My husband shouted, “Take your kid and go to hell,” in court. He smirked as assets were listed—until a sealed will revealed a $32 million estate. When my name was read, everything changed, including custody.

and more than once I felt the old reflex rise in me—to defer, to step back, to let someone else handle the “important” parts.

But every time that reflex surfaced, I remembered the kitchen table and the spreadsheets, the years I had managed finances in the shadow of another person’s ego. I remembered the nights in Eleanor’s office when numbers were continue reading …