firm, clear advice because the beauty of a Pluto conjunction is it empowers you. But it only empowers you to deal with your trauma and your triggers and your shit. So it's not like, "Oh, I feel empowered." It's like, "Oh, I have to deal with this." But there's energy to deal with this.

                        Over the course of the next almost two years, you could radically transform your relationship to not just money but your values system and how you communicate those things in relationships and have them honored, and also be adaptable and flexible enough, because you really need that in your relationships, right?

Duffer:            Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            You could completely break old patterns. But I mean, it sounds good on paper. It's really uncomfortable, the process. And I want to validate that, that it being uncomfortable—the two of you having fights, the two of you recognizing that you're at odds in places—is not an indication that she's going to leave or that you need to leave or that something's unfixable.

                        This period is likely to confront you with things that feel irretractable and unmovable and that require a different approach, a different medicine than what you've used in the past. That's all.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            And so learning how to have these larger conversations where you recognize—let's say as an example she is like, "I don't want to leave this house. I don't want to buy a new house," and you're like, "I need to sell my house. I don't want to move into your house." What the fuck are you going to do with that, right? So then what you would do if—let's say that happened, right? That was revealed. And you can apply what I'm about to say to any disagreement. Then the conversation has to be you would say to her, "This is what I'm hearing you say. This is what I'm hearing you need. Is that correct?" She would have to do the same for you. "This is what I'm hearing you say. This is what I'm hearing you say that you need. Am I correct?" You do that.

                        Then you say, "This is how I'm feeling right now emotionally." The other person says, "This is how I'm feeling emotionally." You make an agreement that you're going to talk again. Maybe it's later today. Maybe it's in a week. You're going to agree and honor that commitment. This only works if everybody honors the commitment to follow up.

                        And then you both present a compromise that you're willing to make and a compromise you want to ask your partner to make. You're not going to come up with solutions. You're going to come up with strategies for how to traverse the landscape. This would be radically different than what you've done in the past, right? It would be breaking your pattern because you're—

Duffer:            Yeah. I mean, I think we've dipped our toe in that kind of thing and started with a therapist who's sort of helping in some ways to facilitate that. I don't think we've got the ball rolling [crosstalk].

Jessica:            The thing about couples therapy is, also, the two of you have to come in and say, "We want to talk about this." And neither of you want to talk about this. And so it's not the couples therapist's fault that they don't know exactly what's going on here, because both of you have these really established—you're both in your 50s—really established maladjusted coping mechanisms around this. And that's okay. The marriage is actually a good one for the two of you to work on these issues. I'm not seeing this as—you know, the building's not on fire. We just have red flags.

                        But we come to all of our relationships with our own individual red flags. And this is the exact situation that the two of you need to learn how to deal with in yourselves as individuals, as well as within the partnership. She has a tendency towards rigidity, and you have a tendency to bend, to compromise in ways that compromise you, that are not sustainable.

                        Again, if the two of you are listening to this together, pause the recording. Check in with each other. Do you both believe that to be true? Do you believe that I'm right or wrong about that? If that is correct, have you actually thought about it in those terms? Having these conversations doesn't mean you're diagnosing the relationship or diagnosing each other. It means it's like you're finding ways of recognizing, like, oh, she might not know that you're bending to her. But you do. You do. You've got so much Pisces in you. You're just like, "There's flow in the direction of your strongly held belief. I will follow that flow."

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            And that gets you in trouble because—

Duffer:            Well, it could be hard sometimes because she'll say, "Well, what do you want to do?" and I say, "Well, what do you want to do? What do you want to do?" But it seems like we're maybe—there's a different reason behind why each of us are trying to discover what the other person really, really wants in those moments.

Jessica:            So, in those moments, my advice to you is to say, "We both need to take a moment and figure out what we individually need." Write in the notes app of your phone. Write it on a piece of paper. Think about it—whatever's easier for your processing style. And then, before you find out what the other person wants or needs, you figure out what you want and need. And part of it might be, for you, a lot of times, "I'm not sure, because what I want and need is for us to get along. And I'm scared right now."

You're allowed to have that be what you want and need because she's your fucking partner. She's your wife. And so, if she is the bestie that you need her to be, she will be able to hold space for that. When you try to power through and be reasonable, she actually—it activates her rigidity more. When you actually don't do all the qualifiers and the defending and the explaining and you're just like, "Oh, I just feel really insecure and scared right now, and I can't figure out what I need because I just want us to be okay," she responds well to that because it's really true.

When you're able to just be like, "Oh. This emotion is stopping me from being able to figure out logically what I need," she's there. And I'm right about this, eh?

Duffer:            I think so. I'm not always very good at sort of recognizing that about myself and saying it.

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah.

Duffer:            The other day, I tried to say—because we were just kind of—it was a tough day and lots of stuff happened, but I said, "Is there something wrong, or is this just that we're angry and tired and frustrated about other things?" And I couldn't really—

Jessica:            What did she say?

Duffer:            —come to a conclusion. Not much.

Jessica:            Okay.

Duffer:            What she did say was, "No, there's nothing—I'm not mad at you," essentially, because I think my question was, "Are you mad at me?"

Jessica:            Yeah. That was your—okay. So I want to—

Duffer:            And her answer was, "No, I'm not mad at you."

Jessica:            Right. So what I want to kind of push you on a little bit is you asked her to diagnose your relationship instead of saying, "Are you mad?" So she actually did respond to what your real question was, but you didn't own the question. And so, the next time you find yourself wanting to say, "Are we okay? What's actually happening with us?" you're asking her to be the decider of the diagnosis of the "us." And that's not a good dynamic in any relationship.

Duffer:            No, it's [crosstalk].

Jessica:            And it's just not good for your emotional health. Yeah.

Duffer:            Yes.

Jessica:            Yeah. But in those moments, what you're really saying is, "Are you mad at me? Ahh. Are we okay? Ahh." And you're allowed to have those feelings and thoughts. Your wife can hold those feelings and thoughts. Your ex could not. Your wife can.

And so your job as a partner, as somebody who's endeavoring to be in a relationship, is to show her what's actually happening. And you can say, "Oh, we're having a funky day, and I'm falling apart because I'm scared something's bad with us right now." Let her be the person you need her to be because she will in those moments. Again, the more intelligently you mask and diagnose and describe, the less helpful she is, actually.

Duffer:            That does track.

Jessica:            Yes. I bet it does. And so, inside of all of this, the real answer to, "How do I talk to my wife about money?" is first figure out, "Okay. I feel guilty about how I've navigated debt, and I intellectually know that I haven't actually done a bad job." True story?

Duffer:            Think so.

Jessica:            Okay. If you don't intellectually know, you should.

Duffer:            I mean, with the education I had, with the resources I had, with the way things are, I did my best.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Duffer:            I can intellectually say that.

Jessica:            And also, the debts you have are not from making—

Duffer:            Not now. Got rid of those.

Jessica:            Right. Right. Exactly. Exactly.

Duffer:            [crosstalk] a long slog, but I—there were decisions that were more poorly made, and I saw that all through. And that was wrapped up in my last relationship, and I took the bulk of the responsibility for it.

Jessica:            Okay. Did you hear what you just said? You took the bulk of the financial responsibility. What you described to me about your marriage at the beginning of our conversation was that you have every intention of doing that again. And that's why I was like, "Red flags. Oh no. Don't do that."

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            You earn more money. She has more liquidity. She has a lot more ease. That means you have the same amount of money. It doesn't mean you have more money. If you can't come at the relationship 50/50, you need to have a better reason than "I have school debt" because that is your primary motive, actually. It's this guilt and shame that you don't spend wisely, so you're like, "Okay, so I'll spend more money on the relationship," which is, again, the logic that gets you into trouble.

                        So being able to figure out, "Okay, we don't have the money we wish we had as a team. If we were coming at things 50/50 across board"—and sometimes 50/50 is you do the sweat equity and I pay more money. That's a perfectly reasonable way of determining 50/50. But it can't be based on assumptions and vibes.

Duffer:            Right.

Jessica:            It has to be based on clear agreements because she might be like, "My sweat equity for our home is not something that I want money for," right? She might actually feel that way. She might not. But having financial goals that are expressly articulated is really important. And none of this is really about numbers, you notice. I have talked to people about money, and we had a numbers conversation. None of this is about numbers. This is all about communication. But it has to start with your own thinking.

It has to start with, "I don't want to re-create my marriage with my ex around money." And it's important that you recognize the ways that you are doing it. And so being able to come to her and say, "Oh shit. I did this with my ex, and it backfired. I'm catching myself doing it with you. I love you. I never want this to end. And I need to figure out a way to not rush to fix things or rush to make choices that are short-term easy that are actually not really sustainable long term—

Duffer: Or to make—

Jessica:            —unless everything goes in one way. Yeah. It's not a good—

Duffer:            Or to make the assumptions I made where I say, "Can we do this?" And they say nothing, and I take it as a yes. And then they don't do it, or—you know.

Jessica:            So, when she says nothing, it's a no—just like your ex, right?

Duffer:            Or, "Yes, I will in the future," or, "Maybe," or, "Let's think about it," or, "Let's talk about it." Those are all noes, I guess.

Jessica:            Those are all noes. Yeah.

Duffer:            Yeah. Okay.

Jessica:            Okay?

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            So, if it's not a yes, that doesn't inherently mean it's a no. But in this context, when your new wife doesn't say shit and you ask her a direct question, take it as a no. Don't take it as a yes. If you say, "Okay, we should get a new place," and she keeps on avoiding that conversation, she doesn't want to do it. And then you have a right, because you're a grown-up with, actually, excellent communication skills when we pull out the emotional component of it—you can say, "I notice that you keep on not responding. Is that because you don't want to do it?"

                        When you ask people to consent, when you ask people to be accountable to what they do and don't say and what they do and don't want, life is easier. Now, your conversations aren't easier.

Duffer:            No.

Jessica:            But your life for the long term is easier. And that's what we're talking about, right? Now, I want you to take a pause. Do some check-in. Do you feel that I've answered this question? Is something lingering?

Duffer:            I think it's brought up a bunch of stuff that I really didn't have in my mind about myself. I think, of course, I've been looking at it as a bit more like, "I'm really optimistic and positive that we'll have the money, and she's really scared and negative and pessimistic. And that's terrible. And we just need to"—you know, "Money loves us. It's coming our way. Don't worry about it."

Jessica:            Uh-huh.

Duffer:            So I've been, I think, more focused on that than being in myself and the pattern that you have displayed.

Jessica:            That tracks. I mean, that's the pattern, right? That's the pattern.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            There's a different between—and you've got a couple—you've got your Midheaven and Neptune both in Sadge, and you've got that Neptune square to your Ascendant. You've got Jupiter intercepted in Aries in the first conjunct Chiron. There is a difference between optimism and being like, "I give it up to the future. She will deal with it, and she will be favorable." Okay? So I want—

Duffer:            I do like to talk about future self and [crosstalk], but yes.

Jessica:            Oh, I see that. I see that. And I want to say that optimism is an energy. It's a way of holding things. Punting choices and responsibilities to future you is not a result of optimism. That's a really complex chutes and ladders coping mechanism for, "I don't want to be here now. I'm sure I'll be fine later," whereas she has, "I don't want to be here now. I'm sure it'll be worse later."

Duffer:            Same, just [crosstalk].

Jessica:            Same. Right. And so, on the surface, at a dinner party, it seems like you're optimistic and she's negative. But that's actually not what's up. You're both doing the exact same thing. You're like, "I can't deal with it now, so future me is going to have to deal with it." And she's like, "Future me is going to suffer." And you're like, "Future me is going to be fine." And you're both not wrong, and you're both not right.

Duffer:            Right.

Jessica:            And the problem isn't being optimistic or being pessimistic, actually. The problem is not naming things in the moment so that you can consent or not. That is the work. And I mentioned that you're going through a Neptune transit. Neptune is squaring your Moon. I have peppered the advice of how to deal with it into the reading, I just want you to know, because I haven't named, "Oh, I'm talking about that." But ultimately, it's about boundaries.

                        And so being able to really set the intention as a team, "We want to be able to consent to the life choices we're making as a team. So that means we need to have more explicit conversations. Otherwise, I'm not clear what I'm asking you to consent to. You're not clear what you're asking me to consent to vice versa. And that's a fucking problem." So that's the labor here, okay?

                        You are right that your optimism is not unfounded. And I don't want you to lose your optimism. Also, as a card-carrying pessimist, I respect your wife's pessimism. I'm not going to criticize her for that.

Duffer:            I mean, that's—yeah, that is literally her.

Jessica:            So it's good to have one of each of you in a relationship. The problem, again, just to hammer this home, is not pessimism or negativity. That's actually a complementary problem in your relationship. It's clarity of communication and consent. So you are not worse at it than she is. She is not worse at it than you are. You are very different in how you are equally terrible at it. Okay. Good. That means—and this is the thing—you may have heard me say this before, but there are two kinds of problems in a relationship. There's the problems that fuck you up, break your heart, and have you abandon yourself. And there are the problems that you need to deal with in yourself anyways, and so ultimately they help you heal.

                        This is the latter, which is why I haven't talked shit about your wife. This is the latter, which is wonderful. Also, the problems that you have with yourself are often more painful to deal with, which is why we avoid it and then we create the secondary problem, the problem that fucks you up. So you've already gone through it in your childhood. You've already gone through it with your ex. You don't need to go through it here. But you have to then be brave enough to show up, and that is a really challenging process.

                        So the more that you make this a team project, understanding that you are going to move really fast in some ways and she's going to just drag, and then vice  versa—again, think of this as hand and glove instead of two hands. You're not doing the same work, but you're doing the same work. Right? And that will help you a lot.

                        And then, finally, Uranus is currently transiting through your eighth house. And that can fuck with your investments. Now, fuck with means high/low. It doesn't mean low. It means high or low. It means inconsistent unpredictable, which tracks with the current economy—global economy and domestic economy in the United States. It also tracks with, "I might sell my house and maybe put the money somewhere. Maybe not." So I want to say you can only make decisions based on what you know, but make decisions based on what you know.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            Okay? Okay. Good. I'm glad you got that. You really got it.

Duffer:            [indiscernible 01:05:01] learning to be better.

Jessica:            Yes. Yeah. And also, you get to waffle. You are allowed to waffle. But share with her what's underneath the waffle.

Duffer:            Okay.

Jessica:            "I'm scared of making mistake. I just want to make you happy. Future self is going to take care of it." Okay. That's what's underneath your waffle. At core, you actually know exactly what you want. You want to sell your house. You want her to sell her house and the two of you buy a new house. That's actually what you want. You're allowed to own that. And it's okay that you want that. And you understand why she doesn't want that, and you're not demanding it of her. But you need to give yourself permission to sit in what you desire. So that's your homework.

Duffer:            Okay. Yeah. [crosstalk].

Jessica:            It's your homework as an individual but also as a romantic partnership project.

Duffer:            Yeah. Right.

Jessica:            It's helping each other figure out what you actually want and need as individuals so that you can, as a team, address that conceptually.

Duffer:            Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            Okay?

Duffer: Okay.

Jessica:            Okay. There is your reading, my dear.

Duffer: Thank you.

Jessica:            Yeah. You stayed present.

Duffer: It was incredible.

Jessica:            I'm very impressed. I really am impressed. I know it was really confronting. Money stuff is hard.

Duffer:            It's rough.

Jessica:            It's rough.

Duffer:            Yeah. Yeah. And I hadn't been owning some of the money things—I mean, I know they're there, but I think that piece is—it's interesting that there's this transit, Pluto/Venus, that is hitting now. And when you started to say it's the one with the big love, I was like, "Oh, did that start two years ago when we met?" because that's really how it's felt with her. But I think it's—

Jessica:            It didn't. It didn't start two years ago.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            But you are in this big love. It coincides with this big love. A lot of people's experience of this transit is radically different than yours.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            This is the thing that's complex about astrology and what makes it really hard to be like—it's not a linear practice. It's understanding that Venus governs love and intimacy, but it also governs your personal finances and your personal resources.

Duffer:            Yeah.

Jessica:            And so, for you, what a gift that this is actually not about you having drama in love, which it is for a lot of people. It's, instead, you having drama with your values—

Duffer:            Yeah. Well, I—

Jessica:            —and how it shows up in love relationships.

Duffer:            I brought that up in the conversation about the house when she said, "Are you afraid of taking on this big mortgage?" And I said, "Well, I think we need to decide based on what we value most about—you know, is it the house and having that place? Or is it the money and having savings and security because we don't have the debt?"—or something like that.

Jessica:            Okay. Wait one sec. I have to interrupt that because that either/or—so Plutonian. That either/or—"Is it money, or is it happiness?"—is really good for someone like you, who's very Neptunian, and you're punting responsibility to future you. But for somebody like her, who's like, "I'm not saying no to happiness, but that doesn't mean I'm saying yes to debt or to financial calamity in five years"—right? So, whenever you're like, "Do we want this or that?" you are setting up your projections into this or that.

But there's actually myriad of things you could want. You could want happiness and not financial debt and not to live in that house and to get a new house. And so we don't get the house with the land, but we do get the house with the garden. We don't get the house in the ideal location, but we do get the house in the better location. There is a lot of space in between this and that.

Duffer: Yeah.

Jessica:            And whenever I hear myself or somebody else saying, "It's either/or," you know you're in a Plutonian mindset, which is a survival mindset. Instead, what I want to say is it's "and also."  "I don't know how to think about money around this issue because I want to be happy right now, and also, I've made that mistake before. I don't want to choose to be miserable right now for theoretical money later, and also, I hear that you're comfortable with that." Practice "and also" instead of either/or.

Duffer:            Thank you, Jessica.

Jessica:            My pleasure.

Duffer:            Much appreciated [crosstalk].

Jessica:            Take really good care.