Do you have secret savings? My husband of 30 years doesn’t know anything about my escape fund: you’ll never guess how big it is

Every few months we review my and I’s little secret ‘arrangement’. I like to see how he is, whether he is plump, healthy and fit for purpose.

Seeing it gives me enormous satisfaction and relief. I feel hugged, soothed and reassured, as if an invisible hand has caressed my back and told me everything will be okay.

Because everything will be fine if we keep this agreement. The gods or any force, divine or corporeal, are responsible for my destiny, they can throw whatever they want at me and I will not sink.

I’m talking about my ‘savings fund’: a stash of money I’ve saved up that my husband doesn’t know about.

And it is not an insignificant amount. Taking shares, ISAs and savings into account, I have over £200,000 in my name (and my name alone) that only I have access to.

That’s money to cover rent, in case I have to move out of the family home for any reason; or a substantial deposit on another property; or even a small maintenance “comfort blanket” in case I am unable to work for a period of time, meaning I would not be dependent on anyone else for my basic needs.

You’re probably assuming by now that my marriage is unhappy, that I’m biding my time to flee an abusive relationship. But nothing could be further from the truth.

I am married to a generous, sweet-natured – and healthy solvent – ​​man who has made me very happy for more than 30 years. My “reserve fund,” as some call it, is something that I believe has strengthened our relationship.

While some may consider it misleading and pessimistic, I see it as a huge compliment to my husband: I’m with him because I choose to be, not because I need to be, and isn’t that commendable after so many years together?

The leak fund is nothing new. Various surveys conducted by financial institutions over the years estimate that one in five of us has a secret treasure.

Bake Off winner and celebrity chef Nadiya Hussain admitted to having one when she recently appeared on Loose Women.

Even before she became a wealthy woman in her own right (she is believed to have earned around £5 million since winning GBBO in 2015), she said she had always “had something extra” that was hers alone. Like Nadiya, a mother of three, my fortune isn’t exactly a “secret.” As she explained: “Even if everyone knew about it, no one would have access to it.”

My husband knows I have savings in my personal account, but more importantly, he doesn’t know how much. We have a common account, in which we have always deposited the same amount of money from our income and from which all household expenses are paid, but what remains of my work as a writer is my business and mine alone.

He knows I had a small windfall a few years ago when my aunt and godmother died. I had no children and owned a modest house in Sussex, which (after taxes and shared equally with my sister) increased my personal account by £120,000.

I wasn’t completely stingy about it. I paid for a beautiful, indulgent vacation for us in California and some renovations on the house (the mortgage on which was paid off years ago), but my husband doesn’t know how much is there now and hasn’t asked.

My attitude, like Nadiya’s, comes from growing up relatively poor. She described her childhood home as a “red letter house”, where final demands were always coming and she felt as if her mother – a traditional British Bangladeshi wife and housewife – was holding her by the fingernails.

I spent the early part of my childhood in a council house, before my parents were able to buy a two-bedroom prefab in the late 1970s. Dad was a mechanic, Mom worked as a carer in a nursing home and money was tight.

Thursday night dinners, before Dad’s pay packet arrived on Friday night, were always an impromptu affair. Fried egg bread, made with the bulge of a moldy white loaf and an egg, between four people, was not an uncommon meal. I remember my mother crying over an electric bill and seeing a ladder with her last pair of good socks on it.

Mom belonged to a generation of trapped women. I couldn’t survive alone: ​​I was totally dependent on my father, who did the best he could, but who, again, was trapped by the confines of our still-rigid class system, long before social mobility became a viable reality.

I think my parents had a happy marriage, but there must be millions of people out there, suffering unbearable hardship, in financial debt to a man they couldn’t stand. As a sensible, risk-averse, big-thinking teenager in Thatcher’s Britain, I discovered early on that the key to women’s economic empowerment and equality lay in their financial independence.

So I swore that I would always have something hidden, so I could “run away” if necessary.

When I met my husband in 1992, we earned the same and worked at a local newspaper. The idea of ​​a joint pot was discussed a couple of times by him, but I rejected it. It was too much trouble, I said. Plus, I’d feel uncomfortable if I felt like splurging on an expensive new coat or pair of boots, and I couldn’t really bear the thought of “asking permission.”

So we kept things separate. Of course, there have been periods in our lives, when the kids were babies (we have two, both now in their 20s) when my husband did a lot of the heavy lifting, financially, but I always had a little cushion reserved. “just for me”, to help me during my maternity leave.

Little by little, over the years, my secret stash has grown. I sought financial advice, made some smart investments, and saved every month. In 30 years of marriage, I’d say I thought about using it once. It was a few years ago, in the midst of empty nest syndrome, when we didn’t spend enough time with each other and we argued a lot.

After a particularly miserable Sunday afternoon, where we had had a huge fight at Habitat over a new dining room table, I came home and started searching RightMove. I calculated what I could afford and where, in case I decided to spend the last quarter of my life on my own, with the dining room table I really wanted.

I even looked at payments on a new car, a small, frivolous, sporty model that I knew would bother him. That I could afford it all instantly made me feel better and I realized I was actually pretty happy where I was.

We made up, spent the Habitat money on a nice weekend, and the argument was forgotten.

We are getting older and aware of our mortality. We had “that” conversation recently, when we updated our wills and had a “show and tell” about documents and passwords, etc., in case any of us got on the proverbial bus.

Judging by how vague he was about some details, I suspect my husband has a small fund of his own. And that’s absolutely fine with me.

Details have been changed. Joanna Richards is a pseudonym.