DEAR PRUDENCE

Dear Prudence: I (she/her) ended my relationship with my partner (she/her) earlier this year. We lived together for many years. When I met her, she was unemployed, as she’d had a business venture fail. She eventually got a job, and then started working for me in my business — first part time, and then at her urging, she became my full-time employee. Things were great for a long time. My business was growing and she was reliable. It felt like we were building an empire. She had goals to become my partner in the business one day. I was able to pay her well. (I’m aware of how this is often a bad decision for people in romantic relationships — it was the right decision for a long time). She was also in six-figure student debt, so I paid the rent on our place. As my business grew, I was able to afford my dream apartment in my dream location, so I moved there a year and a half ago. She agreed to pay the electric bill.

Then things changed overnight.

I discovered a few things: a severe hoarding tendency in her home office (she kept the door closed so I didn’t see how bad it was getting until we got ants); that she wasn’t doing much of her work to a professional standard or in a timely manner; and that she wanted intellectual property credit for an artistic project I was doing on my own. I was working 16 hours a day to make up for the work she wasn’t doing at work.

Prudie, I feel duped and cheated. I feel so incredibly stupid — I let her into my life, my business. I took care of us the best I could. As the breadwinner in the relationship, I was always conscious about potential financial abuse and wanted to make things fair. I made more so I paid the rent — and she pulled zero percent of the weight, in all areas of our life together. I was talking to a friend about it and told them I feel like I was a victim of financial abuse. Was I?

Dear Bill Blues: Financial abuse typically involves an element of power or control that doesn’t seem to have been present here. But you don’t have to label what happened as abuse to be deeply upset and hurt by it! You were dating a liar and a scammer, whether they were premeditated about it or not. You were taken advantage of. Your trust was violated. You had a really awful experience. The best way forward here is to do a few things.

Take some time to be mad, hurt, and sad. But not stupid, because you’re not! You don’t have to beat yourself up over this. Keep talking to friends about what happened, and I bet you’ll come away feeling that you’re one of many people who has fallen in love with someone dishonest, disappointing, or even diabolical.