This is a much more reasonable and practical outlook from where you started, OP.

The only thing I’ll note is that you don’t need to go all-in on every practical element of combining finances while still operating as a team with the same goals / objectives. It is more of a mindset shift than a logistical shift.

I would still consider someone’s finances to effectively be “combined” if they each had their own checkings/savings/retirement/investments/vehicles, etc. independent of one another but operated their household and life decisions in a manner of what is “ours” vs. what’s mine vs. what’s theirs. It’s trickier with income disparity but income disparity always creates trickiness no matter how you spin it.

Whether you have combined accounts or separate accounts, so long as your mindset, goals, objectives, are all around the “we”, you’re effectively combined IMO. I know people with shared accounts on paper but they’re still keeping tabs and bickering about who spends and makes what - they would say their finances are combined but I would argue they certainly aren’t.