Woman Who Won Lottery but Kept It Secret From Husband Divides Internet

A woman has stunned the internet after revealing she won big at the lottery but kept it a secret from her husband for almost eight years.

In fact, the only reason he even discovered her deception in the first place was after intercepting a text telling her she was now a millionaire.

Money has always been a source of strife among married couples. A 2013 study conducted by the University of Madison-Wisconsin's School of Human Ecology found that husbands attributed 18.3 percent of all arguments they had with their spouse to money matters, with 19.4 percent of wives saying the same.

Concerns over their other half's spending habits certainly appear to have motivated this particular woman's decision to hide the fact she won what amounted to $480,000 after tax.

"My husband has a tendency to spend on things we don't need and that aren't going to benefit us in the long run so I didn't want our money to blown quickly on stupid stuff like cars and clothes," she explains in a post upvoted 44,700 times on the "Today I F***ed Up" subreddit of Reddit.

The woman says that when she first discovered she had won big she "panicked" because she didn't want their lives to "turn upside down" as a result of the windfall.

So she made a bold decision. With her wedding to her now-husband, Mike, still three months off, she realized she was "still legally single" and could therefore "accept it anonymously without the need to tell anyone else."

Until recently, she had not told a single soul about the cash, opting to open a new bank account with the funds which she then began to invest "in local businesses and real estate" with a financial adviser.

Things had been going well. A little too well in fact.

Recently her financial adviser called her to give her an update on how her investments were doing. When she didn't answer he decided to text her to let her know her account had "just hit $1 million."

The only problem was that her husband ended up seeing the message on her phone screen and it left him understandably "stunned."

After finally coming clean with him about her secret windfall, her husband told her that while he was "proud" of her for investing in their "future" he was going to stay with a friend as he needed "a few days to clear his head" because he feels like she "hid" a "huge part" of herself from him.

Her story prompted a range of responses on social media.

I_Bin_Painting felt the husband was entitled to be upset. "I would feel super weird about it," they wrote. "They've been keeping a huge secret from you but for the best reasons...I'd probably have to remove myself from the situation to just give my emotions time to figure themselves out so I didn't say anything stupid in the moment."

LittleBigHorn22 agreed, saying they would be "very hurt" if their spouse did this. Davensdad felt otherwise though, writing: "I would be so happy if my wife is hiding $1M from me."

Rejusu thought the woman did the right thing by saving the money rather than "blowing it trying to live like celebrities." They noted: "A lot of lottery winners end up bankrupt largely because they don't understand that what they've won is a lot of money but doesn't actually make them 'mega rich.'"

However, other users like Pilfered felt that the husband "must be feeling a fool" after learning the truth. "You've been keeping this a secret for your entire marriage, how did you not think this money would either be relevant or concerning, simply as a measure of trust and faith," they said. "7 years into the marriage is like 5 years too late to be sharing this sort of secret."

MartijnMumbles felt the woman had been "patronizing" in not telling her husband and he was "right to be upset" adding that "marriages are supposed to be about open communication and respect."

Secrets can damage any marriage though in previous viral stories it has been the husbands rather than the wives who ended up being guilty of deception.

One husband, for example, earned his wife's wrath after she found out he conducted secret background checks on her. In another instance, a married father sparked outrage after having a secret vasectomy.