Conversations with Your Financial Therapist

Improve your financial wellbeing by thinking and speaking about money in a new way Conversations with Your Financial Therapist: Stories and Scripts to Grow Your Money Mindset offers a fresh, empathetic approach to understanding and improving your relationship with money. Through relatable stories, practical scripts, and real-life examples, the book explores how emotions, past experiences, and cultural beliefs shape our financial decisions. Written by Erika Wasserman, one of fewer than 100 Certified Financial Therapists worldwide, this book includes: The Money Mindset Method, a unique framework to simplify the money conversations and decision-making processes. Tips for awkward conversations surrounding money, encouraging self-awareness, practical problem-solving, and empathy to build trust, improve communication, and foster healthier relationship with money Chapters focusing on money management at each stage of life, from starting out as a young adult with credit card debt, to merging money with a partner to separating money with a partner, to taking care of aging parents and adult children. This book covers several key life stages and financial challenges that come with that phase of life. Actionable steps to build trust, improve communication, and foster healthier relationships with money. By focusing on mindset over management, Erika empowers readers to reduce shame, create financial intimacy, and embrace opportunities for growth. Whether you're navigating money with a partner, family member, or yourself, Conversations with Your Financial Therapist: Stories and Scripts to Grow Your Money Mindset is an essential read for all individuals experiencing a life shift and seeking to forge new, healthier habits that fuel both your wealth and wellbeing.

Introduction 1 Chapter 1 The Money Mindset Method: Your Guide to Financial Clarity 11 Chapter 2 Welcome to Adulthood: Where Financial Freedom Meets Confusion 19 Chapter 3 From Burnout to Breakthrough: Taking Charge of Your Career 39 Chapter 4 Merging Money and Mindsets with a Lover 55 Chapter 5 From Diapers to Dog Hair: the Overwhelming Joy (and Expense) of Growing Your Family 89 Chapter 6 From Ours to Mine: Finding Stability in Financial Separation 105 Chapter 7 Raising Together, Apart: Co-parenting with Financial Confidence 125 Chapter 8 Role Reversal: Navigating Finances with Aging Parents 141 Chapter 9 Last Wishes and Loose Ends: Estate Planning Realities 159 Chapter 10 Parenting Doesn’t End at 18: Navigating The Next Chapter with Adult Children 179 Bonus Chapter Hiring and Firing a Financial Advisor 193 Conclusion OWN IT: YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH MOneY One Conversation at a Time 209 Scripts 213 Appendix: Character Overviews 263 Notes 267 Acknowledgments 271 About the Author 275 Index 277