A MUM has shared her despair after her husband’s mammoth lottery win destroyed their marriage.
Jodie and Edwin had been married for a number of years and shared a child together when he won £1.3 million as part of a lottery syndicate.
However, Jodie claims her husband became a “paranoid” man following the win and has attempted to hide hundreds of thousands of pounds of spending from her.
Namely, she believes Edwin treated his brother to a house worth £500k to put the money in someone else’s name and deny her access to it.
“Winning the lottery changed our lives for the worst,” Jodie said.
She added that Edwin splurged his winnings on cars, motorhomes, snow mobiles and quad bikes rather than buying them a family home.
“He thought it was his money and nobody was gonna tell him what to do with it,” Jodie added on an episode of Dr Phil.
“I just wanted to be part of the decisions that he was making.
“The only thing I really requested was that we purchased a home.
“He transferred $500k (£410k) into my account but from that point on, he stopped paying for anything.”
Jodie was lumped with the financial responsibilities of paying their bills. But when the money Edwin had sent her dwindled to £65k as a result, he wasn’t happy.
She describes him as being “really upset and livid”, demanding to know where his winnings had gone.
“He was so furious,” she recalled. “He became so paranoid.
“He would say: ‘you’re not entitled to anything, it was my money and my win’.
“Edwin has made tonnes of threats to divorce.”
In one fight, he revealed that he only had £12k left of the mammoth win. Before that, Jodie assumed the couple had at least £574k left.
“He said he just gave it away and was tired of having it,” she said.
But Jodie later found out that Edwin had spent nearly £500k on a house for his brother, leading her to believe he was putting the winnings under somebody else’s name so she didn’t have “any access to it”.
The couple appeared on American daytime television show Dr Phil to discuss their differences but things appeared irreconcilable.
It is not uncommon for marriages to break down following a big win of money, a phenomenon known as the “lottery curse”.
Gillian Bayford’s, 50, eight-year marriage was destroyed when she and ex-husband Adrian scooped £148 million on the EuroMillions in 2012.
Their lives changed overnight and put so much strain on their relationship, it totally broke down 15 months after their win.
Both Gillian and Adrian blamed the stress from their mind-boggling win as the root cause of their divorce.
