Monica Serci has spent her career in family law, sitting with people at the worst moments of their lives. She's a special counsel at Walter and Elliot Family Lawyers, was named a Doyle's Guide Rising Star, and she gives her own time to advocacy work she believes in. In this conversation with Cynthia Myssy, Monica talks about the early warning signs of coercion and control, why the census undercounts what women actually do, and what happens when you treat a non negotiable as negotiable.

Key Takeaways:

• The warning signs are built to be dismissed: Coercion and control rarely announces itself, arriving instead as a comment about a friend, a preference that your mother visits less, or an offer to take over the budget, and it is the accumulation rather than any single incident that matters.
• A non negotiable has to look like one: If you treat something that is genuinely not up for discussion as though it is, it will be negotiated, which is why the moment to hold the line is early, while the thing is still small.
• The legal system is a tool, not a remedy: Courts can recognise what happened to you but cannot deliver emotional repair, so going in search of validation sets you up to leave disappointed whatever the outcome.
• What is not counted does not count: The census records paid hours precisely and caps unpaid domestic work at thirty, and that gap flows into the administrative systems that calculate child support, leaving two systems pointing in opposite directions.
• The relationship with yourself sets the ceiling for the rest: After a career spent watching relationships end, the one Monica worked hardest on was her own, drawing a clear line between self care and selfishness and treating her own limits as maintenance rather than indulgence.
• Imposter syndrome does not resolve with seniority: It is real, it is worse for women, and it persists in people with every reason to feel qualified, which makes the correction worth borrowing: you are the adult in the room.
• Courage is usually quiet: The most consequential acts are often private, unrecorded and witnessed by nobody, as one small kindness in wartime Sardinia proves three generations later.

Notable Quotes:

1. "If you have behaviour that is a non negotiable for you, but then you treat it as a negotiable thing, it will be negotiated." — Monica Serci
2. "Many people are taught to keep the peace, but sometimes to your own autonomy, there's nothing more that one should protect." — Monica Serci
3. "Thirty hours a week is almost a joke if they were to think about everything they did." — Monica Serci
4. "They're not just names. They're whole worlds." — Monica Serci
5. "You don't need permission." — Monica Serci
6. "Sometimes the greatest acts are quiet and deeply personal." — Monica Serci
7. "I think you see things that many of us don't see." — Cynthia Myssy

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