Three years ago, I discovered my husband had a secret credit card debt. He promised me then that it wouldn’t happen again and we moved on. But now I’ve discovered that he’s fallen behind with our mortgage repayments and has been lying to me about it. He says he only hid it from me to protect me, but now I’m scared that if I stay with him and let him carry on managing our money I’ll just be waiting for another disaster.

Susan advises
Money issues are the number one problem between couples, according to Relate. So one way forward here could be to seek for your husband to seek counselling to help him alter his attitudes to money.

But I suspect that the initial solution to your problem is actually much simpler. It is for you to manage the household budget, rather than your husband. Sure, he may feel threatened that you are taking over - but knowing his own vulnerabilities, he might instead be grateful that you are taking responsibility.

If you manage the money, at least for a while, then you will have no reason to feel bad about your husband. You will also feel more in control. And you will have stepped up to a challenge in your partnership.

Why not learn how to manage your own household finances? Once you’ve developed the skills, then you could perhaps teach those to your husband so that he can manage better. A good place to start learning how to cope is www.moneysavingexpert.com - lots of friendly support and good advice.