Marriage and debt

  • Thread starter Thread starter elohimrules
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Anicette said:
And i never heard that bi polar trouble are at average an impediment to marriage (know someone who is), even if i agree that It may be, in some situations.
Click to expand...
it isn’t in and of itself. But it could become one at a particular time because of the nature of the illness.

I also knew someone with the illness…see posts above. And I’m in no way trying to say that this would be impossible. But it will be very difficult and potentially have an impact on your everyday lives together.
 
My brother is bipolar and his wife has had a VERY difficult life with him. One of the saddest things she ever said to me is that they “cannot be happy together…” When he is in a manic phase he is silly, expansive, extravagant and irresponsible - which makes it hard to live with him. In the depressive phase he is utterly miserable, but she finds him easier to manage. Fortunately no children are involved. But you have to ask yourself if you want to enter a lifelong partnership with someone who is mentally unstable and financially irresponsible, who may leave you mired in debt with a family to raise. Medication can help, but it can be very difficult to find a stabilising dose…so my advice would be to think very, VERY carefully before you commit to someone you may love but cannot “fix”…
 
Your post has actually made me think of something important to consider. Generally speaking, marriage adds to the happiness of the spouses, or that is the hope anyway. But the issue with bi-polar is that it’s very difficult for the person to be really “happy”. They will be up or down and may sometimes acheive a state of happiness for a while, but there’s no guarantee that it will stick around. It’s very difficult to be in a relationship like that. Married couples often help each other to mature and grow and so both of them end up as better and more rounded individuals than when they started out. In relationships where one person suffers from serious mental illness that is not necessarily going to happen and it’s going to be very one-sided.
 
Even if you are not liable for his debt, keep in mind that after you marry, it isn’t morally HIS debt anymore. It’s THE FAMILY’S debt. Even if he is paying it off, that’s money that you do not have for your family needs.

Engagement is a serious business. Back in the day, engagement was considered to be equivalent to a marriage in all but physical matters. Obviously, this is no longer the case, but an engagement should really only be broken for a very serious matter.

If you aren’t sure this man is marriage material, DON’T MARRY HIM. Full stop. DON’T GET ENGAGED. It’s unfair to you and to him. As PPs have pointed out, what happens if you have children together? If his bipolar disorder is severely out of control, there is the potential that he could neglect your children. At the very least, they will be affected by his issues. If you end up getting a divorce due to his bipolar disorder, if he is not in a position to care for his children, you will end up being a single parent. And if he is still terrible with money, the odds are you will get little in child support.

You don’t marry a project. End of.
 
For all practical purposes, you’re responsible for his debt after you marry. In theory, you can partition off ‘pre-marital debt’ but the resources allocated to pay it off represent an opportunity cost associated with not moving other elements of the marriage forward.

Any assets you (or he) amass during the marriage would need to be moved to a trust to protect them from creditors.

A spouse can go buy a Range Rover on Monday, a BMW on Tuesday, a boat of Wednesday, etc. and you’re on the hook. A divorce, in this situation, is the only remedy. Unfortunately, in a marriage, there’s no mechanism to physically stop a spouse from spending (short of having the spouse deemed legally incompetent, with a guardian of his/her finances appointed).

It’s, frankly, a shame that you cannot separate the legal ramifications of a spending spouse (even if I’m a manic state of mind) from the true covenant of marriage. The ways to protect oneself include trusts, incompetency proceedings, divorce, or never marrying in the first place.
 
Lifeisbeautiful3 said:
(short of having the spouse deemed legally incompetent, with a guardian of his/her finances appointed).
Click to expand...
I agree with all you said. This jumped out at me though. If you had to do this, I’d say it’s a fair bet the marriage could have been null to begin with.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top