Her second act became a gift to others

When Armande van Stom was in her 40s, with three grown sons and a successful independent fashion agency, she surprised everyone: she closed her business, enrolled at UNSW Sydney’s School of Psychology, and began the life she had been dreaming of. 

“I approached it like it was a job,” she says. “I started at nine in the morning and left at five in the afternoon. If I didn’t have lectures, I was in the library. I did that five days a week.” 

For Armande, university wasn’t about credentials. It was about honouring a long-held yearning for education – a dream denied since youth. 

“My parents always said, ‘Look, you don’t want to go to university. Your brothers will do that.’” 

As was expected of her, she married young, raised children and for almost two decades played the role of charming wife and mother alongside a successful lawyer-husband in what she describes as a “very Mad Men marriage”. But something was missing. 

In the early 1970s, she attended one of Sydney’s first women’s liberation meetings in Leichhardt after reading Germaine Greer’s The Female Eunuch, which “resonated with a lot of things I had been feeling but hadn’t been able to put into words.”  

Attending the women’s lib meetings helped her realise something fundamental: “I desperately needed to do something more with my brain.” 

Although she loved her husband and adored her children, she needed more to feel fulfilled. Armande waited until her sons had grown and then made the tough decision to leave the marriage.  

Drawn to psychology, she was fascinated by what drives human behaviour. She considered other universities, but UNSW stood out: its egalitarian spirit and humanitarian values spoke to her curiosity and sense of social justice. 

“It was absolutely stimulating. It was everything I’d been wanting,” she reflects. 

After her undergraduate degree, she completed a Master of Sociology. By then, she was approaching 50 – a time when many of her peers were talking about slowing down. Armande, however, was just getting started. 

She eventually became a full-time psychotherapist, working in a private hospital and later establishing her own practice, specialising in addiction, depression, anxiety and relationships. Now in her 80s, Armande still sees a small number of clients.  

“It’s challenging,” she concedes. “But I’m a curious person, so every time someone walks in, there’s something new to explore. It’s always very absorbing.”

Sharing the gift of education

Armande believes education can provide not just a qualification, but also a sense of self – which is why she has left a gift in her Will to UNSW. 

“My children were everything to me, but there was something that was lacking for me – and it was meaning. University filled that gap. It gave my life the meaning I needed.” 

Her bequest will support scholarships for students experiencing financial hardship, giving others the chance she fought to attain. She describes her decision to leave a gift in her Will as “axiomatic” and hopes others will do the same, particularly those who’ve similarly been deeply fulfilled by their time at university. 

“UNSW was such a wonderful, wonderful university to go to,” she says. “I needed that stimulation. I needed that growth. And if you’ve been given something wonderful, it’s only natural to want to give something back.” 

You, too, can open doors for students facing barriers by including UNSW in your Will. For more information, contact Janet Hall at giftsinwills@unsw.edu.au or +61 478 492 032.