We Vowed Till Death Do Us Part. Nobody Vowed To Show Bank Statements.

I know a man who spent three years dating a woman without once telling her about his loan.

Not a small loan. A car loan he was struggling to pay every month. He proposed to her. She said yes. She still did not know. The wedding happened before the truth did.

That is not love. That is a performance with a ring at the end.

We have made marriage in this country a public event and a private mystery. Everybody knows the colour of the aso ebi. Everybody knows how much was spent on the engagement list. Nobody in that hall knows what is in either partner’s account, or what is quietly draining out of it every month to a susu collector, a sick relative, or a debt from three years ago.

We call this privacy. I call it a lie by omission.

Here is why this matters more now than it did two years ago. The cedi has actually been behaving itself. Inflation, which was above twenty percent at the end of 2024, has fallen close to single digits this year. The dollar rate has held steadier than most of us can remember. For the first time in a long while, the ground under our finances is not shaking every month.

That stability is a gift. But a gift means nothing if you are still hiding your half of it from the person you claim to be building a life with.

Think about what we actually disclose to each other before marriage. We disclose family background. We disclose church. We sometimes disclose past relationships, reluctantly. But income? Debt? The uncle you send four hundred cedis to every month without fail? The market business that is actually losing money? Many of you have never said these things out loud to the person you are about to marry.

Ask yourself honestly. Could you sit your partner down today and tell them exactly what you earn, exactly what you owe, and exactly who else depends on your money? If the answer is no, you are not ready for marriage. You are ready for a wedding. Those are two different things.

I have watched financial secrecy destroy marriages more quietly than infidelity, and just as completely. A wife discovers a hidden loan two years in and stops trusting every account balance her husband tells her after that. A husband finds out his wife has been sending half her salary to her mother without ever discussing it, and he feels like a stranger in his own home. Nobody died. Nobody cheated. But something broke that is hard to repair.

Money hidden is not really about the money. It is about what you believe will happen if the truth comes out. If you are hiding your finances from your partner, ask yourself what you actually think of them. Do you trust them with the whole truth, or only the version that keeps the peace?

A relationship built on partial information is not a partnership. It is two people managing each other, not loving each other.

Here is what I am asking you to do this week, especially if marriage is anywhere on your horizon. Have one full money conversation. Income. Debt. Family obligations. Susu contributions. Everything. Not to control each other, but to see each other clearly before you sign a life together.

Do it before the wedding list, not after the honeymoon. TRUTH before ceremony. Always.

You cannot build a home on a hidden account. Show your partner the whole picture, and let them choose to build with you anyway.

God bless you.