MarriageAnna had opened a letter addressed to her husband because it was from their insurance company. It was explaining his options, under a program known as COBRA, for continuing his current policies despite losing his job. But Anna had no idea Bill had lost his job! (Please note that names and details are altered to protect confidentiality.) Bill had been leaving the house every day and appearing to be following his normal routine. He had arranged a call forwarding from his old number to his cell phone and used the identical message anyone would have heard previously. He was spending part of his time doing a job search and the rest going to movies or hanging out at a distant mall. Anna confronted Bill that evening and he told her what had happened. She was stunned. Bill’s explanation was that he didn’t want her to worry and he was sure he would get a new job quickly and then just announce the change. While Anna was concerned about their financial situation, she was far more concerned about the injury to their marriage. How could Bill not trust her to be supportive or believe she was strong enough to deal with this crisis? It placed their relationship in jeopardy by creating a serious crack in the foundation of trust necessary for a healthy marriage.
Jon was becoming increasingly suspicious about Marianne’s behavior. He had begun to realize that there was a piece of time each week that his wife would go somewhere and when he asked what she was doing, in a casual way, she seemed uncomfortable in providing answers. As his suspicions increased, he began to look more closely at their financial records and he noticed a regular cash withdrawal on her credit card. Marianne paid the bills so Jon rarely looked at these things. Jon became convinced his wife was having an affair. He had noticed, for sometime, that their sex life had diminished but he just accepted that as due to the stress of having young children and hectic lives. Now he wasn’t so sure. He made a conscious effort to be more attentive, thinking that maybe he had been spending too much time at work and perhaps Marianne was feeling ignored. He asked oblique questions to try to find out if she was unhappy but didn’t learn anything of value. His sense of desperation increased. Jon loved his wife very much and the thought of losing her was becoming an obsession. Finally he hired a private detective to follow her. The report was that she was going to the office of a therapist in a nearby town! This really confused Jon and he finally confronted Marianne. In fact she had been in therapy for several months. She had not told Jon because she was dealing with a history of being sexually abused that she had never told him about and a combination of shame about her history and guilt about never having told him led her to believe that it was best to do this in private. Though her therapist had urged her to tell Jon, Marianne chose not to. She had been in therapy for this issue years before she met Jon and thought she had dealt with it sufficiently. But the challenge of the emotional and sexual intimacy of their marriage had stirred up some old issues. She thought it would just be a brief intervention and all would be well. Why risk hurting Jon’s trust by telling him she had hidden this very significant part of her past? Jon’s reaction was a mixture of relief and hurt. How could Marianne not believe he would be understanding and supportive? The very thing she was trying to avoid took place. Jon’s ability to trust Marianne had been significantly damaged.
Michael managed all the finances in his marriage of 27 years and Joanne never bothered to pay any attention since they always seemed to be able to pay their bills, they had little debt, and periodically Michael would tell her about the status of their retirement monies. Joanne had no interest in finances, math had never been her strong suit, and she trusted Michael. He was a good husband. Michael was in sales, getting a monthly draw and bonuses semi-annually based on his performance. Unbeknownst to Joanne, business had been diminishing for some time and now was significantly worse due to the country’s economic woes. Michael didn’t want to disappoint his wife and deny her, or himself, the pleasure they got from their lifestyle. It was not extravagant, by any means, but it was enjoyable and he was so proud to see Joanne’s enjoyment of activities that she pursued and those that they shared. So when expenses exceeded income for the first time, Michael simply tapped their savings, convinced things would turn around soon and he would simply replace the money. But the situation never turned around. It only got worse. A few thousand one year turned into several thousand another. Once he was into this, he felt he couldn’t tell Joanne and admit to both his deceit and his failure. A wedding required a significant, premature withdrawal from his 401(k), and the subsequent penalty to thousands more. Michael did his own taxes so he was able to keep this a complete secret. Until the well ran dry. All their savings were gone. And another wedding was in the plans. Finally Michael had no choice. He told Marianne they were broke. Even worse, they were in debt because he recently had begun to max out credit cards to keep the pretense going. Joanne was devastated. How could he think she wouldn’t have adjusted to a tighter budget? She was not a spender. Now she was not only shaken in her trust – it was as if Michael was not the husband she believed him to be – but she was frightened about their future. At their age, replacing these losses was virtually impossible. And how would they explain this to the children?
It’s actually rather amazing how frequently good marriages are blindsided by a story similar to these. How does it happen? What can they do to recover?
The primary cause is fairly consistent. The individual who creates the secret typically is claiming to prevent causing pain to the spouse but in reality is trying to cope with a sense of shame that nearly always has been present for a lifetime but may not have caused significant problems before. In some cases the person is actually quite successful. But somewhere deep inside is a sense of defectiveness. “I’m a fraud and I’ll be discovered.” “I don’t deserve this.” These are common ideas that make up part of that person’s core belief system. Symptoms of this type of problem can be rigidity, being a harsh judge of others, or, at the other end of the spectrum, having a self-effacing manner.
The idea that the spouse will be disappointed in him/her is really a feeling of personal disappointment that is projected on to the spouse. Not that there might be a problem if the truth were told up front. Certainly there is validity to that concern, more so in some marriages than others. But if the truth was really going to destroy the marriage, then certainly the lie is going to. However, the spouse who creates the lie typically is able to delude himself into thinking that the truth will never have to be dealt with.
Another contributing factor, particularly to those lies involving money, and many do (e.g., gambling problems, increasingly common with lotteries and online gambling creating increased temptations), is when the victimized spouse has a history, like Joanne of never paying attention to family finances. It also happens when couples keep separate finances, something that many dual-income couples choose as their money management system.
It probably seems obvious that one way to reduce the likelihood of having a complex lie sabotage your marriage is by trying to have as intimate a partnership as possible. The more you talk share with each other the good and bad about yourselves, the disappointments and fears as well as the hopes and successes, the less likely your spouse will fear telling you bad news. The avoidance of addressing negative issues is a significant problem in many marriages, as opposed to our image that troubled marriages are only characterized by too much focus on negative issues.
Clearly both partners should routinely share in looking at the “books” when it comes to finances. Many problems would be avoided by both spouses looking at monthly statements even for accounts under just one person’s name.
Still, despite our best efforts, some spouses are always going to believe that hiding bad news is the best option. So what to do when the truth comes out? Seek help immediately from a therapist experienced in working with couples. Not only did all of the couples described above survive their crises but they came out of the process with a stronger marriage because they came to know each other better and eventually not only regained the trust that had been damaged but there was the opportunity for the vulnerable spouse (the one driven by a sense of deep shame) to experience a level of acceptance that was never truly expected.
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