My boyfriend and I are from very different financial backgrounds; he grew up in a reasonably well-off family whereas I grew up firmly below the breadline. This can sometimes cause tension between us – we have very different attitudes to money, he is more of a saver and I a spender, and I think as we have got older our differences have become more apparent. Another source of tension is that I sometimes have to subsidise my family when they are short of money (I cannot see them suffer when I have more than I need) and my boyfriend gets frustrated with their lack of planning and my apparent complacency in allowing the situation to continue. Conversely his family tend to presume that we have heaps of money and put pressure on us to go to expensive dinners, which we love, and expensive resort family holidays, which we do not enjoy. It’s a topic that we have had to really work on in our relationship and I think have finally reached a nice balance.