Apparently, many of us stood in the way of cheater greatness. One thing I noticed, reading all the stories here, is how so many chumps just crush dreams and place unreasonable burdens of responsibility on cheaters. If it weren’t for you, he’d be a rock ‘n roll star! She’d realize her FULL POTENTIAL! He would’ve known what it is to truly LOVE!
The affair partner is just a lifeline out of the stultifying existence you created. Once released from your toxic grip, I’m sure they’ll move on to Greater Things. It’s their destiny after all.
So, you meddlesome kids, tell me what you did to thwart their ambitions? And how’s that better life working out for them now?
Better yet, how’s it working out for you?
Mine always dreamed of being governor. Somehow the fact that he’s not is all my fault — it has nothing to do with the fact he never got off his computer (surfing porn and sexting) and actually did any of the work that would lead to elected office. Also, I kept him from attending fancy embassy parties. I’m honestly not sure how that happened, since he was never invited to any.
He was sure, though, with each and every affair partner and cybersex partner, that she would be the one who could propel him to greatness. Not sure how that works with a semi-literate 25-year-old stripper with a domestic violence conviction, but I obviously lack imagination.
But now that I’ve got all his emails, phone messages, sexts, porn, and fetish chats from the last 12 years, I can guarantee you that he will never, ever be governor now. [insert Hamilton gif here]
Well, to his credit, a semi-literate 25 year-old stripper with a criminal background IS more likely to be invited to embassy parties than he is… but as her cuckold, he’s too stupid to realize that the invitation would *not* extend to him.
insistonhonesty, that is an excellent point! Ha!
Yay!
Too bad his contemporaries that do make it to office will likely share in his recreational tastes. I’ve known many politicians, enough to know I wish I didn’t know about the BS and shenanigans that run rampant in those circles. I generally say that the only reason they aren’t all embroiled in scandal is that they share a “gentleman’s agreement” that they will all stay mum about one another’s torrid secrets so they can all keep engaging in them.
But when an outsider has the data? Different ball game. You go, Mutterchump.
Mutter that made me laugh out loud!!!
LOL! this one made me laugh out loud for real. Oh my goodness. What a fantasy world they live in! Thanks for the giggles on this Friday morning.
Never Gonna Be President Now!
https://goo.gl/images/KX9Mg4
I guess you made him throw away his shot…
Loving the Hamilton allusions!
What a fool! He was supposed to have the sex scandal AFTER he was elected to office. Hasn’t he ever watched the news!?
Ok so maybe you are the reason he can’t be elected now (you have the evidence), but that wasn’t true before he cheated on you.
Haha! Mutterchump – I too laughed out loud. Priceless!
“He was sure, though, with each and every affair partner and cybersex partner, that she would be the one who could propel him to greatness. Not sure how that works with a semi-literate 25-year-old stripper with a domestic violence conviction, but I obviously lack imagination.”
Mutterchump, so sorry for your “lack of imagination”! And shame on you for keeping your pig of an X from all those fancy-schmancy parties! But I’m sure his “semi-literate 25-year-old stripper with a domestic violence conviction” will fit in fine if he ever does get one of them. Which he won’t with all the dirt you have on him! LOL
Ok. Just so we’re in context here and since we’ve got people from across the pond here… are you talking a governor of a state, like here in the US? Doesn’t governor mean something different in the U.K.?
Just want to understand fully.
Me? I developed a permanent incurable disability. After him berating and dumping on me, expecting me to deal with his sociopathic mother FOR him ( hell no), expecting me to stay at a job where I was abused daily so he could have his art studio after I’d developed spastic colon and had surgery, after I had children and he refused me even part time help so I was alone with them all day every day (he went to his clubs and events and barely broke stride while I went without a shower for days) I got sick. Any “vacation” was a death march and more than five hours sleep was frowned on.
When the paralysis first hit he would yank the sheets off the bed and scream WHERE ARE YOUR DREAMS? He lied to people and called me lazy. On and on. At the doctor office he was Mr Compassion but as soon as we left?
We aren’t together anymore but he’s stopped paying my deductibles and expects me to pay him back for everything when he makes $200K and I get $12k a year. Of course it’s all my fault. I got sick and have severe chronic pain ON PURPOSE. He owns two boats and fully loaded Mercedes. But I’m bankrupting him by continuing to be sick.
Over the years 90% of people realized he’s a liar. That’s my fault too. LOL
IBC -Please get an attorney asap and file. Get temporary financial ordersHe’s pissing away community funds and you have a right to your share of that money. Get access to accounts that contain marital assets Don’t wait till it’s gone! . My attorney cautioned me specifically not to stop paying for his health coverage- a case here where husband cut off wife’s healthcare and ended up paying back premiums, out of pockets, and attorney fees to her. There’s a big imbalance in your incomes. The court will do something to help- I’m no fan of family court but surely you will do better than what’s happening now. Wish you the best.
He lost all of his best staff members. I helped them secure other jobs just before I left the country, and they all abandoned him at once (about 1 week after I left). They didn’t want to stay working for him once they knew I was gone for good. He never paid them right, and he treated them badly. Just a chauvanistic pig! The staff and I made it look like they had all just coincidently received better job offers. So, he was none the wiser that they’d left due to him being a major asshole and me not coming back. As he didn’t know I was not coming back until about 6weeks later. They all kept quiet. Team work ????????
Also, I don’t know if I should share this, but WTH, you only live once. And I know y’all would love this one – during my days of snooping for evidence post-DDay, I discovered that some of his relatives (who were also living in the same country we were living and working in) were running an illegal business and also didn’t have the right work visas. They too had staff members they were underpaying and treating like crap. They’d been doing it for many years, and I had had no idea!! I had thought it was a legit business. But, nope! So…after I left him at the airport and was back in my home country with the kids, I contacted a friend back in that country who had contacts with immigration officers, and told them what I knew. His relatives were visited by immigration officers exactly 2 weeks later, detained, then deported to their home country within a matter of days. They have been blacklisted for 3 years. Now he has no relatives living in that country with him. He’s living there all alone, with no family members. Just like I was. Hope the schmoopies were worth it!
Well played! Sounds like the lot of them are crooked. Wow.
Thank you! Yes, and I actually discovered that he too was doing a lot of crooked things. I could have easily gotten him deported along with them. And I wanted to. But I held off on the advice of my friend with the immigration contacts. She said to not give him an excuse to stop paying child support (if he gets deported, he’ll lose his job and have difficulty finding employment back in his home country). So, I let him be.
Oh, and he has no idea that it was ME who got his family members deported. No idea. At all. Clueless. Doesn’t even know I have a friend with immigration contacts. #UnderestimatedMeYetAgain ????
Brilliant! Oh my gosh, you are my hero LHATA that is fucking amazing.
I know! I’m still amazed that it even happened ???????? I told immigration what I knew, and didn’t know if/when they were going to approach the relatives in question. And 2 weeks later they were on his relatives’ doorstep. I think I was lucky, as it was all very timely – immigration had been on a several-months blitz of trying catching foreigners working illegally in the country. So, they were eager to follow up my tip-off.
This should be a movie.
ANC, I know, it doesn’t seem real. But it all really happened. When I sit back and think about what occurred and what i did, I don’t even know how I managed to pull it all off!?
I think Chump Lady should be a TV series, as there are some great plot lines from Chump Nation. My story is particularly juicy because I left him at the airport, in the foreign country we were living in, with him none the wiser of my plans. I was going with the kids on one of my regular biannual trips back home to see family, and he was staying behind in the country to work (and screw hookers). He had no idea that I knew about his double life, and had no idea that I was actually leaving him for good. That shock announcement dumbfounded him about 6weeks later, after I had spent the time back home lawyering up and going down all the legal pathways to ensure I could separate from him and have custody of the kids.
My story is also a little unique in that I was lucky enough to have had a major ally during my post-DDay “snooping and collating evidenced phase” – a disgruntled employee of his (who was still working for him at the time) that volunteered a wealth of information and reports of his whereabouts on the daily. I don’t any other chump that’s had that, so I consider myself extremely lucky because I had a huge advantage.
My story also involves 3 countries, with 3 different languages and cultures. Its all a bit messed up – in that intriguing, crazy TV series kinda way ????
That is brilliant! Like they think about us, “You don’t know do you?” I love it! You just inspired me to keep pressing on. My nightmare is starting to take a turn CN! Just a little while longer!
Wow, Nightmare Live, it warms the cockles of my heart knowing that your nightmare is taking a turn. I hope it’s almost over for you. Hang in there! I too was living a nightmare – luckily for me I only had to fly under the radar and fake it for about 5months. It was a mad time, I don’t know how I got through it. Had no appetite, lost a lot of weight (which I have put back on, DOH!), had to pretend that I didn’t know anything. It was indeed a nightmare.
And yes, it’s f**king fabulous knowing that he has no idea about the part I played in having his relatives deported. They aren’t nice people. Always treated the local people as though they were beneath them. High and mighty. I can’t stand that shit. So, I was happy to help send them packing!
BONUS part – I am good friends with his cousin, the daughter of his relatives that were deported. (She has no idea either, none of them do.) But, it worked out better for her that her family are back home, anyway. She has a son with a disability, and she has to work full time. Now that her family are back with her in their home country, they are helping her take care of him while she works (they have time on their hands, as only one of them has been able to secure employment back home). She is constantly telling me how happy she is that they finally came home (they had been gone for more than 12 years), albeit under weird circumstances (being deported and blacklisted). So, I grinned even wider about it all – because cheaterpants has no idea what I did (haha, I know something you don’t know, wanker!), and BONUS, his lovely cousin now has her family back home to help her, and is elated! Win-win. ????????
Underestimating us fellow chumps is the cheater’s choice of drug and is also ultimately their undoing.
https://cdn.someecards.com/someecards/usercards/underestimate-me-that-will-be-fun-d85a5.png
I know, I LOVE that he underestimated me. Totally thought I was a clueless bitch. I really played dumb leading up to my departure, which helped keep him in that line of thinking. He still thinks I’m dumb. But there’s plenty I know that he doesn’t know, and he would have no idea. Example; only a few days ago, one of his old staff members reported to me that he now has a new car. Valuable piece of info that was, because he has been trying to stop paying child support, claiming he’s broke and cannot afford it. Bahahahahaha, speak more liar to me honey, I love it! He tried to not pay this month, and I kept pushing for it, knowing he absolutely had the money and was just being a tightwad. He paid late, more than halfway through the month. No biggie – just means the next isntallment comes quicker now! And he won’t wanna try his “I’m broke” shit on me when he doesn’t want to pay. Because I know about the new 4WD, sweetie ???????? #KnowledgeIsPowerMyFriend #MehLifeIsGrand
I should mention – we were living in a “developing” country, where it is very easy for people in power/with money to manipulate the local, poor population. Local staff are fantastic, yet severely underpaid and under appreciated. It was easy to find them other jobs – I enlisted some of my close local friends to help me find them better jobs. So, when they all left him at once, his life was thrown into chaos for quite a while, as these had been staff members he had had for many years. They were good at their job and could be trusted. It was hard for him to find staff to replace them, because he had to start from zero again, with new people. I heard he went through several different staff members and rotations before he managed to get his skeleton staff secured. Suffer, asshole, suffer ????
Left Him at the Airport,
This is priceless ! Made my day to hear a story of schadenfreude
Wow, LHATA! I’m a couple of days late (speaking of airports, I’ve Just spent 24 hours inside five different airplanes), but I Just have to compliment you for this feat. Continue taking Care of YOU!
BTW, I saw the Wizard of Lies on the flight entertainment. Chump Lady should comment one day on Ruth Madoff. I Just gasped at the last scene where BernieBoy asks Henriques if she thinks he is a sociopath like Ted Bundy. My fellow passenger jumped when I banged the tray and almost shouted “Yes!”.
ClearWaters, thank you ???? And yes, I am taking good care of myself and the kids. Life is great back home with family. We are very blessed.
I haven’t seen Wizard of Lies, must check it out!
And if there are any film producers out there interested in my story, hit me up ???? Just kidding ???? (No, not kidding ????)
For my Ex, only his work was important. Everything else – including me – was just in the way. So now he lives with his barely literate sugar-baby whore who has no interest in him outside of his money.
I have to say, he truly is happy now. He never wanted a partnership, and hated the demands of being in a real relationship. Now, he just needs to open his wallet and everybody’s happy. Sugar-baby can go shopping, and he has all the unobstructed time in the world to be with his first and only Twu Wuv – his work.
Were we married to the same Cheater?
Mine was a workaholic. He grudgingly took me out to dinner once per week, and then stopped that because take-out was easier. He didn’t want to cultivate any friends at work, which is ironic as that’s where he met Schmoopie, and refused invitations to go out with them so that we could expand our social circle. When my grad school friends moved away, he declined meeting up with my colleagues and work friends.
Apparently my problem was that I never acknowledged his greatness. So many other people around him also failed to recognize his genius, too. Schmoopie did, though. She was one of his employees, and as soon as he started buying lunch for his office, she realized just how great he was.
It’s not working out so well, though. She filed for divorce less than a year after they married. Apparently she recognizes greatness as measured by other people’s money. Who could have seen that coming?
I’m sure he’s now trying to seek adulation from some other woman he meets at work.
My ex was going to have a chain of restaurants. It was my illness that prevented it. Of course there was also the fact that he couldn’t delegate and people hated working for him……..but it was my illnesses that held him back.
Now with his new GF he sold the restaurant and is some sort of catering chef for a local college. Livin the dream baby!
The good news is she let him (or perhaps purchased for him) a waverunner, so every weekend he drives 2 hours to where it is docked, drives around on it for 2 hours then drives home. Good times, eh?
Oh – I forgot – I didn’t kiss him like I loved him. Which is true. I kissed him like I might get a disease.
My list of offences is long:
1. I stopped him having kids and carrying on his mother’s name. Err, neither of us EVER wanted kids, plus his mum remarried and had a different name…
2. The house was too big and I kept it too clean, plus I did all his laundry. Oops, sorry!
3. I “controlled” what he ate. High blood pressure /cholesterol, plus a couple of nasty food allergies thrown in – yep, so sorry for caring!
4. I “controlled” the finances and household budget. Again, sorry for being the adult.
5. I’m too old for him (I’m 15 years younger), too intelligent and can take care of myself. That’s fine, Schmoopie is 21 years younger than him, very overweight and thick, so win-win!
6. And yes, he DID want to be a rock star and I prevented that. Nothing to do with the fact his music is crap!
I don’t know how it’s working out for him thanks to NC, nor do I care. My life however, is great: a lovely clean house all to myself, no debts (mortgage aside), I can eat anything I like, and I no longer have to pretend I like his crappy guitar playing!! Good luck Schmoopie, he’s all your’s now…
I was too clean too! I am not even a neat freak of some sort. I just believed in keeping a house at habitable standards. It’s not like I ever asked him to help me, or, nagged at him to not make messes. I just went behind him dutifully picking up his messes for a decade. Apparently that was exerting an intolerable amount of control. Once I watched him make a sandwich directly on the kitchen counter (no cutting board or plate), look over at me, hold the sandwich up , shake it, watch crumbs and a slab of mayo covered tomato fall, smirk and walk out trailing mess all the way. Asshole.
I think we were married to the same jerk! I am not a neat freak either, but I do like things clean. I did everything round the house, and on the rare occasions he vacuumed out of the blue, he expected praise! He once told me I was ironing his polo shirts “the wrong way”, and he used to run his finger along the slats of the living room blinds and complain if they were dusty.
He was a complete slob – the sink was always full of razor hair, he used to cut his toenails over the bath and leave them there, and his leather recliner, don’t go there, it was a bio hazard (I sold it).
Nope, not missing him at all! ????
Yup, “neat freak” here too. I sincerely think they believe that the clean up fairy makes home nice and tidy. It can’t be that boring, troublesome ol’ housework that Mom & Dad used to have to do. Except your X asshole, Jojobee…that’s just plain spiteful.
Thanks for saying so. Over the years he had me half convinced my “insane” standards were to blame!
Every time Shithead would deign to do a household repair, he’d leave me a huge mess. He “joked” that was so I knew he did something! Haha. Bastard.
During one of my STBXH periods of out of control manic behavior, he came into my home (at the front door) to drop our kids off. He had taken the kids with his parents to a bounce house place for the day. His father came in with him to say goodbye to the kids. It was pouring rain and I had mopped the night before. I told my kids to wipe their feet well on a fresh towel I had put down (pouring rain plus toddlers plus tile floor do not mix well). Anyway, STBXH heard me tell the kids to take their shoes off as I had just mopped and they were all so muddy. So STBXH proceeds to stamp his muddy boots all over my floor and then grind the dirt into the tiles and grout. He looked me in the eyes and smiled while doing this.
Narkles the Clown is a borderline hoarder so by any of his standards I was a neat freak. It’s so nice to live with a clean floor. I walk through my house in the middle of the night barefoot with the lights out! I can only imagine what his house is like these days.
My STBX is one of 4 siblings. Every single one of the others lives in a level 4 hoard, meaning pathways only between rooms, filth from pets and people all over, their homes are falling down structurally from the neglect and lack of repairs and maintenance. Absolutely mentally disturbed, every one of them. Only my STBX lived in a decent and clean home and you can guess why that was. We are going to find out just how high his piles of guitar magazines can be stacked now since he fled from his Controlling and Judgmental Wife Appliance. Gawd, he is such a fucking cartoon. “Controlling and Judgmental” is the mantra of these little boys, right along with the ILYBINILWY bullshit. Good luck to Schmoopie.
I got “I made myself small for you,” and “I don’t feel extraordinary.”
Of course, those came *after* busting her on her last affair.
Incidentally, I never did get explanations of exactly how and in what ways that I did those things, despite asking. Still waiting… somebody get me a Snickers bar, because I don’t think I’ll be going anywhere for a good long while waiting for answers on those. 🙂
This is a strange question for me … my STBX has ZERO ambition. His long-term thinking is mostly (maybe completely) nonexistent. This was super frustrating because I am a a goal-oriented type that embraces short-term sacrifice for long-term benefit (even if it is simply saving to pay off a big bill, etc.).
Though, leave it to STBX to figure out how I ruined his fantasy life. 🙂
— In the end, I learned that I was the proverbial “ball and chain” that didn’t make enough money to allow him to quit working AND to buy him whatever whimsical thing he desired … mostly video games and CDs. This is the life he wants to live. (Seriously. And he’s almost 50 for crying out loud!)
— In the end, I also learned he had held a grudge for years because I refused to get a 60-inch TV. (I swear TV size is like how he views penis size … the bigger, the more “manly”). We didn’t have the money … because he was skimming off of his paycheck without me knowing. Such an asshole.
— I also expected him to be responsible. I didn’t beg him to be — I didn’t hassle him about it — I just ASSUMED he would be (or at least would try to be). Isn’t that what normal people with children do? Adulting. It’s a thing (well, not for STBX). He held (no shit) a grudge for the entirety of our relationship because I had expectations of mature, responsible behavior.
Now he and another guy are renting a tiny house on a not-so-good side of town. But he’s thrilled because the guy’s TV is (wait for it …) 60 INCHES! And, the guy owns “thousands” of DVDs. Plus, STBX has his own gaming system. So, STBX is actually quite happy with the material part of his arrangement.
But, he wants to wreckoncile. I’m going to guess he misses kibbles … having a responsible spouse to do virtually everything except wipe his ass … and, well, honestly, I’m pretty certain he sees me as his property.
Fuck no. I am not remotely interested in being married to a rage-filled sixteen year old who inhabits a 50-year-old man’s body. Besides, my girls and I are so much more relaxed with him gone … and we have beautiful lives we are building as a much stronger family without him. Fuck him.
Your story is like mine. He can now watch the movies that he has watched 20 times over without me saying its a waste of time! Manchild!
What’s with them watching movies over and over again? Same ones every weekend. Do ypu know how mant times i have seen Wyatt Irp? Ugh!!!
Same movies and same music. Over and over and over. He’d even sit and watch a TV show episode again and again because, “I liked this episode.” All turned up uncomfortably loud. All the while on his laptop, ignoring the family. Till I wanted to scream! I settled for going to a quieter room and reading. But later, “She would NEVER sit and watch a movie with me!!!”
Can’t win.
Same movies over and over, for over 25 years. I never understood how he could be interested in a movie he had watched that many times. He’d laugh at the same lines, and turn the sound up to uncomfortable volumes during certain scenes.
Geekmom, X would watch the same sitcoms over and over, increasing the volume during his “favorite” scene. If it was a comedy, he’d laugh like it was the first time he’d heard the punchline or joke.
Ha! like geek mom, another fault I had is that I would never sit and watch a movie with him. X probably had that on his list of reasons to cheat.
Serious offenses
So much the same, aren’t they Brit? And Shithead wouldn’t watch a movie that didn’t have a car chase in it. Almost the entirety of his TV viewing was car races, shows about finding cars, car auctions.
He cried, real tears and sobs, when some stranger, on a three-year-old episode of a car restoration show, was presented with his rebuilt vehicle, yet writes off his adult son (who refuses to buy into Shithead’s rewritten version of events because son was eyewitness and knows it’s bullshit) without batting an eye.
It is beyond me.
“Manchild” really does describe these fools. I’ll never forget my nearly fifty-year-old STBX giving my his well-thought-out, soul-searched description of WHO he is and WHAT he wants out of life … “I’m a gamer. That’s who I am.” I will never forget those words.
I was stunned. He rarely played video games (that I knew about). But, I guess–like the cheating, skimming money from his checks, and the resentment for having to act like an adult–it was just another part of him he hid so damned well for more twenty years. And every piece he hid = extraordinary immaturity and entitlement.
Resentment about being expected to act like an adult – that is it entirely! And founded on entitlement. Mine wasn’t devoid of ambition but it was all for himself (great ego kibble) and to pay for his wants (needs in his eyes, of course). In the last 4 years of our relationship he bought 5 sports cars (consecutively) all over $120k (the 2nd last one was $300k although he hid that from me) as well as 5 vintage cars. The only people I ever saw admire the cars to him were teenage boys. I think most of the other people we know think they made him look like an idiot. We live in the countryside where they were completely impractical a lot of the time. Like all above, I did do most of the “adulting”, of course, but he resented being asked to do any. He moved in with OW virtually immediately after leaving and got married 5 months after leaving (we were together 20 years but not married) so I guess he got another replacement to do the adulting in his home life without skipping a beat. He is perplexed as to why our children might struggle with this though. I guess if he thinks of people as objects then why would they mind just a swap in wife appliances (or in my case pseudo-wife appliances). “Shallow” doesn’t really do it justice.
What utter bullshit these cheaters peddle. 9 times out of 10 (or possibly even 99 out of 100), we chumps were the ones that sacrificed for them, not the other way around.
My wife knew she had a losing argument if she claimed I destroyed her prior dreams, as I’d made huge sacrifices for her.
So instead, she focused on *future* dreams and claimed I was destroying those–such as my desire to have children…which she suddenly was against…while we were trying to get pregnant!
That’s me, the Destroyer of Future Dreams (sudden dreams of my wife that appeared during her affair, and then disappeared just as quickly–she and her OM now have a one-year-old).
Reading these comments, and many others here over many months, I’m starting to wonder if *any* of these idiotic cheaters are fiscally responsible or *don’t* accuse their victims/spouses of being abusive? It’s like a huge case study in fucked up, morally (& often literally) bankrupt people who never came to grips with adulthood!
You can safely assume that an inability to manage money is a sure hallmark of a cheater. Of all the cheaters I have ever known in my life, the only one who had any serious financial ability was my father, who had a mistress in Japan. He had his own business, so it was very easy for him to keep finances separate and expenditures on her undetected. If I ever start to date again, I will do more due diligence with regards to finances and financial management ability. There are lots of things a potential cheater could lie about, but following the money always tells you the most accurate story.
Count me as another chump whose cheater was massively irresponsible with money. He NEVER had money, and when he managed to get some, he spent it almost immediately. Ignored bills (which got sent to collections) and didn’t even care. Thank God my state is awesome in the child support enforcement arena. His wages are being garnished and now I can breathe a little easier.
My cheater was surprisingly not difficult with money. He didn’t make much, he wasn’t particularly good with it, but he also didn’t spend it like there was no tomorrow. As long as the bills were paid, he was good. We did not live beyond our means, and that was one of the things I did love about him.
My first husband was so bad with money, got into so much debt, ended up filing bankruptcy after he married wife #3. Owed the IRS and was making payments (thank God after me.)
Hmm interesting question.
I refused to buy my x-wife a $5,000 king size bed on credit and told her if she controlled her spending and saved some money she could pay cash for it in about 3 to 4 months. Everything went down hill after that.
HOWEVER, the guy she was having an affair with bought her the bed and she had it within 1 week of moving out to her new apartment that he got her.
Overall that was the biggest thing was money. She did not make it but she sure as hell wanted to spend it. At one point she wanted a new (not used) Nissan Armada fully loaded which is about a 40k car. I told her it was a lot of money for a car and it guzzles gas.
Fast forward to today I have no idea how she managed this after the divorce but here are the highlights.
Makes 30k a year
Has a 40k car with a car payment of almost $600 a month
Has a 340k home with a $2500 monthly payment
Has 10k in the bank
BUT she has a TON of debt including credit card debt.
In end she got everything she wanted and now she complains to our daughter she has no money LMAO!
Cheater pants got her wonder fullness all right.
Oh and it would appear the boyfriend she had the affair with (who was also married and is now divorced as well since his x-wife and I spoke to each other) has his name on many of these items left her.
Oh…. the irony!!!!! 🙂
I kept signing the kids up for sports and other activities, so that kept her from being able to get in that “4th workout” every day. Apparently the one before work (with the married personal trainer that she fooled around with), the one at lunch (with the COW boyfriend), and the one after work (with the COW boyfriend) weren’t enough.
She was like a modern day Jane Fonda – except that her cardio workouts took place in parked cars.
HOLYCOW! Your X was screwing 4 men (counting you) at the same time?
That isn’t about kibbles IMO thats an addiction at that point.
No, just 2 other guys. The COW was the same guy (and he was married too of course). And given the fact that she refused to do anything with me, I’m not sure I’d count me either…..sadly.
While not always the case, often it seems as if the faithful spouse gets the discard with respect to bedroom activities. It’s not the case of the Chump not liking those activities, but more that the Cheater just can’t seem to be as interested.
My own suspicion is that Chumps can’t compete with affair sex, even if that sex is 2 minutes in the back of the minivan avoiding pizza boxes. Unlike married sex, which is generally available when you’re interested, affair sex involves planning. The fantasy and emotional build up substitute for actual foreplay. There’s the thrill of the potential for getting caught.
Once the Chump exits the marriage, then the affair sex no longer has quite the same allure it once did.
KB, excellent point. Us needy, chumpy Chumps want a level of intimacy and trust when we have sex with our significant other.
Cheaters just want to fuck.
I’e come to realize that the sweetest kibbles to my X was probably to fuck around while deceiving me, he was such a stud, and oh chumpy me, I was too trusting…
Of course, his rationale was that if I didn’t know about it, it would not hurt me… His fucking around had nothing to do with the fact that I haven’t had a normal pap result since around the time he started his affair with gradwhore…
I agree, Chutes! Sex with my husband was a “sacred” thing to me. I don’t fuck for fucking’s sake. She did. But she did because it was all she had to hang onto him. She was disposable and she knew it. She had nothing, was nothing – that’s all she had to keep him attached and interested. Of course, they never consider that the treatment that we Chumps get OUTSIDE of the bedroom directly affect what we do INSIDE the bedroom. If you’re treating me like shit and being disrespectful, distant and trying to find every excuse not to be home…uhhh…yeah. That might impact whether or not I might to share that thing with you that I actually hold in high regard – that should be kept between me and you – that WE…together…cultivated and shared together and was uniquely OURS. Welp…not anymore. The fact that she knows the exact same shit that I do? Devastating. Heartbreaking. That shit was MINE and he had no right to give it away.
That’s it! they just want to fuck! That explains years and years of no foreplay, no physical touching and barely looking at me during sex. most times it was a wake up poke in the back and I am expected to be fully aroused? ha! well dude; in the words of lauren ruth ward, I can make love to myself (better and more satisfying than you)
Yep. X and the neighbor were into hitting each other, and sneaking around trying to be the gossip of the neighborhood. I don’t want to compete with that! I like to think I’m more evolved, I actually learn from living, and sex is about connection and yes, love.
I think they both have arrested development, trying to be naughty? Give me a break!
The faithful spouse still gets the blame, however. “I had an affair because we weren’t having sex anymore”, or often enough, or the right kind or whatever.
True!
There was a point where he wouldn’t kiss me but would complain I didn’t want to have sex. I’m convinced it was so he could blame our sexless marriage when he did get caught.
I hope you all find love again with a worthy individual because sex with someone who is into you and cares about you is AMAZING!
I think mine had a twisted image that he was being faithful to his AP! How’s disguising is that?
During and after MC (post DD#1) he’d reject any touching from me, saying it was too much pressure. Wtf? Of course, turns out he was having affairs before, during and after MC.
Our sex was never fulfilling to me. In the early days it was ok — we were young. But it never matured into intimacy. I never got the playfulness, erotic or even the sweet pillowtalk I imagined.
I ask myself now why I didn’t kick his ass to the curb 10 years ago. Oh yeah, I was devoted to my daughter and promised myself I’d never get divorced.
I ended up on the shelf for 7 years. And it was lousy for years before that. I pray that I’ll be able to save my daughter from the same date. That she’ll learn from my mistakes. She’ll make her own fornsure, but I don’t want her to repeat mine.
Giddy, same.
I can remember only one period of time I felt truly connected to my husband sexually. That was our honeymoon and the first six months of marriage. After that, I became just a receptacle to him. It hurt me deeply.
Ironically I always felt connected to my now XH, and thought he was too. We had sex 5 times/wk on average and it was definitely fulfilling. However, once he started his on line affair he kept wanting the sex until on time he didn’t seem into it. He had fell in love with his soulmate, whom he had never met and she lived half a world away.
SO apparently he decided after a few weeks that he wanted to marry her and dump me, that’s when the sex stopped because as he said he felt like he was “cheating on her”. Gag me still makes me want to throw up.
What’s worse is that he used to say I was “the best” all the time but now he could only fantasize about what it would be like with her, especially since they had the soulmate connection. He practically killed my self esteem when declared that we had never made love because he had NEVER been in love with me.
So yeah, fuck him, NOT, I embarrasingly admit that I was pick-me-fucking until I realized that you can never compete with a fantasy. The last time we had sex was the only time I have felt nasty, degraded and used in all my sexual relations ever.
I think my wife denied me because she had already discarded me in her mind. Sure I was good enough to keep around to pay her student loans, make her car payments, and help maintain our household, but I wasn’t worthy of her attention beyond that.
So I think she viewed denying me as more of a punishment for me than anything else.
Blindside, I think my ex was similar. He had me and our two children for the sake of impression management and for keeping up the house. X was utterly repelled by the idea of investing any time or effort into me beyond securing me in the first place. So sick and so sad.
Giddy I also was on the shelf for 7 years. Basically he never had sex with me after our daughter was born. Every time I tried to flirt or start something up, he would say “Maybe if you were nicer” “Oh now you like me?” etc. After a while of this I gave up trying. I think this is the part about the affair(s) that hurt me so deeply. I was here all the time, begging for connection, and was constantly rejected by my own husband for most of our marriage. When d-day hapened 7 months ago, I was devastated. Why? Why did he cheat when I was right here willing? I can’t prove it, but I now believe he was cheating all along.
So Sex with Dr. Demento, was mechanical. I remember when I first started to live him, I wanted the same level of foreplay and intimacy as we had in the love bombing stage, you know simple things like telling me he loved me. He said, “Sometimes I don’t want to tell you I love you, sometimes I just want to fuck.” SHOULD.HAVE.RUN.
I’d get comments like “You never want to get it on” or “Why do I have to start it?”. When I would make advances to him, he’d just lay there, or refuse to kiss me, or even put his arm up and present his elbow to my face so I couldn’t approach him. Made it a little hard to start a romantic encounter.
Any wonder why our sex life was a little scant???
ringinonmyownbell, X would say, I just want to bang one out, once we were married foreplay became limited to none existent. Rarely touched me unless it was to “bang one out.” I asked why things had changed since we got married, he laughed and said, that was only to get in your pants.
What was I thinking?? So many times, especially after finding CN, I’ve wondered why I stayed and allowed myself to accept so much disrespect.
X made no effort to be intimate, or playful, or cuddle.
When we did have sex, he’d either fall asleep on his side or jump up to go downstairs to watch TV. When I’d ask for him to cuddle, or hold me, he’d say no. he’s an active guy, he’s always got to be moving. What did that make me? a lazy slob?
I didn’t see much movement while he sat in front of his computer or TV.
There were also the times when he had ED, or would be disinterested for long periods of time. I dismissed my gut feelings that he had been with someone, now that I’m wiser (thanks CN) there’s not a doubt in my mind that he’d been with someone.
Mine always wanted it at inconvenient times. I always felt like it was a test to prove how much I wanted him but now I see an even more sinister side to it. He knew how much the after cuddle meant to me. So why would he want it so bad five minutes before my morning alarm went off, or five minutes before we had to leave for somewhere when he knew there would be no time for a cuddle. He was deliberately trying to deny me a part of the experience that was important to me so he could complain that I didn’t really seem to enjoy making love to him. Well, maybe if he had paid a little more attention to meeting my needs I would have.
Our sex life was always very ordinary (at best) but I had never thought about it as abusive until I read Lundy Bancroft’s book on abusive relationships. Mine was basically very sexually withholding ie controlling. Initially, in the brief love bombing phase (a long time ago now!) we had sex virtually every day – then, very suddenly he stopped wanting to have sex with me at all for several months. The pattern then evolved into basically once a week always and only when he wanted. He literally rejected every single advance I ever made towards him – 100%, until after 2 or 3 years I just gave up making advances myself. Mostly, I complied when he wanted sex as I was quite sex-starved, and felt I should anyway, and, of course, he would be resentful and punish me if I didn’t. The frequency diminished over the years, even the pretence of intimacy vanished to the point where basically I was, like someone above said, I was simply a receptacle. Now, when I think about it, I’m sure he was very influenced in his sexuality by porn, and how much I was just an object, never mind his lack of empathy generally. In the last couple of years ours was a sexless marriage. He had gradually found it harder and harder to sustain his own performance and I’m guessing that was because of outside interests – and I had the temerity to gain weight (not that much but when there is no genuine intimacy and you are only a wanking tool that would obvious make it more difficult). He had no concept of me having my own sexual desires, thought of me as someone with a low libido (not true – just quashed by years of rejection and general contempt) and blamed me for the lack of our sex life. I have lost more than half of that weight I gained (I know it shouldn’t matter but I am feeling more confident in my body again) already and, although I’m not quite at the point of wanting to do anything about it, starting to quite like the thought of a possible future sexual relationship where it was actually fun – and sexy! I had it in previous relationships but that was all more than 20 years ago. I had sort of resigned myself to never having that again, but the thought that it is at least a possibility, is kind of nice. I will be very alert for those (numerous!!) red flags next time around though!
Yes i think these bastards play the script in their own mind that they are over the marriage…neglect to tell you anything is up …while simultaneously hating on you that youre spoiling their potential fun. In fact at one point- despite me thinking we were getting on just fine except for financial pressures he turned to me with a mwan look on his face and said ” i do everything for you lot (ie his own kids) what about ME” it was such a bizarre comment because it even sounded a childish thing to say under the circumstances of him making all the family and financial plans unilaterally anyway. So as usual i spackled away blaming stress at work. But i remember it clearly because it was his way of convincing himself he was leaving the marriage and cryptically leting me know !? Thats how fucked up with reasoning things through .
Sex is the most glaring example of stbx’s disorder. It is based on his mentality of doing something naughty behind his Mommy’s back. He has a fucked up almost inscestual relationship with her. After he left and before I went no contact, She told me she was never close to him until he was an adult . Wth, what mother says that? It was weird.
There is One incident has brought out a rage like I have never seen before in Stbx. It was something he wrote about in his hate journal and brought it up a lot during my pick me dancing. We had gon to Florida for a valentines get away. We got to our hotel late at night and I was beat. I had been to a funeral for a friend of my daughter that afternoon. This friend was someone who had been to our home on only two occasions and yet my children spoke of him and would ask when he was coming back. He had such a warm personality and a seemingly bright future ahead until he committed suicide. You might say I was emotionally drained. He had picked me up from the funeral to go directly to the airport and I had left my cell phone in the car. I shrugged off but did ask to use his phone to follow up with dd to see how things were going for her.
So hear we are at the hotel and I just want to sleep. Plane rides tend to trigger migraines for me. I guess he tried to initiate sex and I said, can we just cuddle and wait until morning? He finally said ok and waited which I thought was fine. Now he rages that was the most humiliating night of his life because he was standing naked in a hotel room and I did not jump his bones. He was sexually rejected!!! In his hate journal, he refers to the morning sex as make up sex.
Really, married 25 years- 5 kids and he was humiliated by this sexual rejection.
Never mind that he was sleeping with other women without my knowledge.
Mine was “faithful” to his AP. The weekend of D-Day he was actually messaging her the whole time, so “worried” about her welfare and if “she was ok.”
Also mine was pretty mediocre in bed. He ejaculated very quickly – but I’m not judgemental. I thought we had a strong emotional connection. I thought we loved each other I would never body shame someone and still wouldn’t.
I remember when he was blaming me for the affair. Saying that it was all my fault; I wasn’t good enough etc.
I literally said to him – “I could have gone and fucked other men because you have premature ejaculation. BUT I DIDN;T.”
He just looked at me blankly. No soul in there behind those cold eyes.
Argh… mine has been living a porn star fantasy land for months… again.. sending dick pics and masturbation videos to women on Kik.. lol… but he has the same problem.. quick to finish… I’ve been disappointed for years.. yet here I sit… no fooling around… and he’s the one thinking he’s a porn star! Lol. Too many years of this, and an affair a few years ago, which amounted in 3 bj’s.. he couldn’t screw her because he “knew it was wrong”
What a waste of time.
I don’t know which is worse. Mine is so addicted to porn/masturbation he can’t get off without running through a gymnastics routine for an hour or more, and sometimes can’t even get off, then. Oh, and its MY fault. I just don’t have the stamina to keep up with him, I’m just not attractive, enthusiastic, whatever. He thinks he’s a stud, but after a while, it is just tedious. Finish, already!!!!
For real? How does anyone have the energy for that! I try to give my spouse *** once a month and even that wears me out for a couple days after. Thankful to be a faithful wife of 25 years! I can’t imagine how painful that must have been for you.
I keep hearing all of these stories about cheating women who also like to spend and are generally high maintenance. It always bothered me that STBX couldn’t appreciate that I was low maintenance. He actually complained that I didn’t go clothes shopping often enough, didn’t get to the hairdresser often enough, didn’t own enough shoes, didn’t use that $300 purse he gave me (I dont’ usually carry a purse).
Maybe were really were just a mismatch. He would have preferred your ex. Her spending would have made him look good. At least he would have appreciated her until her spending got in the way of his spending on himself. Hard to keep the Cessna and pay for the high end cars and fashion.
Same here, ChumpinRecovery. He wanted a constantly hot wife and I was content just being me. When I did try to get all decked out he couldn’t offer me any suggestions about what he was looking for. “It ruins it if it’s not a surprise.” Ummmm…. okay. The constantly moving target of wanting something but no ability to define it. Glad to have found a wonderful guy who actually appreciates that I am low maintenance!
Inconvenient times must be in their play book. X would want it right as I would be walking towards the door leaving for an appointment. Looking back I don’t believe it was coincidence, he would use those times against me by saying I was never interested, I always turn him down.
Convenience as an excuse for him to feel sorry for himself and find it elsewhere.
I was frugal with our finances, bought clothes on sale, looked for sales when shopping.
X complained that I shopped sales, and ridicule me for being careful with our spending and insisting on having a savings account that would cover our needs for at least three months in the event his company went under or he lost his job.
I dressed casual, I’ve been complemented on my choice of clothing, I don’t think I look homeless. His complaint was I didn’t dress like a Pilot’s wife. WTF?
This coming from someone who needed to be told there were other colors besides grey he could wear. I taught him how to dress and match clothes. While we were dating all his clothes were grey. Grey shirt, pants, socks, belt and the same worn out black shoes or running shoes.
Again, I believe it’s an something else to complain about and justify their cheating.
Remember they do nothing wrong, it’s our fault they had to cheat. No surprise, Brit didn’t dress like a Pilot’s wife. She’s always looking for sales.., and left him with a boner so she’d make her appt… Our good qualities and all what we’ve done for them doesn’t enter their minds.
You could literally be describing me and my ex cheater. Are we twins? lol.
I am frugal; always was. He knew this from the start.
He said he wanted to be frugal and that he shared the same ideas as me, but his spendthrift and flashy ways indicated otherwise. He was just parroting me to lure me in. He didn’t really share my values. Clearly!
He hated that I insisted on doing a budget, and that I was trying to save 3 months of wages for our emergency account in case one or both of us lost our jobs or had a large, unexpected/serious expense. He would complain regularly, about saving. If it were up to him, we would have been tits deep in credit card depth with no savings.
That $10,000 I ended up saving for an emergency? Shit I really needed that to pay rent and move come D-Day. I will never not back myself for that. I was right. He’s a boy-man that would only have continued to drag me down.
See you at the sales, girlfriend 😉
Keep being mighty!
Thats funny . Its exactly how my ex wanker used to criticise me dressing dowdy or not wearing expensive jewelry on a daily basis…i dont think he was worried about my self esteem about looking after myself
..it was more to do with me playing the part of the high maintenance trophy wife to fit the script he had been putting about to everyone behind my back. My evil MIL even felt bold enough to call me a trophy wife to my face after helpfully counselling me against getting out of control with credit card debt cuting the stort of a friend who was bankrupt. Little did she know it was her son doing all the spending and little did i know he was blaming me!!. So when he stole my credit card out of my bag before he took off he had the perfect cover story built into the image he smeared me with. So me and the kids being left high and dry with a few dollars meant that any time i would ask him to help with bills for his OWN KIDS he would scream to everyone i was blackmailung him and trying to extort money out of him. What a complete dick. Its taken me almost 2 years to realise i married someone who was not even a ‘nice’ person.
I am a new-born chump lurker.
But THIS! oh my. My STBX blames me for everything. “I will never get ahead in life with this family” “I will never be able to travel because of you”. This is a man who left me for his AP who has 4 small children. You think life was hard with us? ha.
I love it when I hear cheaters end up with hordes of other peoples kids. Give it a year but be prepared for him circling back around to you.
My ex moved ALPO and her 3 kids in before the ink was dry on the divorce. Now they’re expecting a new baby. Her kids are 3,6 and 15. His kids are 34, 32 and 30. ( he adopted them when his first wife came with them.)
Our kids are 7 and 9 and our son would be 10 had he not passed away. I also have 5 kids from a previous marriage, 29, 27, 25, 24, and 22. Never would consider adopting them.
I wonder why he insists on dating women with young kids. I WILL say that he never, ever was inappropriate with my kids, ever. He’s an asshole, but not THAT BIG of an asshole.
But, it’s weird. It’s not like he cares about kids. He hasn’t given mine the time of day since he left.
I’m in the middle of it all right now, a really ugly divorce. The other night, he hit me again. Nothing like how he done in the past, but it was still a hit. And this time, I had a witness. Previously, he’d pushed me in 3 different pregnancies. Even years later, there was no remorse. He’d say it didn’t count because it didn’t hurt (only it HAD hurt). Another time, he threw me on the bed and proceeded to choke me in front of 3 babies. He convinced me not to call the cops. Told me it would ruin his business and career and then we (I) would have nothing. This time, I called the police. This time he was arrested. This time, he spent 2 nights in jail. This time, I filed a Domestic Violence Injunction to protect me and also the kids. This time, I know I won’t have to see him again or deal with him for a while. The irony is that in my deposition, his attorney gave me a hard time for not having proof that he has been physically abusive with me before, and now, his attorney is trying to get me to drop charges for the very thing he called me out for less than 3 months ago. So, no worries it’s going to be my fault when this is held against him. If only I’d stayed quiet, he’d be a millionaire entrepreneur by now. Asswipe.
Oh Stronger, please tell s that you are somewhere safe now and NEVER ever returning to that Hell. Protect yourself and your kids…if he was ever going to be a decent human, he would have done it long ago, there is NO redeeming a person who chose this behavior.
Way to be mighty. Have you read “Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men” by Lundy Bancroft? It’s well worth reading, or listening to on audio.
Keep smashing those dreams of control and authority over you!
I’m sending you a huge hug, Stronger. I’m so sorry — how utterly horrific for you and your kids.
I was so happy when I got to “This time, I called the police.” That was so mighty!!! For a billion reasons this was a mighty move on your part — but the biggest reason being that it will help to provide you and your kids with a measure of safety.
Take good care of yourself.
I am so glad you got out. Kudos to you! Do whatever you need to keep that SOB away.
Wonderful to hear, Stronger! Nothing takes the wind out of an abuser’s sails like a little time in the Pokey. Keep yourself and your little ones safe.
Do what you have to when it comes to staying safe.
Leaving Troy is the most dangerous time. Take advantage of everything offers to you. If you don’t feel comfortable with the domestic violence help available in your area reach out to the next closest shelter. Narkles the Clown did work at our local shelter so he knew where it was. The next closest shelter understood why I came to them and helped me even though I did not live in their area.
Truly is the most dangerous time.
My apologies to anyone named Troy.
My 1st husband was physically abusive. I was married to him for 15 years before he beat the living shit out of me and threatened to kill me, in front of our 5 kids. The county attorney told me “enough is a goddamn enough! If you don’t leave him, the next time I see you will be in a body bag!” I kicked him out, put a restraining order on him, and eventually had to put in a no stalking order. I went NC with him and now our kids are grown, I see him very little and am totally at Meh as far as he’s concerned. He is truly not even a blip on my radar.
I totally empathize with the fear of having an abusive ex. It takes awhile to come out of that and feel okay. The money was tight and I had 5 kids to raise, but the peace in my house after he was gone was so worth it. I never regretted ending it when I did.
However, I was so desensitized to inappropriate behavior when I found Mr. Twatwaffles, that the only bar for a man treating me well, was to not live beyond our means and not beat me. Looking back, there were so many signs that he was not good for me either, and I spackled the hell out of it. My kids pegged him a long time ago, but they knew I was happy, so they were quiet about it.
So that would be my advice, Stronger. Be careful about men after this. Fix your picker…I know mine needs a major overhaul.
Oh me! I did!
After I found out after the affair he informed me that part of the reason was because of his decades long unhappiness since according to him he “never wanted to move to *city in the Midwest* and he never wanted to get married or have a baby but I pressured him all into it.” When he told me that I asked why he didn’t say anything earlier and he insisted that I would have just made him anyway. (Shit, man, I wish I had known I had that Power I would have used it for much better things!) Apparently he has wanted to move to Southern California with his college buddies to relive the glory days and continue recording music as a band.
Okay….
So now he’s living in the exact same house in the Midwest with a new mistress wife and a step daughter in addition to his. Money is a ton tighter than it ever was with me. But he does seem to go out to So Cal to visit his college buddies once a year and once they did a little recording. But he did that when we were married so pretty much nothing has changed for him. But it’s probably all my fault somehow. I will say that I told him if he wants to move to California I’m totally fine raising our daughter alone. So don’t let us stand in the way of his great music career. He didn’t take the offer, funny how that worked out.
I’m sure his excuse now is that he can’t leave to pursue his dreams because of his daughter and needing “to be there for her.” Not that he gives a shit; it’s just his excuse for why he isn’t as sparkly as he could be.
He was just switching out kibble sources. It’s an open question for me where their grandiosity (“I could be the greatest if only for you”) plays into their cheating.
LOL, yes, if only we realized what power we had over their lives… Idjits.
Strawberry Jellyfish,
Mine wanted to be a professional poker player or have his own fishing show.
Apparently, being married to me and raising a family was the reason neither of those dreams were realized. I suck…..I’m a killer of dreams.
The part that you touched on that just blows my mind is that all he did was trade down. I’m not speaking of the mistress he left us for, I’m talking about how now he’s got a girlfriend he lives with, is raising her 9yr old girl and 12yr old boy (our kids are D20,S26) he lives in this shitty rental house ( I got the house,alimony, pension, 401k). He can’t afford to fish OR play poker…..
I don’t get it. The life he has now is exactly what he described as what he hated about being married to me, all carpool and dance recitals. She even has a pug and he hates dogs.
He’s living the life we had 15 years ago….but now he’s too poor to leave even her.
Do they not think a step or two ahead when they do this shit?
“Do they not think a step or two ahead when they do this shit?”
No
StrawberryJellyfish & Paintwidow – I can relate to both you its almost scary!
StrawberryJellyfish – The POSH told me after DDay that he never wanted to move from central Texas to north Texas, never wanted to get married, never wanted to buy a home, never wanted to have a baby. DDay was 2 months before my daughter was born. EVERYTHING I forced him to do. He said he was no longer willing to sacrifice his happiness for me. I told him “well i’m glad you finally grew a pair of balls. I feel sorry that you let me control your life because you were too damn scared to be a man and leave me sooner”. He swears I gave him an ultimatum. The only thing I ever told him was “I want children. If you do not want children then we shouldn’t be together”. This was back when we were dating! That’s a normal conversation to have when you are in a new relationship to determine if yall want the same thing! Maybe that is an ultimatum but it wasn’t something I was willing to sacrifice. He always talked about us having kids. It wasnt until the OW got hired that he decided he didn’t want kids. Shocker…
He never took responsibility for his own life. Throughout our relationship he always threw it in my face “well we live here because of you. I moved here because you wanted to be near your family.” so many times I told him “we can live wherever you want! I will follow you anywhere. but you have to go find your job there. I am not quiting my job first when you haven’t done anything to move where you want to go.” He is STILL at this job, now living with a girl that works for him, and her family is from this area! I think its safe to say he doesn’t plan on leaving north texas.
PaintWidow – the POSH is a huge gambler and fisher. Gambling is a classic trait of narcissist. The POSH skipped his grandfathers funeral to go to Vegas. He argued with all of his family that the trip was planned months ago and he would lose all his reservation money. Meanwhile I drove 5 hours to be attend the funeral without him while he was in Vegas. (should have been a red flag but I spackled…) 2 days after we brought our daughter home from the hospital he said to me “I’m going fishing. Just because you have to be stuck in this house with her doesn’t mean I have to be. I’m not giving up my hobbies for yall”. Now whether or not he went fishing or to the OW is irrelevant at this point.
Ha. When my STBX wanted to move us half way across the country I said “we can’t move unless one of us gets a job there”. So he found me a job there and we moved. He is the one who found the job posting and filled out the application then sprung me with the news when I got home from work that day. I will admit, the job was a good fit so I took over and did my part to land it after that, but still.
Oh I have a friend going through this right now. Husband never wanted to get married or have kids or own a home or…or…or. 17 years, a house, 2 kids (oldest 14) later and he decided to tell her this…after she asked why he took his computer with him on a solo vacation.
My friend is currently spackling like crazy because she says she can’t raise her kids on her own. It’s OK I’ll just be over here waiting with a hug and the number to my kick ass attorney.
Paintwidow, you cracked me up! Thank you!
He wanted “his own fishing show.”
An aspiration that I find amusing. Dreams of fishing show glory.
His own fishing show???? Wow. Just. Wow.
Oh! Girl! Same!
I ‘disempowered’ and ‘entrapped him.’ He never wanted a house, marriage or kids, but funny how when I asked him when we first met, and multiple times since then, he would go on and on about how he wanted what I wanted… saying that we were “going to grow old together” and even adding further embellishments like hearing the ‘the little pitter patter of tiny feet’ in our home.
Luckily (for me) we never bought the house or had the kids.
Because come D-Day, he told me that his life would be amazing if it wasn’t for me. That I was essentially, holding him back from his ‘true, vibrant self.’
And, even more – that when he died, he didn’t want to look back and think that his life had been wasted. That he had been an emotionless, unhappy robot! OMG! The dramah! He even had me hating me for a second!
Because everything wrong with the world that was MY fault. Clearly. I had driven him to cheat!
Fucking wanker.
Happy he’s gone.
NLB – omg! I’m sorry – what a colossal fuckstick. Good riddance
Mine wanted his PhD. He wanted to be addressed as “Dr. Cheaterpants”! He did finally get it at the ripe age of 61. He was certain (as was Schmoopie) that it was the ticket to a high paying, little effort, sparkly job. Unfortunately, it pigeon holed him in the job market and his best offer was at 93,000 a year. It was less than the job he left to go live with the whore. She was very upset as she had left her husband who was hauling in a quarter of a million a year! Just after his “dream” was realized, he became sick and couldn’t work at all! It didn’t take Schmoopie long to realize she had hitched her wagon to the wrong horse. She became a vile bitch over this and he couldn’t take the constant pushing she was doing to get him to apply for the “right” jobs. Fantasy met reality and it was ugly. His PhD never did any good for him. It came with a 130,000 dollar price tag though! He died at 62 and never got a job in his field! Colossal Fail!
Gosh Roberta, when did he die? You told us he was sick …
Were you OK with it?
Hugs
Kunty Kibbler told MC #1 that she was promised the opportunity to go to patisserie school once our daughters reached a certain age and after we moved back to Massachusetts after living in the Midwest for 3 years.
MC called her on her bullshit. KK ended 15 minutes on the topic by saying, “I feel like I was promised something, and whenever I bring it up all I hear (from UXworld) is ‘no, no, no’.”
MC said, “But UXworld isn’t saying no. I’ve heard him say several times, ‘let’s find a way to make it work, come up with a plan for how this can happen without going into debt we can’t manage’.”
He sent her home with an assignment to start such a plan, but of course she never did anything but look up schools online.
I often reflect on how I dodged a bullet — I shudder to think about how much deep shit I’d be in if went into debt to satisfy her sudden need to become whatever she thought she was going to be, and cheated anyway.
(No indications yet that this continues to be an issue for her, or if Rider of the Purple Dildo is inclined to indulge it. I doubt it seriously. Most likely, it was a way to demonstrate how I was at fault for her unhappiness.)
Hang on… she wanted to be a professional CAKE maker? Interesting choice of jobs.
I yield to your greatness, CL — I did not make that immediate connection.
Yes, that’s some irony there.
What she really wanted was for you to go to patisserie school and make cakes for her. That’s why she never made a proper plan, just whinged.
LOL! True! I didn’t see that until you pointed it out. ????
Bwahahahahaha!
Awesome to start off the day with a healthy laugh. 🙂
Good laugh Chump Lady! Of course KK didn’t pursue this. What cheater actually makes cake for anyone? It’s much better when served to them by a chump.
I caught it and thought “now that’s some kind of tart”
Slow clap for this gem, Happily!
LOL! If only she could MAKE the cake, then she wouldn’t have to be chasing it endlessly…
I love this!!! ????????????
Mine named all sorts of issues with me and the only thing that infuriated him more than the supposed problems was me solving them.
Yes! This. I am in the same boat. Thank you for the chuckle.
You dodged a giant bullet on that one!
XH gave up a rather well paying job to go back to school for 7 years.
I will give him credit – he graduated and works in his field. He is very intelligent.
However, enter Miss Piggy during his Masters degree. So, not only does he meet his soul mate at school while I raise small children and juggle married life with limited financial and emotional support but he ends the marriage with BD the first week of HIS new career.
Can you say sucker?!?!
Thank God KC had no follow through on her education – let her figure that one out on her own!!!
ba ha ha! Oh god… A PROFESSIONAL CAKE MAKER. I can’t.
You gotta laugh or you’ll cry.
But trust a cheater to just look up schools online but never actually come up with a realistic plan to achieve anything. But then whinge and blame everything on their chump.
Let’s see:
I had the children we both agreed we wanted. That of course, ‘ruined’ my body, so he needed to look at porn to see those perfect bodies he desired.
Then, I actively parented the children we both agreed we wanted. Left me a bit tired to be working full time, pretty much solo parenting, and solo cleaning the house, and solo cooking. Then, I was selfish enough to try to get three of four hours of sleep at night, so he just ‘had’ to go jack off to porn.
I encouraged him to ‘be careful’ since he had visions of being his old teenage self and running marathons. Then, I was a big ‘downer’ is telling him that I thought he hurt himself in his ‘trainings’. And then, I didn’t kiss his boo boo enough when he had indeed fractured his leg trying to become a big running start and impress all the girls on porn hub.
I spent too much time working, since I was always trying to get in extra hours as we seemed to not be financially where we should have been for the amount of money we made. Silly me, didn’t account for his paying webcam girls for ‘private sessions’ and sending them birthday gifts so he would get special attention in chat rooms.
I also ‘got fat’ because I gained five pounds in thirteen years of marriage. That, of course, kept him from having the ‘hot wife’ he deserved.
Good Lord. Hyperfocused on skeevy sex much, Sir Cheatsalot?
Sooo…my STBX! Everything is about me not being good enough, sexy enough, fun enough, and going places with him. When it was really just about his poor “whittle winky”!!
How about spend a tiny, tiny bit of the time you’re spending on porn trying to be a good husband. Seriously! Who wants a guy who gets all his moves from pornhub and Craigslist bitches. I mean damn! My husband kept trying to do terribly weird stuff to me over the years and I had no idea what he wanted or how to make him feel satisfied in anyway! How could I?! I am as busy being a normal human being raising 3 awesome kids and working my full time teaching job and part time nights at our local college (more time for winky and prohub and more money for prostitution). I had no clue what I was up against until I saw his mygoogleactivity. If you have their email and password , google “myactivity google”. You can see EVERYTHING they have ever googled while logged in to their email. And- there is NO legal assumption of privacy for married people. The computer is in your house and he is your spouse. There is no assumption of privacy. I have had two lawyers tell me this and they are GOOD lawyers. Anyway- once I saw his google searches and could click on the porn he was watching – it was like “oh my GOD!” This is what he wanted!!!???? This is what he was trying to act out with me?!!! Plus I found the most horrible pictures of him and this 50+bisexual doing things with rope and black binder clips that are nauseating to anyone with normal mental health.
Black binder clips? Ouch. What was their safe word–Office Max?
LOL Tempest! I had a vision of Miracle Max’s face for Office Max…
Thanks Tempest, afternoon coffee all over the desk.
Tempest, I love you. You’ve just made my week. 😀
Mine complained that we only had three children instead of the four he wanted but also complained that the kids got too much of my attention. So having that fourth child was supposed to free up more time for him?
You see when you have four children it’s an even number so you can pair them up, tell them to hold hands and then lock them outside for hours at a time while you wait on the fifth, overgrown child you married.
Coolbreezeout your post really hits home. What a shithead. I had the same shithole husband and it’s infuriating. Sir Narc A Lot believed that me bringing up planning for the child that we both planned on having caused him complete mental overload that he could be stuck with a wife with stretch marks *gasp!* and that I would no longer be a proper “sexy boat ornament” in a bikini. Because of the chance he would get his wife pregnant he now needed to only jerk off. And now I was disgusting because I was also 5 pounds more than on our wedding day. If I had a dark tan I wouldnt have ruined our marriage and forced him onto Tinder and I also left him no choice but to spend our money on full nude lap dances. And my jeans… If I didn’t wear jeans he wouldn’t have cheated because other women wear mini skirts???? I wasn’t living up to my full potential because I sometimes wore pajamas after working a 10 hour day and serving him dinner and dessert… so ya know… the sight of me was horrifying in my pajamas so he needed to watch Web cam girls on his phone. Then he needed to text our friends to tell them I was wearing pajamas and am a horror of a typical wife. He too didn’t have the hot wife he deserved so he was totally justified because i forced him to be a lying cheating stealing piece of shit. My medium tanned skin was not as tan as strippers and prostitutes so my fault. He told me he was marrying me a couple months after I met him but my parents forced him to marry me and he’s pissed off now that he didn’t get a paid tropical honeymoon… we just got a paid regular island honeymoon. Poor fucker was dooped again! He wanted a wife that made more money than him… so that’s what I did. I’m younger but I managed to make more money than him… buttttt… other women have more time to text him all fucking day. Again I ruined his dreams because I texted him every 20 minutes. The whores can text every minute. I am the biggest disappointment and my abuse for the last 2 years was my fault. because jeans. because slow texting thumb. because skin color. because “cheap” in-laws. because pajamas.
because jeans. SO TRUE!
because walks
because weight
because anal
because brains
because facials
because religion
Simplest list I ever made. Stupidest one, too.
Because we’re human and they are shallow puddles
One of the (few) funny moments during the year our divorce was progressing-we lived in the house together.
X announces “I’m buying a guitar!” Defiantly, petulantly. As if I’ve been standing in the way of his (ha!) rock star dreams. First time I’d heard in 15 years that he had any sort of musical inclination or aspirations.
I heard him “playing” his guitar a few times. Just caught a glimpse of the dust-covered case at his place the other day.
But don’t forget, the spouse is always the problem-never the narc!
My STBX had 8 guitars, including a very expensive ‘signature’ Gibson from his man-crush rock god hero. I gave him 2 of those guitars over our 31 year relationship. You can bet that these as well as the half-dozen guns he took from the house are listed as line items on our divorce split of assets- if he is going to keep all those toys I want an equivalent shift in cash headed my way, and I am getting it.
He sucks at playing. He tried to play guitar for our daughter’s 6th grade promotion event while she stood and sang in front of her whole class and all the parents. He goofed up and had to restart, of course, and she burst into tears. It was so embarrassing for her at that tender age and she will never forget the humiliation. Maybe if he had practiced more or chosen a simpler arrangement he could have managed to get through it without ruining the event for her, but it was not to be. He found a way to blame me for some of her pain though, (and in his childish mind he probably believes it was also something I did that was also the reason he messed up). He didn’t want me to take pictures that evening because it was going to be too stressful for her to remember– see, it wasn’t his massive fuck up that caused her pain, it was my wanting to take pictures of her 6th grade promotion. Such a selfish jerk.
This guitar thing must be a pathognomic thing with Male cheaters… Mine bought FOUR after the D-day mess plus accessories.
Haha! Mine had at least 13 guitars. They would appear out of nowhere. I found an invoice for one that I believe he bought to impress the OW and it cost $2000. My X could play, but never played anything remotely interesting to any human being. Just played random technical picking and strumming farmer tunes. I hope the OW enjoys his obsessive playing of those boring ads sings as much as I did.
I meant ass songs. Damn spell check.
Oh if it wasn’tfor me Narkles the Clown would be a millionaire, with all my buying food for the child and clothes for his growing body. I just bled him dry. Apparently all those posh Vegas restaurants I never went to have “whores eat free” specials and living a double life and supporting his Flying Whore habit didn’t cost anything it was all those peanut butter and jelly sandwiches or my dreaded habit of making my own lunch or just skipping it at work while he dined out every day. All the drama of being on the brink of financial failure. I don’t miss that. LOL
Proud to say I have no idea how it’s going for him other than someone told me he is applying for jobs that make half what he was making when we were together and he can’t get these jobs without a college degree. I can’t count the times he told me I was stupid for spending the money to get one.
As for me. I kept my house, my car, all my retirement and 90% of what was in the house. I’ve managed to keep it all without going into debt. Yes, I can afford everything on my own, all the peanut butter and jelly my kid can stomach, it’s on me! I can keep everything humming on my salary which is about one third of what Narkles the Clown made without going into debt. My son is doing great. I sleep in peace. I have found love again. I have a great job where I flourish. I am on top of the world!
#Footloose&CheaterFree
Yay for you AoK!!
“I have a right to be fucking happy!” =
You are not the boss of me and I should be able to cheat, lie, overspend to the point of bankruptcy, be a substance abuser of anything I can get my hands on,
not go to work if I don’t feel like it, eat out every meal, always drive a new fancy luxury vehicle so I look wealthy, and be the amazing person that I know I will be.
Plus I have a perfectly symmetrical face and should be acting in film.
(The last sentence was a direct quote.)
Makes me feel like an idiot that I wasted 10 years with such a super colossal wanker.
Nejla,
The joke is on him.
He is “acting in a film.”
YOU are not an idiot,
YOU are mighty!
((((Hugs))))
Peacekeeper
Not married, but my ex boyfriend of 6 years confessed he cheated on me with a coworker. I felt blindsided at the time and was wondering who this stranger was in my life but after reading a lot of your stories and Chump Lady advice I’m realizing that’s probably who he always was.
We were renting a house together, I had been planning our 7 year anniversary, booking a hotel for a wedding we were both in, and about to leave on a trip overseas with my sister when he came home from work to confess he had been cheating with a coworker and gotten an STD.
Long story short he ends up telling me they were going to live as starving artists in her messy apartment. Smoke ciggarettes, drink, and discuss literature and discuss movies all day while having sex and working together to make a life. After that failed he was fired from his job and evicted from his apartment. He now lives in a new city working at an insurance companies call center, living on his dad’s couch, while working really hard on his Bumble and Tinder account because he’s ready for a serious relationship now.
I know I should be scoffing at this but I still struggle with wondering why that was a better choice over what we had.
That was my question–why wasn’t what we had worth it? Now I think of him like the carpenter ants eating the oak tree in my front yard. They eat until they consume their host and then they move on. He could no longer use you, for whatever reasons, to manage his black hole of suckitude.
Reality check, it wasn’t a better choice, it was a poor choice and he can’t or won’t admit it. You are far better off. Hugs!
You were so much better than him, that’s why. You set the bar way too high with your values and morales and work ethic. It’s not you. It’s him. He needs to go back to his kind.
You are now free to go on and live a happy life. It’s takes a while to get past the pain and the mindfuck. It takes a while to realize you dodged a major bullet. It’s not that you weren’t good enough. You were too good. Fix the picker and use it when you’re ready to find a reciprocal relationship with someone who shares your values.
My STBX kept becoming friends that I thought were crappy humans who lacked a sense of right and wrong. It was in such contrast to the person he always portrayed himself to be that I could never wrap my head around it. Now that the mask is off, I realize these people he wanted to be friends with made perfect sense. As you said, they were “his kind”.
Oh yes birds of a feather… I always thought Stbx was different from his key employees who were less than polished in their presentation if you get my drift. He would talk about their uncouth antics and tell me how naive I was about typical male behavior. Dumb me, I thought this was all beneath him. He even helped some of these people hide income during their divorces. And surprise, he is trying to hide money from me but he is not as smart as he thinks in that department.
“You were so much better than him, that’s why. You set the bar way too high with your values and morales and work ethic. It’s not you. It’s him. He needs to go back to his kind.”
^^^^^THIS.
I always had better morals and better values – i.e. NORMAL, good morals and values! – than the douchebag ex. And now he’s with a whore that went after a married man who has no integrity. And I think ex is happier with her BECAUSE she has shitty morals. How crappy is that? But she is most definitely “his kind.”
Good riddance to them both.
It’s just poor decisions on his part. None of it “better”…it’s just greener grass on the other side of some fence that they’ll never stop hopping. Jumping right back into dating was what my X did too (kind of nebulous as to when that actually happened, but I’ll chumpily give him the benefit of the doubt…because it honestly doesn’t matter now), all while he is claiming to be working on and improving himself. I would think years of prostitutes, porn, etc. would take some time to work through and get his head on straight before he gets involved with someone, but it’s no surprise based on his superb poor decision making skills that this is what he did. They’re all really committed to “working on themselves”. *pointer finger of one hand gesturing rudely into circled pointer and thumb of other hand*
The bedtime story the Sluterus was told was that I boring, controlled everything and never let him have friends.
I stated my situation goals when we met. I told him I had a huge student loan and my goal was to get my FICO score and savings in real house buying Range with a good interest rate. I wanted to buy a 3 bedroom 2 bath in my current school district.
I already owned an outdated somewhat junky modular home in a good school district. My housing costs were negligible. I never asked him for a penny for the student loan. I paid that faithfully and my car payment, and 85% of the bills after he moved there.
After he moved there, I sold or gave away half my stuff to make way for his. I gave him 4000 dollars of my merit bonus for moving and household expenses. He was happy to not pay rent. Over the years, his credit rating and mine were over 700 eventually.
My goals, my personality, nothing changed. I need the entire time i knew him, he was only the most casual of friends with 2 male coworkers. He NEVER left the house to do things with friends male or female. He complained and raged when I would travel with my BFF. He would be strangely sour meeting my friends. He asked me to not speak on the phone with a male HS friend who identifies asexual and has never so much as breathed on my neck.
Yet, three years in I’m suddenly told I’m controlling the house, stopping his having friends. He ‘hates’ living in my parents’ old house and driving a half hour commute. He sure likes his new car he wouldn’t have qualified for, the fancy cel phone in my name he used to acquire half a dozen female only FB friends, eating out at work every day and having 7K in his checkbook whilst I my 40% larger paycheck was consumed by household bills.
But I urged him to make those new friends!
None of the sudden onslaught of new friends was male, of course. What good is a friend you can’t fuck? Eventually he settled on a new bottom rung hire with a rat’s nest of hair, regrettable teeth, and a history of being evicted from apartments. He got her pregnant.
Because I’m so controlling, I managed to not notice my husband ask The Sluterus to block me on FB so I couldn’t see her many comments before I knew she was fucking my husband.
Somehow, my iron grip did not prevent a 7k trip to Disney World where he texted her from every public toilet, and was so possessive of his phone he wouldn’t even swim in the pool without putting it in a safe.
Who are you texting with? (Said in a conversational tone)
It’s Candy Crush!
I see the text bubbles. Is there something I should know?
Oh that? Tony.
Oh, why not say Tony?
He just texted.
Okay, great.
Because I’m so controlling he could send 5000+ texts to her in one month.
Why did you change our cellular password?
They suggested I should. Hacking.
Oh, got it. What’s the new one?
Uhhhhhhhh…..
I stopped his having friends, y’all. I spent all his money. I crushed his Giant Baby Man dreams!
The reason he had no friends and shitty relations with his family was because of me and how controlling I was. So we moved to the big city in which he grew up, I threw dinner parties for friends and family….and nothing was reciprocated for 3 years. No one had us over. We are talking walking distance 20+ year friends. I made new friends, got jobs etc. Built a network. No one called him. He raged at me about alienating him from everyone. He had to lie about where he was because if he told me he was out with his friends, I’d get mad. He wasn’t with friends, obvs.
After dday, I asked him why, if he had so much time for another woman, he never snuck friends and family time in there too. Seeing how devoted and loyal he was, right? With me strong arming him away from them? When I kicked him out, rather than go 2 city blocks in any direction to huge houses of old awesome friends he adored, he drove 3 hours to his mom’s place. Why, I asked. Because she was the only person who’d side with him. All those “friends” were pissed that he hadn’t reached out, that they now knew he’d made time for a stupid loser over them, and he was a confirmed asshole to them. He had fucked over his family and they were disappointed in him and he knew it. So back to moms uterus, I mean guest room, he went.
He’s since to,d me that he’s projected all his failures on me and would go to his mom to have those projections confirmed. So, all my fault.
They can say whatever they want to their fuckbuddies. If I were such scum, I and my collard greens, potato salad and baked goods wouldn’t still be invited to every holiday with my first husband’s family.
I have plenty of close friends, have for over 30 years now. He’s been in this country for 15 years now. Chaos with women, not one friend he can call on. No one helped him move his shit on GTFO day. All he ever has is to co opt the social circle of wherever his dick randomly ends. Sad!
I kept him from living his dream of having a wife who pays the bills and being able to screw anything that walks. I’m just a bitch that way.
Me too. We suck, eh?
LOL, too on the nose. 😉
One more in this camp, LOL. Now he can enjoy life with ho-chick living in his parent’s basement.
Summer’s Eve is living with his trollop, her two kids in HER home. He is such a control freak so I know he isn’t having the time of his life! Hahahaha!
Mr. Twatwaffles is living with her, her three kids and next door to her parents. Plus, they frequently hang with ALPO’S (finally) ex (Mr. Milquetoast) and have spent time with HIS parents and his cheating girlfriend.
It’s all one big, happy, fucking foursome…with kids in tow.
I refused to believe the gaslighting lies once I found the cheating evidence. He did not work; I supported him. We had one vehicle; he drove me back and forth to work. One day I noticed the car seat was stained and immediately knew he had cheated. Although I was scared to confront him, I did. He was very angry and came up with many gaslighting lies. I would not buy any of them, much to his chagrin. I also found a shirt stained with lipstick and refused to believe the pathetic gaslighting lies associated with that as well. He was cheating with a greedy married whore who wasn’t about to take on a man with no income. The only way he was able to have this affair in this first place was because I loved and trusted him enough to support him and to ensure that he had access to transportation when I was working. Once I took the car away from him and divorced him he had no way to continue seeing her. She did not step up to the plate and provide transportation so the affair could continue. One year prior to D-Day, he had told me that he hated me, didn’t want to have sex with me and was just using me for my money. When I told him it looked like he had sex in the car, he said, “Oh, you say I’m madly in love and I have a girlfriend.” I said, “I didn’t say that. I said it looked like you had sex in the car. Why did you say that I said that you were madly in love and have a girlfriend?” He said, “That’s what you were thinking.” I said, “How do you know what I was thinking? I was thinking you could have picked a stranger up off of the street.” He gaslighted by denying that he had cheated and telling me that I was crazy. I said, “I guess you thought you could go out and have your fun and I would be none the wiser and we would go on, like business as usual.” He then muttered “Hmm-mmmm,” which basically affirmed what I had said, but then he went right back to the gaslighting denials. So, I guess I thwarted his one chance in this life for true love and happiness by breaking up his affair with the whore, which would still be going on to this day if I wasn’t so “crazy” for not believing the gaslighting lies (not to mention so mean for taking away the car). I don’t know that he would have ever gotten a job for her or if she would have ever taken him on without an income. I suppose that was just a Fabulous Standoff.
I kept him from becoming a professional mountain climber (how many of those do you think the economy can support? I dont ever remember anyone offering him this job)
I made him continue on his professional path and refused to allow him to throw become a construction worker who ran a bull-dozer. (He never mentioned it until he was fucking Susan)
Like kmanning above, I prevented him from learning to play the guitar. While pick-me dancing, I bought him one…he never touched it (son taught himself to play it).
I “refused” to have 7 children for him. But he was also mad that I “made him” get married…so apparently after this forced marriage, I was supposed to birth 7 babies that he would leave me with when he found true wuv. Once when he was reviewing my list of shortcomings I asked him something like “So how many children did you want to abandon me with?”
He “wanted” to buy stuff and he “wanted” to have the freedom to not work for a paycheck and be able to start a business. He accumulated debt (huge house, plenty of cars) commensurate with a guy fulling committed to maintaining a “Corporate Joe” existence then blamed me that he had to work to pay it. He assured me that if I were a supportive wife, he would have more options. I make $39,000 a year caring for dying children…not a lot of money in my line of work…Im sure that is my fault.
Dream crusher I am.
We were on our way out of Catholic Mass one day when he saw the man with 7 kids and cheater literally got SO sullen and acted so genuinely upset that he was stuck with this horrible wife who (mostly) shut down the baby factory when he acted like a selfish ass who couldn’t handle the stress of a family.
In true narc fashion, for him it was completely normal for him to have a conversation of “wanting” to do something then later in another conversation he sincerely “wanted” to so something else but thing # 1 and thing #2 were mutually exclusive to an extreme degree. This got so much worse when he was planning his exit….he had one life plan in the morning, one at noon and a different one by dinner.
He refused to do any job that wasnt super cool and enviable…the fire was fueled by him actually getting a super cool enviable job for a while so this delusion was actually reinforced.
I gave birth to our daughter. And I became the enemy. Then I gave birth to our son, and he left. I guess he thought there were no more kibbles for him with two kids and an infant.
I also convinced him we could save 30,000 for a down payment for a half million dollar house in the Bay Area, which we later sold for 165,000 more in equity.
Then I master planned that we could move to a lovely little lake town where he could do all the endurance activities and triathlons he wanted (while I watched kids when he went out) and because the area was less expensive than the bay, I could then stay home and raise our children and cook him dinner every night.
I ruined his life!! He could have been so awesome! That’s what his chiropractic receptionist told him anyway! And he believed her! Now they are the awesomest together!!! (Rolling my eyes)
I meet up with a friend last night, our kids go to school together, she know my story and me and she said ‘any normal giy would be thrilled to have a women like you, your hard working, easy going and funny’ wow really touched a nerve that I had spent so long with that ungrateful fucker!
Wow… Where do I start? And how do I know which of the below reasons are even valid (hint, NONE)?
1. I became a different person when I got pregnant (UBT: you finally had needs, for fucks sake woman, are you crazy?? How dare you need things and then divert your energy to having a child??! I’M THE CHILD!! ME! ME!)
2. I stopped giving him affection (UBT: again, who do you think you are? Didn’t you realize you signed up to keep giving me affection when I am screwing whores? Maybe IF you start touching me I MIGHT reconsider that whore habit. Maybe. Nope. Maybe not. Dance bitch!)
3. I was emotionally abusive and verbally abusive (UBT: I hate it when I block you out, am vague, lie, ignore your calls, placate you with agreeing to do something I never intended to do, you respond with yelling and getting angry. Damn you are so angry. Never mind my whore habit, leaving for work travels earlier than necessary or staying an extra day to spend work and marital funds/time on whores…. if you reacted differently maybe I would have stopped. Just ignore the fact I did this while we were dating, when you were pregnant… you were not to discover this when you were on maternity leave. See? There’s another problem— you snoop and do not give me privacy!)
Adios asshole.
I held back the sad sack for years. Held him back from partying and bar hopping because I have a kid and that’s not my scene. Held him back because he wanted the hot girlfriend to show off to his pals and rich business partners and my weight was constantly fluctuating due to stress and health issues. Held him back from living a lavish lifestyle because I was supposed to pay all the bills alone while he took time to pay off his debts and build his business, with the promise he’d take care of me one day, but I could only afford to just barely get us by. Yes, I held him back all right.
After I kicked his cheating ass to the curb, he’s 43 and now living in a camper and built a tiki bar alongside it, hosting party after party. He’s finally getting in all the party time he lost in the 12 years with me. He’s shacking up with a woman 10 years older than him. Little does she know he’s just using her because she has money and a boat she lets him use all he wants. Because after all, she can give him the lifestyle but isn’t exactly the hot wife. But he sends my son pictures of himself on the boat surrounded by 20-year-olds in bikinis, so clearly he’s working on making that dream a reality now too.
As I try to pick up the pieces, wonder if I’ll ever find love at 40, ponder on the 12 years of lies and deception, deal with my 18-year-old son spending all his time with the cheater because he’s so sparkly and cool, weighed down by all the debt I incurred while he built his business… I wonder when will karma come around? Where’s meh? Where’s Tuesday???
My STBX and I are in the same age-range as you. For a while, I would look at my STBX’s new life with so little responsibility … then I would look at the mountain of responsibility I had in order to try to repair what he had demolished (financially, emotionally, etc.). I would fluctuate between despair and anger.
The thing that helped me (and I hope helps you) was that my life has genuine substance. I REALLY love my kids. I REALLY work my ass off day-in and day-out to try to improve our lives.
STBX’s life is vapid. He may feel happy with it now, but there are two important things he’s missing:
1. The kind of life he’s living (just like your X’s) is so obviously hollow and pathetic. His life has become a gutter. Just because he’s finding short-term thrills from it doesn’t change a gutter to a palace. There is no substance here.
2. The way he’s living is short-sighted and unhealthy. His new trek through the gutter cannot end well. (I envision a fleet of karma buses …)
I still get angry sometimes because this shit is so horribly unfair. But, then I remind myself that as bad as all of this has been and will continue to be for a while–it could be worse. I could still be with him — being humiliated, used, and constantly berated.
Karma will come to your X. He’s already put out the welcome mat for it … it’s only a matter of time. In the meantime, keep your eye on the prize (a better life for YOU). Wishing you all my best.
I couldn’t agree more, JessMom. You said it perfectly. Life is BETTER without them in it…even when it is incredibly hard and unfair.
I said to my son ‘not wanting to be rude about your father, but I have found since he isn’t in my life I am having a lot more fun than I ever did before’.
He said ‘yes I can see that’.
So, (because it would be nice it this all had meaning, if we were just not good for each other) I asked ‘and if he happier? Is his life better?
Son: no, not really, he is completely stressed.
Damn me for taking his emotional punching bag away! All that projection, nowhere to put it!
I think that both of our husbandcheaters had the same coping mechanism…imagine they are the captain of a boat..a larger, respectable boat. Thier wife isnt valued or respected, she is seen as the utilitarian raft that is tethered to their big boat. Whenever something unpleasant is dealt with, they blame the wife and metaphorically dump it onto the raft.
Imagine this goes on for years…the raft tethered to them is rather full of old, rancid, dreaded, unpleasant things and they soothe themselves that all they have to do is cut the tether of the raft and send it down river and they will be released of all of the unpleasantness associated with it.
What a coping plan…it works so well they do it for YEARS….no problem is too big or small to dump on the raft. At some point doing so is such a habit that they don’t know anything else.
While wife is scrambling to keep the raft afloat with all the shit he has piled onto the raft he makes her live on, he gets lonely on his boat, so he invites an OW to join him…when we get mad, he explains that we were too far away so he got lonely…never mind it was him who sent us away.
So many guys eventually cut the tether and let the raft go. He may try and try to continue to throw his shit towards you but you are gone. As much as it hurt like hell to have him cut his tether (you figured that a raft was better than nothing all those years) you realize that life on the raft without shit flying off the bow of his ship was better than life before.
Before Cheater died, I had already developed this “raft theory” but I was still smoking hopium that he would have an epiphany and stop this mode of behavior and be willing to let me on his ship and learn to solve problems together. I was delusional….if they do this for YEARS, it is virtually impossible for them to change. The only option we have is to cut the tether ourselves.
Great analogy. And then the cheater is surprised when OWife doesn’t want to man the shiny new raft he got for her. . . .
UNM, I had two tiny little interactions with him last week. They were so small, but the usual not meeting halfway or showing any ordinary human respect and the old anger and complete frustration started welling up again.
I am SO THANKFUL that that old torture has gone from my life. No wonder I was so angry, anxious and half demented. Yes that is my responsibility to choose my reaction, but the wounding projections that never, ever ended have gone. I never have to rage, worry, carefully consider my words, feel the devastation of being ignored as a human being again.
All my rage, worry, carefully considering my words and not taking other peoples rejection personally will be my full responsibility, in my own life going forward.
It truly is freedom.
Unicornnomore, I think you should write a book, or poetry, that was amazing! I love mental imagery, it helps me process the chaos and make sense of it all. You deserve all the peace and freedom you have now, after that mess you put up with!
Beautiful freedom, that’s the key!
Thanks…My story is compelling in the crazy turns it takes, and there are things that might help people, but I would have to tell the whole truth and my kids would be hurt, so I likely never will.
This morning as I work up, I remembered that I was hesitant to cut the tether and be set free because a divorce in my state takes about 4years and an annulment takes another 2…I couldn’t fathom making a decision that would require 4 years to get me where I wanted to be….and yet the worst of it was 12 years ago…had I cut the tether, I would have been recovering and free long before he died.
You forgot to mention that many times when the raft is cut loose, it floats magnificently, while that big boat sinks.
What a fabulous analogy – it is perfect!
My ex should be retiring early, taking fancy vacations, have a nicer home and oh yeah he should have a vacation home too. He also needs a million dollars in his retirement account. The solution to me was obvious: prioritize and make a budget and a plan. The solution for him was obvious too: sagefemme needs to make more money. I only made 50K while single parenting (no, he took the kids swimming or out for hot chocolate sometimes, sorry!) except for the year after our son was born. So he’s traded up to a higher earning, younger, childless partner. Hopefully she makes enough that he can stop “needing” to gamble on the stock market because the idiot has lost 200K already.
Knowing his desire for long term wealth I tried to be frugal. But I guess I screwed that up too. The complaints included: I don’t drive a new car, I don’t dress sexy, get laser hair removal, lasik surgery or tattoos and sometimes I shop at goodwill. I’m too “vanilla” (don’t worry, his new partner doesn’t think sex in public spaces is inappropriate so it’s a perfect match.)
I’m also responsible for why he gained weight. He needs a partner who MOTIVATES him. I mean can you imagine? Me giving him the freedom to workout literally whenever it suited him was clearly not enough. WTF is a wife if she’s not a personal trainer too?
It is so nice to be away from someone who blames me for every bad feeling or hard choice he encounters. I am sad for myself that I spent so much time trying to find the sweet spot between all these complaints and needs and criticism. It was a trap! There is no sweet spot! The point is for me to be the person he can blame. How did I not get that for 16 years?
I was also guilty of being a Mom, I thought that’s what Mother’s did is take care of your children. They’re the priority since they never asked to be here and need to be taken care of.
I should have known by his feral family that wasn’t how he was raised.
My other failure is, well.., one of many really, is I didn’t dress like a pilot’s wife.
What? there’s a dress code?? I dressed like a Mom who volunteered in classrooms, the scholastic book fair lady, chaperoned field trips, helped with the school reading program, pan cake breakfasts, field days, school projects. Other Dad’s volunteered but not X. Even though X was home all day doing nothing. X did like to be there before school to chat with the other Mom’s and also after school to hang out with the other Mom’s. X never stood with the Dad’s who picked their kids up or dropped off. It was weird. I had a couple of the Mom’s ask me if X didn’t talk with the other Dads because X didn’t like sports (X was a physical education major). X was never an involved father except to alienate our son from me while watching our son’s life spiral while pretending to be a good father in public for appearances. Most often with a little too much enthusiasm to be sincere. A good father doesn’t find pleasure in watching his son’s life and education take a dive from being an A student with opportunities for scholarships, build friendships with similar minded students to almost not graduating and hanging out with the EMO group who can’t bring themselves to muster a smile. Hating everyone and everything. Heartbreaking.
I spent all the money. He was never shopped, cooked, cleaned nor cared for the kids, either.
Even though I worked full time, paid all medical, food, clothing, entertainment and care for kids in his divorce papers; ” Magneto never contributed to the family”.
(I was the only one who wore clearance/second hand (recycled) clothes.)
His greatness I denied? After bomb drop one morning moving into OW’s and his apartment, he called me and snarled; “I like to have SEX two times a day! AND SHE treats me like the ROCK STAR I AM!!!!”
Party on, Wayne. Party on, Garth.
3 years later, I wonder how that 2x a day sex is going? or that rock star career? At the time it really hurt. More the rage/vicious tone, but I’m sure many here understand.
..He never shopped…
Rock star?
What a child.
They rage when they are losing control and to keep you from knowing that their life is far from their claims. Mine LOVES to text that he is happier than he has been in a long time.
He has 3 support payments he has to make (spousal plus 2 child), his son won’t talk to him anymore, oldest daughter goes to dinner with him twice a month, our youngest only sees him for 5-15 minutes each month (she is special needs and he hasn’t bothered to get training) and he has never even met his out-of-wedlock child.
The 25 year old girlfriend must have magical powers to make all of that fade. That is a happy he can run into the sunset with. I take my life with my 3 kids any day of the year.
His life sucks hairy balls!
His life sucks hairy balls!
So many potential rock stars! I too left my ex’s rock and roll fantasy in a flaming pile of disappointment and cast off dreams.
He manages to pretend he has attained a measure of stardom in his online music group- where hundreds of marginally employed and unemployed middle aged musicians post their songs and stroke each other’s egos.
It’s where he met schmoopie! Strangely they all had or have gainfully employed chump spouses and significant others who hold down the fort while they strum/ smash/ding their feelings into song…
X called my Mother who was in her last stages of cancer to tell her that “leaving me was the best decision he’d ever made,” “he’s never been happier.”
How does someone call someones dying mother and say that? How does he live with himself?
That act alone speaks volumes on his character and integrity that he claims to have.
My Parents loved him as if he were their own son. My Mom passed two months after and he made no effort to offer condolences to my Dad or anyone. We were his family for 20 years, or at least it appeared that way.
Speaks volumes, clearly a Sociopath.
Sometimes I really wonder if there’s enough room in Hell for these psychos.
I’m a dream crusher too. For curbing his non-working Jeep (he had 4! 4 non operating vehicles!) and tool acquisition plans. And for suggesting that he not spend $10,000 on a plan to make artistic metal signs (I suggested he take a class or learn from someone who did this first). This from a man baby who never finished a project (including putting a switch plate on a light socket – 13 years – never did it!) in his life AND who already had untold thousands of dollars in wood working tools that he never used.
I also crushed his dream of dressing up like billly bad ass and riding from diner to diner on a Harley. I heard he sold that motorcycle a bit ago. I also ruined Christmas!
Dream Crusher! I want a tshirt! This might be my new screen name!
I made the XN drop out of med school and ruined his doctoring career!
Of course, he wasn’t *in* med school, nor anywhere close to being in med school, but when you have NPD, that’s neither here nor there.
????
Wow Ms. M, that’s super impressive!
Really, I have no idea. I helped make her great and actually didn’t want to stand in her way from a personal and professional level. I got her through the degrees and moved for her career and did what I thought was the right thing for both of us, although I wan’t happy with the last move and how it happened. In the last few years of the marriage, I developed my own interests – I had things that I wanted because I thought we were going to be making a life together. I became much more of a sports fan, took time to express what I wanted much more so I can get through the next years and adapt to different and somewhat unwanted surroundings. I encouraged many things in her life, derby, connecting with friends and other things that are a good thing for an individual to do – she had always lamented that she had no friends through out our life together, so go and get them. Again, I am no saint and not always easy to live with, but all of this seemed reasonable to me – a good marriage does have two individuals at it and they both can have lives and lives together which is what I wanted. I have no idea what other crap she has been saying, but I made concerted efforts to enable her individuality and whatever I did to get in her way, I really don’t want to know. BTW – those reasons would be lies anyway and I stopped nothing, she has agency and she made her choices.
It was ALL my fault that his impotent dick couldn’t raise to the needy occasion of servicing his wife on a regular basis.
His imagination of grandeur for making millions on his great ‘ideas’ was constantly being put onto reality check because I was a dream squasher, so he could never amount to much,
And, when smart phones became more popular then flip phone, it was me that twisted his arm to look at porn while taking a leak for hours on end.
From what I know, none of the 5 women he was whoring around with his limp dick are anywhere to be found. One on social media bragged about her ‘hot’ new man, but that only last as long as his erections did. . . 0.3 seconds IF that!!
I sure did gain a life when I walked out of cheater pants the weekend he was attempting to get his ’50 Shades of Gray’ on with his box of $354 worth of sex toys; ya know because when your dick don’t work you have to bring in the heavy equipment to make up for where your dick lacks in performance.
Oh this is a good one and I will enjoy reading all the karma stories after work tonight…especially the ones related to to actual karma ie consequences from the INTENTIONS behind the actions done to us. I am really looking forward to read your stories, friends.
But in case your own karma story doesn’t seem that awesome please allow me to repeat one sentence from Shirley Glass from her book Just Friends.. I will paraphrase as the book is no longer in my possession but it sounded pretty well like the following …If he abandons you for another woman, you’ll want to write her a thank you note in four years…
At the time this comment came across perhaps a bit too optimist even flippant for my intends and purposes but she was correct and accurate. So to wit, my ex spouse and his mistress are making 500,000 per year, bought a big house and set to inherit great wealth from both sides of his divorced ( and quite old ) parents. She was taken in as the saviour from such a terrible horrible marriage which had made him so unhappy for so many years ( nice greasing the skid job I found out from the few who remained skeptical in his family ). Yes I struggle to meet financial ends and have trust problems with potential suitors.
BUT BUT BUT sisters and brothers, my adult children and I don’t have to live with the succession of emotional neglect, dismissal and contempt anymore. We are free from the obligation to cherish and love a father or spouse rendered cruel by his lack of attachment to anyone but himself and its current extension. As Joe Navarro says in his book Dangerous Personalities ” What do you write on the birthday card for a father who has no interest in you”…I recovered self- esteem, got a new job, and have been and still trying to become the person I would like to have as best friend. And this is priceless.
Chump Lady is brilliant, every one of her blog entries as well as her book is lifeline. I would also recommend Dangerous Personalities by Joe Navarro. Both of these writers compel you to shift from heart to head, line up the past and present red flags, the mask slips we chose to ignore because we wanted to keep our marriage operational. The checklist in Navarro’s book from page 46 to 55 is going to solve a lot of unresolved answers. Same with Tracy’s book which is trimmed for efficiency and complete accuracy.
We are designed to thrive when the advantages overweight the disadvantages perhaps.. To have no one in our life to make us feel diminished, short of the mark and who flirts right in front on your eyes is something that has been passed along to the so-called “price” winner. Complete karma, suckers..keep your money, I keep my new found joy!
sorry correction… WE kept the right to have no one in our life to make us feel diminished.. however this particular fate has been passed to the “price” winner/stealer by her/his own intention.
Be careful what you wish for…Karma does care of things indeed…Enjoy!
The first time he left for Schmoopie 1.0, he told the counselor he never wanted to be married or have kids. By this time we had 2 kiddos and had lost a 3rd during pregnancy. The counselor kept pressing him on it because, let’s face it, it doesn’t make sense. He told me he was angry that I mowed the yard. Yep, I guess I did too much. I danced like crazy to get that turd back. Our kids were 4 & 2 years old.
The second time he left for Schmoopie 2.0 -he left after I caught him, the icloud is a mystery to many :). I didn’t give that fucker a chance to tell me all of my crimes against him. I knew I was the giver and he was the taker in our 20 years together. I told him “I’m done. Amicable”. Nasty ole fucker. He begged that he had made a big mistake and schmoopie was all innocent. Then I see a text to her about getting together and he wanted to tell her how it all started 5 years ago.
Let me tell y’all how it all started 20 years ago. I mistook his constant calls, neediness, and hoovering as love. I know now it was anything but love. He is a bottomless pit of need. My life is calm and serene at home without his constant criticism all whilst he sits on his arse on the couch watching tv. I did all the adulting except for the things he found fun and could extract kibbles from.
I hate it for the kids. Their lives have been changed forever. But some in a good way. Nothing ever suited him–grades, sports, friends. We didn’t have anyone over at the house except people he’d invite because he’d be such a dick about it (the attention wasn’t all on him). The kids spend some time with him. I’ve learned to change my outlook from despair to now enjoying the peace and quiet. I catch up on chores I need to do so I can focus solely on them when they are with me.
I’m not at meh. But I think I see it up around the corner.
After 30 years of marriage, with an exciting career and postings in South America, Europe and Asia, my ex suddenly blew up our marriage to live with his 30-year old schmoopie. He told me I had “forced him to make safe choices” and blamed me that during our marriage he “never got to live in the jungle.” Of course he’d never mentioned any of that. Two years with her and he still hasn’t made it, funnily enough. He’s miserable, apparently.
There was some greatness being thwarted, though – my sons and I are doing better than ever!
He “never got to live in the jungle”. Well I hope for you and your sons that his dream comes true and he and schmoopie get lost in there and can’t find their way back out. What an idiot he is.
My ex told me he just wanted to be with someone who didn’t get bored at horse shows. I think his ideal mate would be someone who enjoys having sex daily on horseback. Oh, and wants to watch football for hours afterwards.
Kabuki,
Hope he contracts malaria whilst “living in the jungle” !
At least we can wish him some highly contagious dick fungus! Jungle junk rot!
Love it! “Jungle Junk Rot”
Had children and actually put the needs of dependent infants ahead of ManBaby and myself.
Invested too much emotional energy into children and took the locus of said energy off of ManBaby during children’s key developmental periods.
Became too physically touched out raising 4 kids as a single married mother. No time or enthusiasm to bake the cake, feed it to ManBaby all while performing Olympic sex acts.
There was No Greatness I prevented him from achieving since it was ME who propped the fucker up, counseled him with his job (we both worked for the same company pre kids. I knew his co workers professionally pre marriage). Great promotions. Great Facade and highly productive in his profession. I.Just.Would.Not.Conform.To.His.Will.Of.PerfectWifeAppliance.
Mine wasn’t so much dreams that were crushed, as I clearly couldn’t have been the “right” man. If she had meant to be with me, she wouldn’t have cheated. Moreover, after the first affair ended, she said she resented me so much for taking her away from “the perfectly good man right in front of her” (which was not me, her newlywed husband) that she had to go get into another affair right away.
X was in his high school marching band which was the last time he touched a drum. He was never in a rock band or played drums outside of high school marching band.
Yet, I unknowingly prevented X from becoming a rock star drummer, when an acquaintance of his from high school asked X if he still played drums, he sadly replied, no, Brit wouldn’t let me…
Really? Not knowing what to get him for his birthdays (he had no interests besides himself) I offered to buy him a set and he refused saying he was done with playing drums.
That aside, he did like to work out and occasionally ran a marathon. Before I had our son I would run three miles before work. I’m not a marathon runner, and definitely not a triathlete. X met triathlete AP and he suddenly had an overwhelming desire to run a marathon every week, and an urge to hike 27 miles up our local mountains “alone.” Thus he needed to find someone different, someone he had more in common with. Eventually they became the triathlete couple.
25 years together, 20 of those years married, a child together, many moves for his career, struggling financially, when we couldn’t afford groceries, let alone afford to run a marathon. 25 years of our lives spent together building memories is when he discovered he wants someone who he has more in common with like a triathlete.
It would have been nice if he had thought about that 25 years prior.
X and Triathlete eventually terminated their relationship. While they were living together X was on match.com and is with his next true love. I find it interesting that he chooses women that are masculine in appearance. Beards??
He never socialized until a few months before he moved out. He suddenly decided to be social with our neighbors after living in the neighborhood for almost 20 years. He befriended a neighbor’s male friend who at 52 never had a girlfriend. Maybe I prevented him from finding himself as well.
The Edgar Suit didn’t have any specific complaints, he liked to lump all my many faults into the category of “I was increasingly unhappy in the marriage” or “I was so miserable living with Beth”. My evil ex MIL, however, had three very specific complaints about me: 1- I didn’t dress up enough, 2- I didn’t wear enough make up, and 3- I did too much volunteer work and not enough paid work (while I was raising her only grandchildren). And here’s where Karma stepped in. Edgar Suit’s live in girlfriend is a stripper he met in one of his favorite clubs. Brandy 1- wears enough make up for 5 women, 2- loves to “dress up” in her sequinned hooker pants, and 3- does absolutely nothing “for free” including fucking evil ex MIL’s son.
LOL. Now your MIL is surely happy!
Mine told me, after I discovered that he’d spent the last 5 years visiting prostitutes during this lunch break, that I was horrible because I “made” him stay in a state that he hated and I “made” him stay at a job that he hated.
After I divorced his sorry ass, I moved across the country. I heard he also moved to a different state. I’ve also now heard that he couldn’t hack that other state for more than 6 months, so he moved back to that state he “hated” and is still working at that job he “hated”
Oh yeah, and he’s currently “dating” a 25 year old. He’s 58. Yeah, I think it’s pretty clear that a new state and a new job weren’t the things his 49 year old wife was keeping him from.
Asshole.
They are all pathalogical liars and hypocrites.
My ex, as always, is vanilla with these things. I did not keep him from a brilliant career, but apparently I, my family, and his family, kept him in line and “made” him do boring, responsible things. He did what was “expected” of him, not what he wanted to do.
Never mind that his MA and PhD subjects were his choice– I never told him what to study.
Never mind that we stayed in this location to be near his family, not mine.
Never mind that I am the one who sacrificed, living far from family and giving up jobs that I wanted.
Never mind that when he did express an interest in using his degree for more “practical” things, he never did anything about it, he assumed it could not be done. And when I pushed him to do it and made it happen… he got involved with MOW. Now he is living his “dream job.”
I think you will find that even his dream will have a shelf life because it was YOU who gave him direction.
Isn’t that what partnership is all about? Supporting each other? Reciprocity which our chumpy selves keep spacing that our cheaters would now give because they valued us? It’s not that we decided to be doormats. I know I was sold the false goods of invest in the cheater and then the cheater will reciprocate. That never happened.
Assuredly your asshole values himself but not enough to think through the long term implications of his/her actions. Your cheater is settled into a new facade and doesn’t understand that to improve and grow you must invest in unsexy stuff-The things that most cheaters are unwillingly to do. The AP may not know that….yet. That person is living the mirage.
Not spacing….waiting. (This is spackle and Hopium. We never knew that there was zero intention of reinvestment.)
My husband decided he was to “special” to work. So he used my prescription coverage to acquire pain meds by the score. Just sweet talk all those doctors. Once he found out how much OxyContin was going for on the streets he was off to make his millions behind my back. Eventually his little business caught the attention of the Federal Narcotics agents. Off to the pokey he went. The Fed’s garnished our assets, guns and vehicles. It cost 20 grand for an attorney for him. He rec’d 6-10 yrs in Federal prison. But that’s my fault because I didn’t hire a good enough attorney for him. Not to mention I had to go into court to fight to get my share of the assets back with no attorney. The assets I’d have to fight for in divorce court. Double whammy.
He did 5 yrs. Once out he hooked up with his “True Love” on the NET I was paying for. A Dominatrix. Hell, I’d known he wanted his ass kicked I’d have loved to comply. Guess something he learned he liked while in prison. An acquired taste. He flew into the arms of his true love and broke parole. That cost him 90 days back inside. (Maybe where he truly has found happiness) His “true love” has him wearing a kilt so I guess she has the pants in the relationship. Now he has found his calling fixing washers and dryers. (He can take care of his own dirty laundry) You have to fix a lot of washers to support a women with 8 kids and an expensive taste. I imagine his aspirations revolve around the show Breaking Bad.
I have forged on without his greatness. I bought a small Hobby Farm which will be paid off in a few yrs. He always dreamed of not working a job and pulling in money. Well I retired from being a Sup at a prison with 29 yrs in last May. I do have an income coming in without working a job. My sunny days spent putzing around my farm and fishing.
You will all love this…
My ex whined and boo hoo’d to me that because of this life or as he called it, “my fairy tale,” he never had enough time to do what he wanted.
He said, “I’ll never have the boat I have wanted since I was 15.” (Never mind that he had 2 boats) Those just weren’t the ones he wanted! Whaaa!
And
I didn’t tow him or drive him enough through ski courses etc so I prevented him from being a “professional water skier.”
I literally can’t count the amount of times he spouted all of that off to me.
One theme I read over and over above is that these self absorbed folks are so planning-avoidant.
We had 3 kids in 7 years and one of the ways we got by was for me to work. Childcare for 3 kids would almost wipe out my salary, so I worked nights and weekends (making a fairly good wage doing 12 hour shifts in a neonatal ICU) but the trade off was that we didnt have a lot of time when we were off att he same time.
My work schedule was posted weeks ahead and if I wanted a day off, I had to request it FAR ahead. Cheater never ever said “lets plan a trip to __, put in a schedule request”. He would wait until friday …about an hour before I left for work and say “why arent we going on a trip to New York City this weekend” with a tone of accusation. My answer would be “I work 2 nights, kid1 has karate, kid 2 has 2 birthday parties and kid 3 is sick” and he would get SO MAD.
Another time he ranted that we couldnt go to Rome…I told him we made enough to go to Rome if we set a goal and planned for it. He looked at me with distain dripping off him like venom off a snakes tooth and said
“I will not ‘plan’ “.
I think my response was something akin to “well then we’re not going to Rome”.
His sense of entitlement informed him that he had the right to have what he wanted (spend your money, demand your wife have 7 kids {I only had 3…see story above} ) but you still gt to do whatever you like without having to make a plan and if it doesnt work out, it is because your wife is a bitch
^^^^Sounds like he might be gay
^^I suspect that he is gay^^ there were other things he did which made me suspect, his body movements, or if another male mentioned his biceps or asked if he worked out, it would be the topic of conversation for the rest of the day. I don’t think men want another man’s attention. He’d pretend he was gay when we were out with other couples it made me uncomfortable. Seemed inappropriate to me.
X made notice of other men’s physiques. Loved wearing muscle, sleeveless t-shirts.
As he became older his grooming became obsessive, he’d spend hours in the magnifying mirror meticulously trimming his eyebrows, side burns. While out on trips he and the other pilot would go to dinner, sometimes the hostess would talk to them as if they were a couple, he’d laugh telling me the story. Hearing the story once was more than enough, but he would repeat the same story over and over for months even years afterwards. I didn’t think it was that significant to even repeat in the first place but apparently to him it was a story with telling again and again. If I think about it there are other traits or incidents that would make me pause or a moment and wonder.
My ex pouted that he wanted to abandon his law enforcement career and his family to be a DJ at dance clubs. I was such a meanie that I wouldn’t let him quit his job to play DJ while I was a stay at home mom with a toddler. Apparently the OW supported him and his dreams, whereas I was just the bulwark to adventure and fulfillment. (No mention of the fact that I told him I’d support him in this career change if he worked out a long term plan to do it while I went back to work. That wasn’t good enough.)
I see that he still has not left his career to be a DJ now that he has several years and a new baby under his belt with the OW. Shucks, what a let down to discover that OW didn’t have magic fairy dust that absolves him of responsibility, and their pesky baby needs vaccines and diapers, too!
I’m out of the picture and he’s still not a DJ. Awwww.
I still get a good smirk out of this: how does a mid-30s man think he will make a career out of DJ-ing in dance clubs?
I fully understand that some DJs work professionally for several years, but the overwhelming majority “age out” of this profession pretty quickly. 20-somethings are creeped out by 40-somethings desperately clutching onto their youth, no matter whether in front of the turntables or behind them.
The phrase, “Don’t be that guy,” comes to mind.
Even more fascinating is, like any good spouse, you started the conversation about what realities would be involved in pursuing his dream.
But reality wasn’t his strong suit, nor hers.
Check out mine above — KK constantly used my master’s degree against me: “YOU got to go back to school and follow YOUR dream — why are you holding me back from mine?”
Me: “First of all, UX design was never my dream. It was a line of work that offered more of a future for us than what I was doing previously; I almost doubled my previous salary when I completed the program, and you were the main beneficiary of that.
Second, I didn’t pay for that master’s program — my employer did. If you can find a way for your employer or anyone else to pay for all or most of whatever education you want to pursue, I’ll take you down and sign you up myself. If not. we’ve got to come up with a plan as to what we’re going to give up for the next 3-5 years to make the numbers work. I’m not taking out a second mortgage of depleting our retirement savings to do it.
Third, you’ve got to give me some indication as to what you plan to do with this training after it’s done. You don’t want to work in a bakery. You don’t want to work in a hotel kitchen. You don’t want to open your own business. This is an investment in our future — what’s the expected payoff?”
No response except for that stupid, blank stare, then a sprint off to the bedroom to slam the door; an hour later she’d emerge, announce “I’m over it,” and proceed with life as usual — until the next time.
Oh, if I knew then what I know now…
He was unhappy. He told me this a few years before we split. When I asked him what he wanted to do about it – go to counselling, change jobs, retrain, join a sports team etc he had answers as to why he couldn’t do anything (lazy and entitled). After he left, he is still unhappy – 18 months later. So it was my fault he was unhappy, & now he is still unhappy, unhinged (he sent strange, nasty text messages to my best friend) & still blaming me for it. I didn’t realise I had super powers.
I wasn’t a supermodel. He needed the appropriate arm candy to be a rock star and I just wasn’t enough. I have pictures of me back then….i was HOT. I have no idea if he’s finally found the right arm candy 2 wives later and don’t care.
I’m laughing.., I just thought of another dream of X’s I crushed. He bought a harmonica and a book on teaching yourself to play the harmonica. I walked in on him practicing his harmonica, I couldn’t help but burst out laughing. . , needless to say, he wasn’t amused and in fact quite angry.. how dare I laugh. He had so much potential who knows he could have been the next Arlo Guthrie but no, I had to laugh and rob the world of the happy harper and his musical and his beautiful music. I wonder what songs he could have entertained us with “Blowing in the Wind”? wait.., I know the perfect song for Chump nation, we could have a sing-a-long. “It ain’t me Babe.”
Hilarious! I’m giggling out loud just envisioning this. Actually sounds like he had some potential… full of enough hot air!
Sorry for the typos, I still can’t help laughing remembering his look of disdain and disgust which only made me laugh even more.
LOL, well at least he has the perfect instrument on which to play his sad sausage blues!
Grandiosity exists in even the most mild-mannered cheater. While we were still together, X kept a white board of personal goals, which I had thought was admirable. When I was scoping out our daughter’s sleeping quarters (also his office), I saw he had resurrected the board and had written there that he plans to write an autobiographical book called “The life of a (not quite) extraordinary person” or something to that effect. Based on his continued denial of the impact of what he did and blameshifting, I am most likely part of what has prevented him from being completely extraordinary. Which is funny, because he really is, but not in the way he thinks he is. SMH
My Cheater was a misogynist who hated (what he perceived as) the feminization of his culture, so he was going to write a book called “Tampon Nation” where he informed everyone of how our culture had been ruined.
For me, the irony in this is that us women didn’t “take over” his culture, it is exactly men like him…whiny, self absorbed, materialistic, responsibility-avoidant, foolish, mean, assholes that abdicated their place in culture to act like spoiled babies…the culture became feminized by the void they left when they (not speaking for the amazing guy-chumps here who fought the good fight) refused to grow up.
In going through his stuff, I saw he started his book…he had a title page “Tampon Nation” and not a word of a book written….how fitting.
LOL, so everything your X knew about women and female culture? World’s shortest book. 😉
I agree though with your theory of the “feminization” of the world men like your cheater would see it. These types need taking care of and pampering and constantly being told how special and awesome they are? Calling all mommies. Then cue the resentment of having to be taken care of and/or not being taken care of properly. Ugh.
*as men like your cheater would see it
The biography of your cheater, UNM, should be called “Suppository Nation.”
I didn’t let him “fall on his face more”. Literally. He was a type 1 diabetic so I always had snacks stashed in my purse, the car, everywhere in case a low blood sugar hit (common). During a wreckonciliation discussion he needed a snack and I said there were some in the car so we walked back to get it. He said “see? This right here is exactly what I’m talking about. Why don’t you just let me fail.” Uhhh… because you literally could die. Sorry. #snacksavior
YDY, this is one of the funniest comments in a very funny thread. How dare you be concerned for his life and health? What kind of horrible person carries SNACKS for their diabetic husband??? And that hash tag…I am laughing so hard. #snacksavior Hahahahahahahaha You can not make this shit up.
How you managed to keep yourself from grabbing that snack in the parking lot out of his hands and shoving down your own throat is truly amazing
#snacksavior indeed
I don’t know if I squelched his “potential” as much as I “made” him give up certain things.
He said that I was never happy and that he was so tired of working so hard to try and make me happy.
I expected him to work and actually support our family.
He gave away our Great Pyrenees because I made the dog nervous when I worried about him peeing on my furniture and carpet.
He gave up hunting and trapping because I wanted him to make a living.
I didn’t like his scraggly beard and hair.
I once asked him not to smoke in the car because I didn’t want to stink on my first day of classes…oh….I just had an epiphany…..while writing this…. holy shit.
He didn’t want me to go to school. He’d started the year before me and something told me I needed to go too. I was seeing the writing in the wall and didn’t realize it then…. and right this minute, I just figured something out…
He never encouraged me to go to school. He didn’t stop me, but he wasn’t thrilled. That time I asked him not to smoke in the car, was one of the very few times we went together, and we drove the 40 miles daily to go… separate vehicles.
He had someone….and thought I’d figure it out then. I did just now.
Holy shit….2013…
He introduced her to me. She came to our house. She was a classmate who quit going to school once I started.
I feel like such an idiot….
Oh I had lots of these moments but mine would wake me in the middle of the night after Nakles the Clown had moved out. 2 am oh shit the lady two streets over, he was so concerned with her boyfriend saying something mean to her. He was really angry at that guy, too angry for something that was not his business. That happened to me a lot. Couldn’t go back to sleep after that shit. Instead I would make my kid the worlds largest breakfast or better yet pie! Nothing says PTSD with uncovered memories in a new light like a fresh homemade coconut cream pie!
Oh, you are NOT an idiot. These are our spouses — and we trusted and loved them. We were not looking for evidence of deception.
And, like AllOutofKibble, I also had many moments like that. For example, it took months after the implosion of my marriage to remember that more than a decade prior (around 2002) someone identified my STBX as having been in a restaurant with our young kids and ANOTHER woman. At the time, we BOTH laughed it off as mistaken identity. ***facepalm
I fully anticipate I’ll have even more of these moments as time goes on and I process the full 20+ years. Regretfully, it goes with the territory when you were married to a serial-cheating, disordered fuckwit.
I’m just…. wishing the unicorn was real…
It will be a year on Monday since Dday1. I just realized the 3rd yesterday.
Never would I have envisioned my life here a year ago today.
((Licking wounds))
Sigh.
We don’t like cheating spouses and we’re married said our vows in front of family, friends, God, regarding forsaking all others. Did commitment, us our wedding vows prevent any of them of cheating?
Bwa ha ha! Me, or any mortal, keep Hannibal Lecher from greatness!! Certainly not, his magnificence shined even in the swamp of family life (as he saw it).
Actually this topic would hit a nerve if I still gave a damn; Hannibal turned out his best academic work since we dated/married, and he did credit me for discussions that helped him formulate ideas. He was quite willing to leech off me–ideas and all–while seeking Muse p***y elsewhere.
Whether a cheater is successful or a loser, at the end of the day, they are all morally bankrupt & emotional parasites. As my MC put it about Hannibal, “not relationship material.”
>>”Whether a cheater is successful or a loser, at the end of the day, they are all morally bankrupt & emotional parasites.”
This is spot-on. While my STBX is definitely in the “loser” camp … my dad was pretty successful, especially given that he married and had his first child at just sixteen years old. He joined the military, went to college, and created a relatively successful business. He loved books; he was always doing something to try to improve himself (one of the few things he did that I grew up respecting).
He was also a jackass serial cheater who didn’t care about anything except that which maintained his image. Kids were ignored unless excelling at something that made him look good. When they did something to impact his image the response was full-blown rage.
His wives all functioned babysitters, maid, and the “owned” sex toy. They were not allowed to put restrictions on him. But, he certainly had no problem implying — or outright telling them–they were stupid, careless, and that they needed to wear certain clothing so as to not attract male attention.
Honesty, respect for others, authentic love, commitment, integrity? Not even on his radar.
I apparently did not make as much money as she thought I would when she married me. I still remember that conversation in 2001, which was part of a larger discussion. When I told her she was ruining our finances by spending way too much money, she started crying and said “I always thought you’d make more money when I married you.” So not only was I apparently a failure as a lover (she was a serial cheater), I was also a failure as a provider.
I left out that she admitted in 2014 that she was having one of her affairs at the time of that 2001 discussion. Perhaps that’s where the $400-$800 a month was going – or some secret bank account.
I was a saver and not a big spender. I preferred saving for purchases beforehand rather than build up debt. Car loans and mortgages being the exception. I would never let him spend money the way he wanted.
He now has a spousal support payment and 2 child support payments. And he has a 25 year old live in girlfriend who works partime at the mall. He has sooooo much less money now than he ever had with me.
The kids and I have less, too, but somehow are saving even more than we did when he lived with us. Go figure…
Wow where to start.
Apparently I kept it from getting his dream job at JPL jet propulsion lab in California… Never mind that he never even applied for the job but somehow it’s my fault that he didn’t get the job that have replied for because one time I said living in LA would be yuck.
Then of course the burdens of marriage and family prevented him from becoming a billionaire entrepreneur like Bill Gates. Because of course you know he’s smarter than Bill Gates and of course he could have been richer and more successful had the only not been saddled with those Dreadful wife and children’s. Cuz he had plenty of time to sit at the bar every night and guzzle down booze from you know 4 in the afternoon until 10 p.m. every night but you know hey whatever… it wasn’t the drinking in The Hungover-ness they kept him from achieving greatness it was the wife in the kids you know the wife who was sitting at home cleaning and cooking and taking care of everything they can care the children and also earning a six-figure salary too.
Of course he never wanted the house that we picked even though he picked it because it was big and had all this guest rooms and work-at-home offices and stuff. We never had house guests and you never worked at home the basement office sat empty for weeks months years on end because he spent all his spare time at the bar.
Of course I only had the three children instead of the six or seven that he wanted me to have all well working. Six-figure job that I already mentioned. And you know having that last kids at the age of 40 now I was just completely washed up and he had no further use for me because I couldn’t produce any more offspring.
of course it was a terrible burden to be stuck with somebody who was so old but with me being 10 years younger than him. So I prevented him of having his goal of having a trophy wife.
Those are all the major things but the day-to-day stuff was of course that I was a b**** and I was no fun which is what he told a mutual friend of ours when she found him in a bar late one night canoodling with the karaoke horror he actually told my friend who was disgusted to find him there that I was quote no fun.
CKOL…wow you were a failure like me for not having 7 kids while working…I didnt know this about you….and I also had a huge house he picked and ruined his chance to be Bill Gates.
The “Trophy Wife” thing….when he was a monster…he told me one day when we were out on a walk that he goal was to get a “trophy wife” (who was CLEARLY not me)…looking back on that now….I was a world class spackler to be able to ignore such a profound insult. My now-husbands friends tell him that he has a trophy wife
You and me, UNM – what we ignored goes beyond anything that is normal.
But what choice did we have?
I had tiny children. I was a SAHM. If I didn’t ignore it, then I would have had to look it full in the face.
Everything happens the way it is supposed to happen, when it happens. This I absolutely believe.
I had a wonderful conversation with a friend at a sports match the other day. He said to me ‘you are so much happier now. Well, you were always fun, but it used to have a [I think he meant brittle, anxious] quality. And when ever he was around, you always walked on eggshells around him.
And him? I always thought he was a chop’.
Best. Conversation. Ever. Thank you, God.
I keep reminding myself that I couldnt know what I didnt know and things did unfold in a natural, organic way….so much of my processing is me wondering if I did the right thing at the right time and I hope someday to really come to full resolution about that. Patsy, it helps SO MUCH to have a buddy who knew me then.
The thing is, I actually didn’t have the sense of self then to set boundaries and enforce consequences.
There is no way I could have asked myself – ‘is this acceptable to me’? (the ultimate boundary question, THANK YOU Chump Lady).
I ‘polyfilla-ed’ (as its known in England) and explained it away until, in the words of my IC, ‘the finally unacceptably hurtful part of a pattern’.
It is what it is.
Unicorn. … i was literally labelled as the trophy wife by the fXXIng MIL . Ex fucktard must have been so disparaging about me that she felt entitled to call me that to my face at my diner table while my spineless wanker ex slid off to the kitchen. FIL just sat back as usual demonstrating that he was a used up male having given up years ago while his wife basically ran the show. I was left speachless. Thus episode of abuse might have something to do with the fact no one in the family wants to talk to them again. Toxic people eventually expose themselves.
CKOL… It wouldn’t have mattered. Between my 3 & PreyingMantis’ 4, I raised 7. PM was never grateful or appreciative. Every bit of attention I paid the kids was just that little bit less that PM got. And I was bitterly resented for it. No matter if you’d had a dozen, the goalposts would always have been moving. I’d love to see Tracy illustrate dancing, moving, frantically twerking goalposts! 😀
I was told by asshat EX-husband: “You never supported me.” I beg to differ – I supported him in every way…financially and otherwise. The more I earned, the less he earned. Never had a problem spending my money on stupid shit, including several failed attempts at training for new careers. I am so happy to be divorced and free! Life is good when you leave a cheater, gain a life!
That sounds very familiar!
STBX did do one kind and selfless act for me early in our marriage. He put his fledgling banking career on hold in order to follow me to graduate school. I thought I was the luckiest girl in the world to have a husband who would do that for me and he got a lot of spackle out of it. After that I was the one who always put his career first out of gratitude for what he had done for me. When he first started to show his selfish/critical side, I would always say “well, he did that, but he followed me to grad school so he is a good husband”.
Anyway, within a couple of years he had his career back on track. He got his foot in the door as an assistant to an investment banking desk and within a couple of years he had moved up to a position on the desk. This was unusual as assistants almost never make that leap, but he is hard working and persistent and I was always proud of him for his tenacity and ability to impress people. When his job got moved to New York we mutually agreed we didn’t want to move there. When he got an opportunity with the same company in NC, however, we jumped at the chance to give that one a go. At that point I am the one who risked my career by giving up a good job to follow him. I figured it was the least I could do after what he had done for me. I wanted him to succeed.
A few years later he was no longer happy with his $200,000+/year career. The company he worked for didn’t appreciate his hard work and took him for granted (sound familiar?). He ended up leaving that career to try his hand at flight instruction. I supported him in that too and was very proud of him when he did eventually land a position as a flight instructor (he just got promoted to director after a little over a year – how does he do that?).
When our marriage blew up, however, suddenly I was the reason his career in banking went bust. Evidently he resented and regretted the one truly kind and selfless act he did for me in the early years of our marriage. He had it in his head that somehow if he hadn’t done that he would have ended up in what would realistically been a very similar job in the exact same industry, but this time it would have been more fulfilling, he would have made more money and been more appreciated. Huh? Yes, his career did get delayed for a couple of years because of what he did for me, but he did recover and he got a lot of support and similar sacrifices from me. He never noticed my sacrifices, however, because they didn’t really count and why did I have to have a stupid career anyway. The one kind thing he did for me that bought him so much good will (not just from me, but my family too) and he regretted it.
It never occurred to me to leave my ex even though he had a degenerative disease. We’d been together 20 years and I figured I’d take care of him for the rest of his life – this is how my ethics works and how my family works. But when I developed a joint problem for a few years and was in and out of wheelchairs… I was so useless and disabled. He cheated and ran off! His new schmoopie is so much better for him because she can better take care of him. It’s a much better life for him. Never mind she was having affairs with as many as four married men and wants to marry for a greencard So fast forward a year and I’m completely recovered and he’s gone farther downhill. And he’s asking me to feel sorry for him because of his disability.
What a crappy person your ex is. I’m sorry Chompingchump.
They do not join the dots. Cause and effect, consequences, is never learned.
He never ever learns. He makes the same mistakes again and again. The only result? A huge self pity party. He has a PhD in tragic.
The week before D-Day, when I was still clueless about the OW, he said he always thought we would do “great things” and we just hadn’t. He used those exact words. He left me a week later in the middle of the night the day after I found about her. At the time, I thought my life was over, almost 50 and a SAHM. Guess what? 4 years later, I’m doing Great things!!! Beyond my wildest Dreams!!
Go you! Cheating and general uselessness seem to go hand in hand. Drop the cheater, do great things!
He cheated because he resented me for making him feel too constricted. You see, he got married too young and never got to “live his wild youth” and me wanting him to not sleep with other women was just unfair because “everybody else got to have that experience”.
After a terribly ill-advised attempt at working things out, he does the exact same thing again. (What a shock.) but THIS time it’s because he “didn’t have enough structure in his life”. I wasn’t ‘checking in’ enough, he didn’t have therapy appointments frequently enough, and he just went crazy with all that freedom.
So – I am simultaneously too absent and also too overbearing.
I am Schroedinger’s girlfriend?
Schroedinger’s girlfriend, lol.
Maybe. 🙂
It depends. What’s going to get him the most output for the least input?
Mine actually said that he planned his life from early on to “do the least amount of work towards anything but get the most reward possible”. He is telling everyone that my brother and I “promised” him a job at the local sheriff’s department, if only he would relocate and marry me. Truth? I left him in another state after finding out he was fucking around (we were dating) and he called/wrote me incessantly, promising everything under the sun if only I’d marry him.
He wanted to be an Xray Tech. Found out there’s actual pre-requisites to do prior to getting into a very competitive AS program. Not interested. But he did find out that young women who want to better themselves go to those classes, so he took them (never finishing even one, but telling me that he did) and fucked several, telling them he was “dumped” by his wife after moving several states to be with her.
Then he wanted to be a private investigator. Takes licensing, classes and certifications. Not interested in doing that work, either. Sounds sexy to be “in security” but not so sexy when it takes effort and time away from juggling 4-5 women at a time on my dime.
So he just basically became a SAHD, convincing me that this would “be best for the kids”. I was the breadwinner, while he spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on “security measures” for our house, went shooting (supposedly) every weekend to “practice” and “teach” so he’d be “ready for the bad guys” who were inevitably going to come get us all. Begin paranoid psycho behavior right about here.
Had 3 D-Days, convinced me each time that “moving away” would change everything. Uprooted everything, only to have him continue with old fuckbuddies and add new ones in the new locale.
He was never allowed friends. He wasn’t allowed to spend thousands on a “knife making” business in the garage. He wasn’t allowed to spend every weekend away from the family (this after me busting him twice in ‘it was only ONCE!’ affairs).
Last but not least, I kept him from doing “anything fun”, but he could never be specific. Once, he told me that he had “circled his intention” to go on vacation—and left the travel book on the coffee table—and it was my job to see that circled “intention” and make all of the plans to do so. It was all my fault his life sucked and he had “wasted 20 years” with “nothing to show for it”—something he realized after I announced MY intention of divorcing his stupid ass after D-Day #3—and one of his fuckbuddies apparently told him “Why would I want someone who doesn’t bring anything to the table like I do?”
So now it’s MY FAULT that his fuckbuddies have all abandoned him, because they were promised “Private Investigator” who makes $17K a month and a big house (that was mine, which I sold right out from under him)—and are now running for the hills.
All. My. Fault. Well, I guess I am okay with that. The fact that everyone sees him for the lying Man Whore that he is is well worth being blamed for his lack of success in this world.
Mine is pretty simple. While he was discarding me for the AP, my now ex told me he made a conscious decision 20 years previous to hook himself up to my wagon due to my earning potential as an engineer, but he was livid because we never completely combined our finances, so that didn’t work out well for him. Well, in fact it did. Half ownership of a house, trips that I paid for, me paying off his debts. The list goes on. My gut told me to never combine finances with him due to his spending well beyond his means and his being mad that I didn’t give him more. I should have seen that as a red flag and moved along.
Chumplady you must be psychic!
I *did* keep him from being a rock-n-roll star! Let me share my evil plan with you other chumps, in case you too want to stifle the next John Lennon:
– Supported him financially 100% for years while he was “between jobs” so he could focus on “his music.”
– Bought him literally thousands of dollars in musical equipment (basses, amplifiers, synthesizers, guitars), mostlynas b-day and Xmas gifts, although he had no sentimentality about not selling or trading them in for something better when he found it (kind of a recurring theme, come to think of it).
– Drove him to and from tons of auditions and gigs (he had no car), taking time out of my nights and weekends to do it.
– Drove him to band practice 30 miles away, during rush hour, taking time off work, for a band the members of which hated me (no doubt thanks to his telling lies about me). In retrospect, God knows what he was really practicing and with whom.
– Spent innumerable nights in clubs, bars and restaurants for his gigs, sitting alone or with people I managed to get to come with me (always my friends because he has none).
– Spent innumerable weekends and/or nights at home alone or doing things alone because he had “practice.” Again practicing what, is unclear.
– Listened ad nauseum to solo practice in the spare bedroom my tiny condo and participated constructively in endless conversations about setlists, venues and how talentless his fellow band mates really were (his assessment, not mine).
– Gave him money and care packages to take with him on his band’s one-week tour of the east coast. A tour which actually cost the band members (and by extension, me) money as it turns out that most of the gigs were unpaid (or he lied and kept any money he got rather than share it with me or pay me back for my generosity). Did I mention he took a week off without pay from his PT job at Pier 1 to do this? No matter, he wasn’t contributing any money toward expenses anyway. It all went to more instruments, his enjoyment, or unknown schmoopies.
– Defended him when one of his bands fired him. Of course it was because they were evil and untalented — not because of anything he did.
But my cheater was too smart! He saw right through all my subterfuge and flat-out told me I wasn’t being supportive. While we were sitting in rush hour traffic. On the way to his practice. Which I left work early to take him to. 30 miles from home.
All the constructive criticism he asked for? It was too negative! Why couldn’t I just emulate Beatlemania and shut up about it?
You’ll all be happy to know that since getting out from under my reign of terror, with a woman nearly 30 years his senior, he’s finally hit the big time.
You can catch him hosting an open mic gig every Saturday afternoon. In a used bookstore. In a dying mall. For free.
Next stop: Madison Square Garden. Woooo!
Wow!! The nerve of you!!!
That’s what he was looking for all along- a mother.
That seems to be a common theme.
I was not able to give him the attention that he wanted but OW was. He said he didn’t think I wanted him from when our son was 6 months. I have no idea why he then proceeded to continue to pretend for 2 years and to plan another child with me. I didn’t really get the details of what wanting him actually meant. I don’t really know why they just don’t leave when they say they have been unhappy etc. They don’t just waste our time they waste their own as well.
X decided about 10 years into our marriage to start his own business, something unique. I was killing him by not supporting his new business, forcing him to stay at his government career job while he paid his student loans off for a degree he got (prior to our marriage) to pursue the career he was working in. I was a dream killer by asking him to make a business plan before I’d sign home equity loan. He said he’d just fake the numbers anyway, so he shouldn’t have to make a business plan. I was unsupportive by traveling with him to interview people doing a similar business in another city in our region, taking notes, and listening to him talk endlessly about his ideas, which never seemed to develop. He kept saying his same spiel to me every couple weeks for a couple years, sometimes yelling it, sometimes saying God told him to do this. So I was not only a dream killer for x but also going against God’s wishes.
I love my life now. Things just make sense.
This topic is awesommmme!
My weasel of 26 years left to save his howorker.
And like many here I went without for years so he could have everything he ever wanted. Which was a lot. As soon as the shine wore off he would be dreaming of the next shiny thing. And when I would say no. We can’t eat out every second night he got resentful that I never let him spend money because finally he was making more than I did.
And with that change in pay came the man child comments of it’s my money. I should. Be able to spend it however I want.
WTF. I was still paying off previous purchases. I simply couldn’t keep up!
CC maxed constantly.
As he left he said he resented that we only had one child (thank fuck for that as he has seen her only 4 times in a year.. unfortunately she still has him on a pedestal)
In reality.. we could have had more children but with my own practice to run, and the fact that I would have required a lot of bed rest. We didn’t have more children as he wasn’t willing to look for a higher paying job, which would have enabled us to have more kids as I could take the time if I needed. . Nope I had to continue working to pay the bills. It was a zinger when he said it but now I realize he is an assclown.
In the year since he left he has been robbed twice.
Had his. Bank accounts hacked(apparently)
Had all his uninsured furniture severely damaged when he moved to a city to put his smoopsie thru uni ( of course he said it was to be closer to our daughter who is in uni too, about 2 hrs from where he lives… but he hasn’t been to see her yet..)
His family has all but disowned him, his brother would like to knock his teeth out after he called his mother a C#$t on two occasions.
One of my friends sent a meme to his smoopsie about infidelity and I’m sure that is like the proverbial worm in the apple. With the emotional depth of a teaspoon he would hate having to ease her fears, and if he doesn’t she will hate having to deal with all those thoughts herself.
I don’t feel sorry for her. She was cheated on by her husband and was so appalled with infidelity that she got someone fired from work when she caught them. But her going after a married man. I guess that’s different some how….
I’m not sure I ever believed in Karma. But the hits just keep on coming. To him that is.
I found a wonderful boy who is kind, thoughtful and a true blessing.
And while my relationship is constantly undermined by my narcissisist victim ex. I’m positive we will weather the storm somehow.
Wish I had found CL earlier.
I apparently squelched his feelings of independence by resisting his continual plans to buy new stuff. We had twin babies and I’d lost my job, yet He was still constantly buying things on credit to replace what we already had with slightly better versions. A new car. New toys for him. (Nothing for me.) When my resistance to further mutual debt became too great, he started doing it on secret credit cards. And when that came to light, he blamed me for having to do it. He Said “you didn’t let me buy what I wanted” (that is verbatim).
How dare I press for a balanced monthly budget so we and our kids could actually have a future!!!
I even finally caved on the car, in hopes it would “make him happy” (insert ironic laughter here). A week later he was driving the secret girlfriend to a secret hotel in that new car, on our anniversary.
Now he has his stuff but a mounting pile of further debt. And I heard through the grapevine that he has started buying again. I had a huge wave of sadness for him and the ugly path he is on…and also a wave of relief that this time it’s not my problem. I wonder when Schmoopie will be viewed as the new roadblock to his purchasing obsession….
Oh the ways I got in the way!
I kept us from accumulating crushing debt by refusing to sign into a house (for sale by owner!) that would have cost us far more than we could afford, for a house falling into it’s own basement.
And YES, he had a chance to join a band years ago that was going to tour Germany, and he had to GIVE THAT UP, you know, for the wife and just born son.
I’m such a freaking bitch!
Sure as hell I thwarted his greatness. Problem was that I couldn’t read his mind. At the age of 57 he exclaimed, “I never got to surf!”
Motherfucker never went in the ocean with the exception of the time he was supposed to be watching my daughter and didn’t notice she was flailing in a rip tide.
I failed to get excited at his magic when he brought his ho worker (pregnant) Dianna to see our child in the hospital and then to our home as I lay in bed taking care of a baby with heart problems and a three year old that also needed care. Yeah episiotomies aren’t thrilling.
Be damned to hell doingme for not going to a chocolate fountain on a cruise with hundreds of kids running wild. After paying for the entire cruise, and south beach for three nights he complained about the deepest of injuries when he doesn’t eat fuckimg chocolate. On Dday he againef mentioned the cruise.
And throwing laundrydown the stairs rather than carrying it because i needed to hold on to the railing. No don’t offer to bring it down instead.
The biggest dream was to move to California. I said no. He talked about it for years. He couldn’t answer how he was goikg to support himself. Finally I went to California and he did not want to go. Until my other children deciddd to come.
The sadz, he complained the whole time.
He got excited at the thought of living in a. shitty hobo community of run down makeshift tent dwellers (homeless) as we drove up the coast. That’s your dream? I cringed. I live across from the ocean. Can see it from my ‘work’ home. In six fucking years he never once came there other than on our anniversary. Not once on my birthday.
Georgetown, D.C., and a rooftop pool wasn’t enough as the horns blasting bothered him. Kennedy center and five star restaurant weren’t worthy of bringing a fuckimg suit and tie or getting a taxi.
Kyaking, golf, hiking, travel, sight seeing, dancing lessons were things I wanted to do and were met with excuses.
The energizer bunny got his charge from other women. I’m guessing most of the women he met found him lacking in personal interests.
Where did he land? Right where he’s belonged all along. Divorcing him ended the torture of nowhere man. He can have the dive bars, casino sluts, drunken sex, and hobo quarters.
Doing Me, right on. I’ve picked up another part time job, slamming money into retirement and spending time with a man who is loving and kind. Life is good.
She comes from a long line of cheaters. Mom and dad. Mom is always dating someone who “used to be rich” her dad is successful, largely because wife #3 is too.
She wanted to be her dad. Well, she had to settle for fucking him. Sadly grandskank, and she can’t see the irony, used to be successful. That is until his wife ran off with the kids because she found out about them fucking. Oh and a big fuck you to her if she’s here for never giving me a heads up. A fucking year of pain it cost me. Thanks.
After D day ex told me how I was so controlling and afraid of me that with the courage of the OW he was able to get away from me. He’s a Navy Seal so imagine how fearful I must be.
I refused to allow any friends. You see when I met his female friends who happened to be 20/21 to his 30/31, I just looked at them and they hated me. Ex said if I could just be nicer to these girls he could have friends. He also didn’t have male friends because they might flirt me and that was my fault because I was so friendly!! This was all my fault. I also didn’t let him buy a surf board instead of baby stuff for our newborn son. I mean the surf board was for him so baby and I could sit on the beach and watch him. I wouldn’t let him by a motorcycle also when our son was first born. I mean we him and I could have gone riding every weekend and left our 10 month with a sitter.
I also spent too much time with the baby. Ex said you know you don’t have to pick him up when he cries.
About a year after our divorce before going no contact I had a conversation with him where he complained how the military was too controlling and his life was just going down hill!
Poor guy!!
In his defense, it’s fucked up that the military and seals would woo all those candidates by promising them massages and vacations with little to no oversight by a superior and then attempt to what every aspect of their lives. I hear they can even sometimes make the men and women in the military wake up at specific times, move, and even fight wars. They supposedly even have codes of conduct. 😉
ISpy
The deprivation, poor lost wounded birds fluttering around responsibilities.
Loving the fact the Limited lied to the whore about everything. All the couldn’t haves were granted. The dreams fulfilled. Yeah right. Two new vehicles, vacations and three years later the whore shows up at a family wedding wearing a bathing suit coverup and he’s wearing a jacket I bought 16 years ago, wrinkled. He’s aged significantly, she gained weight, and let’s just say makeup can’t fix ugly.
They were evicted, the new housing is top secret as rents have skyrocketed. He’s still paying over 400 a month for taxes from 2014. Has to play games to send me a few hundred for a YEARS worth of health benefits.
So now and then I’m inclined to put salt in the cunts wound as I remind him to inform me when he gets married as the health benefits can be terminated. True love ❤️ right there. He has no intentions of ever marrying her. Marriage means nothing to him. There’s the rub as Nanthony knows he’s a serial cheater. Two pigs in a pen.
He dropped out of his nearly completed PhD 3 years before we met, he dropped out of his teacher training course 2 months before completion, wrote the course director that he was too busy running for the local elections. He dropped out against my advice one year after he moved in with (bringing no income whilst studying) but he blames me and the farm for that, but we didn’t get the farm until a year later. After he dropped out he wanted us to go farming full time, wanted me to leave my job, change my bank, lawyer and accountant. I left my job and we moved to this farm, but held on the the bank, lawyer and accountant. Then when he left he said that I wanted to buy this farm, he wanted another one (which was too far to maintain 50/50 custody of his son) and if we had moved to the other place maybe things would have been different. Possibly, he would have been too far to cheat on me with his ex the entire time…
So I thwarted him. I ruined his chance to be faithful. He might have been faithful if we’d moved to the other place. My bad…
I also thwarted him by not keeping a tidy garden. He was so ashamed that he wouldn’t invite anyone over so he had no friends…
I’ve only ever known him to have one friend, his pot dealer. He had females in his orbit at uni and where he lived when we met, but strangely I never saw any of them. No friends left from high school either. When we came here he didn’t make any friends, fell out with most of the neighbours; I had to drag him to social events or go alone.
Despite the fact that we had date night, every week and a regular sex life (2-3/week), my STBXW complained I never took her on vacation, or talked to her, or told her she was beautiful, etc… We really didn’t go on vacations, because I told her she’d have to contribute and she never would. Our incomes were a 60/40 split, with mine being the higher, however she pain only 1/3 of the total household bills. I simply refused to be used. I talked to her a as often as I, or she had anything to converse about. I would tell her she was beautiful, just not as often, as she wanted. I also wouldn’t cosign for a her a new car, as her credit score was low and she changed jobs, every two-three years, on average. Financially, she is a bad risk. I don’t watch television, as it bores me, so I play guitar, in my man cave, however several times a week, I’d watch an on-demand movie with her. It simply wasn’t enough, so she felt “unwanted, fat and ugly”, to the point she began a sexual relationship with someone else, WHILE being married and having an active sex life with me.
C’est la vie!
Sorry about the grammatical errors. I was in a hurry!
I kept him from being the great success that he was destined to be…whatever that is….First, it was a Pharmacist. He quit 3 years into that program. Then he wanted to be a Teacher….Only got an Associates degree….Then I guess school wasn’t working out, so he began to cheat…..I was the breadwinner in the marriage, so I got the shitty end of the deal and got all of the marital debt…but guess what…I still have more money than he does, even after paying the mortgage singlehandedly and raising the kids.
I live in the marital house and have been fixing it up….he lives in his parent’s basement…..
Sounds like mine! He and his mistress live in her grandmother’s house…Classy!
Certified dream crusher here. Kept him from:
1. Becoming an NBA superstar. No matter that we married at 27 and any semi-pro tryouts he had prior to meeting me ended in his being cut because he was too stoned. Oh, and he hadn’t played any college basketball, either.
2. Prevented him from becoming the heavyweight champ. Boxing experience? Grade school.
3. Got in the way of his dream of being an NFL quarterback. Maybe this had more to do with never playing college football?
How did I manage all this, given that he worked out five times a week, including every Saturday and Sunday? Easygoing chump that I was, I let him off with comments like, “You work hard all week; you deserve to go to the Y all weekend. Also, I was raised to “protect the male ego.”
I also somehow prevented him from achieving his goal of becoming the world’s leading expert on CPTSD. Yes, I edited and typed all his papers, applied to conferences for him, praised his work, and encouraged him, but it was all my fault he wasn’t Bessel van der Kolk. Would have improved his chances had he bothered to get a license to practice therapy.
Way back when, I deferred my acceptance into an excellent MFA program because he wanted to move to Maine. Dream deferred for me, but I finally got the degree (free ride, too) several years ago, despite his rage and spiteful attitude.
Narc quotient of this elderly teenager? Off charts. He’s 58 and still needs to be the best in the gym. Two sons, both focused on adult concerns, like building lives and facing reality. Can’t believe I ever put up with his garbage.
Out of Crazytown, now, but still impressed at my own superpowers of denying the world his multi-faceted greatness!.
The final straw that made my STBX want out of the marriage was because I didn’t spontaneously hike Mt. Fuji when we were visiting Tokyo in 2015. Best part is that he went back a few weeks later for work – did he hike it then? Nope. And after he got back from that trip is when we started fertility treatments to try to get pregnant so you’d think the jackass would share with me that he wanted out at that point? Nope. Fast forward to 3 weeks after I had our baby is when he tells me that he’s been unhappy since then. ????
Maybe if he goes back to Japan Mt. Fuji will burp up a huge boulder that will squash him like a bug. It could happen.
Mine didn’t share with me he was still in love with ex through 6 miscarriages and 2 uterine surgeries to try and complete a pregnancy. I also thwarted him by being asexual, cue six pregnancies without fertility treatment. I thwarted him and his twu wuv through multiple immaculate conceptions.
I kept him from having fun. He wanted to go out more. Socialize more. And like a lot of you, I was busy being a mom. Having a night out meant planning for a sitter, etc. He always wanted to go out last minute. When I did plan things (family outings to the zoo, state fair, family friend parties or just a day off to do whatever), he never wanted to join us. What he really meant by socialize more was going to every Happy Hour he was ever invited to or just sitting belly up to the bar by himself.
He also was just plain unhappy. I was too mean–complaining when things didn’t get done or when I didn’t get help. I criticized him too much and made him feel bad about himself. While we were going through therapy, I was also in the middle of cancer treatments. Our MC had us answer a list of questions to each other (which we never got through). One of the questions was what are our concerns for the future. I answered that I was concerned about my health and getting through treatments and I was also concerned about how our daughter would handle everything going on and I was concerned that she would have the same health issues in her future. He replied that of course he was concerned for our daughter but he was most concerned about his happiness!
Jackass had a sad story about losing his business because XW#2 was a spendthrift who first put him in debt and then moved out, filed bankruptcy, got a giant child support payment, and left him destitute. Then he was consigned to working for other people, most of whom had no idea what they were doing.
I thwarted his greatness by offering to bankroll a part-time start up that he could do during evenings and weekends, working toward re-opening on his own. He would have had to produce! To work hard! So his “greatness” largely resided in his own mind, and expecting him to actually build a new business with me looking over his should would have shown he wasn’t up to the job. It’s not all that hard to thwart greatness that exists in a Jarkass’s mind.
This couldn’t have come at a better time! 2 years out and I’m just now getting his interrogatories.
And what exactly do you think was listed under dissipation claims? Kernels of truth, lies and the stripping of context to paint me as a horrible woman!
Petitioner has spent over 90,000 on plastic surgery during the marriage without consent of respondent. Petitioner has also been a student for 18 years, spending over 80,000 on tuition and fees while constantly changing majors multiple times and refusing to complete her education. Respondent has been put under severe pressure and considerable strain to maintain her lavish lifestyle.
God, yes that sounds horrible… poor sausage! Until of course you take out the lies, add in the context and do not twist the truth.
I had 2 procedures over the course of an 18 year marriage (one being 12 years ago) and the other correcting a bone problem. 90 k??? I don’t even know where he came up with that number? Without his consent? … Was that his long lost twin that went with me and picked me up?
80 k over 18 years? How about I have no idea where he came up with that number, and I took classes here and there over 18 years as a stay at home mom. I switched majors AFTER his first affair so that In the case of a second D-day (of course there was one) I could get a job that would allow me to support myself and 3 kids without a spouses income.
He just doesn’t want to pay my dissipation claims that he was stupid enough to leave a paper trail for. All there in black and white!
Feel your pain with the answers to interrogatories. You know they are outrageous but the things they say out of context make the blood pressure rise.
My complaint basically states he committed adultery and then abandoned me and the children. His couner states that he was emotionally abused for years. Somehow, I do not think that seeking out multiple sex partners, carrying out a long term affair and then leaving your children in the complete care of your abuser is the usual reaction of an abuse victium.
Bear in mind that college educations alone can cost $80,000 in 4 years. Spending that over 18 years to keep current while staying home with kids would be admirable, especially your foresight in changing majors to be self-sustaining and able to market your skills in the work force. That will not be considered a “dissipation of assets” if you do a good job in your response. Facts, figures. If you can list courses and costs, you can show that education was (as most people would say) an investment in your ability to make a living, which is paying off now.
I prevented him from living his lifelong dream of never having to mow the lawn or take out the garbage.
“I hate it when you ask me to do chores! My PARENTS used to do that to me!”
He may have actually stamped his foot when he screamed this.
Haha! Oh, how this resonates with me. Mine was always, “You can’t tell me what to do!” He was really like a petulant child.
Yeah mine used to litteraly jump up and down when he was having a tantrum. Comical but sad for a 40 year old.
Suddenly abandoning me/our family for AP was a logical way to become “a better parent” in my stbx’s eyes. So far this plan is not working out well at all; he later acknowledged it might take some time for that piece of his grand scheme to materialize.
Btw, I’m one of those chumps that believed I was secure in a happy marriage of 20+ years.
Over 20 years for me too.
STBX tried to explain to me that divorce is GOOD for kids. (!?!?!) The way he stated it was as if he were a wonderful parent whose children were authentically important to him. This from a man whose parents never divorced (whereas I experienced four divorces during my childhood). He’s also the guy that never really connected with his kids — and ignored our youngest (and me) for the first year of her life.
Outraged, I uselessly tried to explain that divorce is not “good” for kids in of itself. Divorce hurts everyone involved. The rub–and where he snuck in his “heroic” spin–is that divorce is often preferable to staying in a terrible home environment (when one spouse is an abusive cheat is a great example) … but that’s not the same as being “good” for the kids. When the home environment is screwed up by the cheater, a divorce is simply the best decision in a BAD situation that (here’s the really important part) was caused by the willful decisions of the cheater.
I compared his heroically spun “it’s good for the kids” to him throwing us off of a ship. After throwing us in, he stands safely on the ship, watching us flailing in the water. When he finally decides to throw us life preservers, he expects everyone to worship him as the hero of the story.
The truth is that he threw us in and *I* pulled myself and my kids to shore (deciding to separate and divorce). Yes, we are in a MUCH better place than being stuck with a deranged asshole who could throw us overboard at any moment. But, it really would have been fantastic–and far healthier for our kids–if we would never have had to endure being thrown overboard by STBX in the first place.
Cause and effect is not something these assholes care to consider.
Skankboy on Dday said , ” you are the best, you did nothing wrong.” *I* said you’re damn right!
I wouldn’t let RonBurgundy quit his $90k job (that we had worked our way through 4 markets, 1 firing, leaving a business, losing money on 3 houses for) and move 5 of us, (kids 6, 2 and newborn) to a one-bedroom apartment in Chicago for a $14k internship. Funny that in the years since, he and InternWhore never did that.
Aww, you made him have a job, the poor thing. You just couldn’t be satisfied living in a cardboard box on lower Wacker drive? What about his dream of being a panhandling hobo?
Mine didn’t share with me he was still in love with ex through 6 miscarriages and 2 uterine surgeries to try and complete a pregnancy. I also thwarted him by being asexual, cue six pregnancies without fertility treatment. I thwarted him and his twu wuv through multiple immaculate conceptions.
Oh my gosh, Kiwi, that is so horrible!!!!
Let’s see…I stopped XH from being able to waste all our money on frivolous, sparkly things that he felt he needed to be “special.” He also didn’t like that I am low-maintenance, as others have mentioned. Guess he preferred his ex gf who is a broke alcoholic on disability who demands the newest expensive Coach purses in every color. I also stopped him from getting much needed dental work, even though he would make sure to get himself fired from every job he had right before the benefits became effective. But most importantly, I stopped him from “being himself,” which was actually a rude, crude, sleazy, cheating, low-life. Awww, too bad!!! I am happily NC, but uhhh, good luck with that! Lmao
I failed to recognize my ex as the hot, sexy stud he clearly was. Silly me, I thought I was married to a average-looking middle-aged guy with a beer belly! I wasted my time on the kids, my job, and household management (alone, of course) instead of being wet and ready whenever he wanted some lovin’. And I had ridiculous expectations about responsibility, sharing, and mutual respect in our marriage
I didn’t worship his body like the OWs did. I didn’t set his inner animal free. If only I had realized how irresistible he was to womankind….
I’m late to the party here but here are just a few of the things I did to him that were wrong or prevented him from glory (in the 3 years we were together before the 1.5 years we were married):
I bought him an almost new car and made the payments on it (he said he would and never did), thus preventing him from having his old paid for car that the tires went flat on every day and had 250000 miles on it, thus making it harder for him to run off with the sly puppet 25 year old.
I got back the 20k in his back taxes from the IRS, because I am all about money, and I should pay his tax debt from before we ever got together, this making it more difficult to run off with the slut puppet.
I refused to buy another house that he could “fix up” and use as a place for him and his mom to live if we got divorced. This after I found out the slut puppet was on the house hunting expedition with him. This prevented him from having a place that I paid for for them to live in.
I prevented him from being a rock star by not continuing to stay married to him while he was “touring” with the slut puppet and his mom still lived in the house with me. It’s hard to become a rockstar without the wife’s money. It was all about the music and they weren’t fucking, don’t ya know.
Many many more examples of how awful I was for not conceding to his greatness.
I recently stumbled across an eExample of his mind fuckery. This is while he was gone on a 3 month tour with the slut puppet and after I went to see a lawyer who basically told me if I owed him anything, the most would be $6000. I offered him that and this was his response. ( periods added for clarity) : You win im all your with my worthlessnessll 6000 life. I will come home after my tour. But just know as we move forward in life, I wont forget that you put my life value at 6000.00 I will see you when I get home.
I won the pick me dance! Not. I declined that awesome offer of him coming back after his fuck fest (which I was told when they left they would be gone a week).
I’ll try this again, since in the middle of it yesterday I had an Aha moment and another DDay. Sigh.
I wouldn’t move out of my house. I live in a house that was at one time a church and it’s actually owned by my parents. In the whole time he has lived here, he paid rent for maybe 3 years out of the 11 he was married to me and the lack of payment, goes against my inheritance. It’s also large 3200 sq feet with a garage and 5 lots.
He’s never had a job that would support us without my bring in some kind of income, yet he wanted me to give up my house. I said I’d consider it, and while I would be fine with something smaller, I wasn’t going to live ina dive with a crappy kitchen. I told him I’d look but I wasn’t going to settle for a rat trap. He wouldn’t even bother looking when I presented him with a list of reasonable needs I wanted in a house.
Sooooooo glad I did not give up my house only to be left high and dry due to his insatiable dick.
I kept my Peter Pan from being a secret agent. Yes, I kid you not. He wanted to be a secret agent. He did interview with the CIA many moons ago, but his “loyalty” to me kept him from his dream job. Say what? I guess I thwarted him at every step. So finally I am on the divorce track, after several years of false reconciliation. BTW, most MCs for the cheater are so understanding of the cheating.
There is so much body-shaming on this damn blog. Every time I look in the comments it’s all “His OW was fat” etc, etc. Jesus, are fat women just unattractive or something? You know fat women read this blog right?
I know I moan about the OW in my case being overweight, and if I have ever caused offence, I sincerely apologise.
A raw nerve of mine is that he criticised me for putting on weight (I had) and said he no longer “fancied” me. I lost 2 and a half stone, went down 3 dress sizes (and have kept the weight off), but he still ignored me. 2 years later, he ended up with Schoompie who is extremely overweight! I feel somewhat kicked in the teeth… I’d like to say she is attractive and a nice person, but she honestly is not.
Sorry again if I have upset anyway.
Sorry, I meant “anyone” – bloody autocorrect! ????
What you’ve done is say she’s unattractive because she’s overweight, and by extension, you’ve stated that all other women her size are unattractive. Not exactly repairing anything with your statement.
As for the whole “inner beauty” argument below – Backhanded compliments aren’t compliments. I’m ok with being ugly, but I will speak up for the fat women reading this. Plenty of them are attractive and slay all day.
You’re not understanding me – I’m actually criticising my STBXH here! ????
He told me he found me unattractive due to my weight gain, so I lost weight to be more attractive to HIM (fool on me). He then goes to someone with a quality that he said he didn’t like me for. And he even complained about the OWs weight TO ME, and said he felt SHE should lose weight too!). The OW IS unattractive, but it’s not due to her weight, and she honestly has no personality or intelligence – I’ve met her on a few occasions.
My mother is overweight, she has been all her life, as is my best friend. Both of them are the most beautiful women I know, inside and out. Believe me when I say I’m the last person to judge people by size. I’m just furious that my ex treated me this way.
Please accept my apologies. x
Budgie you can’t win this one.
My friend who was married to an even bigger narc than I was, told her the reason he was not sleeping with her was that she was too fat.
She went on a huge diet until she was model thin.
Then he told her the reason was that she was too thin.
I wish it was just my ex! When I first lost the weight, everyone was complimenting me that I looked good. Then Dday hit, and the stress caused me to lose even more, so I ended up underweight. It’s taken me a year to get back to my “healthy” weight, but everyone is now telling me I look haggard and too thin! What more do people want from me!?
I hate this weight obsessive culture we live in – I’ve now been torn to shreds for being too fat, now I’m “too thin”. I wish we all could just be accepted for who we are…
Dem, you’re taking it too personally.
Just because someone is saying the OW is an overweight ugly whore, does not mean all over weight women are whores or ugly. It means SHE is.
No one here called you that and that statement that someone else said or may have said, is not about you.
Budgie is reaching out and being kind to you. She’s stepping out to apologize for something when she isn’t at fault for anything, in order to help you feel heard and validated.
Consider that….and then chalk it up to simply having a bad day when you wrote that and one thing that perhaps you might consider being incredibly sensitive about and being a trigger for you. That’s ok, but put it where it belongs…it’s your hang up and not a short coming of someone else.
“No one here called you that and that statement that someone else said or may have said, is not about you.”
I didn’t say it was about me. I said I was getting tired of seeing body shaming in these comments. I didn’t even call anyone out by name.
” She’s stepping out to apologize for something when she isn’t at fault for anything, in order to help you feel heard and validated.”
I don’t want her validation or your’s. I don’t owe you or her anything. Flat out, full stop. I simply stated I was tired of seeing constant body shaming in these comments. Almost every other day I see it. It’s not ok, I’m tired of seeing it.
I’m fat, old, and ugly. I’m ok with that. My life is basically cobwebs in my vag, but that doesn’t matter. I can still call something wrong when it’s wrong. It doesn’t make me a bad person simply because i’m unattractive. Constantly harping on about another woman’s looks just feeds the whole idea that women are only around to be pretty. F that noise. No one is owed beauty and no one exists as a damn decoration.
Would it somehow be better if the OW were a skinny, beautiful whore? No, it wouldn’t. So why even bring it up? All you are doing is feeding justifications people use for cheating in the first place. I’m out. I lurk because these comments are so damn lookist, body-shaming, and sometimes flat out classist.
Jedi hugs DemHoez, please don’t take it personally, most people are not normally like this. When people are hurting they sometimes say unfortunate things they don’t really mean, or truly believe. People tend to lash out at the person that hurt them, and those that helped their spouse hurt them, in ways they wouldn’t normally. It isn’t OK by any means, just saying that intense pain sometimes overcomes people. Beauty is within, your weight, your outer looks of any kind; those are secondary and easily become beautiful in the eyes of any human when they learn who you are.
The only greatness I thwarted was his desire to stop working and live off me. Wait, I didn’t entirely thwart him, he is living off his girlfriend, but a teacher’s pension is a step down fro