Ever had one of those conversations? You know the one. It starts with a simple question about a credit card bill or a big purchase, and before you know it, you’re in a full-blown argument that has nothing and everything to do with money.
It’s exhausting. And honestly, it’s a huge source of stress for so many of us. We’re told to budget, to save, to invest. But nobody ever really teaches us how to talk about money, especially with the people we love.
That’s where people like Clare Dubé come in. She’s spent her career getting people to talk about this taboo topic, and what she’s learned is fascinating. She believes in a simple mantra: Seek clarity. Take action. Do better to be better. It’s about more than spreadsheets; it’s about understanding the human side of our finances.
From Building Homes to Rebuilding Relationships
You might think someone who helps people with money conflicts has always had their own finances perfectly in order. Not Clare. She’ll be the first to tell you she was “terrible with money” when she was younger.
Her journey into this field was a complete accident. She was working in her family's custom home building business, and part of her job was dealing with change orders. You know, when a client decides they want marble countertops instead of granite, or an extra window in the living room. These changes always came with added costs, and that’s when she got a front-row seat to some serious financial drama.
“I saw and heard a lot of battles over money, and at first I was taken aback by them,” she said. “But then I became fascinated by it.”
This curiosity led her down a new path. She got a degree in finance, but then she went back to school for social sciences. That’s when it all clicked. “I got more of the human side of the money aspect,” she explained. And just like that, a career in financial social work was born, not from a grand plan, but from a genuine curiosity about why money makes us act the way we do.
Helping the People on the Front Lines
These days, Clare focuses a lot of her energy on the Financial Social Work Collaborative, which she co-founded. Her main goal? To train and support social workers.
Now, that might seem like a niche group, but it makes perfect sense when you think about it. As Clare says, “Social workers are on the front lines of people needing help.” They deal with every kind of human struggle, and almost all of them are touched by money in some way.
But here’s the tough part: social workers themselves often struggle financially. There’s this old, outdated idea in the helping professions that you’re “in it for the outcome, not the income.” It’s a message that can create a lot of shame around wanting to be paid well for incredibly demanding work.
Clare is on a mission to change that narrative. She works to empower these professionals, helping them with their own money issues so they can be more effective with their clients. Her work builds on the foundations laid by Reeta Wolfson, who pioneered the financial social work discipline and highlighted how the "gender of money" impacts everyone. It’s about moving beyond the numbers and getting to the heart of our emotional and sometimes traumatic experiences with money.
Why We Really Fight About Money
When couples come to Clare, they think their problem is money. But it almost never is. The real issue? It’s the invisible baggage we all carry.
“It was really about the money messages they received or interpreted growing up and the culture that they brought into the relationship,” she says.
Think about it. Maybe you grew up in a household where every penny was pinched, while your partner grew up with more abundance. Or maybe money was never, ever discussed in your family, so now you don't know how to bring it up. We all have a "money story," and when two different stories collide in a relationship, you get conflict.
Clare even saw this in her own marriage. She was the youngest of four, and her parents were in a better financial spot by the time she came along compared to when her older siblings were young. She and her husband came from different backgrounds, and they had to learn to understand each other’s perspectives to get on the same page.
It often boils down to that old saying: opposites attract. The spender is drawn to the saver, and the saver is drawn to the spender. “I found the reason that someone was attracted to the opposite was because they were looking for something that they didn’t have,” Clare observes. It works for a while, until it really, really doesn't.
A Better Way to Have the Money Talk
So, how do you break the cycle? Clare developed a simple, three-step process she calls SMARTchats (Saving Money And Relationships Together). It’s a framework for having healthier, more productive conversations about finance.
Here’s how it works:
- Start with Clarity. You can’t make good decisions without good information. This is the fact-finding stage. No judgment, just data. Let's figure out what's actually coming in and going out.
- Take Action. Based on that clarity, you decide on a few concrete steps to take. It doesn’t have to be a massive overhaul. Small, consistent actions are what build momentum.
- Review and Tweak. Life happens. Things change. The plan you made three months ago might not work today. This step is about checking in, seeing what’s working, and making adjustments.
This isn’t just for couples, by the way. You can apply this framework to any relationship where money is involved—with your business partner, your friends, even your boss. It’s all about creating healthy behaviors through open conversation.
The Breaking Point That Pushes Us to Change
Most of us don't seek help when things are going smoothly. It usually takes a big, stressful life event to push us into action.
Clare sees this all the time. The triggers are often major life transitions: kids heading off to college, the looming threat of a divorce, or a forced early retirement. One growing area she sees is "gray divorce"—couples splitting up in their 50s or later, which has massive financial implications.
Another huge one? Caregiving. As our population ages, more and more people are finding themselves responsible for aging parents. Clare calls the sandwich generation—those caught between caring for kids and parents—the "panini generation," because they are getting pressed harder than ever before. These situations force tough conversations about long-term care and who is going to pay for it.
It’s often a pile-up of issues, combined with one final trigger, that finally makes someone pick up the phone and ask for help.
The Single Biggest Mistake We Make With Money
After years of working with people in financial distress, I had to ask Clare: what’s the biggest mistake people make?
Her answer was simple and immediate. “Burying their head in the sand and ignoring their financial issues completely.”
It’s the avoidance that gets us. “When you avoid something, you create it in your mind to be different than what it really is,” she explains. She used to ask couples to write down, separately, how much they thought they spent on groceries or utilities each month. Their answers were always wildly different, and almost always underestimated the real cost.
The fear of looking at the numbers feels overwhelming. But here’s the secret: the not-knowing is almost always scarier than the reality. Peeling back the layers can be intimidating, but it’s the only way to take back control. Once you have clarity, you have power. And from there, you can start to take action, one small step at a time.
