The Universal Bullshit Translator gets a lot of “It’s not what I did, it’s how you reacted” pitchforked into it. Blameshifting lays around in piles. Why can’t you chumps be NICER? The cheaters miss their kibbles!
In today’s UBT submission, Lori writes:
He was on his way out last year and did a complete 180, I figure the “supply” dumped him but here’s his response…….
“It was because you became nice. I wish you were still like that. We wouldn’t be in this situation. But then it became worse and you became pissed at me. About everything under the sun again! I wish you could be that Lori. I would still be there. I don’t know why you have to, then and now, be such an angry person. I was waiting for that Lori to come back. She never did. I’m sorry. No matter what you say or think. I’m sorry.”
Roughly translated: “Lori, I’m sorry you’re such an asshole.”
It was because you became nice.
“Became” — implying you weren’t nice before. You transmogrified into a kinder, gentler you and stopped being a raging Gorgon. Thank you.
I wish you were still like that.
Yes, it had to end because you could not sustain nice. Why oh why did you ever cease kibble production? It’s a mystery to him.
We wouldn’t be in this situation.
What “situation” is that? His cheating and lying? He can’t spell that out, because to do so might confer responsibility upon him, so we’ll just use the euphemism that the current unpleasantness is a “situation.” He’s like that douche from Jersey Shore. Mike “The Situation” Cheaterpants.
But then it became worse and you became pissed at me.
Oh Lori, you just can’t stay nice, can you? Being a terrible person is just congenital, un-niceness just laying below the surface, ready to rear its ugly head. Without provocation!
About everything under the sun again!
Everything! Nothing pleases you! He can’t do ANYTHING right! It’s just you and your unreasonable meanness. You’re a grinch! You hate Christmas! And kittens! And cupcakes! You’re pissed at everything under the sun! He’s under the sun, ergo you’re pissed at him. It’s not like he DID something. There’s no reason to this pissed-offedness. It’s Just Who You Are.
I wish you could be that Lori.
I mean the “nice Lori.” The person who fed me kibbles and believed my lies and didn’t stand in the way of my cheating. I miss her. Chumps are so nice. Why can’t you be my chump again?
I would still be there.
It’s all your fault it ended.
I don’t know why you have to, then and now, be such an angry person.
The Problem Is Not What I Did, It’s Your Reaction To It.
I was waiting for that Lori to come back. She never did.
I am a sad sausage. I sit by my window and pine for Nice Lori. Sometimes I think I hear her coming, and I paw at the door and wet myself from the excitement… but it was just the mailman. There’s nothing in my mailbox but cobwebs and loneliness. And bills I wish you would pay. And Pottery Barn catalogs addressed to you. Your name taunts me. I remember the Nice Lori and I cry.
Maybe she’ll come back? I’m steadfast and true — unlike Lori. I wait and I wait and I wait. My pants are soiled. But she Never Returns. (sob)
She abandoned me, all because she couldn’t be Nice.
I’m sorry. No matter what you say or think. I’m sorry.
I’ve done nothing whatsoever to apologize for. I can’t say what exactly I did that I’m sorry about.
I’m sorry you’re an asshole.
This column ran previously. Cheater’s still probably waiting on that “nice.”
Yep, “You’re just an angry person,” said when I found out about his first affair. Because angry couldn’t possibly be an appropriate reaction to finding out you’ve been lied to and cheated on. Well, so be it. If anger “defines” me, then asshole/coward/liar defines you. Enough said. I now have had more joy and happiness in my life than I ever thought possible, all because I divorced him. Viva la freedom.
FindingBliss,
You left him after the first affair?
You are the best example for new Chumps.
You deserve joy and happiness!
I respect your strength of character very much!
I wish. No, sadly, I listened to the RIC and “reconciled” until round two. Then I divorced him in record time. Two years post-divorce. Hang in there, newbies. It gets better.
Kudos to you FindingBliss, wish I had divorced after my first d day.
I’m in divorce proceedings after DD2. Unfortunately I’m finding out about DD1.1, 1.2, 1.3, etc.
I know there’s a better life down the road, but damn it’s rough getting there.
It definitely gets better. I’m 1.5 years out of the marital home. I have a relative visiting me this weekend who remarked on how quiet my house is. Part of that is from moving to a more rural area, but I also think that it’s from being in a drama-free zone.
FindingBliss, you’re my CN hero! My first Dday was 4-1-91. There were 2 affairs then. I went to attorney, but RIC got to me. Ffwd 26 years and here we are again. Dday 6-8-17. 25 years of loyalty in between? Doubtful. 22? STBX says this last affair was “about 3 years”…what is that in cheater time? 22? Can’t trust a minute of all 30 years, now. Cheater is now full of humility & RIC verbiage. He’s “100% to blame” (duh) and is “accountable” and will “contract to never do that to [me] again.” Because contracts – and promises and vows – are so important to him
…now. Not like the one 26 years ago, when he promised similar fidelity. Sorry. ChumpTrain stops here. Hello, attorney! Thanks for all the wisdom & experience. Can is saving my life and sanity!
“If anger “defines” me, then asshole/coward/liar defines you.”
Gonna remember this one. Perfect retort if I were ever to get into it with KK.
And it’s not really fair to be angry at a coward. They can’t help it. It’s who they are.
I think our anger shows that our expectations were too high, thus dashed, and we are shocked and feeling vulnerable. Anger means that we think they can and should do better. Buuuuuuuuuuut…we all know that doesn’t happen. They’re doing the best they can, which is not good enough for us.
So I think it may help to shore up our boundaries and lower our expectations of cowards.
A comment that a co-worker repeatedly stated “whose expectations did he disappoint, yours or his”? And that summed it up. He wasn’t disappointed in his actions. And the lies, well, those were situational ethics. My expectations were too high. When his mask fell off, the person he really is is deep down just ugly. He is a waste of air that a decent human being could be using.
I’ve had to learn this, too, that I have to lower my expectations when it comes to my bastard ex. I can’t expect him to feel bad over what he did, to put our daughter first, to show remorse, to pay child support, to pay the rest of the money he owes me, to take care of his bills, to not lie, to do the right thing. He’s not capable of it.
I was told, ‘You’ve just become so NEGATIVE the last few months’
Sigh. Yes. When you’ve been denying me any affection past a perfunctorily hug or kiss on the cheek but asking for occasional BJs because somehow I’ve become the one you can’t be disloyal to the Sluterus for, and I don’t know why or that she exists, yeah, my antenna are up and I’m hurt and pissed.
When you spend every fucking evening stabbing at your phone with your pudgy thumbs whilst I exhaust myself with home repairs and 90% of chores, 85% of the budget and 100% of caring for the children, I’m resentful.
When I ask you what is wrong and flat out if there is someone else, and you lie to my gotdamn face, I’m devastated.
One of the few mighty things I said to Cold Slab O’Meat was this:
‘Was I always negative? When did I become NEGATIVE? Right about the time you became a Compulsive Liar I guess! Instead of always comparing me to your exes and calling us NEGATIVE, maybe you should ask yourself why you take so many perfectly happy women and eventually make them miserable!”
Right there with you. It used to be hard for me to stay mad at all. I never expressed my anger. Dd1 my husband was actually nervous by how angry I was, like I might burn the house down. Can’t a girl just be angry? Why is it so surprising how mad a spouse gets when they discover cheating? After several months of separation we did RIC but Dd2 was 5 years later. This time it was a different kind of angry. I don’t want to see his lying face at all. He is being nice, like nothing is wrong. Not sure if it makes me madder when he is nice or when he isn’t. I am tapping into new levels of anger now after kicking him out 2 months ago. And no, I am not going crazy because I am mad.
I already clipped that one to my bitch board. It’s awesome.
Dear CL,
Thanks for this post (and so many others). For reasons apparent below, the “unpleasant situation” term resonated. In the Gulf War, I was an Army lawyer. An elderly woman returned to my office to get her will changed, again. She did this every time someone in her family crossed her.
There were 43 soldiers standing in the hallway outside my office, needing their wills & various legal matters resolved before they could deploy. I explained to the woman that without an appointment, I’d have to see her later that week.
I mentioned the need to address deploying soldiers first, given that they were leaving for combat stations & might not come back.
She acted as if she’d never heard of a war in Afghanistan or Iraq.
She said “Combat? You mean the ‘unpleasantness’ (swats air with hand), ‘the situation over…there’?” I never forgot it.
And my stbx husband once described his abandonment from me and our 3 children as “sub optimal”….I never forgot that either.
BRAVOOOO. My fucking cheater is fucking any willing pussy. Just found out he has never been able to keep his dick in his pants. Am not gonna confront or divorce him. Am staying to suck his bank account, pay my debts buy a property, save enough money and take my daughter and settle somewhere else. That fucking asshole is not getting away with it!
Haha i loved the way he qualified my emotional response with a reason of why he shouldnt have told me: ” i fell out of love with you 20 years ago” …me : WTF ?? Him: “see? This is why i didnt tell you i knew you’d react like that ”
No words….
Some narcissists are good at keeping the abuse veiled by sounding somewhat reasonable on the surface. This one, not so much.
Oh yes he wants the “nice”me back.
I was the nice me when he met me, when we said vows, after the vows, children.
Hell, I even remained the nice me at DDay time. I was even nicer, doing the
pick me dance, even had concern for Miss Perfect Lollipop the OW, ( who I never ever knew anything about, not even her name).
I could not have been nicer.
He stayed, no more DDays ( that I knew of truly), but these cheaters, their personalities
suck. People who cheat are missing good character traits to do that initial outside the relationship fucking.
Narcissist, sociopath and other character traits. That’s what cheaters are, NOT nice at all.
They wear on you and then, to them, a Chump is not so nice anymore. They drain the nice right out of you.
They don’t offer emotional support to you when things are rough, ( what happened to that part of the vows), they might
drop you off for big surgeries, but be there for you, hell no. I read it in other’s posts too. They are NOT there.
Guess I am trying to say, a Chump’s niceness toward a cheater is overused, gets depleted until it no longer exists.
I don’t really like the word nice, it is so vague, but, I guess that is what I am to my kids, grandchildren, and real true
friends People who treat me with love and respect. I love and respect each one of them back, so I guess to
them I am NICE. To him, not so much anymore!
Peacekeeper, reading your pst today, all I could think was not only are they not nice, they are downright mean. I need to get over wanting to constantly expose Him. He really does do it himself but I just can’t seem to let it go.
Feelingit,
I want to tell you that you are a younger me.
You are one of the reasons I want to post.
I hate what your cheater is doing to you, so many things the same as my cheater, I see in him.
My heart goes out to you and each one of your children.
There are so many Chumps whose writings bring tears to my eyes, making it difficult to type.
Patience, Pregnant Chump, Fedup Chump, MJB, Martha, Mother Chumper 99, so many others, I get so angry at their cheaters treating them so horribly.
With the recent tragic loss of my daughter’s young husband I am trying so desperately to help and his response is buckle up, words only, no real hands on help, no emotional help. Because there are financial and other complications, this has really thrown me for a loop……I won’t give up…….
This site gives me hope for you and for all other Chumps.
You are leaving him, getting out. I know your struggle is a giant mountain now and there will always be bumps along life’s way because of having children together. But, Feelingit, I am so proud of you for standing up and having the courage to get out of the relationship.
Sometimes I wish that years ago I had not kept it all inside, even sometimes think that a second DDay would have sent me in the right direction.
At the time I did the best that I could.
I see myself as a good example to other Chumps that it is usually best to exit the relationship.
For that reason, because I care about your feelings, all other Chumps feelings and especially for all the children, that is why I post here, on this wonderful, caring, God sent site.
(((((Many hugs)))))
More thsn ok, now this.
The line under the hugs is a typo? Beats me how it got there, maybe cheater is lurking?
Peacekeeper, it is so nice to hear someone encouraging others. I wish I would have known this 20 years ago when my now ex-husband cheated the first time. I was young had 2 children and thought the answer was reconciliation. If I would have known that 25 years of marriage and 3 grown children that I would discover another affair and finally divorce, I would have divorced the first time.
It is a hard road people that cheat aren’t nice and they don’t have the faithful partner’s interest in mind at all.
To Any faithful partners out there you can make it out. True loving relationships that work are out there and we deserve it.
Keep up the encouragement peacekeeper. Special blessings to you!
24andcounting,
Thank you for your kind words.
It really helps to know that others understand and care.
Supporting each other, that is what CL, CN installs in each one of us.
We are so lucky to have each other.
I am so sorry you suffered all those years and I wish peace and happiness
for you and your children.
Xxxxxx
Isn’t that interesting?
I can pinpoint the exact moment when I knew I should of left.
Yes, I was pregnant with his child,. Yes, I had a 6 year old that was very invested in him and didn’t have a relationship with his own father so I stayed.
But I remember. I remember where I was, what I was wearing, that it was sunny and cool outside and the exact moment where every molecule of my being said “go…..run.”
I didn’t listen. 20 years and 4 other affairs later I’m finally free.
The only decent things that guy ever did in his life was give me a gorgeous daughter, a good settlement, and discard me.
It hurts like a motherfucker, but it’s feeedom wrapped in a ton of pain.
Yes. Freedom wrapped in a ton of pain. Exactly. Courage fellow chumps.
24andcounting, we could be sisterChumps…26 years ago we did the cheat/leave/RIC waltz, too. But cheaters don’t change. I have, though. He is practically begging to come back, but I can’t even stomach being around him. I see him as he is, not as the illusions I had surrounded him with. He acknowledges my pain and his sins, but that doesn’t return my warmth for him. He killed it. I was left with the rotting corpse. I’m hoisting it myself and taking it out to the Month Pyhton wagon, “Bring out yer dead!” Okay! It still hurts, but I think it’s the death of my IDEAS about the marriage, about the false pride in claiming “married (nearly) 30 years”, about the staining he did to any happy memories with the mildew of his skanky ways – was there an affair partner in the Boy Scout Troop, too? Likely! I will not waste another precious year…or day…worrying or looking over my shoulder or acting as the marriage police. I trust there is happiness ahead, although old fears want me to doubt that, too. Mindfuckery runs deep. I need CN to survive this and I am SO GRATEFUL I found you before the RIC undertow pulled me back under the waves!
Peacekeeper, you are a wonderful person! Thank you for the mention?????
Bless you peacekeeper, it is posters like yourself that really encourage chumps like me. I really appreciate your wisdom and as hard as this journey is it would be 100x harder without CL and CN. In nearly 7 months out now and most people are bored of hearing my problems now. I know being a chump sucks but at least we all understand each other. We can help each other realise that we are not at fault for this and when we leave the cheater we can gain a much better life.
Big (((HUGS))) to you, Peacekeeper. Thank you for the mention. You are such a good person for encouraging new and old chumps! I don’t have time to come to Chump Lady as much as I used to (in nursing school), but when I need resolve and encouragement (or feel the need to vent or encourage), I come back for a read through the posts.
It’s sad that we all sound so much the same in our stories. I believed all the lies right from the very beginning (even before we got married). I never realized I was dealing with a lot of red flags. I got conditioned from a very early age to not trust my gut/intuition.
It’s so true that cheaters never change! My ex was a cheater and liar from the very beginning, but I failed to really see him for who he truly is. He still is that person even though he’s fooled so many people with his lies — blaming me for his lying and cheating and telling everyone that I’m “crazy.” It’s so heartbreaking that the man I loved the best that I could and forgave of so much for over 20 years and had two children with would smear my good name in order to make himself look good.
Thanks, Peacekeeper, for being here for the newly chumped. 🙂
Thank you Peacekeeper for all of your support. I’m really grateful to have found this site and be part of CN. CL has brought a bit of sanity to my crazy, out of control life and providing the tools to help us all see reality.
God bless you and your family during this heart wrenching time and comfort you during the loss of your son-in-law. Trying to understand the death of a loved one, at such a young age, brings a different sort of untangling with trying to make sense of this tragic loss.
Thank goodness your daughter and grandkids have a sane parent to lean on now.
FeelingIt, it’s a phase we all go through, wanting to bust them, wanting justice. It really will pass! Keep walking away, step by step. I’m rooting for you!
“They drain the nice right out of you.”
Yes!
I know! Hit the nail on the head right there. I could see myself getting meaner and meaner toward him — less patience, “nagging”, feeling so unappreciated — but couldn’t quite put my finger on it. After the revelation, it finally had a name and my anger came out nearly every day while I was stuck in the “we’ll get through this” phase. His becoming increasingly not present in the marriage/our life = HOOKERS. That fucking fuck let me become so angry and drained and lonely and made me think I was losing my mind. NO MORE. He wants nice? You reap what you sew, motherfucker.
Ugh, *sow (too angry for correct spelling)
ChumpOnIt…you got it! I used #skankyisasskankydoes and
#youreapwhatyouho to help me laugh about fuckwit and his married biker tramp (took her a week to narrow it down to my h when I called & told her h about the 3 yr affair, then told him to ask *HER* who he was!). Yes, it was a weak moment, but the call was better than forwarding him the Weiner-style selfie she sent to my h, which was my first plan.
They mindfuck the he’ll out of us then stand back and wonder where the rage came from! Ugh!
I am so proud of you ChumpDiva! Her husband had the right to know she was a skank (if he didn’t already)!!
Oh this is absolutely true. I did not like the person I was becoming while married to him. The constant financial abuse, the emotional abuse, the way he ignored me, the lying, the manipulation. I was so, so angry inside and resented him and it would often come out. He even told me once that I “talked down” to him. I regret acting that way. But I realize now that it was a result of being beat down for 18 years, of believing his lies, of believing he’d changed, and then having my hopes cruelly dashed.
“I did not like the person I was becoming while married to him” – THIS. Being gaslighted, cheated on, lied to and disrespected on a daily basis brought out the very worst in me. Not until I finally got the courage to throw him out (3rd d-day…slow learner) was I able to fully understand what was really happening to me. 18 months later I am really getting it and it is so painful to realize but also very freeing.
My ex would tell me I treated him “like a child” and I realize now, that was because he was acting like one! Duh. Nothing was ever his fault, he could not be counted on for anything as he was always going to get things done “soon” and needed constant attention and affirmation when he finally did do something – “look I emptied the dishwasher – aren’t I so great?”
I am a nice person, really…but was not able to be that with him any more because he did not deserve my kindness or my heart. And that is not my fault.
“Did not deserve my kindness” — Every time I feel bad for how I was with him prior to the revelation, I just remember that information he withheld from me all those years. So, no, all that time he in fact did not deserve my kindness. I keep saying how he was a good actor, but he wasn’t good enough, because what he did seeped out in other ways. I trust my gut, and I was reacting to something horrible, albeit unknown at the time.
Ditto!
I thought I was a bad person too because it was so hard with X at times (before Ddays). I had to bite my tongue 24/7 and felt very frustrated by his lack of co-anything (parenting, participation, etc…..). But I loved him, my family and I would never have left him for another man. I was constantly trying to make life better for us.
Now that we are divorced and I’m dating someone else I see that I’m not a bad person at all! It’s been 2 years, so it’s not limerence. Im a naturally calm, kind, sweet-natured, happy, giving person. I’m quick to forgive, don’t carry grudges.
If X was correct in his condemnation of me, then either it was him bringing it out in me or I miraculously changed overnight when he left. I don’t want to be a blameshifter, and God knows I have bad days and am no saint, but I think it was X all that time.
MotherChumper, it WAS your X all the time! I’m the same way you described yourself (not perfect, but for the most part how you described yourself). And how you described yourself having to bite your tongue during your marriage for lack of participation by your X — me too! I wouldn’t say anything. I would just get silent (not the silent treatment). In the past if I would tell him something was bothering me, I’d get from him, “I can’t do anything right!” So I stopped saying anything, because it wasn’t true that he couldn’t do anything right. He did some things right like taking good care of us financially. Besides that, he didn’t do much else. I never wanted to be a nagging wife, so I never ever nagged from the very beginning of our marriage. If I needed something done around the house that I couldn’t do myself, I’d ask him if he could do xyz when he had time and that’s another thing he did right and well — he always did what I asked him to do and he did it in a timely fashion. No complaints there. In a heartbeat I would trade in financial security and timely chores done for a faithful and honesty spouse. That is worth it’s weight in gold!
Ah, yes “I can’t do anything right” and (snarkily) “Well! I guess I’m not perfect”. And I’d feel like such a horrid person and would apologize! Eeeek!
Yep. One of the red flags I did pay attention to was my own behavior. I am not the kind of person who yells much, but there I was yelling in response to his yelling at me. Paying attention to how someone communicates is generally a good way to understand what kind of communication works for them and how to get on their wave length, but when I saw that I was “becoming” exactly what I hated, I could see how abusive he was toward me (and our kids). I had learned to tolerate his nastiness–but I wasn’t going to tolerate my own.
I’m so glad I’m not alone in this, fellow chumps. When I told one of my friends that I felt like I had also been abusive in the marriage, he said, “You were reacting to an abnormal amount of bullshit. You would not act that way in a normal, healthy relationship.” And it was a freeing comment for me because I realized that no, I was NOT this person. All the resentment I had toward him for everything I was putting up with including 1) me “taking care” of him – he was a man child; 2) his gaslighting 3) his lying and manipulation; 4) broken promises 5) anger/temper tantrums; 6) constantly being on edge when we were in public or around my family because he made inappropriate comments ALL THE TIME; and so, so much more.
I think we were married to the same person, KC.
BlueWillow, it totally blows me away how many of these individuals are out there. Makes me terrified to get into the dating pool again.
We have to keep reminding ourselves that we are now FREE from having to live with that bullshit. And we will heal and recover and become better human beings. They will always suck.
Keep Calm, your friend is very wise and telling you the truth. I was in an emotionally and psychologically abusive marriage for over 20 years. After slowly realizing after the discard that I had been used and lied to for that long, the rage and anger set in. I’m a naturally calm, patient and nice person. Not perfect of course, but I’ve been told I have a “sweet spirit” and a good friend said him and his wife used to call me “Sweet Martha.” That’s who I am. I wasn’t faking it for people. So when the anger and rage came out, I felt like I was going crazy or something. This wasn’t me! It’s not who I wanted to be, but who I was for a period of time. I think it was the years and years of shoving things down when I knew he was lying to me, but I couldn’t prove it or didn’t want the hassle of trying to call him out because it would be turned around on me. And realizing he really did cheat on me when I was pregnant with our second child. And he really did cheat on me before we even got engaged. And each time he lied. And other times I thought he was cheating on me either physically or emotionally. And then there were the 100% naked lap dancing strippers in Canada that he lied about. Just so much deception and it was for so long! And then he blamed it all on me because of my “trust issues!!” Anger and rage is good! Anger turned inward leads to depression and that’s not good!
Also, I feel the same way you do about dating. I have no desire right now after what I’ve been through. It’s funny (not) how my ex has told everyone he was in such an abusive relationship with me, his “crazy” ex-wife. But he was dating the whore I caught him out with while we were still married. A person who was truly abused (me) is in no hurry to get into another relationship. But he has so many people convinced that I was the problem and not him. Unbelievable!
That part about not begin there for you. That is so true. STBX was never there for me because in his mind I didn’t have real problems (I haven’t had many family members die or anything since we’ve been married). Work problems were my own fault for having the nerve to have a career in the first place.
This is why it was such a shock to me when during our first session with MC he said I was “emotionally unavailable”. I was shocked because I thought I had always been available for him if he had bothered to come to me with his emotions. Evidently I was supposed to be the aggressor and ask him “how are you feeling”, but I didn’t think to do that because if something was bothering him he would be sullen and cross and stand offish so I assumed he wanted to be left alone and was being respectful of that. I just kept the kids out of his hair so he could have time to himself that I thought he needed. I thought I was being helpful, evidently I was being “emotionally unavailable”.
Sometimes I also couldn’t tell that he cared when his relatives died. I guess he cared when his Dad died and I was supposed to ask him how he felt instead of just giving him a hug and expressing my condolences and expressing my own sadness the loss. If he had shown any interest in talking about it I would have listened. After that, he didn’t even seem to care about the rest (aunt, grandmother, grandfather) except to complain that he didn’t inherit anything because the aunt was penniless and the grandparents money went to support another aunt who is mentally ill and can’t support herself, but no, he should have gotten the money. Ok, I guess I had a hard time being “emotionally available” to console him on that one.
Chumpinrecovery, you not being emotionally available sounds like total projection. I doubt he even knows what it means.
My guess is that Schmoopie told him I was emotionally unavailable. She was more emotionally available because she thoughtfully asked him how he felt in a text just after our last session with the MC when STBX told him he was giving up on reconciliation in favor of continuing with Schmoopie. How thoughtful. Nobody cared how I felt. Bitch.
It is a standard post-hoc explanation for why they cheated. Has nothing to do with reality; they have to come up with a reason why their cheating was the chump’s fault, and the “emotionally unavailable” excuse is socially acceptable. “Ah,” other people will think/say, “well, if they had grown apart then an affair is understandable.”
Total BS; but cheaters simply repeat that excuse often enough that they believe it.
Number one predictor of cheating? Blameshifting.
“Number one predictor of cheating? Blameshifting.”
THIS x 1,000
I discovered (don’t ask how!) that my ex told the whore that I “made his life hell.” Why I was surprised, I don’t know, especially considering he used to tell me how awful his first ex-wife was. And I believed him! Now that I know better, I almost feel sorry for the whore…almost.
It’s interesting that they seem to all have the same traits, my cheater was never there emotionally for me, not when my father died, not when my mother had dementia, not when my 4 year old grandson died, not when my sister died. He wasn’ t even there for his own family, didn’t shed a tear for his father or his mother when they passed. Certainly lacked the empathy gene! But he loved being at the centre of everything at the funerals always glad handing everyone, so sincere accepting everyone condolences.
Always played the nice guy ‘such a sweetheart’. He walked out for a women that he played bridge with for Christ sake! Lost his family (my family from first marriage) gave up half his wealth, his home and erased 40 years of history with hardly a thought. No discussion, nothing just I want a divorce. He wrote to my adult kids and recounted all the years we were together and memories and said how proud he was of everyone including me! Hoped they’d understand why he had to ‘be on his own’. The guy’s delusional, the kids said it was ‘the big kiss off ‘ and yes they did understand that he left but not to be on his own. Did the moron think I’d not tell them! So he still thinks he’s a ‘good fellow’ not the cheating asshole he is.
The lack of empathy is astounding. My STBX was just defending himself against my accusation that, among about a thousand other things, he wasn’t there for me when my mother had a brain aneurysm burst and was in the hospital for two months. His defense? “I’m not there for my OWN mother! That’s just not who I am!” The look on my face must’ve been horrified because then he backtracked, “but if that’s something that’s important to you I can try to work on that…” Nah, I’m good, wouldn’t want you to strain yourself trying to be a normal human being or anything :/.
Chumpinrecovery,
You are still assuming there is some validity to your cheater’s appraisal of you. You gave the guy his space and were “emotionally unavailable.” That might be true if he’d reached out to you and you ignored him, but that wasn’t the case. I’m willing to bet that if you had tried to have that “feelings” discussion, you would have been acting invasively toward him. The point of the exercise is that you must be wrong. Each and every time. If you respond in the way he would have preferred last time, he will move the goalposts and find a way for that to be wrong.
You just have to trust that the game is rigged for you to lose, and that he sucks.
I like that. Generally I think I am nice but I ran out of niceness for H. Even if he think I am not nice, I still am too everyone else but him. It’s specific to lying cheating H.
Same. Last time I saw ex, I was so damn civil that it nearly killed me, but I was not nice. I am not nice to people who betray me, despite his wanting to remain friends and not be enemies. Screw that.
It’s all so familiar, so consistent, so unoriginal.
One month after I moved out and filed, I met my then-stbx in a park to talk. It was her idea. She was “hoping to slow this train down” and was “putting of [her] cards on the table.” (BTW, if your spouse compares your marriage to a poker game, then run!)
During that conversation, she lied about having spoken to lawyers who informed her I’d owe her all sorts of money (I didn’t, as the divorce would prove). I got angry. I raised my voice.
“Calm down, JC! Why are you so angry? I won’t talk to you if you’re like this.”
I got even angrier, yelled at her. She repeated similar passive-aggressive BS.
Then I got up and walked away, realizing how I’d been been so dumb as to give her yet another chance at manipulating me.
Don’t let them do this to you. You have every right to be furious with them! And you have every right to show them that (at least initially…eventually, you have to take back your own power and disengage from their bullshit, finding another way to vent).
I was told more than once during my divorce that I wasn’t as nice as I used to be…by both my ex and others. And that’s just fine. Being a chump, I was too nice to begin with.
Lol on the poker analogy!!!
My STBX compares everything to a poker game. Just a few of his comments:
– I can continue playing the game until you are forced to fold.
– Except you don’t know whether I am bluffing or not.
– If you don’t do this, I will be forced to play my final card.
One of my favorite moments was telling him “that card has already been played…by me. And now you are sitting all alone at the table with an empty hand.” I know that statement won’t do much damage to a narcissist but it felt good anyway.
Yeah, the deck was stacked.
I cut my losses.
Divorce was the Ace up my sleeve.
Love your response.
Haha, when I had the Worm served he told me I had “overplayed my hand”.
Poker analogy- ✔️
Blame shifting- ✔️
Triangulation- ✔️
DARVO- ✔️
Back Shaving- ✔️
Word Salads- ✔️
Constantly “Working Late”- ✔️
Attached to Cell Phone- ✔️
I could go on but why bother? He’s a cake eater….. I ran! Now why is this divorce taking so long?!!!!
Amazing how many cheaters used the poker anaology!
And even more amazing that they were all still bluffing! My ex used the “putting all of [her] cards on the table” schtick at least 3 separate times, that I can recall.
Not an original thought in any of their heads.
What a sad life when you view even the people you love most as opponents.
Back shaving? Clueless, here. Please explain.
Backshavers are a hairy mess, like a gorilla, and for vanity try to get that bush off their backs
Gotcha! Thanks. ??
If your spouse suddenly starts having you shave their back hair, he might be a cake eater…..actually is a cake eater…..???
I like that: “I was too nice to begin with.” Hahaha!!
This was from a recent email exchange that devolved into a massive pile of flaming garbage (my fault, I engaged and had the audacity to call him out on his BS – mainly telling him that he couldn’t change the terms of our separation agreement after the fact and asking him if he was planning to take our son for a week in August as per the custody arrangement.) When I told him that he needed to be a grown up and look up the arrangement himself and he couldn’t just change the agreement whenever he wanted and that all this was happening because of him, this is what I got:
“Why should I have to calm the fuck down when you get to act like a child, cold hearted, relentless, oppressive, malicious and completely irrational BITCH. Sure say all the hateful things you want and expect me to not retaliate. That fucking figures you two faced bitch. That’s all you will ever be to anyone. A cold bitch. Why did I think you would let me help you in this fucked up situation. Might as well make it as painful as possible for ever. Maybe I’m just setting myself up to be the victim, you’re right. Why do you bring out the worst in everyone. I honestly was trying to think of ways to make things easier and all you do is make me feel like an ass hole. Fuck you 12YW. “
“Why should I have to calm the fuck down when you get to act like a child, cold hearted, relentless, oppressive, malicious and completely irrational BITCH.”
UBT: You telling me truths instead of sugar coated bullshit makes you a cold-hearted bitch. Please stroke my ego and tell me nicely, what a great guy I am instead.
“Sure say all the hateful things you want and expect me to not retaliate.”
UBT: I blew up our family and fucked a married co-worker almost as old as my mom, but your words are just as bad and I need to retaliate. I can’t handle being told I’m an asshole. I’m not an asshole. I smell like one, I look like one and I spew forth shit whenever I open my hole, but I’m NOT. AN. ASSHOLE.
“That fucking figures you two faced bitch. That’s all you will ever be to anyone. A cold bitch. Why did I think you would let me help you in this fucked up situation. Might as well make it as painful as possible for ever.”
UBT: I miss cake. And the pick-me dance. You were so lovely and accommodating when I was pretending I was simply “un-happy” in our marriage and I was fucking the old lady hag on the side. Why can’t we go back to that? You were so beautiful and only had one face – the face of a woman who didn’t know what a giant flaming turd I am. Let’s go back to that.
“Maybe I’m just setting myself up to be the victim, you’re right. Why do you bring out the worst in everyone. I honestly was trying to think of ways to make things easier and all you do is make me feel like an ass hole. Fuck you 12YW. ”
UBT: Maybe I’m just setting myself up to be the victim, and that’s because I AM ONE. I didn’t make myself lie to you for 12 years about my happiness! That was you! Remember how you forced me to propose? Oh wait, you’re right. That was all me, but anyway, you are to blame because I thought you were NICE. I’m just trying to make everything EASIER and you’re making things harder. Destroying our family and marriage and making our son live in two separate households is way EASIER than NOT being a cheating dickwad. Fuck you 12YW, I’m special and you will never understand.
…I can’t handle being told I’m an asshole. I’m not an asshole. I smell like one, I look like one and I spew forth shit whenever I open my hole, but I’m NOT. AN. ASSHOLE…
OMFG! That is hilarious!
Excellent UBT.
It’s shocking how they flip the switch … if you dispense kibbles to them, you are a useful tool; the second you stop dispensing kibbles (regardless of the reason), you are the ENEMY. Nothing else registers on their radar.
“I can’t handle being told I’m an asshole. I’m not an asshole. I smell like one, I look like one and I spew forth shit whenever I open my hole, but I’m NOT. AN. ASSHOLE.”
I refer to X as a rectal hemorrhoid. Because at least assholes work. His unemployed (because he is sitting on millions in a trust and working would mean paying more child support) role in life is to make the kids and mine as annoying, uncomfortable, and sometimes, even as painful as possible.
PS The trust is airtight; it is exempt from being counted as income and a means to pay child support. So on paper, he looks like a sad sausage who can’t find a job. Which means our kids get the minimum child support from a loser father who just bought his second house and goes on trips.
Girl!!
There has to be some way to make that available for the kiddos . . . . !!!!
My mother said “he’ll never have hemorrhoids because he is a perfect asshole”. The only thing that Haggar the Whoreable was perfect in. Let’s give him a cookie. Asshole.
OMG I love this saying and I am going to steal it!
Bitch cookie! That’s a gem!
“act like a child, cold hearted, relentless, oppressive, malicious and completely irrational BITCH”
I found a thesaurus! These things are neat! So many fun wordsy words. I started off trying to call you silly, so I got “act like a child,” but then I thought “Ooh no – how about an evil mastermind?” So I got some words like cold-hearted and relentless… but then I figured that I wanted to go back to silly, so I ended with ‘irrational.’ Yes, I realize that all those traits contradict each other, but it’s like when you’re at the buffet – you just have to try a bit of everything, even if it doesn’t really go together. Anyways, this thesaurus is fun.
“Why do you bring out the worst in everyone?”
UBT: “I would like to remind you that even this unhinged rant is your fault. And my fucking another woman – that was also your fault. Also, my inability to schedule properly, the fact that I missed last week’s garbage pickup and the soup I spilled last night – all your fault.
Yes! I love the thesaurus bit. It’s like “Look! I know adjectives! Aren’t I smart? I know nouns and verbs, too! Amazing!’
And he really does think somehow I made him do the things he’s done. I am so mighty and powerful, I bring out the worst in everyone! I can’t believe how silly I’ve been to place any blame on his poor, burdened shoulders. I should be asking for his forgiveness for making him act like such an insufferable bastard!
You pretty well nailed it. I like your UBT
**clap….clap….**
I wasted 12 years too.
Trusting now that he sucks…
I get that same bullshit. But, not forever.
Shortly after he decided to give up on reconciliation and move out I sniped at him and said “every time you screw her while we’re still married you are being a selfish prick”. His response: “Why are you being mean to me, I am trying to make this as easy on you as I can”.
I called mine selfish for borrowing thousands of dollars for new car parts instead of giving the money to me since he owes me child support. I told him essentially he was picking his hobby over his child. He told me I was being so mean. Literally. He was supposed to bring me a buffet from the house (that he forced me to leave because he threw a raging tantrum on my front steps when I told him that I was moving into my own apartment and taking the furniture. I ended up leaving it and then he asked me if he could bring me any of it when he rents a truck to move his stuff, so I said fine.) He goes “I’m not bringing you your buffet. Why should I do something nice for someone so mean?”
I told him not to touch it. I told him I didn’t want helping me move the thing to assuage the minuscule amount of guilt he might be feeling in the black hole where his heart should be by “being a nice guy”. But seriously, he created the furniture situation by being an asshole and somehow turned me into the bad guy in the end.
Sick off the f____ wall ceiling floor…..totally self delusional …he’s lucky you didnt throw a bat at him
Another “situation!” Chump Lady, perhaps you need to rename the blog “Situation Lady.” Situations abound.
As for you ex, he is projecting his little heart out.
Yes, I missed that in my original interpretation… he still hasn’t taken any responsibility for the “situation”, and I imagine he never will.
Yesterday would’ve been my 11th wedding anniversary, but I fucked up. Back in 2009, I googled a phone number I didn’t recognize on the phone bill and up popped a Craiglist personal ad. He called it more than once, and he called it on a Saturday afternoon when I was taking our 3 yo son to his first classmate’s birthday party.
I confided in a friend who told me about spyware. So I installed that in the computer and saw things I didn’t know existed (places where folks with sexual appetites off the normal menu.). I confronted Mr. Sparkles immediately. I was not NICE.
From that moment on, I was dead-man-walking… I just didn’t know it. HE turned on the NICE and we went to MC and we reconciled. But me, nope, I could never genuinely find the nice me again… because you see, she’s authentic. She doesn’t fake nice. She gets sad and she tries to fix things and make things that are broken whole again.
4 d-days later, he left me for an OW. It wasn’t nice. I filed first – that was nice. I got the pre-nup upheld, that was nice. I might’ve contributed to the OW finding out he was cheating on her, that was nice. I, unknowinlgy, worked my way back to finding the NICE ME (the genuine one)… she was there all along, she was just waiting for me to get rid of the fuckwit.
“I filed first – that was nice. I got the pre-nup upheld, that was nice. I might’ve contributed to the OW finding out he was cheating on her, that was nice.”
A bit of justice is always nice. 😉
CL, you’ve previously discussed the difference between nice and kind as shorthand for chumps. I think today’s column proves that while chumps can learn the difference, cheaters never will.
I got, “I left you because you’re such a fucking bitch!” Let’s see why I was such a bitch. You did’t pay attention to me, or the kids. You came home from work, walked in the house started yelling, then plopped on the couch and went to sleep for the night. On the weekends you spent the entire time riding your Harley. Oh, and also, you had been cheating on me for a year. But when I asked you about it you told me it wad all in my head and just part of “my drama,” yet six months after our divorce was final you married her. It’s also been 2.5 years since you’ve spoken to our 4 children. I’d say that gives anyone a free pass to be “Such a Fucking Bitch!” I’m a lot nicer now that you’re gone, asshole…funny how that works.
Anchor lady, cheater gave me a copy of his “journal” in which he refers to me as an “evil bitch”.
Your post applies to me almost verbatim down to the Harley part. Thanks for shedding some new light on things for me!
While packing up, I ran across the Fucktard’s journal. It stopped shortly after we met, but it had years of astounding crap to read. It seems that he was doing the same bullshit for years with at least two prior girlfriends. I mean living a double life. I shared it with the one I knew. And with my lawyer. Just before we met, the Fucktard was fine-tuning his upcoming suicide. He’d written draft letters to put in the cards to family members and had selected the cards, which were folded into the journal. The notion that I saved his life and he treated me like an experiment in incrementally escalating abuse turned my stomach and woke me the hell up.
He’d always told me that he was cheated on, but the journal showed the opposite.
This ^^^^^^^
I may cheat, but you are angry. sorry, not sorry.
My cheaters only response to my desire for divorce after learning of his years of sex with other guys was, “we both brought issues to the marriage if you want to divorce that is on you”. I was told point blank that my want for divorce was my choosing to sin in my anger. By going through with it I was viewed as unrepentant sin rooted in my “anger is” , and the cheater was given victim status, and supporters rallied round him as he began to groom my replacement before our divorce was final. Through divorce came freedom, growth, peace and happiness.
Oh so MEH!
Thankful-My guy cheated with me on me with guys too!
When I uncovered his two decades of cheating, porn use, lies, etc … it all started to come into stark focus about how really NICE I had been through the doubts, his anger, his selfishness for two fucking decades. I was almost never angry (growing up in an abusive household, I found anger somewhat repellent) and I repeatedly internalized the crap he fed me … trying harder to be be a better wife, better mother … goodness I completely lost myself in this false reality he created for me.
Once I realized all of that …I got righteously pissed. On behalf of myself — and my kids. But his continued blameshifting and lies sent me into a rage I’ve never experienced before. It was like a lifetime of rage against abuse came out of me. Sort of a self-defense on overload.
My STBX, not being accustomed to my rage, had no clue how to handle it. Eventually, he decided to try to out-do my rage … which resulted in the implosion and him being hospitalized.
Me — I’ve come to appreciate my righteous anger, but really, really, really hated the rage. Tellingly, this horrible rage dissipated completely once we separated and he was out of the house.
Now? Asshole is hoovering like his life depends on it. But, even that comes with conditions … he wants me to be nice again as well. Funny thing is that I’ve been very civil with him — and more than fair with financials, etc. I just want him away from me and my kids. No drama. I can’t do anymore drama. So, I have been as “nice” (by my definition) as possible under the horrendous circumstances.
BUT, his definition of “nice” is much more along the lines of “let’s pretend I never abused you or the kids; never lied; never cheated” and life will be wonderful for me!” I love the fact that I can see this shit the second it spews from his mouth. Thank you CL!
Hospitalized? How so if you don’t mind my asking? Aneurysm borne out by rage?
“Aneurysm borne out by rage?” … LOL! 🙂 Wouldn’t have surprised me if it would have been this.
It would have been more accurate to say “institutionalized.” Regretfully, I have one of those covert, passive-aggressive types … he went into a blind rage, so I told him to leave the house. He left and tried to commit suicide — leaving me two, rage-filled letters telling me how everything was my fault.
When he came home, I realized what had happened, so I had him committed for his safety (and the the safety of my girls and me).
He was flagged for potential “homicidality” — so, protective order, home security technology, and escape plans were put into place.
In hindsight, pulling off his mask (exposing his decades of lies) triggered the “real” him. That “real” him is scary as hell.
Whoa, Jesssmom, smart thinking on your part! So glad you and your daughters are safe now.
Thank you, Tempest. 🙂
It all seemed so surreal — at the time, and even in hindsight.
One of the things I’ve learned to appreciate about my “Fight or Flight” mode is that I tend to shut off emotion and “robot” my way through what needs to be done. I “feel” later (and, boy, did my emotions crash after all of this!).
Yep. My ex is the same. Wants to be friends. Wants us to “get along” for the sake of our daughter – who he routinely ignores except for occasional text messages. I am not friends with people who betray me. The delusion with these jerks is unbelievable.
It’s strange to me how these assholes are either one extreme or the other with the kids. So many just go on with life and basically act as if their children don’t exist (horrible … so horrible to do to a child!). On the flip-side, as with my STBX, some of them use the kids as a way to try to slither back in.
My STBX didn’t want our youngest. He turned our teens against me when I got pregnant (because it would be “so horrible to have a baby in the house crying all the time”); left me alone in the hospital when I had a C-Section after preterm labor; then ignored me and our little one for nearly a year … guilt-tripping me as a “bad wife” and “bad mother” the whole time.
I contemplated suicide, but I couldn’t leave my innocent baby or my innocent (though manipulated) older kids to this person who could be so callous to his own children. This was also part of the reason why I feared divorce for so long … I couldn’t fathom leaving my kids with him, alone, for visitation.
Since the separation, he’s turned the charm channel on to 100% toward the little one (who is now 6). Being just far enough removed, and finally gaining much-needed clarity after decades of abuse — I clearly see his newfound “love” for what it is … a manipulative power play. He wants his chump back, and getting to me through our kids is his last-ditch effort.
It’s astounding that after the hell he put us through that he thinks I would ever go back. Not in a million fucking years.
They way my ex treats our daughter hurts the most. I remember having a conversation with him and saying, “We need to put our daughter first right now.” And he said, “She is always the first priority.” It’s so, so easy to say those words, but acting on them? That must be harder than trying to land a plane in the middle of a hurricane because he just can’t do it.
>>” It’s so, so easy to say those words, but acting on them? That must be harder than trying to land a plane in the middle of a hurricane because he just can’t do it.”
Wonderfully worded! Yes — they know the right things to say, but are completely disconnected from the practical application of those words. My conclusion has been that the disconnect is because the words are image management only. They just don’t give a rat’s ass otherwise.
And, yes, the devastation to the kids is the worst part of the whole thing. It’s so unimaginable that the assholes can be so heartless when it comes to their own kids … heck, any kids, for that matter.
I’ve come to realize that my douchebag ex knew *exactly* the right words to say to placate me or get me to believe that he was doing the right thing. And I always believed it because I wanted to think the best of him. Spackle, spackle, spackle!
And yes on the “any kids” because the whore has three kids – and ex doesn’t even care that they are going to be impacted by his relationship with their mom. They’re living together and engaged. Poor kids already have behavioral problems (I think the whore is a horrible mother) and my ex was NOT good with our kids when they were small (whore’s kids are 5, 6, and a teenager). I cringe to think what they must be going through. Though I do believe that the ex will be the model step-parent for awhile to control image management and get the whore to still believe he’s a good guy. After they’re married? She better watch out. The monster will emerge.
I’m so sorry he’s such a jackass. 🙁
Your thoughts about how he’s going to go through the pretense of a “nice guy” to the OWs kids — only for the monster to emerge later — is spot-on.
I watched my dad do it (with a couple of his wives). And, all of my step-parents were the same. So damned nice and considerate at first … then, once they felt like the power had shifted and they were “secure” in it, the monsters came out.
It messed with my head as a kid … the initial kindness gave me some sense of being wanted and loved in an insecure environment … then BAM — suddenly the I was being ignored (by some of the step-parents) and abused (by the others).
The OW is a wretched woman for willfully exposing her kids to this shit — and for not giving one shit about your daughter. Your STBX is a wretched man for willfully exposing his daughter to this shit — and for not giving one shit about her kids.
In their entitled and selfish world, nobody else’s pain registers on the radar. Not even their kids’.
Wishing you all the best as you and your daughter navigate through the disaster he has created. Stay strong, KeepinCalm. (((Hugs)))
My STBX probably could land a plane in a hurricane because that’s where his talent lies. Emotionally connecting to our kids? Not so much, especially daughter.
He also says “the kids are my first priority”. Then why didn’t he think about their best interests before deciding that dating while married was a good idea? Why did he move out, unable to answer when my middle one asked “when will you come back”?Why did he spend Easter Sunday with Schmoopie when my daughter begged him to have dinner with his family instead? Why did he take Schmoopie to the fireworks instead of the kids? Why does he eventually plan to put them in the awkward position of having to warm up to the woman who conspired with him to tear our family apart. He always puts the kids first, not.
The lip-service these assholes pay to parenting is another thing that causes me NOT to be a nice person. It pisses me off. They say it to make themselves look good.
But the simple fact that they pay lip service to it tells me that they “get it.” They know it sounds good to say, because it IS good. It is good to consider how our actions impact our kids — and how to help them when we’ve made hurtful choices.
Even KNOWING they should be good parents, they make a clear choice(s) to act against this — by destroying the security of the kids’ family; by spending their time – emotion – and money on getting their rocks off instead of spending all of that on their family; by minimizing or ignoring the pain the kids experience when his hurtful behavior comes to light.
And, of course, the bad parenting continues after divorce. But, woe to whomever points this out … because they are “good” parents, don’t ya know?!
Good parenting is hard work — and not always sunshine and rainbows. It can be tiring, taxing, and often requires self-sacrifice. Most cheaters refuse to invest themselves enough in their families to make them want to put in the effort. They are much more comfortable with the easy road … SAYING that they are good parents rather than BEING good parents.
You totally nailed it. And when I look back at my marriage, I can see my ex paid lip service to a hell of a lot of stuff – but he actually never meant it. It makes me sick to think about it now.
My two stepsons (22 and 24) know what their father is. They’re old enough to see him for who he is: dysfunctional and weak. I feel horrible for my daughter, though, because she used to adore her dad. Now she doesn’t even want him at her high school graduation next year. How could he destroy that? How could he eve *think* of putting his whore before his own daughter? I asked those questions a lot in the beginning. Now I just trust that he sucks and I realize he is just a massive fuckwit.
I fortunately did not have kids with the Ex, but I found the same thing issue in regards to life events surrounding his parents. Long story, but his dad needed major heart surgery rather suddenly across the country at like age 77 or so. Most people, would be on the next plane, but despite my urgings to buy a ticket and get out there he just didn’t go. Said he had work etc etc. but he was soooo worried about his dad and he would be so upset if something happened. Fortunately his dad was fine and we moved on. A few years later I found out the story he had told me about when his mom died was a complete lie. The whole family knew she was dying and told him he needed to get there, but he just didn’t go. He couldn’t be bothered. But he was soooooo sad when his mom died.
It eventually dawned on me that actually, he wasn’t. Like he knew the words you were supposed to say when your parent was sick or had died, but he didn’t mean it. He didn’t really care. Why should he do something inconvenient like fly across the country to be there when his mom died when he would rather work. Why be there for you dad in the cold in December, when you would rather be fucking your whore and hangin out at work (because he had no real friends). He said the words you say when a loved one is sick, but his actions showed that he really didn’t care at all.
JessMom, thanks. He is for sure a jackass. And I don’t see that *ever* changing.
Chumpinrecovery, same. It’s absolute bullshit. I wrote a letter to my ex *begging* him to be part of our daughter’s life. I was even nice and said that couldn’t you spend time with your girlfriend (i.e. the whore) AND your daughter? I got crickets in response. I swear he has no soul.
Love that last line, JesssMom…not in a million fucking years
LOVE!
IcanseetheMehcoming, so comforting to hear that you can get yourself back after life with a fuckwit. That is a fear of mine although I do see signs of a nicer me emerging.
You can never muster enough “nice” for these monsters! They expect you to walk around the HUGE elephant in the room and act as if nothing has changed! My Ex’s Schmoopie was always sending me e-mails (even after the divorce) telling me she was a nice person even if I wasn’t! Why? I finally had enough and reminded her that nice people don’t screw married men especially when they are married themselves! I know I should have just ignored her, but I would get these e-mails out of the blue every so often and I could not understand why. My cheater did unforgivable things to me and I feel I was justified to treat him like the low life he was! I don’t owe anyone niceness when they have stabbed me repeatedly in the back! Hell NO!
My almost 9 year old tols me a bout a month or so ago, that the Whore bag “just wants to get along with me” and told MY daughter that “it will get better”
Seriously, fuck her.
If she “just wants to get along with” you, then she can leave your old man and get out of your lives and that will make “everything better.”
^^^^THIS.
My daughter wants absolutely nothing to do with the whore despite my ex trying to get her to come out to their new place (which is actually a dumpy rental in a small town about 40 miles away). He doesn’t get that she NEVER, EVER EVER wants to meet the whore. Apparently the whore did meet my stepson (he’s 22) and he said she’s trying too hard and has asked him multiple times to come to their house, too. He told me, “Mom, I don’t want to go out there.” He also said they act like they didn’t do anything wrong. That didn’t surprise me in the least.
My trouble is that my girls are 7 and 9 and Twatwaffle is “nice” to them. They don’t understand why I hate her so much and I have to explain to them that someone who breaks up a family and takes their daddy away is NOT a nice person, no matter how many board games she plays with you, how much she fixes your hair (OMG, I want to break her fucking fingers….) or how sweetly she smiles while fucking your-married-to- me father.
I am in an honest to god contest for the affection of MY kids against that bitch, and I hate every single minute of it.
She really is the devil. Hopefully when your daughters are old enough they will understand how they’ve been played and recognize that she is not a good person. Alas, they may also come to realize that their Dad isn’t either and that is going to be hard on them.
I am SO SORRY you have to deal with that. I honestly don’t know what I’d do.
I agree. Fuck her. Nothing like using the kids to try to minimize all of the devastation she helped to create. SMH
Spot on !!!! these people are disgraces …..so mentally disturbed…Bellevue famous psych ward ( i live in New York)…that’s really where they need to be……..it’s amazing that these f___ing nut jobs walk around in society…………..they need to be locked the f___ up !!!
After I caught my ex in his affair, I asked him one time if he felt guilty. “Yes, but then I don’t feel guilty when you get really angry.” WTF? So apparently he felt guilty when I was crying and sobbing my heart out, but when I yelled and lit into him for betraying me, he felt his actions were justified?
I’ve since learned that apparently the douchebag ex and his whore – excuse me, his FIANCÉE – act like they’ve done nothing wrong. I’ve gone no contact with him and I think in his twisted, psychopath brain, since I’m not weeping and pining after him, he thinks I’m ok with everything now. What a delusional ass.
When you’re angry, they have a nice little visual with which to paint over their entire past with you so that you were always a mean, angry person and they are justified in whatever horrendous actions they took. Fucking delusional cowards.
You’re exactly right, ChumpOnIt. They are truly horrific human beings.
Only one word ….BELLEVUE…….PSYCH WARD FOR THESE LOONS
“I have decided to write you an email as you are not returning my SMS’s. I also saw that you took your bag with you this morning, so I’m not sure if you will be home. This way you can read this when you feel like it, and not feel pressured from me to respond.
Let me just say this: Yesterday I did not do anything except not communicate with you what I was doing that day. I didn’t really know where I stood with bringing up topics that I know you would be unhappy with – so I didn’t say anything. I completely understand how it looks, and how circumstances when viewed from a certain perspective can make it look like I was trying to hide something.
Like I said last night – whether I did the wrong thing or not – we have a trust issue that has created a huge wedge between us. I know that this is mostly my fault. I also understand that this may be a wound that will never heal. I have come to the point where I am weary to the core with feeling like I have to juggle trying to make things right between us, justifying my actions, pleading with you to keep trying to make things work and with everything else that is going on in our lives. Every time we have a big fight or blow up, I feel more and more emotionally empty – to the point now where I feel completely gutted, like a shell of the person I used to be, and nowhere near the person I want to be.
I have been doing a lot of thinking and soul searching over the past few months, and especially over the past 12 hours – and I (like you I assume) am really confused about where to go from here. I am constantly tossing and turning about the best way forward. One minute I think it is best for us to split up, and this thought will occasionally lift an emotional weight off my shoulders. The next minute I yearn for the future we had planned together. What I do know is that we probably need a bit of time apart to have a think about what is best for us. I will leave it up to you what you want to do, but I would like us to sit down and talk at some stage when you are ready.
I am going to use this time to have a think about whether we actually have the ability and willingness to make each other happy. I am not yet sure if I have the emotional strength left in me to keep fighting for the future we had planned (children, a home, joy etc) – but this is moot if we cannot overcome: A) the trust issues, and B) the possible truth that we may not be the right people to make each other happy.”
Chump, is this from your cheater? Holy shit, what is his full time job, writing legislation?
“but this is moot if we cannot overcome: A) the trust issues”
What. A. MORON.
There wouldn’t BE trust issues if he hadn’t cheated! I swear, the crap these cheaters come up with is truly pathetic.
Chump–that is one helluva letter. Apparently cheater doesn’t realize a decision has already been made–by YOU. I hope you’ve already told him to GTFO, and don’t let the door hit him.
Master’s level Mindfuckery. SMH
“Let me just say this: Yesterday I did not do anything except not communicate with you what I was doing that day” – lol… cheater speak translation “technically I didn’t lie, so you have no RIGHT to be mad. Your anger and trust issues are your own problem!
“I have come to the point where I am weary to the core with feeling like I have to juggle trying to make things right between us, justifying my actions, pleading with you to keep trying to make things work and with everything else that is going on in our lives” Cheater speak translation – I don’t like juggling, you are the one who is supposed to juggle. I shouldn’t have to answer to you, justifying my behavior is exhausting. I have a busy double life, and your insistence that I be accountable is exhausting!
“Every time we have a big fight or blow up, I feel more and more emotionally empty – to the point now where I feel completely gutted, like a shell of the person I used to be, and nowhere near the person I want to be” Cheater translation – I can’t handle your anger, I need kibbles! I need you to tell me how great I am, because I need to fill this empty void by believing I am the person I pretended to be. Lie to me and tell me I am the person I want you to believe I am – those kibble make me feel good, your anger… well not so much!
“One minute I think it is best for us to split up, and this thought will occasionally lift an emotional weight off my shoulders” cheater translation – I want you to know that if you don’t start pick-me dancing, I am threatening to leave you. Accountability is too heavy a thing for me to lift, and I do not want to face my actions! Better start spackling or I’m outta here!
” A) the trust issues, and B) the possible truth that we may not be the right people to make each other happy.” Cheater translation – I don’t like that I can no longer be a cheating liar, get over your trust issues so I can go back to doing whatever the hell I want to do! Your mistrust makes my life hard, and I want things to be easy. You suck it up now… or else! If you won’t suck it up, I’ll take no responsibility whatsoever for that outcome, I’m just going to say “we were not the right people for each other” … that way I get to preserve my good guy image, dodge accountability and chuck the death of this marriage in the fuck-it bucket so I don’t have to reflect on my behavior.
Yep… got a typical unremorseful cheater there!
Gosh Chump, this sounds like a plea for cake. Lots of icing though, he sure wants it to be good cake. Don’t level any consequences because he’s a timid forest creature. Gosh if you don’t give him that good cake, actually better cake than he had before, he might just have to let you leave. You know, you have to be the bad guy in all of this dangling that trust thing in front of him now. And if you can’t pick me dance enough, better than OW, than you can’t make him happy. Doesn’t it make you happy to make him happy anymore? All this lack of happiness will be all your fault. Than he can let everyone know the truth, the kind that makes him not seem like a bad guy in this. The narrative becomes ‘we weren’t right for each other and grew apart. We split so we can all be happy’.
“I’m so confused.” “I’m so torn.” “I’m so exhausted.” “I’m not the person I was meant to be.” “I don’t have the strength to go on.”
BUT
“WE have trust issues.” “WE have to do better.” “WE have to figure out whether WE can make each other happy.”
Kunty Kibbler verbalized this exactly over and over and over again. When I said “no fucking more!” and started becoming an advocate for me and my daughters, I suddenly became ‘mean’ and ‘vengeful’ and ‘angry’ and ‘unreasonable.”
Do not engage with this invertebrate any more than is absolutely necessary. Gray Rock or No Contact.
Oh Fuck off. Fuck ALL THE WAY off.
This made me sick up in my mouth.
When STBX and I were talking to the therapist we hired to talk to the kids (and who was informed about Schmoopie), the subject of my little rage at him last March came up and STBX said “I have never seen her like that before, it’s like she was a different person”. Evidently it never once occurred to him that he deserved it and that he must have behaved abominably to get me to act so not like myself.
The therapist remarked that “not to make you the bad guy or anything STBX, but the fact that the two of you can still sit in a room together and talk intelligently and cooperatively about what is best for your kids is remarkable”
The UBT is a powerful weapon when used in reverse, too…
One of the most satisfying quips I ever uttered was in response to his nasty, hate-fueled emails. He was furious with the BIFF (brief, informative, friendly/factual, firm) tone I used to respond to them.
During a pick up, he spewed, “Your emails sound friendly, but I know you think I’m an asshole.”
To which I responded, “Oh, good.”
Hahaha! Oh, that is AWESOME!
Haha, so the subtext isn’t lost then. Perfect!
Hahahahahahaha! Your response was awesome! 🙂
After I finally left cheaterturd after final DDay and stopped being “nice” mine loved to say “it’s you who wanted the divorce, not me” and “I’m sure you’ll drag my name thru the mud because THATS WHO YOU ARE” and my favorite “you’re just a woman scorned.”
He took no responsibility, as often echoed here it is NEVER what they did, only how we reacted. I spackled for over a decade for him. When final Dday dropped he is right, I got pissed and he did not like it, accountability was not his strong suit. It’s why he couldn’t hold a job, maintain any long term friendships or be faithful husband.
Um, does he not know the saying about women who are scorned?
Oh he understood it, it was meant as an insult like women are so thin skinned that you do one “little” thing wrong and they go bonkers. He thought it painted me as a crazy person out of control.
Ha, well then of course he wouldn’t understand that the fury is focused, controllable, and justified. His view says it all. I would just laugh.
He’s dead now but I do still laugh at how ridiculous he was in most things especially when it came to justifying the horror he inflicted on me. Sigh.
And of course, that’s a confession. You can’t be a “woman scorned” if he didn’t scorn you. For you to be “scorned,” he has to “feel or express derision for you.” That means he feels both superior to you and contemptuous of you. And that is on him, not you. So being “scorned” does not mean being chumped or betrayed or pushed aside; it means that someone who is supposed to be your parent and equal has set himself up to be superior to you. And then does something mean and unkind be showing undeserved contempt for you.
That’s a bully’s move.
Definitely the “it’s not what I did, it’s how you’re reacting to it” mentality. Can’t put two and two together. Scornable action comes first. I swear, like many cheaters, my X has a wall inside his own head. It’s probably the biggest way that they are okay with what they do and how they justify it.
Yep – a big, gigantic concrete wall. And nothing will tear down that wall while everything is turning up roses for him: he’s got his “twu luv” with the Schmoopie or is getting all the kibbles and cake he wants. But when Schmoopie throws him out or he’s not getting kibbles? He’ll be back and telling us that “I’m so sorry for what I did; I’m an asshole; I feel so guilty.” But I honestly think the wall is still up. He’s just paying lip service and telling us what they think we want to hear. But now we all know better.
Here’s my wish list:
For all your wishing I’d forever live in the infatuation stage of a relationship after reconciling and forgiving yet another OW, I wish you would have filed and paid for the divorce.
I wish you a life long shrinkage of your itty bitty dick.
I wish you a long term relationship with #19; waking up to the horror of her drug, alcohol, and gambling addictions daily.
I wish you the best when you apply for social security and find out it’s based on YOUR earnings and last I knew it was 500.00 a month.
I wish you strength as your joints ache and your new found whore realized you can no longer support he as your business fails.
I wish you the biggest pitty party as she asses your value and knows you can’t fulfill the future you faked.
I wish you the ownership of your actions which, in the end can no longer reflect the narrative (lies) you told as I comparatively thrive.
I wish you all the best when you expect your adult children to listen to your financial woes and refuse to take care of you.
I bet you wish really, really hard you kept your supply as you are now living in the hell you created once you are no longer on my health benefits.
Keep wishing, you might win the lottery.
I ‘second’ your wish list! 🙂
Your comment about the lottery reminded me … that was one of my STBX’s funnier hoovering statements.
STBX: “If I win the lottery, I’m going to give you half. Even if we are divorced, I will still give you half.”
Me: “I don’t want your money. You know that.”
STBX: “I know, but I would find a way to give you the money anyway. I would buy you a car or a house …”
So stupid on so many levels.
Yeah, money always comes up with the disordered. He first bragged she made very little and then proceeded to tell her he supported me for our entire marriage and I wouldn’t pay his bills.
UBT
She makes very little money and is willing to give him hers so he can support her addictions.
I can just imagine her expectation if he ever won the lottery. The first thing she would want to do is marry him as he says he cannot marry her because he’s on my health insurance. The truth is he told me he would never marry her for obvious reasons. He dumped her in a heartbeat.
Mine probably thinks he is being nice because he is being fair and maybe slightly generous and would have been more generous if I hadn’t refused in our settlement. I think of it as blood money and it doesn’t make any of this ok. Also, I took only what I absolutely need to stay in the house and still feed/cloth etc. the kids and not a penny more.
>>”I think of it as blood money and it doesn’t make any of this ok. Also, I took only what I absolutely need to stay in the house and still feed/cloth etc. the kids and not a penny more.”
Me too. It’s the craziest thing to see how “heroic” he feels for giving me a little bit of child support money every week.
My ex chose me because of my niceness. He tested me in various ways while we were dating and I always responded with external nice and suppressed the hurt, disappointment, or whatever. We are groomed and selected without realizing it. For those boldly stepping forward into the world of dating … pay attention! Don’t let history repeat!
This times 1000!!!! Mine too!
I recently went out with an educated professional who used the word “fag” in a derogatory manner. He talks about how he has hired gays, and is friends with them on Facebook, and how none of it matters to him, yet he tossed it out there like it was no big deal. At the time I was shocked, but later I mentioned that I have friends and family that are gay, that I love them, that I see nothing wrong with their sexual preferences. I asked hm to clarify whether it was the homosexuality he was denigrating, or was it the feminine traits the man was exhibiting? Neither interpretation was very flattering.
He never answered, but invited me out for pancakes.
I thought about all of the sociopath ex-husbands on here that can compartmentalize when it suits them, how little human kindness and empathy he is showing early on, and what my life would be like with him. If I had accepted those pancakes, if I had set aside my concerns, he’d know I was a nice girl with no boundaries and no backbone. I noped out of there.
At this point anything you say about me just rolls of my back. You no longer are worthy of my attention. Talk to my hand you cheating asshole.
I’m starting to think cheater speak is universal! I also got the “you’re an angry person!” What a great blanket generalization to defend all of their shitty behavior; and that’s what cheaters do, blanket their behavior with a smokescreen of generalized statements, without revealing the specific context of your anger. It’s as if they need a PowerPoint review to understand what would make a partner angry.
PowerPoint Review for Dummies ….
(Bait & switch) Manage impressions by Lying to partner about who you are ( beliefs and morals) behaving one way in public and the complete opposite in private >>>>> result: partner is angry
Lock yourself in bedroom to watch porn for hours while wife takes care of 3 toddlers >>>>>> result: partner is angry.
Dismiss wife’s feelings about porn and hook-up site use >>>>>> result: partner is angry
Progressively spend more and more time finding excuses to be away from home to pursue pornography >>>>>> result: partner is angry
Cover up behavior with omissions, pontification, half truths, plausible deniability, excuses, blameshifting, gaslighting >>>>>>> result: partner is angry
Break marital contract by sleeping with prostitutes and strippers >>>>>>>> result: partner is angry.
Note to dummies; reversing the behavior and result is a function of the disordered, does not justify your behavior, and generally … just makes you a consequence dodging douche whom doesn’t wish to take responsibility for their behavior.
Disclaimer: PowerPoint Review for Dummies is not responsible for negative outcomes. If you do not understand this elementary review on basic decency, emotions and respect, please seek therapy STAT!
Standing ovation! 🙂
James Bond and I are now officially divorced.
I was fine until I got the news from my attorney, and the past few days I have been crying.
I always thought he would change, not for me, but for the love and fear of God, from encouragement of family and Faith and friends, and maybe a little for love of me . . .
Yes, I guess I smoked the hopium, deep-down, even though I talked tough, I kept on hoping until the end. And now I am divorced.
I know he was a piece of shit. I know about the prostitutes, affairs, constantly seducing women in social settings, online sex, porn, masterbation. Yah. A real piece of shit.
I didn’t want to live alone, grow old alone. I know that divorce is better than the hell of living with him and his demons. It’s better than being a front to his decadent ways.
During pre-divorce, I have built a new life for myself. I was feeling mighty. Now that the divorce is final, I guess I’m facing the reality: he will not change, we are divorced. Maybe it’s a shock. I’m feeling a little shaky with my new identity: DIVORCED OLDER WOMAN — lonely, sad, abandoned by cheater.
It’s just the shock of another milestone hit. If you have been feeling mighty you will again. Give yourself time to grieve today and then go back to mighty tomorrow.
I have been driving hard to get the divorce over as soon as possible (might be Sep 5, or not depending on availability of courthouse staff that day) to get it over with, but I also know I will be an emotional wreck that day no matter how mighty I feel the day before. As many have said here, the path to meh is two steps forward, one step back. We have to trust that we’ll get there.
And you don’t have to have another guy in your life to not die alone. Other people will care about you. Rely on your friends, any close relatives you may have, and CN when you are feeling alone.
Thanks ChumpinRecovery
I appreciate your words of encouragement
This whole ordeal is just so hard. I’m sorry for your pain, QueenMother. When I get really low and hollow, I read and re-read the poem Invictus by William Ernest Henley. I’m posting it for you in hopes that you can draw some strength from it as well. (((Hugs)))
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.
Yes, it gives me strength, thank you very much JesssMom
I get you. I’ve been divorced for four months and I still have nights where I sob. I really want to stop feeling this way.
I do pretty good until I have to turn the kids over for “visitation” and allow them to be props in his new “faux family” with his whore and her 3 kids. Her divorce was final on the 11th. Her husband helped her and his kids move in before the ink was dry on mine and asshole’s divorce order. I had a conversation about it with Mr. Whore where he told me she was a terrible wife, but a good mom and that he was ok with her fucking my husband because “the heart wants what it wants.”
I’ve concluded that Mr. Whore was also fucking someone else besides his whore wife and that I am the only one of us out of the 4 who has been faithful to their vows.
But I hear you. It gets better. This is just a bad few days, but you will get past it.
Thank you Sunflower36
Whoa, I can see a future where you have all of the kids with you because of those three sub-human “parents”
I will not be parenting her children. I have 8 of my own including 3 with the new ex, (My son passed away 10 years ago)
I do feel sorry for them that their parents are such cheating douche bags, they’re nice kids and they get along well with my kids. However, my kids will be at their bio-donor’s house as little as possible. The whore will not fuck up MY kids as well as her own.
Yeah, Mr. Schmoopie was also a cheater. Sometimes I am as mad at him as I am at her for giving her an excuse to stray and no reason to stick with him so why not convince my idiot husband to run off with her. They have five kids together and no sane parent.
It’s seems so unjust when we are the ones who were faithful, true and honest and now we are the only ones left alone holding the bag of responsibility. Thank god I know my kids love and appreciate me.
Same on being the only one in four who wasn’t a cheater. It really makes me think how did I get here? Cheating would never be an option for me. People talk about revenge affairs, can’t even imagine. Someday the divorce will be final and yet right now, the idea of dating again is as off the wall as me developing a lpassion for studying quantum physics.
I’d rather study quantum physics, if only so I could prove I can handle it after that was the subject that causes STBX to flunk out of grad school. 🙂
Caused not causes
I’m sorry you are feeling sad. I’m guessing the finality of it is accepting the death of something you once loved. I’m two years into the process and don’t see the finality anytime soon ?. Thank you for sharing, it gives other chumps a heads up about what could be lurking around the corner. I don’t think I’d feel that way, but If there’s one thing I’ve learned through this process, it is – never say never!
Even in your pain you are mightily helping others through this shitstorm! You are brave and mighty in your vulnerability! Next stop… MEH!
It is very much like grieving the dead. My heart sank the day I received the signed papers…the whole wanting to have a partner into old age, perhaps a larger family, new adventures, etc. all turned to dust and blew away. There is always time to come back, to focus on yourself and find who you are once again and allow that to attract/lead you to the right kind of people. Maybe it won’t be quite what you thought, but there are good things awaiting you in the future. That being said, I bounce back and forth daily still…it’s only been a couple months since my divorce was final. Hold tight, QueenMother. You’re already making great strides in mightying yourself. We’ll all come out on the other side one day. Hugs.
Hugs, QueenMother. It’s another step through the grief and it will subside, resurface, subside, resurface–but eventually you come to terms with it. It is shocking to realize that they probably threw out God and faith too and can’t be bothered to pretend any more. It’s too much work for them. None of us thought we’d be divorced at this age and after so many years of marriage. It’s okay to be sad. You deserved so much better. And yet, the future is wide open and all the good things you deserved from a relationship can still be yours. I wish you the absolute best in your cheater-free life.
I wasn’t giddy with glee when my divorce was finalized. I got the email from my attorney while I was out of town for a work conference. I got that pit in my stomach of pain and anxiety. I texted my best friend and she replied ‘Happy for you. Congratulations!’. I didn’t feel victorious or happy–just sad.
My ex was in the twu wuv stages and was anxious to get rid of me as fast as he could. Dday #2 was first of May 2016 and divorce final by end of September. Almost 20 years together and two teenagers together. He did the same thing 10+ years earlier – left as fast as he could for twice divorced howorker. He had moved out of our home, wanted it sold immediately, pushed for a quick divorce, ditched me and our 2 & 4 year old kids to pursue the twu wuvs. Gone for 6 months and the grass wasn’t greener and wanted to come back. I took him back to keep our family together.
I knew he would likely follow suit this time too. My goal was to get that quick divorce before he changed his mind. It worked. He was agreeable to everything I wanted so he could run off into the sunset with Schmoopie 2.0. I got the house, most of the stuff, great child support, and ‘liberal visitation’ schedule cause it never occurred to him the kids wouldn’t want much to do with him.
He’s all sad sausage now. Not sure if there’s a schmoopie 2.0, but I think she’s been gone a while now. Kids spend minimum amount of time with him. He’s trying to change the custody arrangement. He’s texting for stuff from the house. Sorry, not sorry asshole. Hope that sunset you ran off to is burning your sorry arse.
Nice.
MJB? This story makes me feel better.
Queen mother, I am not divorced yet and I really can’t predict how I will feel when that day comes but I think your reaction seems very normal.
I love the analogy that these scumbag cheaters who fooled us are as deep as a puddle. I think your reaction proves your thoughtfulness, compassion and emotions run deep like an ocean. Take care of yourself as everyone says and these feelings too shall pass.
I guess it’s the finality of it all. Like the marriage was brain dead but on life support. The divorce is the removal of life support and end of the hopium. Although I was pretty mighty with Dday #2 and kicked him out and filed, my heart took longer to catch up. It’s hard to reconcile this is who they are. You are grasping at straws of trying to figure out what happened so you can fix it. It’s so hard to reconcile the years of your life with this person and how they can do this to their life partner, their children, their pets, friends and family, their whole life. How the destruction of their choices didn’t keep them from moving ahead with the betrayal.
I don’t really think my ex is pure evil. He’s not cruel like some others ex’s. I really can’t imagine how horrible this kind of vindictive cheater is for chumps. But what my ex did was absolutely horrible to me and my kids. He pursued our daughter’s 20-something assistant soccer coach while he was also volunteer coaching. Can anyone imagine how devastating this is for a child? How humiliating for her at school and with her teammates. How humiliating for our son who attends the same high school. How humiliating for me to sit with the other parents we’ve known for years while he’s sitting on the sidelines canoodling with schmoopie.
He told me at the time ‘I’m sorry you got hurt’. Now he tells the kids ‘I didn’t mean to hurt anybody’. I believe he didn’t set out to purposefully hurt people. He’s just so entitled and self centered he didn’t care how it would affect anyone else. As long as he felt the butterflies of this girl telling him what a great dad he was, going to expensive dinners with schmoopie and using our daughter as schmoopie bait so this girl would go and bask in the glow of his wallet, inviting her to tour the hospital cause he’s a doctor-then she can tell him how great and smart he is, him inviting her and paying for an expensive overseas trip that he’d been planning for him and our daughter for months, telling our daughter she can stay in another room and he could share with schmoopie. Okay – as I type this out I realize he must be pure evil. The spackle is strong even a year out.
MJB, Thank you for your last 2 sentences!!! I was reading your post, and really questioning, how can you not think he is evil, how can you be so kind, what is wrong with me and then I got to the end and breathed a sigh of relief.
Ok, yours is pure evil for having your daughter so closely involved, but I think this part was true for my STBX, at lest in the beginning:
“:I believe he didn’t set out to purposefully hurt people. He’s just so entitled and self centered he didn’t care how it would affect anyone else.”
The thing that gets me is that STBX still doesn’t care. He had a chance to turn it around and he chose to continue down the path of destruction. He is now desperately trying to make it ok for everyone but me so that I am the only one who gets hurt. Just one sacrificial lamb so everyone else can be happy. I think that is going to be a tough one for the kids though because they love me and they know how much his relationship with her hurts me even without me saying so out loud.
I am sure STBX will try to paint me as the selfish one however for not just swallowing that shit sandwich and telling everyone his relationship with the slut is just dandy and fine with me.
I disagree chumpinrecovery,I believe they do set out to purposely hurt people because they are evil. They all know that cheating is wrong and that it hurts people, their entitlement makes them not care. They just want to control. Instead of empathizing with the chump’s pain, they feel power which is what they crave. They blame shift anyway so it doesn’t matter that they cause the pain. They are evil.
Like others have said, healing is not linear. Those feeling mighty feelings will come back, I promise! Hugs!!!
So sorry, Queen Mother. I suspect you really are not fated to spend the rest of your life alone, and that in the new life you built for yourself you will find friends who are genuine decent people that will ultimately leave you less lonely than the hell of living with James Bond. I just filed 2 months ago, and one of the big reasons I never had the cajones (ovaries?) to do it before was the idealized “growing old together.” But you know what? As a health care provider, I see what a hellish nightmare it can be to be the caretaker of a sick, elderly spouse, and that’s even for folks that had a GOOD marriage. Every time you fear the “growing old alone” thing, just think how your alternatives would have been either: 1.) you pushing his wheelchair and wiping his ass when he’s old and disabled, which, with the way he treated you, he does not deserve, or 2.) having him pushing YOUR wheelchair and having the power to say when to “pull the plug”, once caring for you becomes inconvenient / too much work. By comparison, growing old alone ain’t so bad.
I’m proud to be a divorced older woman. It means I had the courage to drop the jackass and move on with my life.
Queen,
Yours was a good post because of all the wonderful feedback. I could copy your post word for word.
Especially “I didn’t want to live alone, grow old alone” and “I’m feeling a little shaky with my new identity: DIVORCED OLDER WOMAN — lonely, sad, abandoned by cheater.”
Except, instead of James Bond, I call my cheater Baron Sparkledick von Phucking und Phoresight since he is supposed to be a foresight guru. In fact, so good at foresight he is full of debts and thus tried to reconcile with me (I have no debts).
But his mediocre excuses and nonexistent moral reasoning just made me angrier at myself for spackling for so long. And, lucky for me, I had a crystal ball to see how it was going to be if I forgave the cheater in the form of Sparkledick Sr., my FIL, who treated my MIL even worse (she did not work and when he would be off with his AP she would not have $ to EAT). I could just see Sparkledick Jr. prancing around, snorting orders and pretending nothing had ever been wrong except me growing old and becoming tired of his incompetence.
I’m 65 and counting the minutes until my lawyers tell me I am officially divorced. I jump every time I get an email. I will then run to get the deed to my house and sell it and start a new life doing what I always wanted to do, but that cheater was too accommodated in his narcissistic, feel-good ways to take on.
I agree with MJB, it’s the finality of it all. “Like the marriage was brain dead but on life support. The divorce is the removal of life support and end of the hopium.”
It is indeed “so hard to reconcile the years of your life with this person and how they can do this to their life partner, their children, their pets, friends and family, their whole life”. My cheater did not request a single picture of his children in our agreement or even ASK about our pets.
My son who is living with him (and suffering because of it) tells me he has been blaming me for his debts and professional failure (so much for reconciliation), but he spent his birthday at some fancy hotel and had an artist sketch a self portrait.
So, as LisaLisa says, “I’m PROUD to be a divorced older woman. It means I had the COURAGE to drop the jackass and move on with my life.” That is exactly how I am facing the future.
We are NOT alone, we were before! I would love to be your friend, we have common feelings.
And JessMom, we are indeed the captains of our fate!
Here’s another proud soon-to-be older divorced woman. I still grieve over what I thought I had. He was quite content to stay married to me. Couldn’t believe when I filed. Whenever I get a little weepy and think about going back, I make myself remember what exactly it is I’d be going back to. A man who had it all and it still wasn’t enough. Me, our kids, our family-we were never enough. I can not, nor do I want to, compete with strippers. My adult daughter told me a couple of women have said to her they wished they had my courage. Years ago, I gave him a second chance. It may take awhile, but eventually you find out. I choose to live an authentic life. Trust they suck.
Yes, they certainly do suck. One of my very good friends found out her husband had a girlfriend when their daughter was not quite two. She kicked him out immediately and filed for divorce within the week. He had the nerve to tell her that she was being “dramatic” and that he “never said he wanted a divorce”. They were in their late twenties at the time. I would like to think that it had something to do with being married too young and being too immature to make a lifetime commitment at 22, but the more I hear, the more I believe that he would have just sucked more with time. She was devastated, and worried she would never find someone who would want a single mom with a toddler. That was a little over four years ago, and she is now in a committed relationship with a very nice guy, living together, and they just had their first child together about seven months ago. She always says that her ex was never nearly as nice and kind to her as her new boyfriend is, and bonus for him, he is also very good to her daughter. There is a good life on the other side of this BS!!
My current frame-of-mind when I read this dreck from cheaters is, Who Cares?
Who cares that you think the chump is mean.
Who cares that you minimize your affair.
Who cares that you come up with false equivalencies (“well, you put too much cinnamon on my toast”).
Who cares that they want to maintain the facade of control when the chump throws them out.
Who cares that their wittle feewings are hurt.
Who cares that they blame the chump for being so flawed they HAD to cheat (#nootheroption).
Who cares what the cheater thinks at all.
Cheated on your loyal spouse? You’re a cipher. Game over, you lose. Now GTFO and STFU.
Tempest,
You make me smile.
I love your posts!
Just wishing there had been a Tempest older sister, just like you, in my day years ago.
You rock girl
You give me strength!
Can’t say enough words of praise and admiration for YOU!
Tell it like it is,
Listen Chumps!
?
P.S. Tempest,
Please, if possible, re run Lucy in the little blue dress with GTFO and STFU.
All Chumps need a smile and Lucy was mine.
Thank you!
Here you go, Peacekeeper!
Thank you Tempest,
That’s my girl, Lucy in the little blue dress,
She says it like it is!
“Who cares that you come up with false equivalencies?”
One that I got was that I liked the cats more than I liked the dog.
For real.
That is pretty astounding. No wonder he cheated (eyeroll).
Agreed. Because after they leave, life is so much better. Sometimes I get a nagging feeling because I shared 12 of my years with my cheater X and for some reason, I don’t want him to think ill of me. It’s then that I have to bitchslap myself and remember this is exact mantra, “Who the hell cares what he thinks?”
Blameshifting is a truly dark art. It’s purpose is not just to distract people from the the cheaters and their deeds; it does so by reinforcing the unfair advantage that cheaters insist on:
They know the truth; the chumps stay in the dark.
They refuse accountability but insist that the trump be accountable for the whole relationship.
They’ve broken every aspect of the marital agreement. But chumps are required not only to live up to their end; they’re expected to do the cheaters’ part, too.
Cheaters can be angry and abusive; chumps must be “nice.”
Cheaters have power and control; chumps get to stay in the relationship if they give up power and control.
Total asymmetrical power dynamic.
A dark art- I love it! It appears a lot of us were married to master artists. How is that for a positive spin?
I was angry. Too angry! Look at the expression on your face!
Mean, angry Gonna just told him ” behold what you have created”.
Total waste of breath. Too subtle for him. A well-aimed ball peen hammer would be too subtle.
It’s a no win situation. We will be to blame no matter how we act. I was nice through the divorce although I prefer to call it behaving honorable. I wasn’t going to get down in the mud with him. My being nice didn’t coincide with the bitch tale he had going. None of this was justified in his mind if I wasn’t a bitch! So he amped up the abuse until I was forced to take a stand. Until I was forced to call the police for my own safety. Then I became the bitch he told everyone I was. Definitely a no win situation with these assholes.
I received the same feedback from cheater X. 3 years out from DDay, we were still married and I was finally ready for divorce. Just could not do the dysfunction and craziness anymore. I had been as “nice” as I could be. I offered to take on our joint debt which of course, he eagerly agreed to. He got my gorgeous pots and pans, my beautiful place settings and he kept our savings. I thought I was being very generous in our divorce settlement – there wasn’t much to split, but my attorney/dad gave me the best advice and that was to let as much go as possible because it really won’t matter in the end. You can buy new pots and pans and new place settings. I have the job, so I can make more money. He didn’t have a job and I knew it would be some time before he got one because, well, I knew him and he hates to work. I thought I was setting him up well. Yet, approximately a week before we (yes, I was there helping) moved him out, he said that I had become mean. There is nothing, NOTHING that you can do for these people that is good enough.
Thank goodness I don’t have to listen to his gobbledy gook anymore.
My CH told me he likes it when I am nice. He said I should be sweet like I used to be. My answer, “Oh, that girl? She’s gone. You killed her.”
I always remember my therapist saying, “The appropriate response to injustice is rage.”
I’ve thought about that a lot, because I am not really comfortable with my angry self. It’s very un-Zen, tends to lack compassion and empathy, life goals for me. However, when I step back and look at the sorts of things that incite my anger — people cutting to the front of a line of traffic, racist politics, people who abuse those in their care (whether humans or nonhumans) — I get more comfortable, because it’s appropriate.
So when I was angry with XH, it was always based on injustice. It wasn’t fair that he knew the whole story while keeping me in the dark. Not fair that he promised me he’d be a better person than he was actually capable of. Not fair that his personality type (NPD) was the type that allowed him to skip off unscathed into the arms of a woman half my age, that our culture and society not only permitted that but secretly, with a wink and a nudge, lauded it. That all our friends fell for it, too, because, damn, look how HAPPY he is!
Nice? As someone once said here, I’m not “nice,” but I am “kind.” Just not around injustice.
NWBiblio — well put! Your therapist is wise. The things you list are the kinds of things that make my blood boil too. X could never make the correlation. To him, I’m just an angry person. I know he’s wrong, or I would have a lot less support behind me. For anger in the face of injustice to be acceptable, there has to first be an injustice, and they don’t permit themselves to see this as fact. We, and those who are supportive of our righteous rage, know better.
My ex was a racist and a bigot – and the things he said just outraged me. He also had little to no empathy for people – and I am an empath to the core. I hated how he lied to people (and lied to me). I hated how he manipulated people – and me. So when we’d get into fights and I’d try to get him to understand, the anger just came rolling off me in waves because he didn’t see an issue with his actions or behavior. He used to tell me that he hated my anger. Well, to be honest, I hated it, too, but after YEARS of dealing with his bullshit, it was always right there underneath the surface.
The night I confronted him over the affair, I had never felt such rage and grief in my life. They collided together and produced one hell of an explosion. My therapist put it like this: “you were like an animal, backed into a corner, and you were doing everything in your power to protect yourself.”
Why do cheaters think they deserve nice. How delusional is that? My cheater calls me a bitch now. I hope he means that because maybe he will realize the old chump is gone and the bitch is not putting up with his crap anymore.
My cheater had the audacity to ask me why he would come back to me when I was so angry? Another feeble justification to solidify his leaving and making it because I was unhappy. He told me so many times that I was unhappy and that he tried so hard to make me happy.
In fact, I’m seeing a guy who is the exact same way. Sigh.
I’m an asshole magnet.
Sunflower, I hope you don’t keep seeing this guy. You deserve better!!!
Exactly why do they deserve nice? Are they nice to us?? Breaking vows, destroying families, putting their penis in someone else, all the while telling us lies, ruining children’s lives, . Which part of all that is nice? NONE of it.
I’m not nice because I got upset when I saw from other woman’s Facebook page that she was going to a cabin with her family for Christmas. The same cabin I found husband looking at 2 weeks before on the internet. In the town we had been looking at for 2 years to buy land. I didn’t even mad when I asked why it was the same cabin. Got the deer in the headlight look and the I have no idea that could happen. I only got mad when he told me they had discussed going to cabin together. Of course he told me he only told me what I wanted to hear. ( at the counselors three days later) Right?
I think the cabin sounds like the whole lack of originality thing that has been discussed on here before. Cheaters do not have imaginations and/or they are simply trying to overwrite history.
I’m not sure what you really mean.
Maybe I read your story incorrectly, but I thought he was bringing her to a cabin that you had both been looking at previously. At the very least, he was taking her to a place in the same town in which you had planned on buying land together.
Just saying that cheaters try to recreate what they did with you with the AP because of either a lack of original thought (cheaters tend to not have their own personalities and mirror whoever they’re targeting in order to lure them in) or “correcting” their life’s narrative by taking the AP where the two of you had once been, thus overwriting the experience for themselves.
We had never looked at that specific cabin. He was looking at it one night when I walked into the room. He showed it to me of course. Two weeks later, I see she is going with her family to a cabin for Christmas. The same town we had been looking at for land. She put up pictures and I looked. I recognized it as it had some distinctive kitchen features I loved. I didn’t confront my husband until the next night. I can be a great actress plus my kids had been thru enough with us dealing with this stuff for a couple of months. So, he was speechless literally. I never even said, were you going to go there with her. A couple of weeks later I told him he needed to explain it. Keep in mind it was Christmas time and I was holding it together for kids. I asked. He screamed he would tell me the truth. That Yes!! They were going to go to cabin together. We didn’t speak for 3 days until next counseling appt. Of course he says he didn’t mean it. Counselor tells him to apologize and he does. Funny thing, this woman and I have about 50 mutual friends. So when I finally have 2 text messages with her, one dear friend contacts me. I told her what this shit is about. Her husband is the one who recommended my husband for work. I also tell her about the cabin. Of course she calls me back a couple of days later to tell me she’s talked with her. I told her things but not everything as I wasn’t sure how close they were. They ended up being closer then what I thought. After she gave me her opinion of it all… I’ll spare you… she proceeds to tell me the last thing this woman said to her was that it was ashamed she couldn’t hire my husband anymore because he’s good at what he does. Like I don’t know that and took it as a dig. Kind of funny how her cabin pictures disappeared from her page but are still on her husbands as he has no idea!! I should have left then!!
Oh, I totally think cheaters lack originality.
When the ex told me that his whore reads all of his text messages ( which he never let me do) I told her that everything he’s doing with her, he’s already done with me and that the main reason he has a new woman was so that he didn’t have to come up with anything new.
Then I sent her a link to Black Label Society’s Another Spoke in the Wheel.
Wish you were nice means which you were naive, unsuspecting and spineless, so I can continue cheating on you. Most chumps were nice, i.e. unsuspecting, which got them in trouble in the first place. These cheaters want us dumb, stupid and brainless, so they can perpetrate their fraud on us.
Mine called me on my 50th birthday to say happy birthday from our holiday home, which he had just had to go to with work colleagues. Splutter , cough.
He then hung up v quickly as clearly that “special colleague” had come up the stairs.
Yet when I became angry as more and more shit came out, guess who was being “too angry”?
His best line though was to tell me that the reason he had to cheat ( all the time as it happened) was because I hadn’t pursued a job more. I worked until I had child 2. (he earned good money, was always away, I had 3 small children, by then lived in a foreign country due to his work, barely spoke the language,and managed property). Somehow he was Mr Fabulous and I did nothing.
Trust me, if you worked full time that would have been the reason that he cheated. Ask me how I know?
Yes, I can attest to that one too.
Yes, I have heard the…. Mom is angry and just wants to keep bringing this up.
Twisting yourself into omega shapes and “being nice” is futile. Because of a wonderful cheater jedi mind control tactic called moving the goalposts. You will never be enough, you will never do it right, nor improve – no matter WHAT you do. You will be faulted for doing the exact same thing you were told last week you did not do enough of.
I always wondered if this was a deliberate mind fuck, or a subconscious thing the cheater mind does to justify their actions and validate their actions. My cheater, for years of therapy and me pick me dancing, absolutely believed his ever changing complaints every time he pooped one off.
I used to stare at his face to see if he actually believed the *(&^%&^ he was spouting. I am convinced 100% that he did. Every time.
Magneto,
??♀️☝️
EXACTLY!
My ex was able to manipulate linear time by reversing it when she was caught banging my cousin.
When the inevitable unpleasant conversation occurred she said “you see how unpleasant this is? That’s exactly why I’m with Someone else.”
In other words, the current unpleasantness somehow caused her to cheat in an earlier time.
A truly amazing feat of metaphysics and linear time manipulation. Hats off to her. Bravo. She blinded me with science.
LOL Rick. I’m sure it was infuriating to hear such nonsense at the time, but looking back, yes, that is a clear case of twisted cheater “logic” and, at the same time, a marvel of science. Looking forward to reading that thesis.
Ohhhh…Rick, I wish I could whack some sense into her with a 2×4 for you.
They really do believe that they’re geniuses don’t they…
Love a good 80s reference Rick!
“Grace, you made me miserable for five years!”.
He made me endure five years of living hell trying to make it work with him.
He made me endure his affair with his best friend’s fiancé.
He made me endure his DUI wrecking my car, paid off no less, in the process.
He made me endure learning that a prostitute was in my car when he wrecked it.
He made me endure learning that his stomach problems were, in fact, him sexting in the bathroom with his AP.
He made me endure hearing his AP call me ma’am.
He made my daughter endure seeing his AP’s name written on his chest and telling her she was seeing things.
He made my son endure getting the crap beat out of him and having CPS go to his school.
The list is endless but I made him miserable?!
His life is imploding and I am trying very hard not to feel the deep satisfaction that it brings me. If that makes me mean and not nice…so be it.
If that’s the reality he lives in, then there’s a bridge I want to sell him. If I’m gonna pay off my student loans I might as well use cheater cash.
It is insane how they rationalize everything.
I got the “why wont you help me with my taxes, why are you so short with me, Ive been very kind and respectful.”
Yes princess, you are very kind and respectful. You cheated on me. Divorced me while claiming I abused the children and you. Yes whatever you say princess…..NC is the only way.
after years of being DX instructed me to “play nice or I would be sorry” presumably sorrier than I already was to have discovered his lying and cheating. However I’d found CL and lawyered up. He emailed how he was “disappointed” to hear from a lawyer. Mhahahaha
being nice I meant. can’t even type that phrase anymore,
I was “nice” for too many years, even when the emotional & verbal abuse kicked off. But from dday – not so much. I changed in a split second into a demonic harpy. There are generations of women in my family with terrible tempers which I didn’t seem to have inherited – but I think I channeled them all!
I very rarely swear, but I used words I’d never used before, I hacked his email, bank accounts etc (just to monitor him), I broke things and threw things. Then I started to lie and gaslight HIM – boy, did I mess with his head. And I actually became that “controlling bitch who ruined his life” that he accused me of before dday.
Shortly after I managed to kick him out with the help of my solicitor, I felt really ashamed of the horrible person I’d turned into for a few months. Aside from the odd flare-up if someone pisses me off now (not a bad thing!), I’m back to the “nice” person that everyone recognises.
With hindsight, that “demonic harpy” saved me, and while she isn’t a particularly “nice” person to be around, I’m glad she’ll be waiting in the shadows should I ever need her again.
Sounds mighty and necessary. Well done.
We are currently trying to sell a property. (personally very sad about this). We have spent every xmas there for most of my children’s lives. It is in the court order to be sold.
He has done – precisely zero about selling it.
I received an email ” I have bent over backwards in order for this to be sold”.
Nope. Done de nada.
How can anybody actually write this drivel?? This IS DONALD TRUMP. If I write it, and I say it, therefore it is true.
No.
Yet my ex is a very succesfull CEO here in the UK, and Trump is CEO of USA. It is scary. This shit works. Fake it til you make it etc.
Also he would clearly stand up in a court and insist he has done all sorts of things. In my experience the other real problem is nobody asks him for proof.
The POSH still tells me that he “laughs at me fore being so angry” or tells me “how does it feel to be a miserable person”. These comments came after I stopped being nice for the sake of our newborn daughter and playing the pick me dance and went No Contact. Now questions about our daughter are answered and if it is a yes no question I answer with “Yes” or “No”. No added language is needed. When I answer “yes” or “no” I’m a miserable person he laughs at. If I answer more, he calls me a bitch or the “c” word (which is really awesome that our infant daughter has already hear the C word and it was her father calling her mother that all because she said “yes she still gets 6 ounces of formula. same as last week”.
I feel I am always in a lose lose situation. No matter what I try to do to minimize the aggressiveness he has towards me it always backfires. Which first makes me upset and then I get angry that he still has that power to upset me. However, in my POSHs case, he takes anger as kibbles. If I’m angry, he knows I still care and he still has some power over my emotions.
IIWII, you are doing a great job. He’s furious with you because you won’t play his games. He’s abusing you, insulting you and you are doing a great Grey Rock job. Don’t let him rattle you. You may feel you are always in a lose situation but you’re winning and that’s why he is trying the rage on you. Big hugs to you, this must be so hard with an infant. Stick to your Yes/No, very short BIFF replies and you’ll make it. You’re mighty.
Kiwi is so right. He is behaving that way because you are getting to him. Don’t let him get to you. Continue with BIFF and grey rock. Protect yourself and protect your daughter. Be sure to document everything. Whether you need it or not, is irrelevant.
I am sorry you are going through this but it will pass and peace will return on Tuesday. *hugs*
-No cheaters, narcs, or sociopaths
-No distant, avoidant types
-No grumpy jerks
-No emotional neglect or abuse
-No commitment phobes
-No LDRs
-No “projects”
-No one with effed up pasts who refuse therapy
-No addictions
-No gaslighting
-No accountability allergies
I post this today for my formerly chumpy self to remind me that I raised my bar much higher after my chumped experience. I no longer care about untangling skeins or to spend time with someone with whom I don’t even like myself, when I’m around them. A good relationship brings out your best self, and your real self, and your not-nice self, because sometimes you have to be honest to work through relationship problems. I used to make the mistake of watching the person I was dating, rather than myself; all the signs were right inside me, all along. Fuck being pleasant when someone is metaphorically bashing in my skull with the frying pan. The above is a just a twist on “take my abuse with a smile.”
They really do have a handbook.
K, I love your list. I think I need to print it out as a reminder when I start dating (ugh).
I was far too nice in my marriage. I put up with far too much. I SPACKLED the hell out of him.
Now I’m so relieved it’s over. Yes, it’s still painful to realize he’s already moved on with his whore and thinks that getting marriage will make everything magically better. But now I’ve started to feel sorry for him rather than be jealous. Who wants to live that kind of life, where you’re constantly trying to justify your actions and ignore the fact that you destroyed a marriage? Not me. That’s their fate. They can have it.
K, your list is dead on. Before I fell in love with Turdd, there were many things he did and said that would be a deal breaker for me today (porn and getting drunk weekly, not having good relationships with any of his sober family, etc.).
These types of lists are key in making sure we don’t duplicate our greatest mistakes.
On dday I was told that I was an angry person. When I asked him what he meant by that he said that I once raised my voice at a store clerk early in our marriage. WTF? We were married over 24 years. Asshole!
Good grief! What a bastard!!!
Don’t worry, “Nice” Lori will come back, as soon as she signs the divorce papers, gets a fair settlement and doesn’t have to put up with a huge asshole anymore. Her life will be very nice, indeed. Sayonara Fucktard!
Just piggybacking on the “nice” word. One of the things that drove me crazy about the Worm was his use of the “nice” word to be an asshole.
He would non-compliment me by saying, “you look nice”, like it killed him to give me an actual compliment. Like I didn’t deserve an actual compliment. What a wormy little weasel.
I left because I didn’t like what he was turning me into……let’s just say I wasn’t nice…..until I left……now I exude niceness! I am nice nice nice!?
I will NEVER be “nice” to my ex-husband, his family or any of his friends ever again!
I was “nice” to everyone for well over 20 years. I put-up with all my ex put me through for all those years and still remained “nice” to him. Forgave. Spackled. Believed. I put up with being manipulated by his mommy for about the same amount of time. Kept trying to be a good DIL. Kept trying to win their love and approval — never could do enough for that family! They always wanted more! “Martha will do it!”
His friends believe him over me, even though I was the one who was 100% faithful our entire relationship. I wasn’t the one who got caught out on a date with a newly divorced woman (he’s a predator of women). He got caught in many, many lies post D-Day. But still they chose to believe him. All of them, including is family. They couldn’t believe (or didn’t want to accept) that Mr. Perfect and Special Cheaterpants was truly who I said he was! Goodbye ex-family and friends! I have no room in my life for users anymore!
I will never ever be “nice” to them again. I won’t even pretend niceness. I won’t even be civil “for the sake of the children.” I wouldn’t want my kids to put up with people using and abusing them. Why would I model that behavior for them ever again?!
I have not posted in a while and I did not read all the comments, so I doubt I am saying anything unique. I have been through this in two marriages and have been divorced for over 10 years now from my second cheating wife, 21 years from my first. And, I have become sort of obsessed to learn all I can about cheaters and infidelity. This led me to learn about Personality Disorders, NPD, BPD etc. I am no expert by any means but I read about this stuff and have talked to a lot of people who have been betrayed and cheaters, too.
It is very , very common for cheaters to take the tack this cheater has and to claim some deficiency in their spouse led them to cheat. This is well known, not breaking any news here. Very few of these folks seem to wake up down the road and realize that they fabricated their justification for cheating. Most, I have found, cling to the notion that they were justified and driven to it for the remainder of their lives.
The hard part for me and other betrayed folks I have spoken to is to resist buying it to some extent.
Most of the time, I am pretty certain that I had nothing to do with causing the cheating. It helps that I discovered that both my XWs had been OWs in their past, long before they knew me. And it helps me that quite a few people, including both XW’s family members and friends who knew them before I was on the scene, have come to me and disclosed things about my XW’s past and how others perceived them.
But, as all of us probably can, I can think of things I regret having done in my marriages. Nothing egregious like abuse or ongoing neglect or anything. More like working too much ( needed to ) or, even more so, volunteering to do too much of the childcare and household stuff, such that it was lopsided and my XWs got way more leisure time than I did.
So, once in a while, I wonder if I may have contributed. I was tired a lot, working three jobs to keep up with my second XW’s spending and I was way to agreeable to staying home nights with the kids while they both went out frequently at night.
These cheaters are not good people at heart. They are, for the most part, way more selfish and narcissistic than a normal person. And, in addition to being practice liars, are very good at blameshifting and making one doubt oneself.
Many are really good at new age word salad phrases, too, and they , often have supporters who tell them what they want to hear about their justifications.
best to just go NC with them ads they are so fucking toxic.
This expectation from the Ex, friends, family, counselors, court, society, church etc that you are the one that looks poorly if you don’t act a certain way makes me crazy… and further enrages me! I have sent my ex many truthful expressive accounts of his actions and that of his mistress and the ramifications it has had or will have on myself and his daughter. But, over the last couple of months I have stopped. I end up texting the messages and sending then to myself or write them in a journal. So many times I have bitten my tongue from telling his family the full truth of everything from years past to the current lies and deception, or refrained from texting the things I have wanted to say to him or his family in fear that I would be the looked at as the one that deserved it. His family doesn’t even know of the first affair he had when I was 6 months pregnant. I want to tell them but I just don’t know if I should.
I just don’t know why we are looked at negatively when we express our anger. It is our lives that are blown apart because of their coward, selfish, lying cheating ways! I want to let him and everyone else know what a liar and cheater he is. The advice that I get is it won’t do any good. You are the one that looks bitter. I just don’t get it. No wonder people cheat. There is no accountability! Everyone looks the other way! But chump, smile away as you wipe the shit sandwich off your face. That is the expected way!
If they have been through it, they understand. Otherwise, forget about a non betrayed person ever getting it.