The Disaster of Financial Dependence

by Leslie Bennetts

“She dropped out of college to marry her husband, and they had three children. Now she’s 31, and he’s just left her. She has no education, no career, no work experience, and no skills. She also has no idea how she’s going to support herself. Her husband is being nasty about money, she can’t pay her bills, and she’s in a lot of trouble.”

In marriages that stay together, conflicts over money can still be vicious. “I have friends whose husbands are torturing them,” says Wendy Greenberg*, a Manhattan stay-at-home wife who prides herself on being able to buy what she wants without her husband objecting.

“The wives feel they don’t have as much worth because they don’t work, and the husbands agree. Because they’re bringing in the money, it’s ‘No, you can’t buy the boots for $250!’ A lot of these women have husbands who make millions of dollars a year, and they still say, ‘You can’t get the boots.’”

Even when husbands are nice about it, women who had been accustomed to supporting themselves can find it unexpectedly galling to play such an infantilized role.

“It’s really hard to ask for money,” says Claire Matthews*, who gave up her career as an actress when she and her husband adopted two children. “If I want to stop and get a chai while I wait for the results of my allergy tests at the doctor’s office, I feel guilty. The other day, I had to ask my husband for money to go buy some new underwear. He wants to know every little penny I’m spending and what it’s spent on.”