Types of Financial abuse, and common signs you might be missing.
I bet you were someone who thought you knew the signs of financial abuse and that it would be SO obvious to spot. Whether you are questioning it in your own relationship, or someone you may know.. don’t worry, I thought I would see obvious signs as well. Until I was a victim of financial abuse. Now I can’t believe I fell for it and missed all the signs.
Financial abuse can be hard to detect especially because society praises providers, especially men, for financially providing for others- and sometimes that can work in a relationship- until it doesn’t. Controlling someone financially makes it even more challenging to escape from the abusive relationship, which is why they do it.
Let’s chat types of financial abuse and give common signs that this may be abuse, and not a positive thing in your relationship.
Full control of the finances.
Abusers will convince you that they need to be in full control of the finances. This will include having all of their earnings into their account, that you do not share with them, and you having to either ask for money out of it or given limited access. This can also include hidden bank accounts that you are unaware of. They will often put other assets in their name only such as homes, cars, etc. so that you do not have financial freedom and struggle if you attempt to leave. Some may even make sure they are the ones to file the taxes, and only ask you to come sign, so you are fully unaware of their yearly earnings.
Limiting your ability to work and earn your own money.
Abusers will interfere with your employment and financial status in various ways. One way may be refusing to put the kids in daycare so that you can earn your own money. This typically happens to stay at home parents. Whether you agreed at the beginning of the relationship to stay home and later changed your mind, or you had to take time off to have the baby and later they refuse to help, abusers refuse daycare and refuse to help with the children which then affects the victims ability to earn their own income. There are abusers who will not show up on days they agreed to watch the children so that you have to call into your work for the day, drive by your work to monitor your work schedule causing distraction and fear.
Intentionally lying about contributing financially while spending their money on their own personal choices.
If you are in a relationship with someone who first agrees to splitting the bills and then they switch up when bills are due this may be financial abuse. Many abusers will prioritize things like drugs, alcohol, sex addictions, giving money other family members instead, etc rather than paying the bills they agreed to split with you. Abusers do not hold the conversations about the inability to contribute to combined bills, and expect you to make up for their lack of efforts. Oftentimes society misunderstands this factor because they chalk it up to “figuring it out” within the relationship. The key point here is the lack of communication from one partner (perpetrator) who is abusing the other partner (victim) by expecting them to make up for them not paying the bills and choosing other areas to spend their money on.
Economic exploitation.
Sometimes victims are able to place the children in daycare and start a job, but abusers will interfere with their employment. They do this by threatening to cause the victim to lose their job, they stalk them at their place of employment, call them incessantly.
They also can depend on you to do more work with the children while you do not get paid fairly for your work. This often happens with stay-at-home mothers. An example: the husband has a high social status and has access to funds (let’s pretend he comes from a long line of wealth) tells the wife to stay at home and have multiple children. The wife does not have her name on the land, the home, the bank accounts, any of the credit cards, any of the cars, and cannot work because she is to homeschool the children, cook and clean the home while the man either works outside the home or lives off of his inherited wealth. The (abusive!) man has done this intentionally and exploited her economic status by making it harder for her to leave.
Setting boundaries on your spending without listening to your input
Abusers will expect full control over what you spend your money on without ever asking you your input. They will either make comments about what you purchased, or in some situations start limiting your access to the same amount of funds they have. Some abusers will pretend early on that they are not financially abusing you and give you access to either a credit card or an amount placed into your account, but will later put limits on this. In some cases abusers will do this with their new supply and use their accounts to hide money so they do not have to disclose it for child support, but they will tell you that you are not allowed to touch it even though it is now in your account.
What to do if you feel you are being financially abused? Although you can choose to stay- I would personally tell you to strategize your exit. I am no lawyer to tell you legal advice, but as someone who has been there, I could not sacrifice my own soul for the devil. I ended up being homeless, applying for government assistance and applying for section 8 housing just to get away from him. I became resourceful and let go of my pride to ask my community around me for help. Even if it was things like plates, sheets, food, or help with bills. If you are scared to leave because of the fear of starting over, I get it.
If you’d like to start with a phone consult to strategize your exit click here. You got this!