When *Lucy met her husband *Troy (not their real names), she was a young administration worker at a large company in a capital city.
He was several years older and worked there too.
"I thought he was really cocky … and I do remember he had a girlfriend," Lucy said.
But several months later the girlfriend was gone and Lucy had been charmed.
"He was fun to be around and I felt very safe around him," she said.
A couple of months after that, despite concerns from her family, Lucy and Troy moved in together.
He began physically and verbally abusing her almost immediately.
"Throwing me against the wall, smashing my head against the floor and dragging me around the house," she said.
"[He would say] you fat c***, you whore, f***ing mole."
Lucy didn't tell anyone about Troy's violent behaviour and kept hoping things would get better.
They didn't. And over time Troy started abusing Lucy in a way that she was at first oblivious to, but which ended up reaching into every facet of her life.
He started abusing her financially.
Fighting to succeed
Lucy worked hard to create better career opportunities for herself and, over the years, moved up in the company and obtained a post-graduate degree.
"He didn't want me studying at all … he didn't see the value in it and thought it would detract from my focus on him … but I fought really hard," she said.
Eventually Lucy was earning just under $200,000 a year, by which time Troy decided her higher salary meant he could work less.
He’d left his original job and was working in a different industry.
Troy was supposed to work from 6am to 3pm but years later Lucy found out he was often absent.
"He was apparently at the pub for a lot of that," she said.
Financial abuse
As Lucy's income increased, her mother advised her to buy a house.
"I would say [to Troy], 'Why don't we go to the bank and talk to them about what our borrowing potential could be', or 'Let's get a joint bank account and start putting savings in there together'," she said.
"[There was] complete resistance around that."
So they kept renting and eventually Lucy gave Troy a bank card attached to her account for shared household spending.
"But all the money would go missing and so I had to put a stop to that … it would literally get down to $5 left in the bank account," she said.
Lucy instigated a new system whereby Troy would give her a portion of his income to cover his share of the household expenses.
"There was just week after week of him saying he hadn't been paid, or he'd lost his wallet or someone had stolen his key card," she said.
Lies and cover-ups
Lucy also did Troy's tax return for years but didn't realise he'd been lying to her about his income until the tax office introduced a system that automatically pre-filled earnings.
"I said to him, 'There's a $17,000 discrepancy in earnings here,' and he said, 'I'll have to speak to work about that, they must have short paid me'," she said.
Troy also made sure Lucy never had a key to their letterbox because he didn’t want her to see his bank statements.
As the years went on and the abuse continued, Lucy was expected to use her income to pay for all their bills and expenses.
For a long time she was too ashamed to tell anyone what was happening.
A spokeswoman from the family and domestic violence hotline 1800RESPECT said many others in Lucy's situation often felt the same way.
"Some people can... feel ashamed to reach out for help, feeling that it is their fault," the spokeswoman said.
"Financial abuse can make people feel scared, trapped, isolated and powerless.
"It is a form of domestic or family violence and can happen to anyone."
Lucy said she was able to hide the real state of her marriage from friends and family, and was able to get by each day, because of her "good coping skills".
"And that's probably been my downfall," she said.
"I was [also] very fixed on what my vision of my future would be like and I was prepared to get that at all costs and to me, that was a house with a white picket fence and two kids and my dog and my great career and my husband."
It wasn't until Lucy told a friend that Troy was not giving her the agreed portion of his income for expenses that she realised the extent of his abuse.
"She just said, 'Everything you're telling me is not normal, that's not how relationships work and there's something very strange going on here'," she said.
It emboldened Lucy to confront Troy.
"I said, 'We're going around to the bank, I need to see your bank statements'," she said.
"All of his income was being spent at pubs during the day on pokie machines … and at [the liquor shop]."
He’d also racked up huge debts in both of their names.
Pushed to the brink
Troy agreed to get counselling but things got worse.
One night when Lucy and her young daughter were out together, the little girl saw nude photographs of her father appear on her tablet computer.
"He was taking photographs of himself at home but forgot that his phone photos were connected on the cloud to her device," Lucy said.
"One particular day things escalated quite seriously and he did have his hands around my throat.
"My son walked in the room, and I remember the look on his face and I just thought to myself, I can never have him see that again."
When their marriage ended people were shocked.
"They were like, 'You are the golden couple that everybody aspires to be like and you're the quintessential Stepford wife … the fantastic mum … and you've got this great job and we had no idea that [the abuse] was happening," Lucy said.
Red flags
In hindsight, Lucy said there were red flags from the start.
"He'd had his car repossessed and was still borrowing his ex-girlfriend's car and asking to borrow money from me," Lucy said.
It also took many years for Troy to reluctantly agree to marry Lucy, by which time she was older and wanted children.
"It was really like a transaction … [it] was horrible … he never asked me to marry him," she said.
On their wedding day Troy snapped at Lucy because she was worried it would rain.
"I just remember thinking, 'This does not feel right,' but the love [between us] was enormous."
Once they had children, Troy would pick them up from childcare and school and supposedly look after them until Lucy got home from work.
Years later, she learnt they were often locked in their bedrooms for hours on end while Troy spent the afternoons drinking.
Lucy said she spent a lot of time feeling confused because sometimes Troy was kind and loving, and she wasn't abused every day.
"Because if that was every day then you would absolutely leave … but anyone who knows abuse knows it comes in waves and cycles," she said.
"[He] would be flipping between kind of Jekyll and Hyde all the time."
A counsellor has since told her she believes Troy is a narcissist.
"[The] seemingly nice behaviours are actually very controlling behaviours designed to clip your wings and attach you like superglue to that person," she said.
Advice to other women
Lucy has since left the relationship.
She acknowledges every relationship is different but firmly believes women should create and maintain their own financial independence.
"Some people are just really trustworthy and you should be able to go and get a joint loan together," she said.
"If that person's passed the test of transparency … around income, around bank accounts … then yes, you look at entering those arrangements.
"[But] always have money that you earn for yourself, perhaps always have investments for yourself.
"Just always look out for your own financial security — assume that something could happen."
Financial independence 'important'
In 2015 the children of murdered South Australian woman Zahra Abrahimzadeh set up a charity called The Zahra Foundation, focusing on economic abuse.
Its chief executive, Kelly-ann Tansley, agrees women should create and maintain financial independence.
"I think we're at a point now [in society] where we can have some really clear conversations … that love does not mean sharing a bank account, love does not mean having everything in joint names," she said.
She said it was also crucial for women to know where important documents were, like passports, regardless of the health of a relationship and in case they needed to escape.
"Take an interest in your finance, in your bank statements, in your loan statements," she said.
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Source: Zahra Foundation Australia | |
Regional women face extra challenges
Ms Tansley said women in regional and remote areas faced specific challenges when trying to escape from financial abuse.
“It's far more likely that couples are working together, whether it's in a shared business or on a farm,” she said.
“That makes it even more tricky because finances are entangled and there's often a … dependency there for employment.
“Furthermore, in small towns women are impacted with confidentiality issues — everybody appears to know everybody.”
Ms Tansley said any woman needing advice, no matter where they lived, should call 1800RESPECT.
Anyone in immediate danger should call 000 for police and ambulance help.
*Names changed for legal reasons
