I told my wife a secret and now we are in bad place

[calus]

My wife and I have been married for 10 years (both aged 28 now )and together for 14 years. We have 4 beautiful children together who are healthy and good kids.
when i met my wife i was immigrant and my parents were political asylum seekers . We connected because her mother and her had been stationed in my home country with the army and she spoke my language fluently having lived there for a few years .

I never told my wife that my grandfather who had a large stake in a oil company left me large sums of money and a few properties because that was simply not something we spoke about in our family.
We all knew what we each inherited and we had left that part of the world behind but some years back the political situation had changed and the government allowed my family to return.

my wife found out and feels like i hid the fact that i come from a oil family.

She is giving me the silent treatment for 5 days now.

[Wiseman2]

How did your wife find this out? You need to suggest marriage therapy, if you want this to work. That's quite a lie and changes her thinking, that perhaps you wanted a sham marriage of convenience. What is your goal? Stay married? Stay where you are? Go back to your country. How will you collect this inheritance?

[Capttrae]

Maybe I’m stupid but why would that be a problem, that you come from an oil family? Or that you had inherited a large sum of money plus oil wells and property?

[calus]

My wife and I are not talking due a me not having told her that i come from a wealthy family. My family were political refugees and we did not tell anyone this part of our life. The political situation in my home country improved and she came to find out about money she feels i did not tell her about. .
She packed her stuff and has taken the children to her mothers.

There have been moment that we struggled financially and she feels that I made us suffer for nothing.

what can i do to get my family back

[Capricorn3]

Threads have been merged.

[Capricorn3]

There have been moment that we struggled financially and she feels that I made us suffer for nothing.

This is hard to understand. You say you have so much wealth/money, so I am not sure why you didn't use this money to sort out whatever "financial struggle" was going on. Makes no sense to me. I can sort of see why she would be upset if this is the case - why you let the family suffer when you had all this wealth which could have sorted things out. Just seems very odd.

[calus]

This is hard to understand. You say you have so much wealth/money, so I am not sure why you didn't use this money to sort out whatever "financial struggle" was going on. Makes no sense to me. I can sort of see why she would be upset if this is the case - why you let the family suffer when you had all this wealth which could have sorted things out. Just seems very odd.

government seized our wealth shares froze my father bank account, we had nothing we started from scratch. We have since received royal pardons and my wife walked in on that conversation being discussed.

[IAmFCA]

"What can I do to get my family back"

(1) Acknowledge that you are a team, that you are united in life and in all that life entails.
(2) Acknowledge that, by keeping information from her, you deprived her of the opportunity to understand you. You pretended to share with her whatever anxieties may have arisen because of the hardship, while keeping from her information that might have given her hope.
(3) Acknowledge that hiding or keeping relevant information from her is detrimental to your relationship together, because it makes it more difficult for her to know you and therefore more difficult to love you. And, practically speaking, more difficult to make decisions as a team, given that only one of you is informed.
(4) Apologize for the barriers you created between you. Explain that you did not understand the impact of your choices, and having learned from this experience, you would make different choices. Explain what you would do differently -- that you would share the information, share the ideas that you struggle with, seek her counsel, and seek her understanding.
(5) Explain that due to the family circumstances, you had deeply seated fears about the family wealth. That it isn't yours, exactly. That you had wanted to be certain you could survive without it, especially since it was nearly lost.
(6) Explain that the financial hardship was painful for everyone, and yet it was a gift too. By pulling through it, together, you gained confidence in yourself, and perhaps the two of you gained confidence in each other. You see that you can face hardships together and succeed in the face of difficulty.
(7) Acknowledge that Yes, you could have used family money to relieve their pain. Acknowledge that it may have been better to do so -- except that then, you would have felt dependent upon it. Beholden to others, and unable to stand on your own two feet.
(8) Apologize, again, for the pain of the hardship.
(9) Thank her for having faith in you, for believing you two would pull out of it and find better times.
(10) Thank her for her strength.
(11) Thank her for appreciating you as the man you are, apologize for having to learn a lesson (that you can stand on your own two feet) at the cost of the family's comfort. Assure her that now that you have gained more wisdom, you would be able to accept inherited wealth and spend it if/when necessary. And include her in your financial planning decisions, going forward.

What is unclear from your post:
Is this family wealth yours to spend/invest/manage as you please?
Is this wealth something you intend to keep to yourself, or do you intend to open it up for family needs?

If it isn't yours alone, then it isn't yours. And certainly isn't hers.
If you intend or are required to control this wealth individually and/or for the benefit of your birth family/siblings/parents, then you need to be clear about your role, and the fact that the money isn't as available to you as it might seem.

If the money is available to you, and was when you needed it but you chose to hide the money instead, then you need to be clear about why you made that choice, take responsibility for letting the family struggle, and point out the benefits of that. You also need to be clear about how you will behave going forward. Take responsibility for damaging your relationship by hiding something from her, and assure her that now you want to make decisions as a team, even difficult decisions. Especially the difficult ones.

In return you will need her understanding. Earn that by offering her your own.

[calus]

If it isn't yours alone, then it isn't yours. And certainly isn't hers.
If you intend or are required to control this wealth individually and/or for the benefit of your birth family/siblings/parents, then you need to be clear about your role, and the fact that the money isn't as available to you as it might seem.

If the money is available to you, and was when you needed it but you chose to hide the money instead, then you need to be clear about why you made that choice, take responsibility for letting the family struggle, and point out the benefits of that. You also need to be clear about how you will behave going forward. Take responsibility for damaging your relationship by hiding something from her, and assure her that now you want to make decisions as a team, even difficult decisions. Especially the difficult ones.

In return you will need her understanding. Earn that by offering her your own.

This money was not available to me until recently when my family received a royal pardon. in fact we were unable to visit my country as we would be thrown in prison for simply entering the country. My father has been trying for the better part of 11 years to make amends and it eventually worked out positively. I have never discussed that part of my life with my spouse as it never seemed to come to anything .

we struggling financially and i didn't want to make a bad situation worse by mentioning money i did not have access to . Just imagine welfare and talking to your wife and kids about money which might or might not come.

now however things have changed and everyone will get a payout from the government and compensation for the years we are unable to receive any money.
She feels like i have kept something from her and that i didn't trust her enough to let her know that my father was working with the embassy in trying to fix the situation.

I just didn't think it would ever work out it eventually took 11 years to fix

[IAmFCA]

This money was not available to me until recently when my family received a royal pardon. in fact we were unable to visit my country as we would be thrown in prison for simply entering the country. My father has been trying for the better part of 11 years to make amends and it eventually worked out positively. I have never discussed that part of my life with my spouse as it never seemed to come to anything .

we struggling financially and i didn't want to make a bad situation worse by mentioning money i did not have access to . Just imagine welfare and talking to your wife and kids about money which might or might not come.

now however things have changed and everyone will get a payout from the government and compensation for the years we are unable to receive any money.
She feels like i have kept something from her and that i didn't trust her enough to let her know that my father was working with the embassy in trying to fix the situation.

I just didn't think it would ever work out it eventually took 11 years to fix

To recap:

You didn't have any money with which to fix everything.
What you kept to yourself was the potential to receive money.

Your wife knew of your refugee/ex-pat status and the family history of having left your homeland? She knew of your family, she knew your background?

Then still, go through the steps of acknowledging that you kept something from her, as discussed below.
Hiding something always prevents someone else from understanding you fully. Hence, your silence put you two at a distance from one another, and that was not your intention. Take responsibility for that.

Ask permission to share your experience and your desire to avoid disappointment. Share your emotional landscape. Your logic.

Tell her that you learned from this experience how important it is to let her know your thoughts.

-- Make sure she understands you could not have changed your financial position, previously.

Listen to her. Listen to her more than seems logical. Her trust is diminished, and it is unclear why: Perhaps, she needed some kind of hope, whereas you needed to assume you would never get anything to ensure you would find a way to live without it.

You are different people. She expected something from you that you didn't provide. That doesn't mean you don't love her. You do want to provide & protect your family to your greatest ability. And that is what you did, by using whatever resources you had, and protecting them from expecting resources you didn't have and had no expectation of receiving. You were trying to protect the people you love as best you know how.