It was January and time for the annual come-to-Jesus meeting with the financial advisor who watches over our savings.
These meetings always feel to me like something between a root canal and a follow-up appointment with an oncologist. I always expect pain and bad news.
It is almost never the case — I am a worrier — and this year was no different. We are semi-OK. And I had the urge once again to share the cautious good news with my adult children.
"Don't worry, at least not yet," I wanted to tell them. "Mom and Dad aren't going to be living in your spare bedroom, at least not in the immediate future."
But I hesitated. We are so secretive about paychecks in this country — we share more information about our sex lives or our weight. We are reluctant to even tell our own children — the people to whom we are financially tied most closely.
In the end, I was vague. I said things were fine, but I didn't put a dollar figure on it. I am not exactly sure what made me hesitate.
New York Times family money columnist Ron Lieber tackled this issue in a recent column adapted from his new book, "The Opposite of Spoiled: Raising Kids Who are Grounded, Generous, and Smart About Money."
In it, he describes how several different kinds of families handled the sharing of financial information with their children — some very young children. The goal is to help the kids understand not just where all the money goes, but the kinds of values we employ when we decide how to spend it.
He describes the father who went to his bank and withdrew a month's earnings — in single dollar bills — brought the sack of money home, dumped it on the dining room table and, while the kids watched, divided it into piles for mortgage, food, taxes and sports camps until there were very few dollar bills left.
That's a pretty concrete way to explain family budgets, even to a 6-year-old.
In a separate interview with financial writer Jean Chatzky, Mr. Lieber admitted that he had not gone very far down this road with his own 9-year-old daughter, that he and his wife were struggling with how much information to share and how much of it is meaningful to a child.
"I guess it is easy for me to mouth off about telling your kids how much money you make when I haven't had to do it myself yet," he replied to a question from Ms. Chatzky. He says he will wait until his daughter understands more about math and has proven herself trustworthy with such private family information.
He did take the opportunity to explain mortgages to his daughter, he said, and how people rarely buy homes outright. And he explained that college, too, was something you need to save for over time.
He said in his column that children deserve to know how much you make, but I am not sure most parents would agree. For so many, such a financial detail is off-limits despite its obvious importance.
Mr. Lieber suggests that the money talk — like the sex talk — is a function of readiness. You do best when you answer the question being asked (can I have an allowance?) instead of answering the much larger question you think you are being asked (are we rich?).
That's all well and good for a grade-schooler, but teens need to understand more because their financial demands are higher. Is there enough money for a car, for insurance, for cell phones, for college? Do I need to get a job to pay for the extras that I want?
This kind of financial literacy is even more critical for 20-somethings dealing with school loans, marriage, home ownership, children, retirement savings and whether both parents need to work.
A financial advisor is as important for young families as it is for those of us approaching retirement. But I would also argue that we should share our own financial decisions with our children, especially the mistakes we think we made along the way, no matter how chagrined we might feel
Our experiences — through which the kids have probably lived — are priceless.
Susan Reimer's column appears in Mondays and Thursdays. She can be reached at sreimer@baltsun.com and @SusanReimer on Twitter.com.