Divorce? Hey, You’re Doing It All Wrong

cruise
Blogger, Happy Hausfrau, had a goofy Facebook post this week where she riffed on photoshopping old family pictures with the ex.

I just read a funny article about a woman who is taking pictures of her with the ex and photoshopping celebrity heads in them. Sorry to burst a millennial bubble, but it’s old school breakup therapy. Case in point: that time Tom Cruise and I posed for a pic with our little Christmas babies.

It gave me a chuckle. Not exactly meh, but hey, a creative solution. If you’ve ever blanched at the sight of a bittersweet family portrait, you get it. Oh such an innocent time… before I knew about the Craigslist hookups…

However, as is often the way on the interwebz, someone Voiced An Objection.

Sniffy Lady sniffed:

I’m sure it’s therapeutic, but only for the mother. I’m not divorced so this might be easy for me to say, but I think I’d put those pictures aside for my kids so they’d have memories and the ability maintain a sense of family identity. That is unless the father was an axe murderer, child abuser, etc.

So you’re not divorced, but…?

As she appeared to be unclear on the concept — the whole breaking up families bummer — I explained divorce for her.

Sniffy Lady replied:

I know what divorce means, but thanks for giving me your definition. I didn’t mean to upset anybody. I wouldn’t photoshop my kids dad out of family pictures. That’s my choice. What you do is yours.

My parents divorced, so I think my perspective is different than yours. If my mother would have marred up the pictures of our family it would have broken my heart (she did no such thing).

Really, Photoshopping Tom Cruises’ head would have “broken your heart“? What? Are you made of spun sugar? Your heart’s so fragile that celebrity cut ‘n paste could shatter your psyche?

Horrors. How DARE we mock the sacred bonds of family!

It’s so bitter and unkind. Unlike abandoning a wife and four kids for an affair partner, withdrawing all financial support, sending the mother into near bankruptcy, and never speaking to one’s children again for YEARS? (Happy Hausfrau’s exact situation.)

No, THAT we must “maintain a sense of family identity” with. For The Children.

Fuck you, Sniffy Lady.

I’m sorry you’re the child of divorce. I’m not a child of divorce — my parents have been married for 50 years — so this might be easy for me to say, but I think healthy people do not maintain a sense of “family identity” with axe murderers, child abusers, or cheaters. Actually, I’ll go one further — I don’t think people should maintain a sense of “family identity” after divorce from Perfectly Nice People Who Sucked to Be Married To But Are No Longer Our Partners.

Perhaps you should stay off blogs you know nothing about? It’s not as if the Happy Hausfrau was including this image in her Christmas cards, or email blasting her children with it, or plastering it on public bathroom stalls — she put it on a support site for divorced people. You don’t like it? Maybe you’re not the intended audience. Maybe her divorce is nothing like your parent’s divorce? And maybe you shouldn’t project your experience on to others?

Listen, I’d rather my son’s father had created a dart board with my visage, invited 10 of my son’s friends over, blindfolded them all and played “Pin the Tail on My Shitty Ex-Wife” than sue me pro se for a decade. Maybe it would’ve released some of the tension, who knows? Awkward for the children? Sure. But not as awkward as multiple custody trials. It certainly wouldn’t be as toxic as disappearing from his son’s life for years, canceling his health insurance, or being a deadbeat.

Here’s a thought Sniffy Lady — maybe your mother, instead of eating shit sandwiches and preserving everyone’s sainted opinion of Dad, modeled a little moxie like the Happy Hausfrau. Who handles shattering heartbreak with aplomb and — yes, HUMOR. Who took a little, tiny sliver of her power back with a cut-out of Tom Cruise’s head.

God forbid we laugh about this shit. Oh no, you’re a Bad Mother if you laugh at this shit.

But that’s a slippery slope to Bitterness and Scarring the Children Forever!

Look, let me be VERY CLEAR here — I’m NOT in favor of alienating the kids or making sport of exes in front of the kids. I tell chumps to tell the truth about divorce (mom or dad cheated), but leave off the editorializing (i.e., “Mom’s a slut.”). But in the confines of your support group? Alone with your friends? A 2 a.m. on an infidelity board? LET IT RIP.

Find the absurdity! MOCK THEM! Photoshop a cat’s anus on the Other Woman’s face for all I care. Will it make you feel a little more powerful? Will it alleviate some of the fear and anxiety when you can laugh at them instead of pick-me dance for their favors? Then DO IT.

Eventually, you won’t feel the need as you go no contact and get to meh. (Which can take YEARS when you’re co-parenting with a fuckwit.) But for the rest of you, who just found out, who are curled up in balls of rejection and self-loathing? Paste a celebrity head today!

You’ll heal faster — and isn’t that what’s best for the children?

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MidlifeBlast
MidlifeBlast
8 years ago

I’m opening up photoshop right now and pasting ashley walters, kano and all of the musketeers (from the BBC series) over his ugly face!!!! mwahahahaaaaaaaaa. I feel better already. Is there a gallery where we can share all our lovely pictures?

Bubbles the jellyfish
Bubbles the jellyfish
8 years ago
Reply to  MidlifeBlast

Amen Chump Lady. All I can say is Amen abs everything you said!

Gayna
Gayna
8 years ago

I did something similar with our family pictures. I came across some pumpkin/Jack-O-Lantern stickers as I was cleaning up one day. I started with just one and then it became addicting.
All photos with the cheater I put the perfect sized Jack-O-Lantern over his face.
As childish as it may sound I remember laughing so hard after I place my first sticker.
It makes me smile when I look at family photos now instead of feeling sad focusing on the betrayal and loss of our family.
The photos now bring a smile to my face and makes me happy, I still laugh whenever I come across a photo of Jack. It’s hilarious..

ChumpB
ChumpB
8 years ago
Reply to  Gayna

OMG Gayna, I so cracked up reading your post. I love love that pumpkin idea. So truly hilarious. I love laughing again; thanks for making me do so. Still chortling!

Irish
Irish
8 years ago
Reply to  Gayna

I have to jump in here. I burned every stinking wedding photo. But……the assclown had a photo album of his “glory days” I saved the pictures of our wedding when he was kneeling down in front of the priest bawling his eyes out. Sooooo committed and overcome with emotion. Yeah right. What an Oscar worthy performance. He had me too,for about 6 years before I stumbled onto his double life. So, I took all the copies of the red faced, lying pud whacker and inserted them liberally in the pages of his stupid little photo book. So when he gets nostalgic to see himself as the athletic stud he thought he was, he gets to see the lying, cheating con man that he is. Haha haha!

Angela
Angela
6 years ago
Reply to  Irish

I burned all photos with him in it. I waited until my boys had a weekend visit, bought 2 bottles of wine, and went through all our photos, made a huge pile of burnable. I then took that pile and threw the photos, memrobelia, gifts…etc into a bonfire. For me, it was therapeutic. I cried and got drunk, but it helped me to move on. Some people think it was crazy, but for me it helped.

ChumpB
ChumpB
8 years ago
Reply to  Tracy Schorn

Here here CL, again, the voice of truth, passion, and wisdom! Love you!

GotTheTShirt
GotTheTShirt
8 years ago

One of the pictures skanky OW texted my husband was a headless (protecting the not so innocent? Like her 100 nude Twitter pics never existed…) boob shot of herself naked in a bathtub and cropped off just above the hoo-haw line of her unmentionables. My nickname for her since seeing this has been WhistleTits because she thought it was cute to wear one around her neck in that photo. Theyre not even as perky and nice as mine (and mine are real so how fake ones are worse is anyones guess) but theres no accounting for taste either

a cat’s anus is the PERFECT item to restore her headless form in that photo. Thank you Chumplady for such a stellar idea indeed…

Ever_the_Empath
Ever_the_Empath
6 years ago
Reply to  GotTheTShirt

your skanky OW sounds like my skanky OW. no heads on the pictures. no brains I guess.

mgirontree
mgirontree
8 years ago

I have torn up every picture we have together, deleted his f**k face on my iPhone. I haven’t done anything to the family pictures yet, but I think Donald Trumps head would be very befitting. Thank you for the idea Happy Hausfrau !!!! And thank you CL for posting:)

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  mgirontree

Tough choice–Tom Cruise, Donald Trump, or my X’s face? hmm…they all suck as husbands and people. Perhaps the Jack-o-Lantern stickers….

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  Tempest

Ha!! Found exactly the picture I’ll paste over Hannibal Lecher’s face/body in all photos (and Francois Arnaud looks muuuuccccchhhh better in leather pants than the X):

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/108438303501836214/

Skinwalker
Skinwalker
6 years ago
Reply to  Tempest

He’s got a Jerry Seinfeld pirate shirt on! Remember that episode?

Ugh!

As I’m sure most of you know, Jerry’s another fuckwit who broke up a 4-month old marriage to secure his latest golddigger wife, Jessica.

Apparently Broadway theater heir Eric Nederlander was not rich enough.

And before that, the disorded cheater at age 39 started diddling a teenager (17 year old) he picked up in Central Park for years. And refused to marry the poor kid.

(Sorry for going OT! I was triggered by the Jerry shirt.)

mgirontree
mgirontree
8 years ago
Reply to  Tempest

Tempest,…….. Nice one!

Michael.
Michael.
8 years ago
Reply to  mgirontree

I’ve deleted it all too including $2000 dollars worth of engagement and wedding photos.

k
k
8 years ago

Does anyone know if once a whore presses the send button and emails the boob job /ass pics of herself to my then husband do they become property of his (in this case ,mine)? I’ve always wondered. 😉

chump-tastic
chump-tastic
8 years ago
Reply to  k

From a copyright standpoint I don’t think the pictures become his property (they’re the property of the “photographer,” heh) but I like the way you think!

divorceat25
divorceat25
8 years ago
Reply to  k

Unfortunately the copy right of a picture remains with the picture taker. So you can’t really distribute it or sell the imagine legally, but you can totally deface it 🙂

Ever_the_Empath
Ever_the_Empath
6 years ago
Reply to  divorceat25

I always said if it wound up on a memory stick off our shared computer and then that memory stick fell out of my pocket in a public place…well… could happen.

walkingthruhell
walkingthruhell
8 years ago

“Photoshop a cat’s anus on the Other Woman’s face for all I care.”
Lol! Thanks for starting my day with a laugh, CL! Of all possible objects… a cat’s anus?! Hilarious! I needed this as I start a week where Cheater is slyly sneaking his howorker into his hotel room while away for an entire week’s worth of “business meetings”.

MrsVain
MrsVain
6 years ago

As funny as that is, i personally would find it strange that anyone would have a picture of a cat’s anus.. .. that is a whole different kind of fucked up disorder.. ahahahaha

Divorce Minister
Divorce Minister
8 years ago

I could almost understand Sniffy Lady if these were the ONLY family photos and she was putting them up in the hallways of her house. Assuming such things is assuming A LOT, though!

This seems to be a rather benign why to work through one’s pain. It is not like you are hurting your ex, and the kids never need to know just as they don’t need to read your personal journal.

DC
DC
8 years ago

I’ve heard tell of many, many kids who would rejoice if their cheated-upon parent took the thing in stride with harmless yet vindictive humor.

Sniffy Lady was being deliberately offensive, by the way. Nothing like co-opting the language of self-actualization (your choice, my choice, I don’t see it that way, etc.) when someone tells you you’re being a butthead. Can somebody dissect why this is so poisonous? I know whenever people do it to me I just want to punch them imaginarily in the face. What IS that? Somebody take it apart for me.

MrsVain
MrsVain
6 years ago
Reply to  DC

it makes you feel like you want to punch them in the face because it is just another shitty way for them to disagree with you and invalidate your feelings.. .. in such a nice way… GAG.. .

she is basically saying your choice (doesnt mean shit to her) and my choice (is the only right choice).. .. just not saying the whole thing.. .. that is your choice (because she knows you are wrong and she thinks you are too stupid to understand….) her choice… ..

ironically, i started using that with wasband.. because he never understands why i get upset about his actions and behaviors. i mean who wouldnt get upset when their husband stays out all night and is broke 2 days after he gets paid.. .. but why you mad mrsvain? you want me to be held accountable for the shitty things i did to you and the kids?… .. well that is YOUR choice, you know i loved you but it is your choice to get mad.. .. ugh !!!!

so now i do the same thing.. .. you dont want to come to my house to pick up your kids? well that is your choice. you dont want to call my cell phone to talk to your sons?well, that is your choice. (even thou we do not have a house phone and the kids do not have their own cell phones so i dont know what other phone he can call.. .. .. oh wait he wants his boys to CALL HIM.. why should he have to call his sons at all, if they want to talk to him, they know his number… .. ) it seems to work on him very well.. .. hahaha

nuclear tuna
nuclear tuna
8 years ago
Reply to  DC

It drives one to rage because it is invalidation. Gaslighting, in other words. Denying your reality and their part in it. It’s a two-fer for them: 1) Deny the reality of the shitty thing they just said or did, and 2) insult you for being livid about it.

The one that still gets me is the fuckwad who delights in pushing buttons, and then tells me I have no sense of humor. “I was just kidding. Geez, can’t you take a joke?” Fuck off and die, dickhead.

DC
DC
8 years ago
Reply to  nuclear tuna

Yep, I’d say that sums it up pretty well. Sometimes you even get a threefer: (3) They deliberately did Annoying Thing X multiple times to see how you’d react. If the reaction is negative, they invalidate and condescend to you in the name of defending their own “perspective.” If not, then obviously Thing X is ok and you can’t complain about it later. Ugh!!!

DC
DC
8 years ago
Reply to  DC

Or just once can be enough. Then if you call them out they say, “Stop making such a big deal out of that one little thing.” It’s so sick and twisted.

ChumpB
ChumpB
8 years ago
Reply to  nuclear tuna

Oh nuclear tuna, you just summed up my marriage perfectly. As you said, he completely denied the reality of the very shitty things he did, then was insulted by my reaction. I am still sorting out what I did that was wrong so I can take responsibility and be better, but honestly, the majority of my anger reactions were from feeling abandoned, invalidated, misunderstood, rejected, belittled, minimized, and basically treated ilke a POS. Wouldn’t anyone react to that? Then when I found out about the cheating (and honestly really did feel tremendous rage), it was all about my reaction to it that was the problem. All of his behavior, I believe, is classic textbook narcissism: blaming and completely incapable of taking responsibility.

Even in my child support battle, I made a very reasonable offer to end the entire dispute and guess what he said: “I have been very fair to you, I do not accept your offer.” OMG. I told him that fair isn’t having an affair for 4 years during the marriage, fair isn’t withholding child support for your child to punish me, fair??? Fair??? And once again, his reality absolutely blows my mind and of course I am not supposed to react to it because that would just be too much for him! Fair!

ChumpB
ChumpB
8 years ago
Reply to  ChumpB

Oh, and one more thing: he treated me like a POS, but APPEARED to be the quiet, soft, sensitive, intelligent, understanding type to the world so as a result many people truly were baffled by our divorce. That one still gets me!

nuclear tuna
nuclear tuna
8 years ago
Reply to  ChumpB

ChumpB, be sure to go easy on yourself when sorting out what you did wrong. I’ve found the most anger I have (and boy do I have lots of anger) is at myself for all the times I sold my integrity down the river just to appease Capital-D-Dickhead.

I misunderstood who I was so angry with until I replayed my selftalk to my therapist… “I should have told him to fuck off and die!” and so on, and on, and on. She gently said, “Tuna, you’re not mad at him, you’re mad at yourself.”

The next morning was the first morning since our breakup that I wasn’t angry 10 seconds after I woke up.

I hope that helps.

Jeep
Jeep
8 years ago
Reply to  nuclear tuna

Fuck off and die dickhead!!!! LOL!!!!! AMEN SISTER!!!!

Divorce Minister
Divorce Minister
8 years ago
Reply to  DC

DC,

They are treating you as neurotic and distancing themselves from you with that language. That’s probably why you want to punch them. Plus, they are choosing not to engage or accept they hurt you. It’s pity in some ways. And pity is all about looking down on someone. Another reason to want to punch them.

IMO,
DM

DC
DC
8 years ago
Reply to  DC

I thought of one thing already: I think it has something to do with the undertone of “Why are you making such an ugly, drama-filled fuss about this simple little difference of opinion?” which counts as minimizing and blame-shifting, like the other person is somehow wrong for taking offense. It’s basically “You’re too sensitive” in repackaged and up-to-date vocabulary.

kar marie
kar marie
8 years ago

I’ve been a graphic artist for 35 years. Great idea! Photoshop is the best. My computer is just mine and password ptotected. I’m gonna make a screen saver of asswipe being eaten by zombies!! Oooh lala! Happy Halloween and onto rolling on the floor in tears of laughter!!! Coffee spitter this morning!!!!!

ChumpB
ChumpB
8 years ago
Reply to  kar marie

Kar Marie, that is a great idea! And just the image in my head is comforting!

Jeep
Jeep
8 years ago
Reply to  kar marie

Oh I am just LOVIN this kar marie!!! LMAO!!!!!

TheClip
TheClip
8 years ago

Maybe Sniffy can identify with this? My daughter and I took a long over due vacation. I had plans to return home however Idiot stragically returned my daughters passport paper work a few weks before intended trip. I planned an alternate vacation for half the time and somewhere locally. Idiot calld repeatedly (10 times) to my cell on the second night away insisting to speak with our daughter. She has her own phone. She chose not to pick up and instead texted him. His calls escalated in the am. We left our phones inthe hotel. Messages included from him stated ‘ you are taking a trip on my dime’ and ‘ you are such a selfish bitch’ and other obsenities. He then texted about 12 different paragraphs and attacked my relationship with my father, old boyfriends , what I didnt do for him and that because ‘ your little feelers got hurt that I left so now you are trying to turn my daughter against me.’
On and on. Rehashing all the old garbage. I told him that he needed to get new material and reminded him we were on vacation and would be returning on the dates of the itinerary I supplied him. Reminded him that our child has a phone. And shut my phone off.
When we returned home I removed all family photos from the walls. I had left them up for my child thinking it was the ‘right’ thing to do. FUCK IT.
He aint that man in the pictures anymore and perhaps never was. So the pictures were removed and stored should my child want them in the future. My daughter and I chose some pictures from our holiday and some others over the last year to fill the frames. I dont have to look at the face of Idiot with his big cheesy grin wondering who he went and fucked after that family photo. Now I look at the happy face of my daughter in the pictures of her and I and I can count on the fact that moment was real…. And so can she.

MidlifeBlast
MidlifeBlast
8 years ago
Reply to  TheClip

Love it!! All my exes photos were down within hours of his confession. I never really thought anything of it. Now i’m wondering if maybe I was a bitch. Look at it this way, he’s not going to move into his new place and put up a pic of me just to make the kids feel at home is he? I think we have the right to freshen up the space we live in.

Nord
Nord
8 years ago
Reply to  MidlifeBlast

Excellent point. The chances of a picture of me anywhere in his life is nil, mainly because he didn’t take a single picture of the kids or any part of our life with him when I kicked him out. I even offered at one point but nope, he didn’t want them because ‘it hurt too much’. Wanker.

MrsVain
MrsVain
6 years ago
Reply to  Nord

wasband has a few photos of just me. and of the children. i was big on making sure he had pictures for his wallets and even gave him some for his truck. (maybe i was trying to remind him that he had a good wife and wonderful children ).. .. anyhow i know he has a stack of 5 x 6 photos because i gave them to him a month after he left. there is a really good picture of me in there also. (a little snarky since he is dating a oompa loomp troll).. .. but i figured she (or he) would burn or at least trash the picture of me and i brain dumped the whole thing. i still send him pictures of the boys every now and then (and when i have a current address for him since he moves like every 3 to 5 months)

ironically just 6 months ago, his old boss called me wanting to know if i had a current phone number for him.. .. which i did not. however, we got to talking and this old boss whom i never met, is telling me that wasband showed him a picture of me and the boss thought i was beautiful. and the boss cant believe wasband left me for the smelly troll he is with now (his words) … … anyhow, the boss tells me that wasband keeps my picture and shows it off to many people… .. we have been divorced for 3 years now.. .. JUST BLOWS MY MIND.. .. why would anyone show a picture of his exwife!?!!?! especially when he goes out of his way to ignore me, tells my then 14 year old son that mom doesnt need to know where dad is leaving and to lie to me, and purposely allows his troll to call and talk shit to me? and then turns around and shows my picture to a new boss?

my mind can not logic this kind of crazy… ..

tossedaway
tossedaway
8 years ago
Reply to  Nord

I took all the family pictures when I left. I repeatedly asked STBX if he wanted pictures of the kids and he always said no, no baby pictures, no birthday party pictures, nothing. I understand he wouldn’t want pictures with me in them (wouldn’t want his new “true love” to see pics of him happy with the mean old ex wife) but no pictures of his children.

Humpty Dumpty
Humpty Dumpty
8 years ago
Reply to  tossedaway

I had a very similar experience my EXpletive. When she packed her things to move in with the douchebag neighbor, she didn’t take a single picture of our three children… nothing. After a 26 year marriage, I guess it was too much of reminder that she actually had a life before Mr. Wonderful. Not once, in three years now, has she asked me for a single picture. What kind of parent does this? I don’t think I’ll ever understand that kind of fucked up mindset.

cheaterssuck
cheaterssuck
8 years ago
Reply to  Humpty Dumpty

Humpty-I’m a woman-the exhole cheated on me and I eventually fled the house like an escaped refugee after giving him 3 years of second chances. I took nothing but my clothes, my shoes and I pretty much bought everything else new. I didn’t take any pictures at all. Our kids are adults now and I’m okay with not having any reminders of our life together.

If he were to give some photos to the kids I would look through those but I’m not asking him for anything. Haven’t talked or texted him in well over a year and there have only been a handful of emails.

I’m not comparing my situation to yours but I don’t think my mindset was fucked up and I did the exact same thing your wife did (minus the cheating of course)

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  Nord

Eye roll–the “hurt too much” is such a dead giveaway to selfish, poor sausage sentiment.

I offered to let mine take the family dogs while I was on vacation, and got back the “but I’d have to give them back, and that would hurt too much.” Real reason? He had just moved into his mansion with hardwood floors and their little paws would scratch his finish and get hair on his furniture.

kb
kb
8 years ago
Reply to  Tempest

I am looking forward to taking my dogs with me into a home with hardwood floors (unless I get the cute manufactured home on a half an acre of property, in which case I’ll rip out the carpet and put a high-quality laminate or bamboo–something that will hold up under feisty herding dogs). Hardwood may scratch, but it’s so much easier to clean up animal messes from hardwood or area rugs than from wall-to-wall.

STBX hates that the dogs have nails. Of course, he doesn’t even notice that the cats have scratched up all sorts of surfaces.

JennyK
JennyK
8 years ago
Reply to  MidlifeBlast

Same here MidlifeBlast! I was putting all the pics of us and him in a tote in the basement soon after I read all the texts between them and stopped vomiting. He was taken aback by my haste, but it made him realize I meant business. He moved out 10 days later and I continued to purge the house of him for months ( I even did a smudging ceremony with sage). If it weren’t for the toxic chemicals, I would have had a bonfire with the pics. We didn’t have kids and he only wanted the pics with him alone in them – typical narc. He needed some head shots for all the dating sites, snicker. I never thought of the photoshop thing, it would have been very therapeutic.

mgirontree
mgirontree
8 years ago
Reply to  MidlifeBlast

Nice, MidlifeBlast!!!!

chump-tastic
chump-tastic
8 years ago
Reply to  TheClip

Same here, TheClip. Our house is the place where my child gets to be safe, warm, genuine, and fully supported. Not the place where nothing is real and everything is tenuous. I’ll keep promoting my kid’s happiness and removing the things that detract from it, no matter what he does at his house.

ChumpB
ChumpB
8 years ago
Reply to  chump-tastic

The Clip, I fully support what you did. My ex’s hideousness does not display in my new home! My daughter said at dinner last night: “I am so mad at dad right now, he doesn’t support my dreams. I start to think I am crazy and wonder what exactly does he mean with his passive aggressive remarks.” This was after they had lunch (that’s about all the time they spend) and he simply is unable to show any empathy or encouragement. And this is a 17 y/o kid who is writing a novel, a for real major project she has worked on for years, is legit, well-written, and I promise beloved CN will be published. She is talented, driven, motivated, has big dreams and discipline, writes everyday and ex just cannot get out of his own head and give a little encouragement. She said, “Just wait, when my books is a movie, I’m not inviting him to the premiere.”

LiningUpDucks
LiningUpDucks
8 years ago

This comes down to the basic sense of identity. When our cheaters lied, gaslighted, and fucked us over, we had a sucker-punch reality check that they were NOT who they said they were. They were wearing a mask.

So why not make it official in a photo? And why not have a little fun, and have that mask be Tom Cruise’s head? Looks much better than the wolf-narc face that they really were.

Datdamwuf
Datdamwuf
8 years ago

I just realized the real Saddam is better looking than ex-Saddam but this pic is fine, doesn’t need any photoshopping… http://www.theodoresworld.net/pics/1106/saddamhangedImage11.jpg

Boudica Reborn
Boudica Reborn
8 years ago
Reply to  Datdamwuf

Great photo Datdamwuf! The turtleneck sweater he’s wearing becomes him. What? It’s not a sweater? Oh well, still looks like it was tailored to fit.

Elizabeth Lee
Elizabeth Lee
8 years ago

i don’t think Sniffy Lady understands what it does to a child when a parent abandons the kids. My cheater ex walked away from the entire family when he left our marriage. My kids hate the fakey happy family photos just as much (or more!) than I do.

TimeHeals
TimeHeals
8 years ago
Reply to  Elizabeth Lee

Smart kids. Better to be authentic than to worry about the fake appearance of being happy. That kind of nonsense can screw you up for life. Know who you are and be happy with who you are, I say.

JC
JC
8 years ago

I’m a chump who left his cheating wife. But given my ex-wife proceeded to build a relationship with her AP (they now live together), I sometimes feel that *she* is the one who cut *my* face out of the family photos…not the other way around.

It would be surreal if it weren’t consistent with her easily dissatisfied personality that I had spackled over for years. She simply got bored me with (as she did prior men with whom she had a relationship) and swapped me out for a different model (again…as she did with prior men).

Same job.
Same friends.
Same life.
Different man,

Of course, I now know what a blessing it was to have my face replaced with someone else’s. And I say that any and all actions that help us move on is GOOD therapy. No contact. Destroy old love letters and e-mails. Ex-communicate the in-laws. Allow yourself to call a spade a spade (or a tramp a tramp).

Family photos? I’d say, have at them! I still have our wedding album somewhere in a box at my parents’ house, as well as thousands of digital pics of our life together on a backup hard drive in the back of my closet. I never destroyed them, but I haven’t looked at them since my divorce was finalized. They’re afterthoughts. In fact, I forgot all about them until I read CL’s post. And that indifference feels good!

Carmella1722
Carmella1722
8 years ago
Reply to  JC

You’re right JC, they’re the ones who cut us our of the picture before we ever knew what was happening. I feel like I’ve been kicked out of my own life and now when I look at pictures, all I can think about is that he was already cheating at this time, or was he already with so and so at that time, and on and on. Of course I would never destroy the only copy of a special picture of him and my daughter, not that there are that many, but the rest can go to the shredder.

Lina
Lina
8 years ago
Reply to  Carmella1722

That’s how I feel too. I’ve posted here before that he actually left a picture of me in a pile of trash he left for me to get rid of.

I’ve packed everything away. With my Dad failing I think I will even keep my wedding video for the part of me dancing with him. Maybe I can look at it again someday. Same with my wedding gown. My Mom made it. I never want to see it again but can’t through it out so I’ve packed it away.

Carmella1722
Carmella1722
8 years ago
Reply to  Lina

My gown is a hideous thing from the 90’s and I plan to unceremoniously dispose of it, but the wedding album and video are tough. Both my parents are gone now, as are some other close relatives and I want those pix preserved. My dad and I danced to “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling” and I cherish that memory. Looking at the rest though, how happy and full of hope we were, is soul crushing.

MrsVain
MrsVain
6 years ago
Reply to  Carmella1722

dont distory your wedding gown. donate it to be made to angel gowns (for still born babies).. .. here is the link

https://www.evefoundation.org/?gclid=CjwKCAjwpfzOBRA5EiwAU0ccNyrDPtzfdaq5FhXx89xAXFgJthB–l6fckkE5t7H_yzDDaNxTSKwJRoCj6wQAvD_BwE

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  Carmella1722

Mine was a pale yellow beaded gown, 1920s style. MFer wasn’t going to take my joy in that dress away, so I wore it to the opera (an activity I also took back). He tainted my life, he won’t taint the things I loved.

NorthernLight
NorthernLight
8 years ago
Reply to  Tempest

Tempest, Good for you for reclaiming your gown (and opera). It sounds gorgeous….

Tracy
Tracy
8 years ago

Our daughter did one of her Dad as Lord Farquad from Shrek…. Little man syndrome is his problem and he thinks he owns everything. His nick name was The Governor. She also did a raccoon face with his after he put a dead raccoon on my windshield.

Cats anus….love it…but even that’s too good for the husband’s whore. What an insult to cats.

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  Tracy

!!! He put a dead raccoon on your windshield?!! Is he a redneck Godfather?

kb
kb
8 years ago
Reply to  Tempest

A dead raccoon on your windshield? WTF?!

I guess that’s one way to control the narrative. I wonder if he thought about the message he was sending to his kids when he did it.

DC
DC
8 years ago
Reply to  kb

I’m a man-sized housecat and here’s a raccoon-sized mouse?

DC
DC
8 years ago
Reply to  DC

Also, love how that was just a casual factoid in the larger narrative.

StarbucksGal
StarbucksGal
8 years ago

I am a scrapbooker and have struggled with this. I think I will give the kids any pictures I have of their sperm donor but keep them out of the book. The book is about them not the sperm donor. I agree with you CL.

Kids are better off knowing the truth.

Portia
Portia
8 years ago

There is always a problem with humor — we all have a different sense of it, and some unfortunate people have no sense of humor at all. They just do not understand the tremendous release one gets with a big belly laugh. So sorry for them.

Any suggestion for dealing with stress is just a SUGGESTION. If you don’t like it, don’t try it. Don’t make some type of a judgement call about whether or not it is appropriate for EVERYONE. It was appropriate for the person who said, “This works for me . . . ”

Happy family photos are just a captured moment in time. Some of them were not really happy at the moment they were taken. If cheater-pants could barely sit still to have a Christmas Photo before rushing off to sext the AP, a twu-luv photo if ever one was sent, then the family moment was a big fake anyway. There is a whole culture full of folks who believe it is better to look marvelous than it is to feel marvelous, but once they reach a place where they cannot pretend everything is wonderful — attitudes may change.

I believe children understand the “fake” aspect of photo’s very well — often they do not want to dress up and have their hair combed and sit still for a picture, even if it will make the grandparent’s happy. How often have you seen a screaming child being forced to sit on Santa’s lap in the mall? Why would a child want to have a “Happy Family Photo” hanging on the wall, when they know Daddy or Mommy abandoned them and is now making porno films in the Bahamas with New Daddy or New Mommy? Kids do not need reassurance that there were happy times back in the “Good Ole Days” — they live in the NOW. My suggestion is to put away the old memories in an old memory storage box, and when the children reach an age of independence, ask them if they want those pictures, or not. If you keep a copy to adapt to your own sense of humor, in a place where no uninvited eyes can see them — well, that’s your business, isn’t it?

violet
violet
8 years ago
Reply to  Portia

One of my friends (a divorce lawyer) once told me,”Scratch under the surface of any happy family portrait and you will find something dark and ugly.” A jaded point of view perhaps, but I do believe many people present a facade of perfection that just does not exist. If photoshopping a baboon’s red ass-my personal favorite – to an old family photo brings a smile to the face of a person who has been betrayed, by all means photo shop away! Fake life, fake pictures. As for the kids, I am in complete agreement with Portia, they know a lot more than they let on. I was amazed what I learned from my kids post D-day. In fact, in the words of Leonard Cohen, “Everybody knows.” Whether or not they acknowledge the truth is completely on them.

Mike Wilcox
Mike Wilcox
8 years ago

Well, I just boxed all the photo’s up for the kids, it’s part of their history, a history that was a damn good one right up to the last six months of the marriage. I refused to allow how my marriage ended to poison the good 23 years the kids, the X and myself had before it happened. My Kids can decide to do what they want with the photo’s after I’m gone.

Lyn
Lyn
8 years ago
Reply to  Mike Wilcox

Documenting memories of our family was so important to me. I took the pictures, kept journals, made scrapbooks, etc. I used to think if our house caught fire I’d grab the scrapbooks if nothing else. It seemed so weird when I told my ex I’d make copies of the pictures for him and he said, “That’s okay.” He didn’t want them. Now they’re in boxes in various closets of my house but I don’t look at them. Maybe one day I’ll be able to go through them with my kids. It’s been four years since D-day and lately I’ve been able to look at pictures with my ex in them without having an anxiety attack or feeling really sad. It’s like that life was a previous chapter in a book I’m reading, and all I want to do now is find out what happens in the next chapter.

TimeHeals
TimeHeals
8 years ago
Reply to  Tracy Schorn

I boxed all mine up, and I have no kids 🙂 I just have an aversion to going near the box. I guess it’s time to toss some more stuff out, huh?

RedQueen
RedQueen
8 years ago

My ex left his dark green Harley in my garage for a year and a half after the break up (hey, free chumpy parking!). He texted me months later asking after it so I sent him a pic that I had photoshopped to make it look like I had painted it pink! I have excellent photoshop skills. It looked real! Didn’t say anything else just sent him the pink bike. Priceless.

Ever_the_Empath
Ever_the_Empath
6 years ago
Reply to  RedQueen

I RODE my ex’s harley. It was half mine afterall. Looking back I know it was a power maneuver to say I didn’t need him anymore. for anything.

Nord
Nord
8 years ago
Reply to  RedQueen

What was his reaction?

RedQueen
RedQueen
8 years ago
Reply to  Nord

He didn’t quite believe I had painted it but I’m sure he was relieved when he finally saw it! It was gone within a week. I wheeled it to the end of the driveway and left the keys in it. Sent him another pic of its new parking space. It was gone the next day. It was last kibble umbilical cord.
I had just finally had enough.

ChumpB
ChumpB
8 years ago
Reply to  RedQueen

Wow, RedQueen, love love love that!!!!!

moving forward
moving forward
8 years ago
Reply to  RedQueen

Love!!!

Dr. I Can't Believe I'm a Chump
Dr. I Can't Believe I'm a Chump
8 years ago

I don’t think my ex was “heartbroken” when he showed up unannounced to find Elton John’s face, circa Glam Rock, pinned over his mug in our wedding portrait. It likely just pissed off an already pissy person with no humor.

Should have called first, loser. Besides, Elton was way more excited to be married to me and has a great divorce soundtrack (“I Don’t Wanna Go On with You Like That” or “I’m Still Standing”, anyone?)

Carry On My Wayward Nerd Girl
Carry On My Wayward Nerd Girl
8 years ago

I saw that original article, and loved it. My KIDS loved it. They thought it was hilarious. Jensen Ackles and Misha Collins are about to become my new husbands, and if I can ever figure out Photobucket and jpeging, you will all be able to see my hot new hubbies 🙂

Renee62
Renee62
8 years ago

Hey fellow Supernatural fan they’re already taken… by me! ?

Carry On My Wayward Nerd Girl
Carry On My Wayward Nerd Girl
8 years ago
Reply to  Renee62

I’ll fight you for them!!! LOL

Anita
Anita
8 years ago

As usual, the problem isn’t them being cheating turds, the problem is your reaction to them being cheating turds. Fuck that.

DC
DC
8 years ago
Reply to  Anita

Exactly! Thank you. Your ebullient self-care is making me, an outside observer who has never been in your situation, feel sadfeels. Please don’t do it. It hurts my feelings.

Arnold
Arnold
8 years ago

Didn’t Hausfrau bang some dreamboat dude behind her ex’s back when they were dating? I seem to recall one of the readers here having gleaned that from her writings way back. I think she bragged about it in one of her stories.

Arnold
Arnold
8 years ago
Reply to  Tracy Schorn

It was unclear to me, based on the “stepping out ” comment, that her relationship with her futre husband was done when she had the other relationship. Kind of a weird use of ” stepping out”, eh?

Maggie May
Maggie May
8 years ago
Reply to  Tracy Schorn

I’m thinking Arnold is The Happy Hausfrau’s ex or his cheating partner/wife. Pretty sure he also shared his/her opinion on Jenny’s blog.

Arnold
Arnold
8 years ago
Reply to  Tracy Schorn

Will take your word for it, CL.

Maggie May
Maggie May
8 years ago

Love Happy Hausfrau and because I know Jenny’s story I have no problem with the face replacements. The children will always be able to see photo’s of the dad who deserted them on Facebook…….with his new mistress/wife and his new children. You see Sniffy Lady, the whore always wants to advertise her “win” by posting the new happy family. Oh wait, silly me, you wouldn’t know about that because your husband didn’t desert you and your children for a work place fuck buddy………Keep it up Jenny, you are loved.

Rumblekitty
Rumblekitty
8 years ago

I haven’t read all the comments but have to say this . . . I’m old school. My house, my rules. We get so caught up in “FOR THE CHILDREN!” bullshit and I’m not having it.

If this were me, I’d let my kid keep photos of dad in their room if that’s what they wanted to do. But proudly display his face in my hallway or family room?!? Fuck to the no. Not for my kid, not for the children, no fucking way. If that makes me a bitch, OK.

It’s bad enough to be chumped and have to content with the hell that brings, but I’d be damned if anybody was going to tell me what I can and can’t do with pictures. If the cheater was so concerned about the enduring “family identity”, he shouldn’t have fucked whores, yanked all the money, and disappeared.

Lyn
Lyn
8 years ago

When I was a kid one of my great aunts cut her ex’s head out of all her family photos. I remember thinking she was a bit nuts to do that. Another aunt cut the crotches out of her husband’s pants, but for some reason I thought that was just funny!

Our divorce happened after the kids were grown, around the time they got married. My oldest was extremely angry with his dad, but the youngest was very protective of him. My dad made what was to me a funny comment about my ex in front of my youngest son, but it didn’t go over well. My youngest got very upset, so I asked my dad not to say things like that in front of him.

One thing I had to deal with at the time is “dad never says anything bad about you” from my youngest. I believe he bought my ex’s explanation that “we were just different people, and we grew apart.” Over time, however, my son has started noticing things about his dad, and is starting to see him from a different perspective. He still loves him, though, and says if it weren’t for him, his dad would have no one.

Kids are working through their own feelings about the demise of their family, and often love both parents. I wouldn’t do anything to our family photos (30+ years of them) because there are a lot of good memories. It is true I look back at some family photos and think “he was in love with OW in this picture,” but I choose to just put it away where I won’t see it rather than deface it.

However, if you’re Photoshopping just to help yourself and have a laugh, I think that’s healing. Just don’t expect your kids or other family members to understand. I watched my sister go through a horrific divorce from a cheater but didn’t understand some of her crazy behaviors until it happened to me.

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  Lyn

I agree family photos depict may depict a lot of good memories. However, I now look at them and think “Was he banging someone recruited from Ashley Madison just before that vacation, or afterwards?” or “Did he buy a beach souvenir for slut-face while the rest of us were getting icees?” I now also know X wasn’t just a partial-fucktard but a full-blown, multi-degreed fucktard and I can hardly bear to see his visage in pictures. Tainted, every last photo.

Chumpedupchik
Chumpedupchik
8 years ago
Reply to  Tempest

I’m with you Tempest. The serial asshat’s cheating has left the same black mark on every photo I have and I can’t think about anything except the timing and who he was chasing around at the time that wasn’t me. It taints everything. Every photograph, every memory. I hate him for that and also for acting like wtf is MY problem that I’d be bothered by photographs of our vacations or holidays or other random events.

Example: pictures of little man’s school play that cheaterass couldn’t attend bc he “had to work late” again? Yeah, he had to “work” alright….stupid fuckwit. He seemingly has zero understanding of how or why those photos are painful and triggering to me. Even when I explained it he seemed confused as to how it could bother me bc OW isn’t physically IN the pictures right? Dumb fucking asshole.

BetrayedNoMore
BetrayedNoMore
8 years ago

Sure, altering the family photos might seem a tad passive-aggressive. On the other hand, it’s much more constructive than driving over to the other fucktard’s house and beating his head in with a baseball bat.

DC
DC
8 years ago
Reply to  BetrayedNoMore

Plus, it’s not being done AT the ex, so the “aggressive” part is all a fiction. Anyway, I read somewhere that when you’ve been abused it’s actually extraordinarily productive to be a passive-aggressive jerk about it. It keeps you from sinking into victimhood in your own mind. (Not that I have any truck with victim-blaming, but it is such a shitty way to feel that avoiding it cheaply is well worth a few sidelong swipes at the abusing asshole’s supremacy.)

Tessie
Tessie
8 years ago

I didn’t have a computer when cheater ex did his thing. Instead, a few days after my youngest son’s funeral, my eldest son and I sat down on the back steps with scissors, the family album, and the intent to purge evil from our little family.

We cut cheater ex out of every picture he was in. It made a nice, tidy little pile on the cement. Then I handed my son a bottle of lighter fluid and a book of matches, and told him to have at it. He not only burned the pictures to ashes, he squirted more lighter fluid on those ashes and burned them again.

Later on, when I could afford a computer, I had a great photo shop program that helped me reconstruct those photos sans cheater ex. It was liberating.

The other form of erasure we employed was legally changing our last name to something completely different. If I could have posthumously changed my youngest son’s name along with ours, I would have done it in a heartbeat. It felt good to not only erase cheater ex from our family, but his whole evil narcissistic family. Goodbye, and good riddance.

ChumpB
ChumpB
8 years ago
Reply to  Tessie

Best to you Tessie. What a cathartic experience you described. I applaud what you did.

Syringa
Syringa
8 years ago

I burned and/or destroyed every single picture of me and the XH. It was a fake life and a fake marriage with a fake man.

Rumblekitty
Rumblekitty
8 years ago
Reply to  Syringa

I actually had a bonfire and torched everything. Wedding bouquet, old love letters, pictures. Everything he ever bought me was thrown away or given to the Salvation Army. Oh wow was that fun . . .

Luziana
Luziana
8 years ago

I have been giggling nonstop since this posted. While meh prevents me from downloading photoshop, you can have my best efforts in Paint. May I present a Man and his Lady?

 photo A Man and His Lady_zps3nsoihqf.jpg

conniered
conniered
8 years ago

Photoshopping celebrity heads on pics requires some sort of effort that I don’t the energy for or interest in. I simply removed all the pictures from my home that had been on display. When I finally sold the house, I had friends box up all of the photo albums and pictures so I didn’t have to deal with them. I wasn’t quite able to manage living my marital home and boxing up pictures all in the same day. And after that weekend, I got the news that he had moved in with the OW. You know, because he couldn’t pay his bills. That’s what he told our 8 yo son. Not for twu luv or anything like that. Needless to say, when we get our permanent home, I”ll be putting up pictures of our new memories sans cheater.

PianoMom
PianoMom
6 years ago
Reply to  conniered

Conniered…more proof that there’s nothing original about cheaters….mine said exactly the same thing to my son when moving in with the ‘slut puppet.’ “Uh…well, it’s cheaper for us to live together.” Asshole.

nosilac
nosilac
8 years ago

Ha – I ripped his face out of any photos that had my parents in them. My parents died 12 and 11 years ago and would have killed him for what he’s done! Thank god they’re not around to see how he’s treated his own children… I left photos of my kids and him intact – the ones that are in baby albums etc. But the physical photos lying in boxes in the attic that featured him and my parents – had him removed. I ripped him out of them, and put all the bits with his face on, in an antique microscope box that belongs to him. He then removed that from my house and no doubt has never opened it since – it’s probably taking pride of place on his fireplace! Would love to be a fly on the wall the first time his schmoopie’s 5 year old asks what’s in that box and turns the key and opens it… cue avalanche of confetti with his face on!!! So cathartic. Divorce papers came through today – feeling pretty rough, but got to try to see it as a beginning of something good…

LadyStrange
LadyStrange
8 years ago
Reply to  nosilac

Congrats nosilac – yep the beginning of your new great life 🙂

nomar
nomar
8 years ago

She’s never been through divorce, much less infidelity, but she’s going to wag her finger at those of us who have? Great. Maybe when she’s done here she can go hector cancer patients about how they’re doing chemo wrong. “If my mother had let my friends see the unfashionable pink and purple crocheted beanie she wore to cover her bald scalp, ***I would have been heartbroken!***”

DC
DC
8 years ago
Reply to  nomar

“If I had ever learnt, I should have been a true proficient!” –Lady Catherine De Bourgh re: Lizzie’s inferior piano-playing

I think the real issue isn’t that she’s speaking out of ignorance, it’s that she’s violating the SIlk Ring Theory of kvetching: Comfort in, dump out. You want to gripe and show concern about somebody who’s in pain? Gripe and show your concern to somebody farther away from the painful situation than you are. Sniffy Lady is griping *in,* directly at the people in pain. It’s in exquisitely poor taste, made worse by the fact that she tries to cover for it with “That’s just your opinion, Miss Thang.” Lessons in manners are often counterintuitive to those who like to criticize others’.

Calla2015
Calla2015
8 years ago
Reply to  DC

great quote. And I totally agree.

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  DC

Well played, DC!! Love the Silk Ring Theory.

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago

First, “Sniffy Lady” as her moniker tells us everything we need to know.

Second, she is posting comments on a divorce blog when she is not divorced? She needs a hobby. May I suggest paint-by-number? or braiding fabric strips to roll into a circle for a rug, circa ‘Little House on the Prairie.”

Kim
Kim
8 years ago

I have our wedding photos packed away for my daughter to have one day. I also let my daughter keep a framed photo of her and her dad (taken by me from back in the day) that she sleeps with. I gave her a picture of her and me to keep at her dad’s house, but he threw it out. I know how much the picture of her and her dad comforts her so I stomach it for her sake. She loves him, and as much as I hate him I just can’t hurt her like that. What I don’t have around are any photos of the three of us from before. They exist, but buried deep away in a closet somewhere. I don’t even know where.

zyx321
zyx321
8 years ago
Reply to  Kim

As I was boxing up all the pics of just ex and I, daughter asked to go through them. She picked out 3-4 and has them in her room… evidence that we were “happy” together at some point.

GladIt'sOver
GladIt'sOver
8 years ago

As I was packing for move to my new place with Nice Guy, I came across the beautiful photo album from my wedding to ex. I had held onto it thinking one day our son would like to have it. But as I looked at it, I thought, no, son is never going to be interested, and even if he was, these photos are nothing but a record of a lie. I went through the album, tore out all the pictures of my immediate family and heaved the rest of the book into the dumpster.

It felt good.

GladIt'sOver
GladIt'sOver
8 years ago
Reply to  Tracy Schorn

Thanks, CL! Today is actually the two-year anniversary of my first date with Nice Guy. It’s so wonderful being with a normal, stable, decent man after all those years of insanity.

5jumpchump
5jumpchump
8 years ago
Reply to  GladIt'sOver

I’m glad for you! I’m 2.5 years on with my new gal (chump), and until folks go through the entire disordered experience, culminating with their cheating, they have no idea how fantastic “normal” is. I was married for 23 years, and looking back, I CAN NOT believe all of the shit and mistreatment I put up with.

It is so unreal to actually have someone who reciprocates, is appreciative, no drama, no yelling, supportive, humble and modest, truly kind, empathetic,accepting and loves me for me. Not one fight or argument, no fucking passive-aggressive B.S. mindfucks, no “mommies mad, we better walk on eggshells”, no hurtful put downs, or completely violent, rage infused melt-downs… It really helps you to see what these cheating POS said about us, was nothing but more lies, mindfucks, and manipulation, and absolutely solidifies that they should all rot in hell for what they will gladly put anyone through, even their own children.

Below is just an atoms worth of how un-normal I had it… I was finally, formally diagnosed with depression after D-day; here is what ex-POS thought about that.

1- If you cared about your family, you would have found a way to snap out of what troubled you. I don’t think depression is real and neither does my mom.

2- Your ‘depression’ is a cop out, just more woe is me. You have nothing to be depressed about, only people who go through REAL trauma get depressed.

I’m not making this up… She is the poster child for cluster B’s.

Yep, “normal” as it relates to a relationship is pure fucking magic, and I will never settle for less.

Arnold
Arnold
8 years ago
Reply to  5jumpchump

Congrats, 5jump. Me, too. Been with my GF for almost 4 years, now. The difference is amazing. So great to be away from NPD. At first, I was waiti g for the other shoe to drop. Never happened.

GladIt'sOver
GladIt'sOver
8 years ago
Reply to  Arnold

Arnold, I know exactly what you mean. It took me at least a year before I wasn’t always expecting Nice Guy to turn into a disordered freak. Like you said, I was always waiting for the other shoe to drop. I worried I would never get past that or be able to trust again, but very slowly, I did. God, it’s good to be away from NPD drama. Just the thought of all that makes me tired now.

NewMeme
NewMeme
8 years ago
Reply to  GladIt'sOver

CL, it would make for an interesting post to find out how long it it has taken members of CN to, as Arnold and Glad said, “stop waiting for the other shoe to drop”. I love reading about chumps who have moved on to normal, stable and decent!

I don’t trust anyone at this point, except my sister, can’t even imagine going out on a date. I parse everything now, suspicious that every person I am dealing with will be a disordered freak, which is probably not the best approach.

I’m guessing that this behaviour fades with time and distance, and that the duration has something to do with the length of time spent with the disordered.

5jumpchump
5jumpchump
8 years ago
Reply to  Arnold

Thanks, glad for you too.

Amazing how programmed we were, and that we even feel as if there must be another shoe at first? Best of luck to you, and to the rest of my fellow chumps!

NewMeme
NewMeme
8 years ago
Reply to  GladIt'sOver

Glad, this post made me so happy when I read it today. I’ve been following your story for a while now and you deserve to have all the normal, stable, and decent you can get in your life. My regards to NiceGuy and happiness to both of you from the Wet Coast!

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  NewMeme

I agree–“GladItsOver” can now become “Gladformynewlife”!!

NewMeme
NewMeme
8 years ago

When I was going through the house getting it ready for sale I finally tackled the photos. Most of which I had taken; there were only a handful of images with both of us in them, and he never took pictures of me and the kids. Most of the pictures his family had taken didn’t have me in them either. Broke my heart a little bit more going through those albums and boxes, as it really did reinforce that I was only an appliance in that marriage, But it needed to be done.

I took a big box, opened a bottle of good wine, and just started dumping. I went through every album and photobox and removed every photo. Any picture with him in it went into the box willy nilly, undated, uncaptioned, and when I was done the box then piled onto the mound of stuff he had to take after the divorce. It will be up to him to keep them for the kids if he wants to. Not my job any more to document his acquaintance with us. I have plenty of pictures of me and my lovely boys growing up and all the good memories, and I don’t need any photos with him in them.

Likewise with all the pictures from/of his family. Every one in the box. Again, his job to sort those lovingly for the kids if he wants to. Aside from a note when my mum died, six months after he left, I was completely cut out of their lives after over thirty years of marriage. So they have been completely cut out of mine.

He’s a lazy sob and I doubt will ever look at those pictures again. But not my circus, not my monkeys anymore, as I’ve given up on being curator of his life for good.

LadyStrange
LadyStrange
8 years ago
Reply to  NewMeme

My stbx never took pictures of me or the kids either. Jackass didn’t make it to his daughter’s senior prom, but wanted me to send him the pictures from my phone. Why? Probably to make it look like he wasn’t the asshole father he is and have others think he was actually there. I never sent them.
And yes – if you were to look at his phone (not like I could get within 2 feet from it), there were no pictures of me in there – but there were plenty of pictures of his friends, beer cans (for real….) and his morel mushrooms. See where I stood in his order of life?

Free Vixen
Free Vixen
8 years ago

What Sniffy Lady fails to understand is that in many cases cheaters remove themselves from their family. Pasting celebrity faces on top of old photos is just covering up an empty void that the cheater intentionally created. My ex cut himself out of his old life; he left me, our son, my family, and his friends, and even his relationship with his family is hanging by a thread. This was all for the sake of inserting himself into a new life, not because his old life was unsatisfactory, but because he found *himself* to be unsatisfactory. He thinks that new surrounding and new people will somehow change him into the person he wants to be. So Sniffy Lady, if my ex chooses to leave, you’d better believe I’ll cover that space with something (and someone) better. And frankly, our family photos were lies. They represent a reality that did not exist. I will not allow those photos to create a false sense of history for my child. My ex was comfortable distorting other peoples’ realities, but I am not.

Eilonwy
Eilonwy
8 years ago

When I asked for a separation (for a number of reasons, but the fact that he was bragging about having found his “true soul mate” was among them), he tore up every picture he could lay his hands on that had me or my family members in it. And he scattered the pieces around the house–including in the beds of our young children. (He also shattered the glass and frames and left them where they.)

I recall frantically trying to collect the shreds before the kids found them (not to mention collecting the shards of broken glass.) I was still trying to protect them from their father’s wrath and irrationality at that point.

On the bright side, it saved me having to make any decisions about what to do with family photos after he moved out a few months later!

(Weirdly, he later demanded half the wedding photos from our wedding album. Did he have a yen to do more shredding? Did he think it would hurt my feelings to have to “divide” the album? Personally, I suspect he just wanted some professional shots of himself in a tuxedo so he could admire himself from more angles.)

verity297
verity297
8 years ago
Reply to  Eilonwy

My ex smashed up some of my family photos and put them in the bin the night before he left, Some were irreplaceable. I remember sweeping up broken glass at 2am so the dog didn’t cut her paws.

moving forward
moving forward
8 years ago

Agree – to a point.

Yes, absolutely, bitch away in front of your friends and photoshop to your heart’s content in private. (Honestly, I wouldn’t make the effort, but the photos here made me laugh.)

BUT in front of your kids, it really sends a terrible message especially if you aren’t bothering to record new and happy photos. My parents divorced when I was in college, so I got to watch them both unravel and become totally self absorbed for years. I would not have seen the humor in either of them defacing my happy memories. It is tricky business when it comes to images/memories.

Personally, I’d spend the time taking new and goofy family photos — or photoshopping pics of me and my “new boyfriend” who looks remarkably like Geroge Cluny, lol.

moving forward
moving forward
8 years ago
Reply to  moving forward

sigh…spell check…George Cluny

Shechump
Shechump
8 years ago
Reply to  moving forward

Clooney?

ChumpFromF
ChumpFromF
8 years ago
Reply to  moving forward

No, that’s an abbey. L’abbaye de Cluny. Lol.

verity297
verity297
8 years ago

I left a photo up that I loved of me with ex some 6 months earlier in Greece. It was my daughter who asked me to take it down because it upset her so much. She was 25 then.

Luziana
Luziana
8 years ago

Just a minor point for Sniffy McSquiffy- Scanning an image and photoshopping it does not mar or deface the original. So the betrayed spouse for onee can have cake and eat it too.

The only photos that bother me are the Disney vacation ones where he’d already secretly impregnated the ho worker. But plenty of those just have my cutie mcstuffins in them. Over time, we’ve just sorted the value of the fun we had from the fact that MeatSlab kept ducking away to text the hooer.

It just means we had already learned to have fun without him. Been doing it since before D-Day.

DC
DC
8 years ago
Reply to  Luziana

Find a Disney-themed image to Photoshop? Say, one of the dogs’ butts from 101 Dalmatians?

kbchump
kbchump
8 years ago

I find it interesting that all of us chumps seem to have been “stuck” with all the family photos and albums. When my ex left it was like she couldn’t wait to get out of here fast enough into the safe arms of her AP (our daughters boyfriend’s father)…she took a couple of pictures that were hanging in the hallway of the kids and that’s it. 24 years of photos, photo albums, 18 years of 8mm videotapes of the kids sports, vacations, school functions…not a word about any of it. I’m going to box it all up and let the kids decide as they are older now anyways..if it wasn’t for the kids in them I would’ve burned them like her cards and emails all got tossed and deleted.

zyx321
zyx321
8 years ago
Reply to  kbchump

yup, I had all the albums. Finally gave them to ex so he could scan the kid pics that he wanted (I took out all the photos of just him and the kids and gave them to him, and I took out all the couple pics to save for the kids for later). He had them weeks, then had to move and said he did some but not all. According to his statements, he was unemployed at that time. What was he doing with all that free time when the kids were in school?

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  zyx321

You ask, “What was he doing with all that free time when the kids were in school?”

a. trolling Craigslist
b. downloading animal porn
c. self-satisfying
d. a and c
e. all of the above

Shechump
Shechump
8 years ago
Reply to  zyx321

KB – I’m not sure why, but I thought it was mainly the male cheaters who left behind all the precious photos. I guess this is not gender specific at all. Mine left behind every Championship photo of our star-dog, including a beautiful head-to-toe ribbon for coming in 17 in the country. He was so damn proud of that dog. Never looked back at a photo or the dogs again. Who does that? I can’t imagine how much it must hurt when they leave behind all the kids/family photos. (we never had kids)

TimeHeals
TimeHeals
8 years ago
Reply to  kbchump

Photos, pets, often kids, bills, and other things that sound like responsibility.

ANC
ANC
8 years ago

The digital drop box or archived photos….I went through most and deleted any of us together. I kept his gf trophy shots, though. On a USB. If I were to photoshop, most likely it would be of an asshat. Literally.

whatthefuckever
whatthefuckever
8 years ago

Well, obviously I can only speak from my own experience! But I know for certain that my kids would be horrified and traumatised if I Happy Hausfrau’d one of our family pics.

They can’t even call Tom by his real name. . . they just say, ‘oh man, it’s that irritating little alien-botherer again.’ But if I pasted in Bear Grylls as their dad, they’d give me a high-five and tell me I rock. 🙂

Chris W.
Chris W.
8 years ago

Not sure if this was addressed in the comments yet or not, but it never ceases to amaze me that people can spend hundreds of hours a week wasting time on Internet sites that have nothing to do with their lives and circumstances. Didn’t Sniffy-Lady say she WASN’T divorced, but was visiting a recovery site for divorced folks??? WHY is she visiting that site and commenting? !?!???

For instance, I am not into
spelunking and while I’m sure there’s hundreds, if not thousands of sites out there, I’m not spending time on them, or posting comments to the people who are obviously there for a reason. PLEASE answer HOW these people have that kind of time and where can I get me some of that?!?!?!????

DeeL
DeeL
8 years ago

Maybe a disclaimer that “no original pictures where harmed in the making of this photo shopped remake” would have saved that woman some “trauma” over all those divorced meanies that deface their ex asswipes pics.

GladIt'sOver
GladIt'sOver
8 years ago

For my birthday one year in the early days of our marriage — this would be the early 1990s — ex went to Glamour Shots and did a photo session, then gave me an 8×10 headshot of himself all dolled up, practically slathered in makeup and hair neatly coiffed. He was wearing a floral silk shirt, (okay, it WAS early 90s) and looked so flamingly gay I’m surprised the film didn’t catch fire. Just what every woman wants for her birthday, right? And yes, he signed it for me as well and framed it.

I actually found the picture buried in a box of photos a couple years after I moved out of our marital home. I threw it away, but now I’m really sorry I didn’t keep it. It was hysterically funny… you could tell how self-absorbed he was and how incredibly sexy he considered himself. Those of you old enough to remember Glamour Shots know what those pictures were like… well, my ex took it to new heights. LOL.

GladIt'sOver
GladIt'sOver
8 years ago
Reply to  GladIt'sOver

Nor did I keep any of those “penis as still life” pictures he so liked taking back in the days of film cameras. His penis posed on top of an apple, his dick surrounded by feathers, his dick propped between his heel and his thigh….

Tempest
Tempest
8 years ago
Reply to  GladIt'sOver

GladIO–that is some image! Now i’m picturing a 90s glam shot with silk shirt. Is this close? (then imagine zipper undone, dick encased in feathers): http://www.aliexpress.com/item-img/Men-Shirts-2015-Plus-Size-4XL-Emulation-Silk-Luxury-Shirt-Men-Camisa-Masculina-Long-Sleeve-Social/32410144287.html

My sides hurt from the humor of the last 7 days of CL columns & comments.

Carmella1722
Carmella1722
8 years ago
Reply to  GladIt'sOver

WTF!?!?! I’m cracking up laughing and feeling repulsed at the same time. You know that somewhere out there someone tells the story “Yeah, when I used to work at FotoLab back in the day….blah blah…..apples…blah blah blah…feathers….”

nuclear tuna
nuclear tuna
8 years ago

I was cleaning out my hard drive and found a pic I took of him on a family outing. I spent the entire day having a blast, but come to find out in therapy later that he despised me and my behavior that day. The photo that stops me dead in my tracks is one I snuck of him when he thought I was fiddling with my camera. The look on his face as he looks at me is deadly. As much fun as it would be to photoshop Fat Bastard onto his body, the real image is an important reminder to me to not get swept off my feet ever again. I value it for that reason alone.

divorceat25
divorceat25
8 years ago

My friend out of nowhere sent me a link to the article in distractify. It’s funny how life works that she did it the same day you posted about it here in CL. Personally, I don’t see a need to do this with any of our photos. I’ll create plenty of new memories alone, with family, friends or new loves, that I don’t want to stare at this face for longer than necessary to Photoshop the images. But it might be something I do with friends if I get drunk enough. I also don’t have any kids so no obligation to preserve a “good memory” of someone who cheated and then walked out.

Anyways, here is the link to the original article: https://www.distractify.com/mustafagatollari-ex-celeb-shop-fb-1396449775.html?utm_content=inf_10_385_2&ts_pid=2

Marci
Marci
8 years ago

What I did notice from a final sift of photos was:

1. The red eyes on his evil face (I swear they were not in the photos prior to d-day!)
2. The absolutely hateful stare he put on in photos I innocently took earlier in the day..on d-day. And I thought poor sausage was ill, no, it was because OW had threatened to out him, and I guess he was really trying hard to decide which flavour of cake was best.
3. The only photo I ever found of me among his remaining possessions was one taken of me asleep with my mouth hanging open.:). Nothing like having an adoring partner!
4. When I realised this, I made sure any photos that would be precious to him were not forwarded. We had no kids, so meh!

Marci
Marci
8 years ago

My first cheater ex, with whom I had kids, took the old VHS and even super8 movies we had of the kids early years and had them redone as mpgs.. He ever so kindly sent me a copy of same on a memory stick. When I got around to watching the movies, it dawned on me that I was not in the movies AT ALL. Partly because I filmed most of them, but also because he had edited them to make himself look look he was the only parent ever playing with the kids. I know there were films of me…and I was so angry he destroyed the footage of me with my sons. Agh. Beware of a spouse who never takes photos of you!