Ask The Tough Questions Early!

sexuality that are not so quickly dismissed. There are those who believe that sex is strictly for procreation, and if having children isn’t what you want, either now or in the future, this is a high wall that could be impossible to knock down. The question you would have to ask yourself in such a case is whether you are willing or prepared to live with someone who desires sex very infrequently. If you consider sex to be for pleasure rather than procreation, odds are that you probably aren’t.

How do you each handle money? - Anyone who gets involved with a person without knowing his or her feelings about money and the way it should be handled is heading for trouble fast. Despite the romantic – and often unrealistic – notion that "money doesn’t matter if you’re really in love," the hard and brutal truth is that money does matter. And it is naive at best and immature at worst to think otherwise. Whether we like it or not, money is still essential for our survival. We use it to pay our most basic living expenses, such as shelter, clothing, food, utilities and transportation, and the more luxurious costs as well. The most crucial thing you need to know is how a partner manages money as a rule. For example, does he pay the rent, electric, phone, and other monthly bills on time, or at the very last minute? If you have occasion to visit his home and happen to see a large stack of unpaid bills on the table, that’s your first clue right there, and it’s not a good sign. Landlords and utility companies are generally very strict about their payment deadlines, and customers who routinely ignore them will eventually get evicted or lose their utility services. How does your partner handle credit? If she has several credit cards – which I now call debt cards due to past experience and no longer use them – from different banks or stores, does she pay all of them off, or does she owe large amounts to each creditor? That’s also something you should know before becoming further involved. The Dr. Phil show has had more than a few couples who were in severe financial trouble due to maxing out credit card limits. It was not a pretty picture.

Relationship expectations, sex and money are three of the most important issues you need to ask the tough questions about as early as soon as you feel comfortable doing so. You have nothing to lose by gaining knowledge in these crucial areas, except partners who were the wrong prospects for a relationship to begin with.