MONEY WOUNDS
Money wounds refer to unresolved pain caused by past experiences with money that were traumatic.
I have interacted with a friend who has already gone public sharing her childhood financial trauma and how it shaped her. I specifically share this one example because she has been able to resolve the traumas. She has combined her experiences and training to form a career that she is thriving at.
She was raised by a single parent who did manual jobs. Her mother could barely provide basic needs for her. As a result, she resulted to depending on any well-wisher to feed her and help raise her. On many days, her needs remained unmet but on few good days, her needs were met.
As they journeyed through life, her mom could not care for her so she moved to several other foster homes. Some of those homes did better than her mom but still the experiences in those homes cause her of financial trauma.
As an adult, she had many struggles that related to her scarcity mindset. These included overspending, asking less than she deserved, over identifying with people who she felt were financially privileged. She was living in anxiety of what would happen if one day she became poor and kept over extending to society- by doing more for society after all she was a “community child”.
Many people experienced levels of financial trauma from the family of origin, cultural(community) dynamics where they were raised, or personal financial trauma – experiences around money that impacted their perceptions, attitude around money.
A number of people think that people who struggle with money wounds must have experienced poverty. While this is partly true, money wounds are not a reserve for those low income earning families, some of those raised in high income families have had their fair share of their financial traumas because the parents had unhealthy relationship with money.
How to tell that one has money wounds;
- Making financial promises that one has no capacity to keep.
- Charging way less than your worth.
- Reacting to children's financial requests negatively most of the time—statements like "we cannot afford," "you are being ungrateful for needing more," "we cannot compare to those others because they are rich," "you are stressing me by asking xyz..."
- Delaying paying people money you owe them or only doing so when reminded. This also includes paying people late, feeling pained when you have to pay for services that you need – you prefer them given for free.
- Struggling to ask for financial aid when you are genuinely in need because it makes you feel needy, weak, or like a failure.
- Struggling to spend on yourself/buying the things you desire while you are quick to meet the needs of those you love. Spending on yourself is a huge struggle.
- Experiencing intense emotions—sadness, anxiety, or anger when paying bills/doing your financial obligations.
- Limiting dreams because one feels a lack of capacity to meet them financially.
- Spending more than one's level of earning, or spending too much within a short time and struggling practically the rest of the time before the next paycheck.
- Ruminating on negative money emotions until it affects daily functioning.
- Not being able to plan your future financially.
- Having difficulties talking about finances with loved ones.
- Expecting one gender to fully provide in romantic relationships without exceptions.
- Feeling poor and incapacitated when broke as opposed to finding ways of monetizing the skills one possesses.
What causes money wounds?
Our parents’ relationship with money
How our own parents related with money form a blue print of what our relationship with money is. If they argued about money, we learnt that money is emotive. If the powerful parent financially denied the other, then we learnt that being powerful financially gives us leverage while being financially weak makes us victims.
If they only purchased what was needed at home in small portions that led to struggle, we learn to either buy more than enough or still do small purchases that makes us continue to struggle.
If they struggled to spend even when they had because they believed that money was scarce, we developed money wounds in ways that keeps us from spending or spending at every opportunity to compensate for what we never had, even when we do not have.
Growing up in lack and scarcity creates a scarcity mentality in people. It creates the belief that money is little and however much they work; they still feel poor. Another way this mentality shapes people is by making them holders because they fear to spend then end up poor. These individuals can however be so given to accumulating assets while they remain afraid to spend on themselves.
Beliefs, attitudes and perceptions such “society treats us differently, or opportunities are taken away from us because we are poor” by the family of origin is also a source of financial trauma for those who grow in such environments.
These children as adults develop negative attitudes and beliefs with money, such as the belief that they do not deserve the best because they are less privileged or if they increase their income , they should have all privileges life can offer.
In families where there was a healthy relationship with money, there is abundance mentality and these children view themselves as capable of making money and so they balance between spending, saving and investing.
Cultural community dynamics
Children who grew up in communities where everything was done at communal level may struggle with individuation financially. When these individuals do well financially, they struggle with survivors’ guilt (feeling guilty to having it better than those others they grew up with)
This survivors’ guilt is a trauma response to their financial trauma especially when people did so much to see this individual provided for. The money wound here is the in ability to enjoy comfort until one makes all other people comfortable.
Another form of financial trauma in some cultures is where those in certain social economic classes relate with those they perceive to be in similar classes. The effect of this in adult life is the members who were discriminated for being in scarcity feel disadvantaged anytime they encounter communities that they perceive better than themselves.
Some cultures consider men the sole providers and women take up other roles especially at home. While this is may not be unhealthy in itself, when the man in this culture is not able to provide for any reason, there could be conflicts because the woman in this setup may experience their relationship as financially unsatisfying.
In other cases, when such women get into relationship with men in the same culture or other cultures, they come in entitled because all their financial needs need to be met. I have worked with some who feel that finances should be provided for them and their extended family. These circumstances leave the people involved financially tired and wounded.
Personal experiences
Individuals have varying experiences that created their financial trauma that are not related to their families or cultures. These may include their experiences at school, with peers, at work level, their work experiences and many other factors that may have led into them having money wounds.
How to heal money wounds?
- Acknowledge the areas in your life where you may have suffered money wounds.
- Identify the patterns of money wounds that you picked from your past that have shaped the way you view money.
- Interrogate the patterns to see if they work for you. At this point, you may need the help of a therapist or another professional who has skill to help you resolve self-defeating patterns that relate to money.
- Once the patterns have been resolved, create patterns that are healthy, patterns that allow one to live comfortably now and ensure that your future is safe financially.
By Joan Kirera - Psychologist/ Marriage and Family Therapist.