Every spreadsheet budget we built broke by month two. Turns out the problem wasn't discipline. It was pretending every month looks the same when our income didn't.

Five tabs, a spreadsheet, and a phone calculator, just to guess at where we stood. By the time we had a number, it was already slipping.

We paid contractors in USDC and got reimbursed in stables. It worked great until April, when we had to explain a year of on-chain activity to a CPA.

$50,000 of reimbursable conference costs on one credit card. A few thousand in legitimate business write-offs mixed in. A camera-roll folder called "Receipts" that was maybe 60% complete. Then came the reconstruction.

Check the balance. Open the calculator. Subtract rent, the card, utilities. Breathe. That's the number until the next deposit lands.

We finally listed every recurring charge on our cards. Within a week, we'd cut the total by more than half — and found a few we could have sworn were already gone.

When we got married, we had a condo with some amount of equity, a mortgage, a car loan, a card balance, scattered savings, and a 401(k) between us. We couldn't have told you the number if you'd asked.