My Husband Took Me To A Luxury Steakhouse For Our 10th Anniversary. When The Waiter Came, He Ordered A $100 Meal For Himself But Told Me I Couldn’t Eat Because I Was Unemployed And Broke. Then A Couple At The Next Table Handed Me A Mysterious Business Card.

The First Step to Freedom

The next morning I waited until Paul left for work. My hands shook so hard I could barely hold my phone. I dialed the number on Natasha’s card and she answered on the second ring. Her voice was warm, like she’d been expecting my call.

I asked if the offer to meet was still good, and she said absolutely. She gave me the address of the shelter and said she could be there at 2 that afternoon. I wrote down the directions even though I’d already looked them up online three times.

She asked if I was safe right now, and I said yes because Paul was at work. She told me to bring any important documents I had, and I looked at the pile still sitting on the kitchen table. I gathered everything and put it in a grocery bag.

Then I spent 4 hours cleaning the house because I didn’t know what else to do with myself. The shelter was in a converted office building downtown. I parked two blocks away because I was afraid someone would see my car.

Natasha met me at the front door and led me to a small room with a couch and some chairs. A woman named Khloe introduced herself as one of the counselors. She had kind eyes and a notebook she didn’t write in.

She asked me to tell her what brought me there, and I started with the restaurant. But as I talked, it came out that Paul had been controlling money for years. He’d always handled the finances because he said he was better with numbers.

He’d made me ask permission to buy things even when I was working. He’d questioned every purchase and made me return things he deemed unnecessary. When we had joint accounts, he’d monitor every transaction and call me at work if I spent money without telling him first.

Separating the accounts 6 months ago wasn’t the start of the problem; it was just the latest step in something that had been happening since we got married. Khloe explained this was financial abuse, and I started crying because I’d never had words for it before.

Khloe gave me a folder full of information about legal help and housing assistance. She said the first step was getting my own bank account that Paul couldn’t access. Natasha offered to drive me to a bank across town where Paul didn’t have any accounts.

We went that afternoon, and I opened a checking account with $20 that Natasha gave me as a donation. The bank representative asked if I wanted checks or just a debit card. I chose just the card because I didn’t want anything with my name and address that Paul might find.

The card was bright blue and had my name printed on it. I held it in my hand and felt something shift inside me. It wasn’t much money, but it was mine. Paul couldn’t see the balance or question how I spent it.

Living in Secret

Natasha drove me back to my car and hugged me before I left. She made me promise to call her if anything got worse. I got home before Paul and hid the debit card in a tampon box under the bathroom sink.

He came home at 6:00 and went straight to the living room. I followed him and found him on the couch with the remote control. I tried to log into Netflix on my phone and got an error message. I asked Paul if something was wrong with the account.

He smiled without looking at me and said he’d changed all the passwords. I asked why, and he said because I didn’t contribute to those bills either. He’d changed Netflix and Hulu and the Wi-Fi password.

He told me the new Wi-Fi password cost $50 if I wanted it. I went upstairs and used my phone data to look up free Wi-Fi locations. The library had it and so did the coffee shop 2 miles away.

I could live without Netflix, but I needed internet to apply for jobs. Paul called up the stairs asking what I was making for dinner. I didn’t answer.

3 days later Paul announced he had a business trip. He’d be gone for 4 days, and he said it like a parent sending a child to their room. He packed his suitcase and left at 6:00 in the morning without saying goodbye.

I waited until his car disappeared down the street, then I pulled out my phone and started taking pictures. I photographed every bank statement I could find in his office. I took screenshots of old emails where we discussed having joint finances.

I recorded the dates when he’d separated our accounts and changed the passwords. I found receipts showing he’d spent $300 at a bar the same week he told me we couldn’t afford groceries. I photographed the hole he’d punched in the wall last month during an argument.

I backed everything up to a cloud storage account he didn’t know about. By the end of the first day, I had over a hundred photos documenting his spending versus mine and his pattern of control.

The Job Hunt

My phone rang on the third day of Paul’s trip. The caller ID showed a name I hadn’t seen in months. Laura was my former coworker from the job I’d been laid off from.

She asked how I was doing, and I tried to say fine, but instead I started crying. Everything came out in a rush about the restaurant and the money and Paul’s trip and the shelter. Laura listened without interrupting, and when I finished, she said she was coming over.

She arrived 20 minutes later with coffee and her laptop. She said we were updating my resume right now. We spent 3 hours rewriting my work history and making it look professional.

Laura said her new company was hiring and she’d put in a word for me. She also knew two other places looking for administrative help. By the time she left, I had applications ready to submit to three different jobs, and my resume looked better than it ever had.

Laura hugged me at the door and made me promise to keep her updated. I watched her drive away and felt something I hadn’t felt in months. It might have been hope.

Laura called the next morning with a list of companies looking for people to hire. She’d sent my resume to her boss and two other places she knew about. One interview was scheduled for tomorrow at 2, and another for Thursday morning. The third company wanted to do a phone call this afternoon.

I wrote everything down on a notepad I’d hidden under my mattress where Paul wouldn’t find it. Laura asked if I needed a ride to any of the interviews, and I said yes because I couldn’t risk Paul seeing me dressed up getting into a car. She said she’d pick me up at the library both days since I told Paul I was spending time there anyway.

I met Khloe at the shelter that afternoon to practice answering interview questions. She had a list of common ones printed out, and we went through each response until I stopped shaking when I talked about my skills.

The hardest question was explaining why I left my last job. Khloe told me to keep it simple and professional without mentioning Paul or the financial problems. Just say the company downsized and I was part of a larger layoff.

She made me repeat it 10 times until it sounded natural instead of rehearsed. Then she took me to the donation closet where they kept professional clothes for women going to job interviews. I found a black blazer that fit perfectly and a blue shirt that looked clean and pressed.

Khloe added a pair of dress pants and some black flats that were only slightly scuffed. I tried everything on in the bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror. I looked like someone who belonged in an office, someone who had her life together.

The person staring back at me didn’t match how I felt inside, but maybe that was okay. Maybe I could fake it until it became real. The phone interview went better than expected.

The woman asked about my experience, and I talked about my last position without my voice breaking. She seemed impressed with my organizational skills and said they’d call back tomorrow if they wanted to schedule an in-person meeting. When I hung up, I realized my hands had stopped shaking halfway through the conversation.