We asked readers to channel their inner Carolyn Hax and answer this question. Some of the best responses are below.
Dear Carolyn: I’ve been married seven years. It was my first marriage but my husband’s second, and the first one ended due to his cheating. That was of course a red flag, but he won me over.
One thing my family urged me to do, and which I’ve read in numerous places, is to make sure I have money set aside “just in case.” That was really important for me here since (a) I was shifting to part-time to focus on starting a family, and (b) he had a history (not just cheating, but his ex felt she got shorted in the divorce).
So, we agreed to send our incomes into a joint account, but I secretly sent 10 percent of my earnings to a separate account. Ironically this was his mom’s idea; she was upset about how his last marriage ended.
Fast-forward to now, and my husband was going through tax records for a loan application (he’s a furloughed federal worker) and asked about the interest statement from my separate account. I froze and played dumb, but he figured it out pretty quickly, and I had to come clean. He was apoplectic.
He says it shows lack of trust, and he’s mad about the lying. While I get that, I haven’t backed down, saying every woman in my situation would do this. I didn’t mention his mom. He doesn’t believe me, and also says he feels betrayed because I now have enough in my account to cover the mortgage payments for which we’d need the loan. He said he’ll definitely leave me if we can’t use my emergency money for the mortgage and might leave me either way.
How do I explain to him that this is something we women must do to protect ourselves? Should I enlist his mom and/or tell him it was her idea? Do I relinquish the funds? We do need it, but we can get a loan too, and the whole point is to keep it in case of divorce, and now that’s exactly what he’s threatening!
— Secret Money
Secret Money: Wow. As a consequence of your actions, you must realize that your marriage is changed forever. The change could be for better or for worse, but your actions have crossed several lines. The lines here are financial fidelity and emotional fidelity. You hid your money and your emotions.
You need to decide if you want to stay married to this person, because your actions say otherwise. If you do, then both of you need couples and individual counseling to sort out the issues that have not been said but have been in the background of your marriage. Good luck.
— Togstad Glenn
Secret Money: I think it’s important for you to be straight with yourself, and with him, that this isn’t just something routine that “we women must do.” You have your reasons for setting this money aside and for keeping it secret. As you yourself describe those reasons, they are specific to this partner and this situation. The gender dynamics are real, but they aren’t the whole story. That is a half-truth and wouldn’t be an honest foundation for your marriage going forward.
Give yourself the best chance to repair the breach in your relationship, and be candid and vulnerable about your fears with your husband — in a way that’s about your specific relationship, and without leaning on generalizations about men and women. That frame may be comforting, but it’s not helping you see the stakes of your particular situation clearly.
— Not All Women?
Secret Money: Put the shoe on the other foot. Imagine you’re the primary breadwinner dealing with financial stress, and you find out your spouse is hiding money that would alleviate the problem. Then, he self-righteously doubles down and alleges that your history is predictive of cheating, so he needed a safety net for him, not your family. C’mon.
— Notamiso
Secret Money: You may be right that you need guaranteed financial independence, but he’s right that you should have discussed this with him and not his mom. Maybe he deserves your distrust, but that doesn’t excuse your lying. Trust has to exist between the two people involved in the relationship, no one else — not his ex-wife or his mother or your family. You have farmed out the responsibility for your lack of trust and used it to justify your own dishonesty. You should have talked through this issue before you married and certainly before you went behind his back to pack your financial to-go bag.
Do not compound this betrayal by dragging in your co-conspirators. This is on you. If you can’t discuss trust, you shouldn’t be married to him, and you absolutely shouldn’t start a family.
— Shar
Every week, we ask readers to answer a question submitted to Carolyn Hax’s live chat or email. Read last week’s installment here. New questions are typically posted on Thursdays, with a Monday deadline for submissions. Responses are anonymous unless you choose to identify yourself, and are edited for length and clarity.
The post My husband found my secret emergency savings. Hax readers give advice. appeared first on Washington Post.
