What I’ve Learned from Speaking to Real Women About Their Financial Lives
Part of my work explores the complex intersections between money, identity, emotional trauma, and healing. It’s not just about numbers, it’s about how money makes us feel, what it represents, and how our experiences and relationships shape the way we engage with it. Over the past few months, I’ve had the privilege of speaking intimately on a one-to-one basis with women. Each of them carries a powerful story. Each is navigating a complicated relationship with money that can’t be solved with a budget alone.
This article is a reflection of those sessions. I remember one woman, a senior professional with a quiet voice and a louder yearning, who said, “I have everything I thought I wanted, and yet I feel invisible inside my own life.” Another whispered through tears, “Money was always the reason we argued at home. Now I avoid it completely, even with my own partner.”
These are not isolated confessions. They are shared experiences, quietly echoed by women across different backgrounds, careers, and cultures. These are not theoretical case studies. These are real women balancing financial decisions with motherhood, relationships, past wounds, and their evolving sense of self. They are intelligent, responsible, and ambitious, and often carry invisible burdens related to money. Whether it is fear of being too much, guilt over wanting more, regret about past mistakes, or confusion about how to move forward, these emotional patterns are far more common than most people realise; and let me stress, this is not solely restricted to women.
Why does this matter? Because when we ignore these unspoken struggles with money, the effects ripple through every area of life. Marriages grow distant. Dreams shrink, and the silence and fear surrounding money get passed down to the next generation.
My hope? That as you read these stories, something stirs. Maybe you see yourself reflected in one of them. Maybe you start asking different questions. Maybe you realise you are not alone, and that it is okay to want more from your financial life.
These women could be anyone: your friend, your sister, your coworker, or even you.
Are you ready? OK, let’s dive in.
1. The Fulfilled-but-Forgotten Professional
She’s a married mother of one. She worked hard, landed her dream job, and now feels lost.
The job she thought would bring happiness no longer feels fulfilling. She’s stuck between gratitude and dissatisfaction. Despite earning well and contributing meaningfully to the household, she feels aimless. There’s no shared financial vision, just a comfortable routine.
Lesson: Achieving your goals does not mean the journey is over. According to research on post-achievement dissatisfaction, attaining extrinsic goals, like landing a job or reaching a salary target, often fails to produce lasting fulfilment when they’re not aligned with intrinsic values. Our vulnerability and willingness to dream again are key to growth and personal expansion. It’s okay to outgrow your dreams.
If this is you: Tonight, write down three new financial desires, things you’ve never said out loud. Then share just one with someone you trust. According to expressive goal-setting research, articulating intrinsic aspirations is a key step toward emotional wellbeing and authentic achievement.
2. The Stability-Seeking Survivor
Raised by a single mother who lost significant amounts of money in investments, she learned early that financial systems are dangerous.
Now, as a married mother, she keeps her finances separate from her partner, not out of secrecy, but as a form of protection. She enjoys the stability of her job, but knows that she is meant for a more fulfilling role more aligned with her personality. However, this involves taking a risk she is not prepared to take.
Lesson: Past trauma often shapes present-day caution. Trauma-informed financial studies emphasise that safety behaviours can turn into barriers to growth when not reassessed in new contexts. But the world you are in now may not require the same defences.
If this is you: Tonight, list two financial choices you have avoided out of fear, then research one small action (e.g., opening a savings account or speaking with a friend) you can take to challenge that fear, a method shown to reduce avoidance behaviours.
3. The Present-Tense Spender
Once diligent with money, she began spending impulsively after a devastating breakup.
Travel, clothes, gifts – small luxuries that brought temporary relief. Now she lives in the moment but struggles with dwindling savings and a lack of future planning.
Lesson: Emotional pain often plays out through our spending habits. Research links emotional regulation difficulties to impulse spending, highlighting the need for mindful coping strategies. Understanding the why behind the behaviour is key.
If this is you: Tonight, journal about the emotion behind your last impulse purchase. Then choose one supportive activity (e.g., a walk or call to a friend) to address that need without spending, following recommendations from emotion-focused therapy.
4. The Silent Daughter of Wealth
She grew up in a financially secure home where money was never discussed – even during crises.
Now married, she struggles to talk about money with her partner. She isn’t hiding anything; she just doesn’t have the language.
Lesson: Wealth without communication breeds confusion, not confidence. Financial socialisation research confirms that open dialogue improves both knowledge and relational trust.
If this is you: Before bed, choose one money topic, like monthly budgeting or savings goals and share it with your partner or a trusted friend. Research shows that verbalising financial intentions increases follow-through.
5. The Self-Built Skeptic
She received no financial education growing up. Everything she knows, she learned through trial and error.
Now successful in her corporate role, she has savings but doesn’t invest and doesn’t trust anyone enough to ask for help.
Lesson: Hyper-independence might look like strength, but it can also be a barrier to growth. Studies on communal coping suggest that seeking support leads to better financial outcomes and reduced stress.
If this is you: Tonight, identify one person in your network and ask them a specific financial question, taking a micro-step shown to build trust and expand support networks.
6. The Passive Planner
She and her husband split household bills and talk about money occasionally, but there’s no structure or shared financial vision.
She’s accumulated savings but doesn’t know what to do with them. Fear of making the wrong decision keeps her frozen.
Lesson: Communication is not the same as collaboration. Every household needs a plan. Research indicates that co-created financial plans lead to greater couple satisfaction and reduced conflict.
If this is you: This week, schedule a 15-minute “money date” with your partner to co-create one budget category. Brief, focused sessions boost joint planning efficacy.
7. The Monthly Tightrope Walker
Despite working hard, she struggles to make ends meet each month.
She feels shame and frustration, wondering why her efforts never seem to be enough. Seeing others succeed financially only deepens her self-doubt.
Lesson: Scarcity isn’t a sign of failure. It can indicate structural barriers. Behavioural economics shows that resource scarcity taxes cognitive bandwidth, hindering decision-making.
If this is you: Make one call or send one email this week to a community resource, financial coach, support group, or peer mentor. Research on social support demonstrates this reduces perceived scarcity and stress.
8. The Overwhelmed Visionary
She’s a natural leader who thrives in emotionally driven work, but money overwhelms her.
Budgets feel boring. Numbers feel heavy. She fears that engaging too much with money will take away from the joy she finds in serving others.
Lesson: Financial structure can support creativity rather than silence it. Studies reveal that aligning planning systems with personal values enhances both productivity and creativity.
If this is you: This week, spend 10 minutes designing a colour-coded or visual budget that reflects your values. Visual tools have been shown to increase engagement and adherence.
9. The Shadowed Investor
Her husband handles his investments independently. She watches from the sidelines, unsure how to begin her own journey.
She isn’t excluded, but she doesn’t feel included either. She knows she needs her own strategy but feels lost.
Lesson: Access is not the same as empowerment. You need your own roadmap. Empowerment theory highlights that personal agency grows through incremental mastery experiences.
If this is you: Choose one concrete task – like setting up an automatic transfer to savings -and complete it within 24 hours. Small wins boost self-efficacy and momentum.
The Cost of Silence
Research shows that financial attitudes and behaviours are often inherited, not explicitly taught. Children develop their core beliefs about money through both direct communication and observational learning, what’s said, and more often, what isn’t. When families avoid discussing finances, especially during periods of stress or crisis, children internalise that money is taboo, unpredictable, or unsafe. These beliefs follow them into adulthood and shape how they engage in relationships, careers, and long-term planning.
Not talking about money comes at a price. It builds walls in marriages, limits ambition, and repeats cycles of fear and confusion. It teaches the next generation to stay quiet, too.
When women feel unsupported or ashamed about their finances, their relationships and futures suffer.
Final Thoughts: Rewriting Your Financial Story
These women are not broken, but they’ve been taught to stay small, to be grateful for enough rather than bold about wanting more.
Money is more than a transaction. It reflects who we are, what we value, and what we believe we’re allowed to want.
If you recognised yourself in these stories, pause and reflect:
What does money mean to me right now, and is that story still true?
Now take this further.
Try this: write a financial forgiveness letter. To yourself. To your parents. To money itself.
Start with:
“Dear Money, I forgive you for…”
“Dear Self, I release you from the shame of…”
You don’t have to send it. But write it fully, truthfully. Studies in expressive writing show that even one honest letter can shift emotional patterns, lower stress, and support healing.
This small ritual can help interrupt cycles of fear and scarcity, and plant seeds for a more compassionate, intentional relationship with your finances.
You don’t need permission. You just need to begin. Get curious. Ask new questions. Seek the right support. Then act.
Healing your relationship with money doesn’t begin with math, it begins with meaning.
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