The ‘Bitch Be Crazy’ Red Flag
Here’s a situation I’ve encountered many times among dating friends. Friend will swoon with excitement over new man in her life. Man is divorced. Being the horrible Chump Lady killjoy that I am, I’ll ask why. (Sorry, Mr. Prospect. You don’t date someone I love without being vetted.) And invariably I’ll get the nebulous tale of an ex-wife who one day, inexplicably, just went batshit crazy.
This is never a good sign, people.
I call this the Bitch-Be-Crazy red flag. “Oh, well she had mental problems. No, really. Even the neighbors say she was fine and then one day she turned on him. It’s like something snapped!”
I am skeptical. Now, it’s true that the world possesses many crazy bitches, and that crazy can be the factor in many divorces. I don’t doubt that. However I DO doubt the nebulous case of Crazy Bitch that just descends on otherwise fine women one day, who take leave of their senses and turn on wonderful partners like rabid raccoons. Symptoms include “jealousy” and failing to sufficiently appreciate him.
As someone who actually divorced someone for their untreated mental illness (my first husband), I can speak to leaving crazy. Here’s what distinguishes leaving actual crazy for vague crazy — I can tell you his diagnosis. What doctors we went to and for how long. I can tell you every symptom of the illness and the drugs used to treat it. What support sites are online and what your Amazon reading list should include. And I can tell you that untreated mental illness tends to be a slow, confusing decline — and that unless you suffered a traumatic brain injury, crazy doesn’t come on all of a sudden. Either you’ve suffered with it for most of your life (depression, anxiety), or things that were once eccentric or in the range of normal become chaotic and untenable over time. There are a lot of irrational conversations and embarrassing confrontations.
Most important — if you’re any kind of loving person, you tried to get your partner help and understand the illness, and you struggled with the decision to divorce or be divorced. Sure, you can be angry, but mostly divorcing someone with a mental illness is just sad as hell. “Crazy” isn’t a one-size-fits-all excuse for leaving someone.
So, if someone lays the Bitch Be Crazy narrative on you — ask some pointed questions. Don’t spackle. Pay attention to the answers. “What was her diagnosis?” “How much time did she spend in treatment?” “Why do you think she’s angry with you?” “Did you cheat on her?”
And on the flip side, if you have a terrible ex-wife and you’re at pains to explain your failed relationship — just cut to the chase — share that she cheated on you. You don’t have to say she’s crazy. Your date will take in the wonderfulness of you, and conclude that herself.
And if your ex describes you as that Crazy Bitch? Not a thing you can do about it. (Okay, except maybe worry for the next chump.) Enjoy your freedom from a cheater. The sanity is priceless.
Usually bitch be crazy means “she stopped minimizing her needs and expected me to do things”. Or “she was tired of my cheating and entitlement “.
While mental illness is one thing, it’s the rare thing.
Abuse causes victims to skirt mental illness because of the abuse. And Lundy Bancroft says cheating is abuse. While many abuse victims get treated and diagnosed for mental illness, the mental illness is a by product and reaction to abuse.
Prodding about mental illness will perpetuate an abuser to gaslight and lie about what happened. It puts the person asking the questions at risk of buying into the abusers excuses and having falsely triggered empathy.
I think it’s best to step away from “what illness, how treated” approach into asking situational questions to find out what caused the “mental illness” in the first place.
For example, a man may say that it started up on the birth of her first child. By using really good questions, you could learn he wasn’t supportive when the child was born, felt that his needs were not being met. There’s your first clue to probe further, and you may learn that he was cheating, looking on purpose to stay away from the home. Which means this is not a good partner and most certainly lacking in character.
I couldn’t agree more! I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression 2 years into my marriage with the narc. I was suicidal by that point and despised myself. He was completely fine with abusing me and blaming it on my “mental illness”. During an attempt to self harm, instead of calling 911 like any normal loving husband would do, he pulled out his phone and filmed me and then used it later in court against me to prove I was “crazy”. Before I met him I was a happy confident girl, during our marriage I hardly recognized myself. I had no self worth. After I left him, my “mental illness” disappeared, I learned to love myself again, and I have not felt suicidal or depressed once. But of course he went and told everyone (and I mean EVERYONE. Like friend’s husband who I don’t even talk to and our old pastor in another country) that I was mentally ill and that he tried to help me but just couldn’t handle my abusiveness and anger anymore. Of course those that knew us knew right away that he was bullshitting. I can only imagine the story he’s spun for the new girl considering we have a newborn and two other kids, he must have spun a real good tale to land her.
without going into my history, suffice to say the serial cheater cheated with another cheater. I really liked your, she’s crazy cuz, ” she was tired of my cheating and entitlement”. And just a tidbit from my hurt, this cheater started cheating with me while living in her house and with the cheater woman, but did not ever tell me he was otherwise taken. Yes I ended it and told the cheater/cheated on woman via a certified, signed receipt letter that her cheater man was now cheating on her. The ex-wife (who I located) earned and deserved the affirmation that the woman who cheated with her ex hubby, was now being cheated on herself-thank you karma train god. So in the scheme of things as to who is crazy-slightly crazy is getting involved with a married man and making a life with him. Full-blown crazy, is being a cheater, making an attached life with a cheater man as a cheater woman and then learning that he is now cheating on you, and still staying with him and letting him live in your solely owned house years later is the first three words of this sentence. AND, IF PERCHANCE THAT WASN’T CRAZY TO STAY, THE PARANOIA AND CHEATER COP, AND LOSS OF TRUST AND DAILY DOUBT, AND CHECKING AND VERIFYING AND QUESTIONING WILL MAKE ONE FULL BLOWN CRAZY. And I kinda think when she received my letter, he told her, “she’s crazy” because he told me as he was representing himself as a single, divorced man, that “my ex-wife was crazy.” Once we get enough time and distance away from the hurt, it’s all sardonically humorous. I am almost there.
Bouncing Back,
I’m a perfect example of being duped by a Bitch be Crazy explanation and now I’m the Bitch be Crazy. He’s abandoned two wives at the ripe old age of 36.
However, in my defense, he did such a good, caring, sweet “Bitch be Crazy” that I was non the wiser.
His First wife Bitch be Crazy explanation: Yeah, I tried really hard to stay in that marriage. She was manipulative and I didn’t know it. I mean, we knew each other since high school, so when we ran back into each other, I was celibate and so we got married after only 6 weeks. After a few months of marriage I started to see cracks in our marriage. I stayed as long as I could (less than 3 years) but I just couldn’t do it anymore. She was really manipulative. She lied to my family and they all hate her.
Truth: He was celibate because he was previously caught messing around in Officer school with an enlisted girl and needed to put disciple in on himself. She was manipulative because of his shitty relationship solving skills and unwillingness to make changes so she had to gently maneuver around him. His family hated her (after they originally loved her) because he talked badly to them about her. He abandoned his first wife after he met a new woman, and then realized “how terrible his marriage was”.
I bought his Terrible First Wife Story. chumpy me.
Second Wife (Me) Bitch be Crazy story: Yeah, our marriage was falling apart and we were really unhappy. We sat down on the couch and talked about a divorce and we both agreed. She’s super manipulative (just like my first wife), she believes in a different religion and she totally cut me out of my step-son’s life and she stops me from seeing my daughter and she is a gold digger.
Truth: I went off to college for 10 days cheated on my wife, came home and told her ILYBINILWY while she was frantically searching for marriage therapist. I was sleeping with my phone and “going to the bathroom” for 20 min at a time every hour. She had NO idea this was coming because if you asked anyone under the sun they would say we were the perfect couple. She put all the pieces together and now she went grey rock and doesn’t even talk to me because she’s super mighty. So I converted to a new religion to look good to everyone else in my new church. I’m still paying the mortgage on the house that we had just bought 6 months before I abandoned my wife and step-son so she’s such a gold digger by “forcing” me to pay the mortgage instead of accepting my measly $600/mo child support offer when I make $140k a year and am a noble officer in the Marine Corps. I don’t lie, except to myself and to protect my image. And I always do the right thing, except when I don’t.
His stories sound believable because he says them with puppy dog eyes and a sad look on his face instead of a face contorted with hate. That’s how he fooled me so good.
I’ve found that there’s one really good clue in the “bitch be crazy” story if kids are involved…
People who are mentally ill are not able to do parenting very well. If the bitch (or dude) really is “crazy” the other parent uses every minute of his(her) 50/50 parenting time and regularly picks up the slack when the other parent goes off the rails. If a guy says that the bitch is crazy, but he’s fine leaving his kids with this supposedly crazy person most of the time and rarely sees them, then his story is probably a lie.
I suspect that my ex tried that story on his first lawyer. I was told that the original lawyer has a reputation for trying to save marriages. First lawyer asked for primary custody, but when he found out that ex was cheating the lawyer suddenly had reasons to back out of representing the ex.
I am so terribly sorry. I didn’t make clear what I meant. I was so busy thinking about the “bitch be crazy” trope that I made a stupid generalization. Heck, I suffer from mental illness (depression, anxiety, probably PTSD). However, my illness has been treated and I can get by in life.
What I meant to say is that if someone’s mental illness is so severe that a person of good will cannot remain married to them (like Chump Lady and her ex), then that person will not be able to parent effectively.
My ex has a raging case of narcissism. I sincerely considering remaining in the marriage until all of the children were adults so that I would not be required to leave minor children in his sole care. I finally ended it when the youngest of our five children was starting high school because I couldn’t take it any longer. The effects of being around him was damaging MY mental health too much.
If somebody throws out the “bitch be crazy” excuse for divorce, but have no concerns about their small children being in the sole care of said “crazy”, then they are probably lying.
My mother was abused as a child and made a very bad choice for a husband because of her feeling unlovable and “defective”. Before her death from cancer, she and I had some frank discussions about my parents marriage and what she hoped for me in a man. She considered leaving him twice, once a couple of years into their marriage and then later when my brother and I were entering adolescence.
Why didn’t she act when it would have been in her best interests rather than wait for my father to yank the rug out and put forth the narrative that she was the problem ? Both times to protect her children. She learned she was pregnant with my brother (in the early sixties) and had no support system and very low self-esteem. I don’t even think she could have found a safe place to have an abortion back then (and she didn’t want to). When my father’s emotional abuse escalated to blatant public disrespect in the form of cheating, she told me she didn’t want to leave us alone with my father due to his neglectful nature.
My father used my mother’s depression and history of abuse to paint her as the crazy one. His parting shot to my older brother as he left was unbelievably cruel. “You know, your mother has a lot of problems with men.” A friend who is a social worker saw another layer that I didn’t even consider. My father might as well have said “Your mother is crazy and I’m leaving you, a young man , alone with this woman who has problems with men. That’s how little I think of you as my child.”
Who’s the unfit parent in that scenario ?
I was forced by the court to give parenting time to a mentally ill (untreated) parent. It’s often not a choice — and it’s certainly not an endorsement of their parenting.
I get your point — good enough to leave your kid with, but “crazy” otherwise. I’m just pointing out that it takes a LOT to deny someone their parenting rights.
Wow, so we are just going to let the whole idea that no mentally ill person is well enough to parent slide?
Sure, if a mental illness is treated. My mother is bipolar, FWIW.
Where are you getting the idea that I’m stigmatizing mental illness? Because I left someone with one?
@Elizabeth Lee, Point well taken here. I am one of the ones whose fuckwit left me with 100% care of of the 5 children (only 3 were minors at the time).
He has been shouting every which way that he left because I was crazy or mentally ill. If that is the case- shouldn’t he be concerned for the children? It’s not the case and my children have done quite well since fuckwit left. And I have had professionals tell me that based on talking to my kids and how I have handled things, I am far from crazy or mentally ill.
So, not that it matters but when we disposed fuckwit’s affair parter, my lawyer asked her what fuckwit told her about me and why he left. She responded he said that “she was mentally ill, suffered from mental illness”. While I think my lawyer did a great job, I wonder today why he didn’t ask her to explain that more. When I think about it, it is so broad. It would be like saying, he left because she had a physical illness. Just what? We need details! The category is too broad.
Anyway as I said none of it matters because the whore is a liar too and it doesn’t matter why fuckwit left, she is there for the $$$ and they can have each other.
I wouldn’t be surprised to learn down the road whore is mentally ill.
Ex narcopath claimed his exwife was a “bipolar nut job “and told story after story about how crazy and abusive she was.
I was witness to their text exchanges, before I knew what he was, and yes, she appeared to be very emotional and angry.
He claimed she was a horrible mother and used the children as pawns.
Indeed, every sunday night when their boys would return to her after a week with us, around 9pm her texts would start. She grilled those boys about every moment they spent with us and then would send hours of texts berating me, threatening to all CAS and calling me every name in the book. He, of course, delighted in my pain and anguish over her attacks and when I confronted him asking him why he wasn’t seeking full custody of the kids, he always would reply “the boys need their mother….” Which was a total contradiction to what he has said about her.
He used the boys just as much as she did, and they both egg each other on and enjoy the confrontation.
I’m hindsight, and after knowing ex wife personally after I left ex narcopath, because he dated so voraciously and introduced so many women to the children, she was, in her own way, trying to protect the boys. She felt threatened that she would be replaced as a mother. But, in general, she is a very angry person and she could turn on you in a second. So I ended our friendship. But he knew every button to push to cause her to have an extreme reaction.
deposed not disposed lol (would have rather though) lol
Uh no, some mentally ill parents do a fine job. “Mental illness” covers a vast plethora of things.
FFS, another person posting ignorant, bigoted blanket statements about the mentally ill. WTF is going on here today?
I’m pretty shocked, too. CN is usually really careful about avoiding blanket statements and hurtful generalizations. This sucks and makes me mad, too!
It’s also disappointing that only a few of us even spoke up about it.
Mental illness isn’t rare — one in four people will suffer a mental illness in their lifetime. It is, however, treatable. I’m not trying to stigmatize mental illness.
However, if a partner doesn’t manage a mental illness, that’s untenable IMO. And personality disorders or active addictions (that often come along with mental illness) — don’t take that on.
Most mentally ill people are lucid (i.e, are not delirious). Therefore, they have choices.
There is a new book out, Aristotle’s Way: How Ancient Wisdom Can Change Your Life, by Edith Hall. I have not read it yet, but it seems to be an essential book to read.
CN can have a good idea about the book’s main message at the “look inside” at Amazon and its recent NYT review (forgot the critic’s name, don’t have time to look it up).
Anyway, the way of looking at life built by these readings made me think: mentally ill people KNOW that they cause suffering to themselves and to others. Because they are lucid. They have the capacity to take an ethical path to treat their suffering. Why don’t they?
I adapted the following writing from the book, it can apply to mentally ill partners and to cheaters:
“Each of us needs to acquire self-knowledge and decide what sort of ethical sustenance we need to provide for ourselves. Is it offering help, relinquishing grudges, learning to apologize? You may not be exceptionally nice, you may be impatient, reckless, blunt, have emotional extremes and be vindictive.
But Aristotle’s idea of the “golden mean” between extremes explains that all of these unpleasant character traits are fine in moderation. Because people who are not impatient don’t get things done, people who never take risks have limited lives, people who evade the truth and do not expresses pain or joy at all are psychologically and emotionally stunted or deprived, and people who have no desire whatsoever to get even with those who have damaged them are either deluding themselves or have too low an estimate of their worth (Chumps, do we see ourselves here?).
If we fail each other, we, in turn, fail ourselves. In Aristotle’s day, and our own, friendship is often reduced to its pleasure or utility, and there is nothing particularly wrong with friendships of this kind save that they are vulnerable to early closure. These relationships, Aristotle writes, “are easily broken off. … Ideally, in contrast, Aristotle maintained that lasting connections — intimate, civil and political — are based on a mutual respect for the virtues each participant holds dear. True friends, true lovers, true citizens want the best for one another. What is “best”? Happiness, of course, defined by the pursuit of excellence (arête) or living up to one’s fullest potential.”
@ClearWaters … You said, “They have a capacity to take an ethical path to treat their suffering. Why don’t they?” I don’t think it’s as simple as that. Of course, it really depends on the mental illness and its severity.
I worked with mentally ill (MI) for many years (chronic & severe). For the most part, most MI people wish they could/would get better, or at least become more stable. I have known thousands that have tried for decades. They’ve gone to countless Psychiatrists and therapists, been on tons of different medications, been to various mental health programs, had numerous past psychiatric hospitalizations, etc, all with no success. They become weary of trying to fight what seems to be a losing battle. What I’ve mostly seen in my experience isn’t that the MI don’t WANT to get better but a system that has failed to help them.
RoseThorns (I like this moniker, so true!), I agree that it is not simple and for many reasons. And I also agree 100000% that system fails these patients. Ask me how I know… The hell I have gone through with my son. I can’t count the number of times I, his mother, was judged and blamed. Talk about blame shifting the lack of talent, competence and imagination to the parent. Is it MY fault he has visual-spatial difficulties?
I think the most fundamental way the system fails mental health patients is exactly through sheer lack of talent, simple preparation and competence, and imagination. Not that the mental health professionals themselves are bad,lazy people. Dealing with mental illness is just so complex and requires TALENT, not just courses and diplomas.
But, again, looking at my son, I feel he has an ethical way of looking at his problems. But he won’t listen and he won’t trust anyone! No matter how much talent.
Anyway, cheaters are plain dishonest and exploit innocent (but not necessarily good) people. Simple as that.
Your son is an individual. He does not represent every single person with mental illness. Many have no choices whatsoever. Treatment is not particularly effective in many cases, in some not at all. The drugs don’t work on everybody, or cause side effects that are even worse than the illness. I know people who have tried every treatment imaginable and showed zero improvement. In my case, I have to avoid anti-depressamts because for me they cause a dangerous effect known as serotonin syndrome. Then there are people who will lose their marriages because anti-psychotics and some anti-depressants kill the sex drive. Thus they refuse to take them. Who can blame them?
How about we leave it to trained professionals rather than discussing what you read in a self-help book?
I wouldn’t call this book a “self help” book. The author is a scholar and seems to be an honest human being.”
And I liked it when she points out that “people who have no desire whatsoever to get even with those who have damaged them are either deluding themselves or have too low an estimate of their worth”
At least that is how I got chumped: by deluding my self and not doing a good estimate of my worth.
The laughter and insights I get from Chump Nation and Chump Lady are my vindicators.
None of this has anything to do with what you posted. Aristotle did not love in a time where society had a scientific understanding of what causes various mental illnesses. Who cares about Aristotelian philosophy in this context? It has nothing scientific of value to add to the plight of mental illness. “Make better choices” is not a solution.
In this comment section I have learned I am crazy, a bad parent, need to make better choices, and am incapable of being a good partner.
Thanks, I’ll be sure to share this with my community so we all know how horrid we are.
I don’t think anyone should be staying and toughing anything out. You can leave for whatever reason you want and whenever you want to, just don’t bullshit people. Don’t carry on multiple relationships if your partner hasn’t agreed to that, etc.
My whole point here is “mental illness” is not one specific thing. It covers vast territory, most of which goes undiagnosed throughout a person’s life. Things like Generalize Anxiety Disorder, Panic disorder, OCD, Autism, ADHD, etc are all considered mental illnesses. In the case of all of these, there is clear proof they exist and what is going on in the brain of those that have it. OCD is the most common disorder and for most people, it’s not disabling. Most of it is mental checking rather than the classic germ and cleaning rituals associated with it in movies. Mental checking does not harm others.
Either way, the whole point is people need to stop making blanket statements concerning issues they don’t understand. Until you’ve gone through it yourself, you don’t get it. I was the one that got dumped, mentally I’ll old me. It wasn’t the other way around. It wasn’t about my choices.
DemHoez, about mental illness: I am no specialist, but I have experiences with a son.
Just this Monday day we were discussing partners with dementia (a mental disease) being cheated on, abandoned, etc. (the B. Smith post, “Is Cake Better than Abandonment?”) and how there are partners who tough it out and honor “for better or worse”, no matter what.
Then today Tracy reminds us that she divorced her first husband because he refused to get treatment for his mental disease.
So, why should not everyone with a partner with ANY form of mental disease and mental suffering stay and tough things out in the name of honoring the “for better or for worse” vow? Is there a contradiction here? I think not.
Please Dem and Chumperella, I am not saying that people with mental illness are necessarily bad or lazy people. In fact, they struggle and suffer a lot.
However, I see my own beloved son in this gray zone of his choices and the grip of his disease. Neurobiology or no neurobiology, as I said above, no one knows where the biochemistry ends and the soul begins. And that is where I feel Aristotle, the “golden mean” and ethics come in and can help.
As Tracy says over and over: she does not know us, but it is easy to make one judgement about us at CN: no one deserves to be cheated on. And I think it takes a lot of guts to join Chump Nation because one has to admit that one is a chump and, in many cases here, was deluded, chasing unicorns, tolerating abuse. We all struggle with our faults.
Totally agree. That was just more of the usual ignorant, bigoted nonsense the mentally ill have to put up with.
Because a lot of so-called trained professionals aren’t any better with mental illness diagnosis than the therapists who embrace the RIC ideas.
A few sessions, a gaslighting manipulating cheater, a self-blaming chump, and, hey, let’s try these bipolar drugs and call me again in about a month.
Forever after the gaslighter will call the chump bipolar and batshit crazy. And the chump will be willing to believe it.
That’s why.
I’m thinking lucidity doesn’t apply to psychosis, the type of mental illness where people see things and hear things that aren’t there. And it may not apply too paranoia.
Yes about the psychosis, and paranioa too. And ‘real’ bipolar also has periods where the person appears quite lucid, but definitely does not have a realistic perspective on their mood and energy levels, plans and actions.
I don’t like the idea that people always have choices and freedom. When a mental illness is severe, it is truly disabling, and the symptoms themselves can stop the person from seeking or following treatment.
However, CL’s point stands; when ‘bitch be crazy’ is the reason given for a divorce or separation, further inquiry is definitely needed!
Just a quick clarification.
Delerium is a condition, where if you can treat the underlying cause, the delerium recedes.
Delusion or psychosis is caused by something that is either chemical or structural. The victim can have schizophrenia or some other type of mental disorder.
Delerium is something we see in the ICU–ICU delerium–disorientation, agitation, hallucinations–because of the lack of windows or sedation or some other illness that causes it like fever or drug/ETOH intoxication. Take away the underlying source, you usually can be successful in treatment.
Psychotics or delusional behavior—danger, Will Robinson.
This being said–neither have “choices and freedom”. I’ve taken care of ICU delerium, and there is no reasoning with them. It’s something that has to be treated, and hopefully, keep them safe until treatment works.
Psychotics and schizophrenics, the worst, in my opinion, of the mental illnesses in some big ways—they also are not “free to choose”. If a schizophrenic is not on medication, there is no “self reflection” or “self care” that they do. They are unaware that what they are seeing and hearing and doing—is not correct or real.
I’ve worked in healthcare a long time, and have seen the spectrum of mental issues–but to say that someone with depression, schizophrenia, bi-polar–some of the illnesses that are chemical in nature—that they just have to “choose”? That’s very wrong.
You have to make a distinction between mental illness and personality disorder here. A sociopath is very aware of his/her choices, and is knows right from wrong. They simply choose to do whatever it is that gets them what they want. They are absolutely free to choose. Same with borderline personality disorder.
Please don’t lump depression, bi-polar, schizophrenia into “it’s a choice” pile. It’s not.
There are different forms of delusional behavior and then there’s delerium. Neither of which are not controllable by the victim suffering from it…and that’s from a medical standpoint, from someone who is a medical professional in an ICU.
The most difficult patients are the ones who have been diagnosed, have a good medical treatment and then decide they feel fine, or no longer need the medication(s). Of course, starting and stopping can lead to the regime no longer working for them at all.
It’s very sad to witness and it’s hell to live with – so I believe that family members need to be heard from and taken more seriously than they have been in the past.
It took NAMI years before they ever evinced the slightest bit of interest in the children of a mentally disordered parent. I have been told they care about them now, but they certainly didn’t when our children needed help. I was on my own.
Yes, LAJ, I agree, delirious patients are something else.
No one knows where the biochemistry ends and the soul begins. Or the other way around… Where does paranoia end and delirium start?
Anyway, people suffer and make others suffer for so many reasons. But most have choices and freedom.
It is very important that we fix our puckers and do what CL says “don’t take that on”!!!
My picker was broken ( understatement of the year ) when I finally separated. I dated a guy who I believe has extreme, untreated mental illness, plus sex addiction.
These guys don’t come with warning labels.
I was broken, but being a chump I spackled like crazy and put up with his crazy as it started to surface ( new me would RUN).
Of course, his X wife was crazy and left him unannounced one day. Took the kids and ran.
It took me 3 times to break up with him and I still came home one weekend to find out that he had broke into my house and slept in my bed.
From what I understand he now lives in his car.
Jackass’s “bitch be crazy” took the kiddo and ran, too. I couldn’t understand why she would do that….
If they don’t see or even talk to their own kids, that’s a humongous waving red flag. Most likely, they’ll say it’s because, “My ex is crazy”. While that may or may not be true (most likely not), if it were in fact true, uh shouldn’t they be seeing their kids more or trying to get custody to protect them?! Exactly.
And I have to add, over the years I have observed a lot of women being diagnosed with bipolar disorder. And I truly believe that what is perceived as her bipolar disorder is really just a byproduct of abuse and the inability to cope with the abuse
@BouncingBack … You presented very interesting theories worth pondering. Hm. Thanks.
That is a very good point bouncing back.
I recall , while working in nursing, this one psychiatrist who when called upon to do a psych consult on patients, (always women in the cases she assessed), she always, always, always, labelled the patient as bipolar!
We called her Dr.Bipolar.
How very sad. The poor woman was placed on medications for being bi polar and the root of her problems was probably never accessed. ( note, this was not even a psych ward, but rather a general ward, where the family doctor requested a psych consult as he or she probably thought the patient was a little “crazy)”
Ugh! ( there was probably many a cheater lurking in the patient’s background)!
My STBX managed to make me think I was bipolar.
I even got a referral to a psychiastrist. Said psychiatrist, after some hours, found nothing. Turns out I am not bipolar. I do no have asperger, autism, anxiety, etc. Nothing, nichts, nada. Only stress
Upon receiving the non-diagnostic, my husband declared he doubted the psychiatrist’s competence.
Psychological abuse does create a lot of symptoms that can mimic some of a bipolar disorder. But the range and the intensity are not the same. No real manic episode, for instance.
Being triggered = bi-polar, to many. MANY.
Even though you’re being peppered with triggers. Even though those triggers are inflicted ON PURPOSE, in front of others so they’ll see how “unbalanced” you are.
Carefully gaslighting their partners among carefully-chosen witnesses. There’s a psychopath. I’ve seen it happen. I was the wrong witness. He believed she hadn’t told me anything.
I have seen this happen…. way too many times. Triggering someone on purpose so they “overreact” in front of a carefully selected audience.
I was often in a similar boat and my STBX would carefully prep me before we invited people over or carefully selected jokes in front of friends and family. I did not realize how much I acted like a puppet and reacted until I reflected on our dynamics more carefully. I was not labeled crazy, but “angry and controlling bitch”.
My ex was a master at this. It’s craxy how easily manipulated I was back then. I totally fell in to his narrative that I was crazy.
My exwasband, serial cheater for 12 years, is now engaged to a much younger woman on her 3rd marriage. Not sure who’s worse off at this point. Sure as hell isnt me.
I’m a bit of a Chumperchipcookie killjoy myself when it comes to dating men that have been married more than once and can’t give me a good reason why they are divorced. Ok answers are: she ran off with the mailman, she drank everyday until she passed out, she gambled away our life savings, or she died. Anything else gets an eyebrow raise.
Right!!!!!! I agree with all of the above. I used to paint over red flags….. not anymore!
The trouble with those answers, though, is they could be lies, and no way to check. For example, my first husband committed suicide. Afterwards, I spiralled into a state of depression and drinking nearly every day. I managed to stop it. When I met the cheating lying fucktard I’m now almost finished divorcing, I confided this episode, because I trusted him, and I wanted to be totally honest and open. 🙁
He used it against me, as in ”no wonder he killed himself” whenever we had a row. When I filed for divorce, citing adultery and unreasonable behaviour, he retaliated when it came to the financial side, by stating in his Form E I was an alcoholic who drank every day and passed out, and this was the main reason the marriage ‘had broken down’. (didn’t do him any good, it’s not something that a judge would take into account when deciding finances anyway).
I’m totally NC and have been from the start, but it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if he uses this lie with whoever he hooks up with next if he drops the rat faced whore. Point is, though it’s not true, how would his next victim be able to check ?
I think really it comes down to fixing our pickers, taking time to get to know someone, being alert for red flags, and making damn sure we know our boundaries, and enforce them.
Amen, Sister. I’ve come to believe nobody should marry until after at least a years close acquaintance, no sex, simple getting to know one another. But there’s always the Call of the Hormones, so that can get awfully complicated.
I was in a similar situation but replace alcohol with anger.
While we were dating I told him about some childhood abuse I endured from my mom. It was something that I was scared of repeating with any of my own children, especially knowing how easy it can be to fall into patterns that are familiar to us.
Flash forward to us having a child and suddenly whenever I am angry about any of his behavior or if I was frustrated with toddler behavior, I get comments like “Well, I guess your mom showed up tonight” “You’re always angry” “Daughter, your mom is crazy” “Daughter let’s get away from mom because she is throwing a tantrum”. All these phrases would be thrown out if I showed even the slightest hint at being frustrated, which is a normal thing for a person to feel. But it was his way of invalidating ANY of my feelings.
When I finally realized he was trying to set me off, I did everything I could to keep any emotion I felt inside. Then he started pushing harder, doing things he knew I didn’t like and then getting in my face saying “Are you getting MAD? Do you want to hit me? You do don’t you? Go ahead hit me!” Even though I had never, ever hit him.
Then when he left, it was because he couldn’t take it any more. He wasn’t strong enough to take my angry behavior. He told others I was controlling and belittling. And that’s just what I know that he said…who knows what else.
It makes me sick that I trusted someone to be my support and instead he used my vulnerability against me.
Fucktard X would systematically pick fights with me before each and every marriage counseling appt. Then he would spend the hour discussing how out of control I was. I thought it was a pretty neat trick to avoid any accountability for his misdeeds.
PS The therapist knew exactly what he was doing and when we discontinued couples counseling, she asked me why on earth I was ever with such a manipulative lowlife.
OMG, Chumpnomore6, that is THE most vicious, cruel thing one can say to a survivor of a loved one’s suicide. I am glad you are away from him. What a POS.
You poor thing. Mine drove me to drink too and then tried to sabotage my attempts to get off it by bringing booze into the house when I specifically asked him not to (even after he moved out and the house was mine). I stopped that shit (and him coming to the house) when my doctor asked me if I didn’t think that was a deliberate ploy to keep me where he wanted me. Me, sober, he couldn’t control, but give me a bottle and it was easier! Glad to say I got rid of him and the need to drink disappeared at the same time!
My ex also provided ALL the alcohol. Even selected and opened the bottle for me before he left for the evening. Needless to say, he was just planning and plotting… as of course, during the divorce, using the excuse “she drinks”, tells my psychiatrist that “she blacks out”! All, of course not true. Explain this: she’s such a drunk that she raised both your children, held a full time job, handled the home, finances, taxes, landscaping, cooking, decorating, shopping and all else? Also, he NEVER mentioned that my drinking was ever a problem in 35 years!
Yep, and I didn’t get 4 DUIs, get my driving licence cancelled and a court judgement for domestic violence either!
The “drinker” card, Yep mine pulled that one out too. I did not drink at all when we first got married, had 3 children, worked, managed the home, kids, cooking, shopping and all the details of life. After the kids moved out for college and he had retired but was starting up another business, I would get a daily call telling me it was Wine Time and when was I going to be home. We both drank socially but a bottle of wine as anyone knows can bring out a lot of tears, memories and misery. It came to the point one anniversary (fake) get a way that I did go off on him HUGE. The next day he cried and told me how sorry he was for causing me to be so hurt. blah blah blah!!! I stopped drinking for the next 4 years and during that time managed to divorce his ass SOBER and I know he used the alcohol excuse to many ppl. Truth is Im not an alcoholic, I could be if I wanted to be … turns out HE was the problem not booze.
32 yrs of his BS gone turned me into a new soul. I don’t need to cry in my booze anymore it was always a cover up for my pain of his serial cheating, lying. porn addiction etc.
LOVE this }}>> CL “Leave a Cheater, Gain a Life”
Huh, one of my ex’s complaints was the fact that I don’t drink. Maybe he wanted me to drink because then I might have been easier to control. Again, just one of my good qualities being used against me by somebody who doesn’t know how to count his blessings.
I don’t know on this one Chump Lady. I have read your blog for years because I find it very helpful, but this is the first post that I cannot get completely on board with.
My relationship with my first wife was incredible, all through dating and the first year or so of marriage. That turned out to be the love-bombing stage. Oh sure, there were red flags, but I was too in love at the time to properly notice them. After that we hit the devalue stage, where everything I did and everything about me was bad, no matter how hard I tried to change it. I will never forget the blatant disrespect and then the entitlement to cheat. To this day, I have no idea what I did to bring that on. I certainly know I did not cheat.. However, the problem got progressively worse until she gave me a case of crab lice.
At that point, I was done. I went no contact and filed for divorce. I have not spoken to her since. Did I tell anyone who knew me why I did what I did? No, and I am not sure why. I really did not care what anyone thought of me, and people to this day wonder why I bolted. I did not stick around for an official diagnosis. An official diagnosis just did not matter to me. When I finally recovered enough to date, I could only say that my first wife suffered from a mental illness when asked why the marriage did not work. That was my way of saying, “bitch be crazy.” I would not elaborate on the details because I find them too humiliating.
Looking back on it all, I am really not sure what I could have done differently. I just could not eat that shit sandwich. However, I clearly would have fallen squarely into your “bitch be crazy red flag” for a future relationship. I am not convinced that would have been fair, although I understand why that particular red flag exists.
Sometimes bitches are crazy, to be sure. I dated someone whose wife was two bubbles short of plumb (I listened to her voicemails; knew the couple’s son who had been horribly emotionally abused by the woman).
I think CL means where someone claims their wife (or husband) suddenly went off the deep end. Then, probe for cheating (because betrayal does make us momentarily crazy, and even homicidal).
As in all things, it pays to get the complete picture to see if a potential yellow/red flag is true or not.
@ChumpedbyaLoser The reply you should give instead of “She is crazy” to “She gave me an STD”.
It isn’t your turn to hide what she did. She might have been crazy to DO that, but you left for the STD.
CbL, Actually, I am thinking that you are a charitable person towards your ex, who does not deserve this charity (crabs?!)
What I understand from Tracy’s post is that cheaters LIE about their former chump’s mental health to look good. One thing is charitable white lie, the other is slander.
My cheater used to call me crazy in front of my children. For example, when I would complain about his debts.
I think you missed CL’s point. She is talking about our cheater exes using “bitch be crazy” as an excuse for why the marriage ended. In other words, a cheater saying “my former marriage ended because my ex was crazy” instead of telling the truth: “My former marriage ended because I lied, cheated, gas-lighted and generally abused my ex in every possible way so I am absolutely not good dating material.” Her post is about what our exes say about US not what we say about our exes. The point of a red flag is that it indicates possible danger and warrants caution and further investigation. If someone gives you the “bitch be crazy” line about their former relationship you should investigate further. If you tell someone that your marriage ended because your former spouse was mentally ill and they are a savvy person, they too will question you further to make sure your story is legit. Nothing wrong with that at all.
This is what I took from it. We are not denouncing mental illness, but cheaters often use it as a lazy, offhand excuse for why they decided to take the actions they took: because the person they were married to/partnered exhibited outlandish behaviour that they just couldn’t tolerate, so they decided to rub their sexy bits on someone elses outside the marriage. Most of the time they are providing an inaccurate impression of what happened, while also playing to what seems to be a societal trope that the ex (usually a woman) was unstable and we all know how no-fun that is. So blameshifting is seen as a valid get out of jail free card, but if you go on a date with anyone that uses it as an excuse, then look a little more closely. CL is saying that anyone who has genuinely rubbed elbows with a mentally ill/personality disordered partner will not have such a throwaway generality to offer as an excuse to why their relationship didn’t work out, because real mental illness is no laughing matter.
I agree, Beth. There is nothing wrong with questioning further at all.
I am now happily remarried (to a fellow chump). For those chumps currently marred in pain, it does get better, and you do recover. One evening while my now-wife were getting to know each other, I was prepared to disclose to her the details of why my marriage failed. I prefaced it with the explanation that it is difficult for me to talk about because I find it so humiliating. Her response was, “well then, don’t t talk about it.” She does not know the details to this day. Yes, Chump Lady, I am still carrying the shame of it all.
Despite all the pain that I went through, I am now grateful. It put me on the path to spend the rest of my life with the most incredible human being that I have ever known.
I have not followed my ex-wife’s path, but we are from a small town, and I still receive the local newspaper. I have observed that every time a family member of hers dies, the obituary shows she has a different last name.
Tell her.
She has a right to know, and it will also make you feel a damn sight better.
CbL, you might one day find it highly liberating to tell a few select people what happened in your previous marriage. That humiliation you feel? That is you still feeling like what your ex did somehow reflects on you, your value as a person and a husband.
We often hide these things because we are ashamed. The shame is HERS, not yours. And sharing the facts can lift that shame and put it back where it belongs.
This is how I took it too. And by the way, according to my ex, I’m “bitch be crazy” as well as an alcoholic. It’s okay, his ex wife before me is “bitch be crazy” too. His new supply will join us when her time runs out.
I think her point is how people present their ex. You explained your history and still haven’t even told your people close to you why… you haven’t gone around telling people the ex is a nutter. You don’t post crazy Facebook rants about ‘the vapid bitch’ in all caps. You haven’t taken all your friends out for pints to tell them how crazy she is. You’re the opposite of what she’s describing.
In recent explorations of people I might date… I have noticed people who describe their exes as ‘totally crazy ‘ as people who generally tend to have more red flags down the road. Additionally, they disparage their previous partners and that means two things to me- they may not be ready to date… they are still hurting from things… or they may not be emotionally someone who can look at relationships well and be fair. For instance, when people ask why I’m no longer with the man I married, I say it didn’t work out, or we had different ideas of what monogamous life meant. I don’t rail on about him being a crazy douche. That’s not the time or place to air my pain. Because that’s not what they asked. Rational people will understand infidelity as a great reason to divorce; it doesn’t need the addition of ‘crazy’. That I can describe it without piling all my baggage on it? Proof of Meh.
Many of the men I have talked to when potentially dating are divorced. The ones who say ‘it didn’t work out’ or ‘she cheated’ … I can ask more questions and look a little further as we get to know each other but the initial response being non-dramatic is often a precursor to them being able to be adult about it. If a dude rails on about how crazy his ex is, chances are he would say it about me. His emotional stability may be a bit off- either because he’s still healing, or he hasn’t ever addressed his issues. It’s a blame game. I want the person who can talk matter of fact but succinctly and respectfully about exes even if they are terrible.
Is it totally normal to talk with your friends about your ex being bat shit crazy after all they put us through? Absofuckin-lutely. Is it normal to do shots at the bar with a first date while planning to go TP the ‘crazy bitches’ house? No. That’s the red flag.
All respect, chumpedbyloser, but I don’t think it’s true that you’d “fall squarely into the ‘bitch be crazy red flag.'”
My read of what CL is saying is that your ex cheated, so “bitch be crazy” is not the answer to give in a budding relationship. The answer to why you’re divorced is that she cheated so you respected yourself and got out. That’s a far different answer than “bitch be crazy.”
Yeah. His exwife doesn’t sound crazy, she sounds like an asshole.
I think a couple things are in play. One is crazy is shorthand for “the bottom suddenly dropped out.”
It feels like Bitch Be Crazy (Bastard Be Crazy) because of discovery. A double life is revealed, and the the madness is all of a sudden.
But if you’re a chump (I raise my hand), you were probably putting up with those “humiliating details” for quite awhile. The weirdness, the lack of reciprocity, the discard. And to un-chump, we have to examine why we put up with that shit.
So I GET it, why anyone would gloss over the experience or struggle how to explain it to another person.
Here’s the problem with gloss — you’re still carrying the shame. The shame that DOES NOT BELONG TO YOU. I’m not arguing for emotionally vomiting on people’s shoes. I’m saying fight chump stigma. “She cheated on me” or “I didn’t like her boyfriend” — your ex made a relationship-destroying choice.
If someone thinks that reflects on you? Next.
Omg. I didnt like his girlfriend. I am using that from now on. I usually say, he fell into another vagina. I know a bit gross, but at the time i didnt care.
I know i wasnt batshit crazy, and i really dont care what his current or future girlfriends think, they screwed in the office next to our kids picture on the desk!
As for me dating, im finding what they say of their ex’s and how they say it is a sign. I am learning and have stepped out of the pond and onto the beach to give kissing frogs a rest. A year off, to learn me and be ok in my skin. I thought i was ready after two years divorced but i am not. My picker still needs fixin.
I read this everyday and gain insightful tools to learn. Thanks for this blog.
I say I wasn’t cool with him having girlfriends AND a wife. The poor dear is polyamorous, you see. He can’t control it.
He’s also untreated/poorly treated bipolar who made multiple suicide attempts, but I tend to leave that out. I’ve had more judginess exposing that than the cheating.
It sounds like the word “crazy” is being used in two different, incompatible ways.
CL’s “crazy” is “certifiably mentally ill”. That’s pretty straightforward, but required a level of involvement in mental health treatment to comply
Your “crazy” is “acting in hostile and aggressive ways that I could never understand”. This fits the colloquial use of the term “crazy” but not the clinical one.
My XW is not “crazy”: she has poor relationship stills (for foo reasons), a weak sense of empathy that disappears entirely when it runs up against her bloated sense of entitlement, a devotion to her career that leaves little room for other humanizing pursuits, an often crippling lack of self-awareness, a concept of romantic love that never matured past the love-bombing high-school-crush stage, and of course poor emotional and sexual boundaries. At the time she was discarding me I couldn’t put any of this into words (not least because she was lying about the affair that precipitated the end of our marriage), and one mutual friend who had had long discussions with XW about her state of mind did describe her as “bat-shit crazy”, but there’s a difference between “throwing away your life for reasons that everyone else can see are stupid” and “clinically insane”. It’s unfortunate that “crazy” in common usage conflicts with its use in the medical professions, and we’re seeing that confusion in the comments here.
I see that crazy vs. mentally ill is a gray area. Not sure if personality disorders constitute mental illness as they are very hard to diagnose and it is mostly a symptom based diagnosis, not many get brain scans to show their minds are physically responding differently.
Regardless, from my perspective, these two posts go right along with cl’s post. Your spouses cheated and that is all you have to say. As for your drinking, that is another issue all together. If you dealt with it, great, and you can explain that to new partner. If not, remember cheating doesn’t cause drinking, it was just your reaction to it and that would be an issue to explore.
????????THIS.
Yep. Involuntary Georgian nailed it.
???? Second
And I’m seconding and a me too there.
Totally in the CL and CN Saved My Life camp but . . .
These days to explain my 22 yr marriage that went down in flames I have to say, Bastard Be Crazy. No diagnosis or treatment ever gonna happen there for my exwit, because Narcissist. Geez the dude wouldn’t even do marriage counselling. No, no, the problem was ALL me.
Facts happen to speak for themselves if anyone needs to know, (decade gay clubs/female hookers, shed load of porn, because I “wasn’t there for him” after daughter died, lying, devaluing, cruelty etc), but still. I guess, what CL is saying, do the drill down and if all you find are “interpretations” and “perception” and especially the Pity Channel – yeah nah.
They COUNT on the next one having no capacity to independently evaluate the last. Tho not necessarily.
His current squeeze is a former dear widow friend of mine. He was in her (dead husband’s) bed 6 months after begging me to let him come home. These freaks are CLEVER. For her, I AM Bitch be Crazy, because Narrative . . . and we were close. I thought.
I hear what you guys are saying but Im still TeamCL on this one.
For those of us who really had spouses with deep mental problems (you seemed to have left yours, I didnt have that much sense and stayed way too long) I can see how this advise seems ill-fitting to us, but our seriously mentally ill spouses are not who she is speaking of.
I have too many times also seen a person who treats their spouse like total shit and when the OP is discovered, the perfectly reasonable response from the betrayed spouse is put into the narrative as “she just went crazy”. In reality, mental illness is not a reason to leave a family and starting dating bimbos, mental illness is why good dads would need to get custody of kids and raise them alone to protect them from a dangerous parent (remember the severely mentally ill woman in Texas who drowned all he kids and went to prison and the husband just walked away and remarried).
I have heard the “we went to counseling and she just shreiked” (double bitch cookie for counseling AND crazy wife) yet he had a replacement all set up the minute they separated.
My nowhusband was married to a woman who had world class entitlement then added some post-partum depression on top and she coped by leaving him. In so many ways it was a shame, they probably could have stayed married. He tried to fix what h could with a very limited understanding of what was happening. When we started dating, he was respectful in how he spoke of her. It was me who later discerned that she was a shrew. She married a man who claims the “my XW is crazy!!” and I dont know how well that is working out for everyone.
I hear you, unicornomore. I was called a crazy bitch after I discovered X’s shenanigans. Then my replacement was called a crazy bitch after she discovered X’s shenanigans. At that time, X’s family put two and two together and decided that the common denominator was X, and that he was the problem.
The current Mr. Survivor has never called his ex crazy. She was and is an entitled person who is financially inept (a bad combination), and was lining up chatroom fuckbuddies who she believed would provide her with the more opulent lifestyle she felt she deserved. When she ran off with one of them, he counted his blessings, changed the locks, and filed for divorce. So she’s a calculating grifter, but that is my own conclusion, confirmed by the string of evictions, car repossessions and judgments she leaves in her wake when she’s in between relationships.
Even if the Bitch Be Not Crazy, it can be a red flag for a very high conflict previous marriage/relationship, with or without cheating – and the guy is not being 100% honest about this.
If there’s been a pattern of violent physical or verbal fighting throughout, then the Bitch Be Crazy phase is just the extinction burst.
So there’s potential issues with your new guy having addiction to drama, broken picker, medicating with people, etc.
We have something like this in the extended family right now, complicated by previous cray-cray high conflict relationships on both sides. It was first presented to us as a Bitch Be Crazy situation – which story then unravelled into a more honest account of long-time high conflict.
When I was dating I wasn’t even alarmed by one “crazy” ex. I was however amazed when men would tell me ” Every woman I’ve dated long term has turned out to be crazy?” I was amazed how many men would lead with this. Really? Every woman? The odds of all that crazy concentrating around specific data point are exceedingly slim. The response I developed to that? “Well, there are only a few possible explanations. 1. You repeatedly seek out mentally ill/emotionally unbalanced women for relationships. Or, 2. You get with women and drive them crazy. Neither explanation looks good for you.”
The flip side of this was that my now husband had also been terribly chumped by a cheating, lying, addicted narc. During our dating he never said so. Never let on about the crazy. Then our first few years of marriage were quite difficult as she brought all of her high conflict, aggressive, manipulations and rage, home in the form of custody manipulations, boundary crossing, outrageous demands, vandalism etc. Frankly, I would have liked more of a heads up. She really warranted a “bitch be crazy.”
I went on a coffee date with a divorced man who told me he had to file a restraining order against his ex-wife. He did all the talking. When we walked to our cars and parted ways, he saw a parking ticket under his wiper and slammed his hand in anger on the hood.
He emailed me an angry email ten months later (!) demanding an explanation as to why I said I would go out with him again and then changed my mind. I never responded but this man scared me.
I do my best to avoid self-centered people who after five or ten minutes are still talking and haven’t shown any interest in me.
I’m not a therapist/don’t want to hear intimate details about another’s life during a first date.
If a man has an ex with severe psychiatric problems that will intrude on his life with another wife or partner, I really don’t want a part in that. I’ve already had enough drama in my life.
This man is still single and probably thought I was a “bitch”. Too bad,so sad
“Every woman I’ve dated long term has turned out to be crazy”
Who is the common denominator in this equation ? He is. Red flag. Full stop.
I always thought my ex was “not quite right somehow”. Sadly we weren’t able to live together before we were married (he was in Marine Corps housing). Had I seen that temper I would NEVER have married him. Over time as his behaviour got weirder and weirder I really thought he was “mad” – and no it wasn’t PTSD – he never saw action. He tried to hide behind that (as I saw from his eventual psychiatric assessment). He was, however, eventually diagnosed bi-polar and for me at least he ticks every damn box as a borderline! Add to that a rampant, violent alcoholic and what’s not to love. I have a strong character but I started to think I really was going mad – I guess trying to “understand” his behaviour and the accusations he threw at me constantly. One time he told me I was obviously having an affair (every Saturday as it turns out) because I “took too long to do the grocery shopping”. How the hell do you even answer that? Or when I would be making lunch on a Saturday with my apron on – then go to check the mail box (still with my apron on) – and it was just to “show everyone round here that you do everything”. Again, no answer! My sister and her husband did once ask if there was a “touch of M in him” (M being his mentally retarded brother). I’m convinced of it now. But that didn’t stop him from telling all his scuzzy friends that I beat him up every night when he came home from work. Whatever! If I ever did become a crazy bitch it was all down to living with him! I’m so glad I’m out of there it’s unreal!
You beat up the Marine! LOL – you badass! And he admitted it? LMAO.
My NX likes to go around and tell everyone I was abusive. What did I do you may ask? I flicked him with my finger! (I actually did flick him once on the shoulder, just like my big brothers used to do to me, when he was really being an ass.)
I’ve seen social media posts where he whines about how me and his later girlfriends (3 1/2 yr out now!) all have been abusive and manipulative to him. Gee, like above, either he is really bad at choosing women, or maybe its not them! What really mystify’s me is how they think that this narration to potential future mates would find this victim-hood attractive??
So happy for you Attie. You deserved that winning ticket.
I was criticized for reading books in bed, playing words with friends, and talking to my best friend. He’d ask why I didn’t laugh like that with him. Then I was booted from his phone plan because I talked to her too much.
The worst part was saying I was an addict. He convinced everyone. Set me up and then sabotaged. He’d show up while I was shopping, wondering why it took me so long.
I’ll never go out with anyone who calls his X a crazy bitch, especially if it’s aimed at one with mental illness, real or not. It shows a total lack of respect and empathy.
((((Attie)))),
I also, am so glad you are out of there!
Big hugs strong lady!
Thanks Peacekeeper – being free of him is better than winning the Powerball!
I remember Tom on Parks and Rec talking about how men didn’t have to explain a failed relationship, all a guy had to do was roll his eyes and say. She was crazy and all other guys knew what you meant. An easy out. Before cheater did his thing I warned him that his whinging hobby friend was in the prowl because he always complained about his mrs and tried to make her look unreasonable and controlling. Then I found out he’s been yelling friends and family behind my back that I’d been such hard work since our child had been born that he was being forced into the arms of another woman so I know this one first hand. It’s a lazy explanation when it just didn’t work out would probably do with most explanations of former relationships when you are in the early days of dating. I also hate it when new girlfriends get on board to gang up on the previous girlfriends patenting skills. My cousins daughter often goes on social media to berate the baby mamma of her current boyfriend whom she is now pregnant to and all I can think is he’s probably a dead beat whose only given her his siddvjf the story and oh honey, you’re next. You’ll have to put up with him telling his new girl crazy stories about you in s few years. Ref flags galore and so classy.
I had to laugh after this happened to me, no laughing matter at the time obviously, but now when I hear a story if how the wife went crazy I take it as code for, yeah she got tired of putting up with your selfish shit and pissjbg all your joint time and money away on his hobbies. A women is usually oatieng but there comes a time when enough is enough.
He shouldn’t be disrespecting his ex, by calling her crazy. He’s probably lost his control over her, and he hates it.
The only thing I talk to my ex is about the kids.
You would be surprised how many people stick up for drug addicts, alcoholics, but they don’t have to live with them.
Many people had terrible childhoods they don’t become addicts.
It’s a huge red flag. Mental illnesses are treatable. Many struggle for years seeking treatment, go off meds and display behaviors that are apparent with never ending chaos.
She went crazy isn’t a loving response. It requires questioning. I’ve been in the receiving end of accusations of just about everything imaginable. This summer I was floored after being told by my daughter that she was seeking treatment to determine my mental illness. It was devastating to process this bullshit.
I’ve supported her financially for years and raised the daughter she abandoned. Thank God for my therapist He warned me to stay away from her years ago suspecting she was borderline.
And now I’m hearing how much money the Limited supposedly made that I spent keeping him broke.
All lies. My response? My home is thriving with a son whose career has taken off and a granddaughter who is competing and winning fist place in our home state. That’s the result of stability, love and support.
I haven’t filled the void with spending.; I’ve invested in what matters. Bitch be crazy doesn’t apply. Thank you CL.
Oh my gosh Doingme, I remember some of your story about your daughter. The temptation to jump in there and try to defend myself would be enormous but I think your keeping away from her is the best solution. Hugs to you!
Thank you Attie. I had made it clear that I wasn’t going to stop everything to attend to her needs. It was exhausting and I’d hear unsolicited comments that were meant to maim.
I mad the mistake of giving her a ride this summer. I was on my way to visit friends from out of state. She wasnt ready, didn’t answer her phone and I called her business to see if she had gotten a ride.
The rage started because I dared call her employee. I was screamed at for doing this and said calmly that it was perfectly reasonable.
Here’s what I got in that 7 minute ride.
NO one likes you.
You don’t know how to be intimate
You have no friends.
You’re a narcissist.
You have a mental illness.
I Went to a therapist and asked how to help you.
She asked what was healthy about your mother and I said nothing.
Don’t ever call my work
Me: What mental illness do I have?
I don’t know. I read all of them and I’m not sure.
You need to say you’re sorry.
Me: Don’t tell me what to say. You can’t control me.
Me: One question: if I’m so mentally ill why would you want me to raise your daughter all these years.
Cunt.
Then she texts me asking me to work an hour later.
I found out layer that Nanthiny had taken on the job. Damn I’f I wasn’t good at image management.
It was a heartbreaking painful summer. I learned the hard wsy.
Nanthony is a powder keg. For all the lies and deliberate harm the Limited inflicted intentionally, he has one crazy bitch on his hands. She doesn’t treat her mental illnesses.
It’s a long process to freedom and worth the work.
Hmmm My ex wife was highly contradictory with classic “ push- pull behaviour.She had a number of affairs, sent me letters saying she wanted a divorce and after each one then begged me to stay.
She was highly volatile during our marriage and one time verbally abuse me demanding I f… off and leave! as I got up to go she ran around and locked the doors to the holding me prisoner.in various forms this happened so many times
In the absence of a clinical diagnosis ( she would always say she was perfect and nothing wrong with her and I was never good enough) I concluded that she probably has mental health issues.Of course if anyone thinks they can offer a better explanation of her crazy making behaviours I would be very pleased to hear it, as it might offer some comfort to my autistic son as to why his family life exploded as it did.
Interestingly I came across the Hare psychopathy checklist and found my ex wife shares a lot of traits on the list.Of course that isn’t a clinical diagnosis but if she isn’t psychopathic it would mean she just happened by coincidence to have a lot of psychopathic traits.
The funny thing is at the time I was the one who feared for my sanity not, her before I was able to finally break free.The reason I stayed so long was I didn’t want to leave my children.After she threatened suicide in front of them I thought they need at least one sane parent in their lives so I left.
Cl isn’t saying that ex-spouses don’t sometimes have very real mental health problems. (There’s still a lot of controversy over whether narcissistic and sociopathic traits are a mental illness. Mostly because the person with those traits isn’t suffering because of them. Borderline is different – AND treatable!) She’s saying that if the person’s only explanation for their divorce is that their ex was crazy, we need to open our eyes a little wider and get a little more info, because there may be red flags waving.
And when there are real mental health problems that led to or contributed to the divorce? Then a respectful person will speak of it in a respectful way. And we want to date respectful people, right?
Ex UK Chump, my ex also checks like 95% of the boxes on the Hare psychopath list, as well.
And he thinks he is totally fine, it’s everyone else, and has actually told me that anyone would be lucky to have him, he is a real stand up guy….
Meanwhile, I too, thought I was going crazy (like he describes his ex wife), had a raging case of cognitive dissonance, was trauma bonded and have spent the past year and a half healing from it all. Therapist, yoga, kayaking, walking, BodyTalk….. serious healing.
Him? Flouncing off with his new POF dating profile, dating people left right and center. And occasionally hoovering me when his current supply is low. (I am no contact.)
Try the cluster B personality disorders …
If someone tells me their ex is “crazy” there is no second date. I don’t even ask for details. It’s a major red flag. Even if their ex actually is “crazy”, they should have a more mature and considered way of referring to her.
I do have a “crazy” ex with a diagnosed mental illness and all the bs that goes along with it. I never refer to him as “crazy” in that context.
THIS!!!
In my 20’s I worked with a gentleman whose wife was suffering from mental illness and in the end they did divorce. This was a slow process of them both coming to grips with her illness and how to handle it. There were multiple professionals involved in diagnosing her and trying to alleviate the situation. One day she sat hm down and told him it was better if they split. She could not handle what her illness was doing to him. He was heartbroken but agreed that it was taking an incredible toll on him. Looking back I am amazed at how mature they both were to see it and to handle it. He was devastated and I would catch him crying in his office. He never once belittled her or made her out to be a bad person.
Eventually they both managed to move on. She decided she was better off single and has not remarried and he has found a new love and has children. I see him on social media sometimes where she comments on his posts about how nice it was to see they went skiing or how the little one has his smile. They are still friendly. There are boundaries and there is happiness without blame for what happened. If he has a bad day it’s not his exwife’s fault for having a mental illness. It’s a. BAd day and that’s it.
Of course during my brief time dating after d-day when I needed the validation of someone else finding me valuable for some reason I saw a bit of bitch be crazy in the broke ass bartender’s story and it was nothing like what I witnessed with my former coworker.
One of the most painful things about my divorce from the X , who was actually diagnosed with psychiatric and personality disorders, was a secret maintenance drinker and doing drugs to the point naive me thought he had dementia…
Was that my psychopathic sister teamed up with him to convince my adult sons that I was over reacting, out of control and being dramatic ( he was in sex addict recovery. Me, over reacting?)
My sister was a perfect flying monkey.
My sons (not his) believed it all, abandoned me at my lowest, throwing off a supportive upbringing (single parent) to call me names. I guess it was easier than supporting me. Any attempt to tell them the truth… that Sister was lying, that H was living a secret life, was “ evidence” of me being “crazy”.
I cannot tell you how much this hurt. On top of hurt.
I guess the X can tell his new OW /wife that I was a crazy bitch. But I wasnt. I went completely NC, got myself to therapy, remade my life and am proof they were lying. And I went NC forever with the sister, and stayed NC with my sons until they came to their senses., watching me and the liars actions, not words. We are slowly rebuilding a relationship.
“No Contact is the way to truth and light”….thanks AOOK
This is something I struggle with. I believe my ex is mentally ill. She has anxiety. She’s also a sociopathic narcissist. I always felt she was a worry wort. I spend many days during our 18 years hearing about her irrational fears. I tried to help but our therapist, who we didn’t go and see until after her affair (which never stopped) said I wasn’t validating her feelings. Funny in therapy she said she wanted everything to be as it was and the therapist said “then why did you have the affair” classic blame the victim. Next session VALIDATION she did it for the validation. Right arround when it started I stopped listening to her worries. I told her that I try to help, give advice, she won’t listen and after the crisis passes and turns out to be nothing she doesn’t learn the lesson. I’m not a mental health professional. I don’t know how to treat anxiety. Maybe I failed her. Maybe her AP is a kibble machine that hangs in every trembling word. I couldn’t do it anymore. I said she should talk to a therapist. (Her father molested her, her mother never left him, he’s dying now which I think triggered her midlife crisis) So yeah Bitch Be crazy. But I also tell dates that she cheated. I tried for four months to save “us”, she never stopped the affair, never stopped lying. Honestly, every woman has been incredibly empathetic.
Lately, she’s been texting and emailing me a lot, nothing weird just routine stuff but stuff she doesn’t need to say. Just last night she emailed about a pick up time with the kids that I have emailed her already like she can’t say I’m sorry or how are you just: Confirming pick up Friday at 5. Pick up has been at 5 since Aug. 2017. I wish I knew more of what was in her head. I wish I encouraged her to get help (I didn’t tell her to tell her parents to fuck themselves, lol, multiple times they’re very needy and lay the guilt trip on her all the time. But none of this is my problem except how her crazy impacts my kids. Every day gets better.
Except it wasn’t her anxiety that caused her to cheat. That just isn’t a thing! Nor her need for validation; everybody needs some of that, many of us need lots! It was the sociopathic narc part.
So don’t be worrying about how you dealt w/her, and CERTAINLY don’t respond in any way to her little attempts to re-connect. BIFF responses, gray rock. She may be circling around … and you and your kids need you to not get sucked into that again.
Anyone getting into a relationship—and especially chumps—would be well advised to respond to any vague or conclusory statements by potential SOs about big issues by asking, “What do you mean by that?”
Works in countless settings, for instance:
“She/he was crazy.”
“I have addiction issues.”
“I haven’t seen my family in a long time.”
“I’m not great with money.”
“My boss doesn’t like me.”
See? Don’t be an accomplice in you’re own duping.
Nomar, this reminds me of the most important message in Martha Stout’s book, “The Sociopath Next Door.”
“After listening for almost 25 years to the stories my patients tell me about sociopaths who have invaded and injured their lives, when I am asked “how can I tell who not to trust?” the answer I give usually surprises people.
The natural expectation is that I will describe some Sinister sounding detail of behavior or snippet of body language or threatening use of language that is the subtle giveaway. Instead, I take people aback by a assuring them that the tip-off is none of these things, for none of these things is reliably present. Rather, the best clue, of all things, is the pity play. The most reliable sign, the most universal behavior of unscrupulous people is not directed, as one might imagine, at our fearfulness.
It is, perversely, an appeal to our sympathy.”
When people describe an ex as crazy, most people sympathize. That’s horrible. That’s awful. Poor you.
Ex narcopath did that to me. And he was clever because each of the scenarios he described of his ex wife acting crazy, he would tell about 75% truth. They always seemed to be missing a piece and after I got to know him more and lived with him, I would question and his stories would change.
After we broke up for good, I reached out to his ex wife and verified the stories. She was more than willing to fill-in-the-blanks, and her version always made more sense, and her “crazy” was a result of his abuse.
How did I know? Because i was reacting the same way to his abuse.
Now, i will not give the ex wife a free pass, because we did hang out for a couple of months and she did have some disturbing character traits, that resulted in us breaking off our friendship. Twice. I think that because she was with ex for so long, 10 years, and subject to his abuse as her first major relationship, coupled with her very troubled childhood, she adopted some very unhealthy coping mechanisms and is a sadly, still trying to overcome them.
Ex narcopath has done a number on her and she is still subject to his torture (because they have kids and she wont grey rock) but I think she enjoys the game of it with him and is not super interested in healing. She was jealous of the healing I had done and always said she wanted to “get there” but her actions did not match her words.
One last thought about the pity play. Because I met ex when I was vulnerable, the pity play sucked me in. I remember wanting my love to heal his broken heart. He made it seem that he tried everything to save his relationship with ex wife and would still be with her if she just hadn’t been so crazy. Sigh. I now know that’s a lie. But it really cues the pick-me dance, which was unknown to me at the time.
I think it’s wonderful that CL has decided to tackle this topic. As this is part of healing and learning and fixing our picker for next time. Manipulators have spent a lifetime honing their “bitch-be-crazy” narrative, and honest people with big hearts can fall for the unspoken “but YOU can save me” in that….
ChumpedInCanada,
That is so interesting about Martha Stouts book regarding the pity. I posted up near the top and mentioned that I was so fooled because he didn’t speak badly of his ex with hate, but spoke with sadness about how hard he tried in his marriage. I felt so bad for him that such a good dude was being so taken advantage of. (He cheated on her and left her) He eventually cheated on me and left me and two kids. I’m sure Next Girl will feel so bad for him too when he tells her how his ex-wife Sucks So Much.
My ex was Bitch Be Crazy/Lazy/Fill in the Blank followed by the pity channel. It was a big red flag but I was too naive/unaware to process or even understand what he was saying. Sometimes, I wish I could go back 19 years and tell her to run and never look back.
Absolutely! I’m a big believer in “verify then trust” as opposed to “trust but verify” or worse, “trust”.
Spot on nomar. Also, if they seem to have oddly few friends. Or that “crazy ex” turned everyone against them.
When I found out about my STBX affair with my cousin from her daughter. As per the daughter my STBX called be a nut job. That I was such a nut job that I could not keep jobs. I just sat around the house and did not clean. Even told Skankella all about my struggle with early menopause. He betrayed me as a crazy psyco bitch. He had to betray me this way to justify his cheating. And even to today Skankella tells people that I am crazy. It used to upset me. But, I have moved on and do not care what either of them think about me or say.
A running joke in the Dickhead’s family about me was that I was normal. His young first wife was normal but everything in between was not. I actually think he likes cray-cray as he often said that he liked his women on the trash side. Gawd, just typing that makes me wonder what the hell I was thinking for the past 19 years.
He won’t be able pull the Bitch Be Crazy about me. Anyone that knows me or knew us knows that I was the solid, nurturing one.
The Bitch Be Crazy or in his case about his first ex was Bitch Be Lazy. He made it seem that he had to take care of his baby daughter because he would come home from work and the dishes weren’t done, bottles were dirty, he had to give her a bath, blah, blah, blah. One thing I learned that he can do something ONE TIME and suddenly at re-telling it becomes every day 24/7. He probably washed the bottles one time (ever) and it becomes a statement on their marriage. I know that his first wife later suffered anxiety and major depression. As I told old and wiser, whenever he would tell the story again, I would ask his if he thought maybe she had been depressed. Suddenly, I’m on her side and now he’s mad at me because I’m not supporting him.
Whenever someone leads with any kind of Bitch/Bastard Be Crazy, it’s wise to listen carefully or walk away. Your choice.
I want to add if the line is Bitch Be Crazy followed by the Pity Channel, definitely run for rhe hills!!!! This is a huge red flag that should not be ignored.
What ends a relationship can be very subtle. People do fall out of love over time so it’s not easy to say why a relationship ended in a nutshell. though I am put off by the “Bitch be crazy” response as well. People have all sorts of behavioral ticks that are not going to get diagnosed and certified by professionals.
My first husband was passive aggressive. Ergo, being direct and honest with him was a waste of time. I didn’t pay a psychiatrist to give me that diagnosis. He also engaged in selective sight, hearing and memory. I didn’t like the way he prioritised his friends over me, his wife.
Ready to go refresh your glass of wine?
One thing I do find interesting about men is tthat he very women they call “crazy”, ” in need of professional help” and so on are the ones they remain (close) friends with.
And I was told that men don’t like drama.
I tried to comment, but the ads are so bad today that they keep forcing a page reload before I can finish. I hate ads.
I’m sorry! If you get bad ads or redirects, email me and I’ll tell BlogHer. It’s a game of effing whack-a-mole sometimes. But yes, clearing the cache works. Or use Google Chrome as your browser.
Thanks! I was just whining. Sites have ads. That’s life. I just wish they didn’t crash my keyboard app and browser when they try to pop up. It only happens on Blogher and Blogger sites (and I do use Chrome on my phone.)
Clear your cache and delete your cookies, then restart.
Thanks! My phone picks them all up again so fast. Some days are better than others. Thanks, though! Waiting an hour or two until a less pop-upp-y cycle kicks in often does the trick, too.
You can probably put an ad blocker on your phone browser. Makes life so much simpler!
How do you do that?
Go to AdBlocker Pro.com and download it. It really works!
According to my son’s father (a relationship that was brief and ended in my early 20’s), everyone of his ex- girlfriends were either crazy or crackheads! I always thought that was odd….either he was the unluckiest guy on the planet or he could really pick them. It did not really hit me until after I ended our relationship and a few days before I found out I was pregnant, that he was the problem with all of his past relationships. He was telling people that I was crazy because I broke up with him…you know because I was a struggling college student and got tired of his entitled ass showing up at my apartment when I wasn’t there (somehow he got a copy of the key from my roommate) and eating all of my food, and just living there rent-free. If I would have known that three forms of birth control were going to fail, I would have definitely been fishing in the deeper end of the gene pool, and not messing around with that loser!
Now that I’ve been single again for a few years, I have a few hard and fast rules about exploring someone else’s character.
The first goes like this. When you ask someone about why he or she is divorced, what kind of answer do you get? Is it specific, or is it vague?
If someone had a more-or-less valid reason (and I know we all define what is valid differently), and was NOT the one at fault, the answer will be specific, and short.
“He had an untreated mental illness.”
“She cheated on me with [whoever].”
“He beat me up so badly I had to go to the hospital, then threatened to kill me.”
“She was a drug addict, and was bringing crack addict friends into our home.”
Now, on the other hand, if the person WAS at fault, you hear things like:
“We grew apart.”
“I realized I didn’t really love him, but I just thought I did.” (huh?)
“I had to take time to realize who it was I really was.”
“I wasn’t properly appreciated.”
These are the kinds of answers we, as chumps, are used to hearing when we get ditched for the AP.
This is what my ex tells people:
“Some people say I’m the asshole, some people say he’s the asshole. It all depends on who you talk to.”
I tell people:
“She was a serial cheater.”
I don’t know, I was told in my group for women who are victims of domestic abuse not to reveal much about that when meeting new partners, because someone with bad intentions will use it. So I can’t believe all vague answers result from guilt.
Yes! When asked i tell people we are getting a divorce because STBX cheated on me twice in 3 years. He tells people “my wife left because we grew apart”
Funny how it’s easier to lack details when it makes you look bad.
Yeppers
This is very similar to what I was going to comment earlier. Thanks!
Exactly this!! Especially the vague “we grew apart” answers. Most people who take their vows seriously go to a marriage therapist, do communication classes, talk to their pastor, etc. Especially when there are kids involved. Cheaters gloss over that part and talk about how they were “unhappy” or “fell out of love”.
I know that people are unhappy and do fall out of love but I think smart cheaters also try use those excused and try to fall into that category too, at least I know mine did. He forgets to mention that he just abandoned two wives in less than a decade with no attempt at ANY form of saving his marriage in either relationship. And both his wives had no idea how “unhappy” he apparently was.
People certainly fall out of the shallow, infatuated kind of love or a selfish pseudo-love based only on getting their emotional needs met. The deeper, unselfish kind of love, OTOH, does not just vanish for no reason or because time has passed. It can be killed by unkind behavior, though.
^^^This.
My ex has diagnosed mental health issues: anxiety and depression.
Undiagnosed: rampant narcissism and sexual compulsiveness.
I went to therapy during our marriage to work on myself, and here was my diagnosis:
“I think you are depressed, but you’re absolutely in a terrible marriage.” Continued therapy throughout marriage and its dissolution, and post-divorce.
Three years out, I’m not so depressed. I love my life and all of its challenges. So grateful that I got out and got to build my life so that it’s driven by my choices (both good and bad).
I went to see our work doctor because I thought I was starting the menopause and maybe HRT would be a good idea as I was wanting to cry all the time. She knew the Twat and knew our background and said “if I was married to your husband I’d want to cry all the time too”!
“Bitch be crazy” is an explanation some people use for why a marriage failed. It’s worth noting that it puts all the responsibility for the failure on the other person. Jackass said straight out that his XW2 was “crazy,” bankrupted his business, moved out while he was away on business, and alienated him from his daughter. She was the villain in all of it. He did nothing wrong.
Once I hit D-Day, I had a much more realistic picture. I don’t know what went on in that relationship, but once she hit the devalue stage, she probably spend 10 years living with abuse.
Wow, nice ableist comment thread. I have ADHD, I am not an abuser, crazy, or seeking to harm others. Glad we can have an opportunity to shade people though ????
I read all these comments and wonder what my ex told his new GF. Now that I have seen the true him its hard for me to look at other woman and I get frustrated that they don’t “see” the true him. But these slime buckets are so good at manipulating us and are such good story tellers it amazing that any of us actually have “fixed” pickers. I do think we are more aware of the entire picture after dealing with these types. When they give us that story we now do a little more investigating. It’s just really hard when the whole family has been convinced by their story as well. Makes the story even more believable to the new characters that come in.
I know I shouldn’t care what story is being told about me but damn, I so want to know what he’s saying to convince people he’s the victim.
It’s been a long time since I posted here. DDay was back in 2011 and occurred in the midst of what I now know to be a full-blown manic episode. Following DDay, my husband was diagnosed as bipolar, and I have the thousands of dollars in psychiatrist and therapist bills to verify it. He had been previously diagnosed with anxiety disorder and mild OCD early in our marriage and I had always been very supportive of his mental health needs. I come to learn that he had been spiraling into depression and mania for some time before the big reveal, but that he concealed it from me because he did not want to take medicine. In the meantime, our marriage was suffering because he was not an equal partner in life or parenting, leaving me to manage the bulk of adulting for our three children and creating a great deal of resentment in me.
We were separated for several months, and then I agreed to let him move back in after he demonstrated remorse (real), meeting my conditions, which were (in no order, all equally deal breakers): no more affairs, equal or even greater share of the housekeeping and child responsibilities, treat his mental illness including meds. He apologized to our children and my family for what he had done. It was a rocky 3 years or so in the beginning. I had one foot out the door and he knew it. I worked on my career and became the CEO of a large nonprofit organization, cementing my ability to walk if needed.
Flash forward to 2019. There is still scar tissue, but we make it work. He carries an equal load around the home. His mental illness is under control — he takes his meds daily and without any involvement on my part. I am not his mommy or his therapist. I am fairly certain there are no affairs, but now the situation is completely different. One kid is out of the house, and another on the way to college this fall. The third is going into high school next year. My career is blossoming. If there were an affair, I would be out of here in a hot minute, no looking back. I am not a dependent person raising three little kids and working in a low-paying job. I don’t need him and I have made it plain that I am not sticking around for another ride on the untreated mental illness roller coaster.
Once, a couple of years ago, he mused aloud about whether he needed his medication any more. My response was to say calmly, Sure, It’s your body and your mental health. You can make the choice about what you do about those things. But know that as sure as the sun will rise, that I will be out of here, because being married to a person with an untreated mental illness is a total dealbreaker for me and there is zero chance I will do it again. Call your doctor to taper off responsibly and I will call my lawyer to get the divorce documents drawn up. I think my cool and immediate response shocked him. He has never brought it up since.
When I have learned about friends or acquaintances being victims of infidelity, I always send them here to this site. This sometimes generates confusion, because I am still married. But it was a long hard slog to get here and I don’t sugar coat it. I make it plain that my marriage is conditional, something I as a lifelong Catholic had never considered prior. I have learned a great deal about boundaries, caring for myself, and rejecting the stigma and “both sides” blame that floods the usual narrative. I don’t consider myself to be a unicorn, because I am clear eyed about the damn hard work that has gone into this marriage, and because I make a choice every day to stay married. It is not for everyone and if circumstances change, it is not for me either.
Your spine is blinding me!! I need sunglasses. You go girl. I want to be you when I grow up :p
You already are mighty. I don’t know how recent your DDay was, but that trauma is real. You will get past it. I still visit this site regularly to get booster shots for my spine. It helps remind me to keep and enforce healthy boundaries. My heart goes out to all of CN and my gratitude remains for CL. I have gained a life, even if I did not leave the cheater. I am not the marriage police — don’t have time for that, nor is that a way I want to live my life — but he is on permanent probation. But honestly, I am not asking or requiring him to do anything I am not also expecting of myself: staying faithful, carrying my fair share of the load, and being responsible for my own mental health.
I don’t get it, why not divorce and find a guy you can actually respect before too many more years go by? Your story makes me glad to be divorcing (as absolutely sucky as my divorce is). Don’t you ever just want to rid yourself of him and his problem? Was the cheating not an actual affair? I’m so conflicted on this. I’m thrilled to be divorcing a guy who cheated on me with hookers he picked up in strip clubs and anyone willing on work trips.
Why don’t you just do you and let other people decide if and when they want to divorce !
I have not dated much since divorce, but I thought long and hard about what information I would put out there about my XH.
He did not have an official diagnosis, because everything was wrong was … ME.
It boiled down to this. “He cheated. More than once. As much as I would have LIKED to control others actions, I have found out that in the end you simply can not.”
I realized that if I told a date about the circus sideshow of lies, twists and turns that was my divorce, they WOULD run away screaming…..
This isn’t a black and white issue, but if someone has a string of “crazy bitches” in their wake, you better damn we’ll take heed. Either (1) the bitches weren’t crazy and they are the problem or (2) the bitches were crazy and they’ve got some serious picker problems. In either case, proceed with caution because they are the common thread.
I’ll add that I’m dating a guy who’s 3 major past relationships ended cause bitches be crazy. That fact has caused me great concern, and if he were not open about his poor picker and his ongoing efforts to change, I wouldn’t be with him. He’s a chump like me, fighting to change his life.
Contact the “crazy bitches” via social media.
I had already ended a brief relationship but needed to confirm that my picker is getting finally honed. It was worse than I thought-he didn’t hold a job during his ten year marriage to axe#2 ! He referred to his ex-wives as his axes. According to him, #1 was borderline (no formal diagnosis) and #2 was bipolar.
Tread carefully. My ex told me his ex wife was crazy and said she cheated on him. Turns out, HE cheated on her. My ex is now telling his new supply I’m crazy. It’s possible he’s saying I cheated on him too.
If your new guy has three major past relationships that ended because the women were crazy and “cheated on him” (this may be projection on his part), I’d run for the hills if I were you. That’s already WAY too many red flags.
Yea, it’s alot. It scares me. I know this guy from childhood–dated him when we were kids and I ended up breaking up with him to date other people–and know several of his friends and family, but I am proceeding with caution. I know he’s not a cheater himself, my larger concern is why he has 3 times as an adult paired with cheating and/or lying women? But, it’s a version of the same question he must be asking about me–why did I stay with a lying, cheating, emotionally abusing man for 20 years? The partial answer to both those questions is: kids are involved. The rest is mostly that we are broken people who need to fix ourselves.
I read that much of the reason we put up with the abuse (and sometimes choose another disordered partner) comes from how we were treated/nurtured as children. So, I looked back on my exes and realized, yes, they all had similar narc traits. I was bound to end up with a narc since I had yet to learn my lesson. I’m going to make damn sure I learn my lesson this time so I don’t repeat the same mistake!
So, in order to fix my picker, I’m staying single and working on my issues which revolve around growing up feeling inconsequential and lonely. I’m learning to create and defend my boundaries, and with that comes the feeling that I deserve better than what I settled for with the ex.
OMG I can so relate to this!!
Ex told me his ex was verbally and physically abusive for no reason cause you know Bitch Be Crazy. Not so, it turns out he was a verbally abusive gaslighting POS who drives you CRAZZZZZZZZZZZZY. Like you don’t know which way up because he insists you’re wrong and a crazy bitch and so selfish and you’re lucky he’s with you. He also acts like he’s going to hit you but doesn’t. He winds up but doesn’t do it. So he can say he doesn’t hit women because he technically doesn’t!
I wish I could go hug her and apologize to her for falling for his crap. I was so wrong. I believed him when she was the real victim. I’m so sorry to have automatically gone against you Jill. I wish I’d known better. I ended up being “verbally and physically abusive” too. I’m sure his current on/off gf is hearing about his two bitch be crazy exes. Never again am I falling for this narrative, I now know it’s a predictor of what you’ll be post break up.
I too wish I could go back and talk with his first wife and the mother of their kids. In supporting the Dickhead, I turned against her as well. I wish I really knew why they split up. His version was she was lazy and she cheated. I think she was depressed and living with a partying, drinking, no-responsibility, no help,cheating husband aka the Dickhead. I remember he said she cheated so he cheated. I doubt she ever did.
I fell for his shit and the pity channel.
Yes, I have been through the same. Even the threatening postures.
Me too – like screaming about one inch from my face, chest all puffed up and frothing at the mouth. Trouble is, the Twat eventually starting beating me up but it all starts with the “puffed up peacock” stance!
It is possible that the ex is a serial cheater who never got caught. When they suddenly ramp up the devalue and your once loving spouse suddenly can’t stand you and everything you do is wrong it can kind of seem like they are suddenly going crazy. As traumatic as it was, finding out about the infidelity made a lot of things suddenly make a lot more sense.
There may have been some red flags before and underlying traits leading up to this but they were subtle and infrequent. Once the infidelity started it really did feel like the bottom had suddenly dropped out of our marriage.
Hey CN! So far I’ve been trying to be ok, he just spent the entire week at his cumdumpsters house! I don’t know why it still bothers me! He hasn’t seen or asked about him kids, that hurts my heart. A vagina is more important to him, he is such a piece of shit. I haven’t reached out to him once. I’m proud of myself for that. I can’t wait to move out of this hell.
It baffles me that a man can start a full on relationship with another woman while still married and with 2 very young kids, like as young as a 2 month old! Not sure what this woman is thinking either? Like hey! This man cheated on his wife with me while she was pregnant, lied to her, continued to cheat after she gave birth. Left her at home to take care of a newborn and their other child while he fucks off with me. He walks out on his family and neglects his children! Yeah all great traits! He’s going to be a great partner in life! Like is she that dumb? Or does she feel like she’s won or is superior because she got a man to leave his family for her?
He treated his wife, a woman he created a life with, does she feel she’s won a prize? Sometimes I feel like I’m the one that’s lost and she’s won, I’ll be honest about that. I just wonder what he tells her, and how jumping from a marriage into another relationship makes any sense!?
Dear Heartbroken, May I offer a few words to answer your questions? You have done nothing wrong. This is not your fault. Your soon to be Ex husband is a man-baby who will not accept the responsibilities of an adult. Life was getting too serious for him so he ran.
The other woman involved thinks that she will satisfy ALL his needs and he will NEVER treat her in the way you have been treated. Your past is her future.
Gather together any pay stubs, bank account statements, income statements, etc and find yourself a lawyer to get child support and alimony claims started.
Your husband will never change. This is who he is. Believe it. Accept it. Step into a new life.
Best wishes from one who has been there.
Heartbroken, if you post on the Forums (the General one gets more traffic), you’ll get responses and support. Your STBX is a piece of work! And the answer to ‘what is he thinking? and what is she thinking?’ is; they are NOT thinking! You deserve to be with a man who cares about you, cares for you, and THINKS about what he’s doing!
Thank you! Do you mean there’s more forums here on chump lady!?
I do deserve better, he is not worth it! I just really hate him
Oh, and they might not show up on the right if you’re on mobile, but you’ll still see a Forums link at the top of the page.
If you create an account (actually log in, there’s a link at the top of this page) you’ll be able to see links to the forums on the right side of this page. They’re hidden to non-logged-in users. Took me a long time to figure out, haha.
People generally don’t ask how my marriage ended and so I don’t tell them (I am well over the spewing to strangers stage). If they did ask I probably would tell them “He was having a mid-life crisis and I was just part of the fall out”. I happen to think this is true. I am not using this to excuse his behavior, feeling bad doesn’t give you the right to treat others like dirt or ignore their feelings. I think he had various underlying personality traits and possibly mild mental issues (I had always suspected a hint of manic and OCD in him but not severe) that made him especially vulnerable to mid-life crisis and how he chose to deal with it. Age, hormonal changes (men have them too), not feeling accomplished, concerns about image and a number of family and friend deaths all exacerbated these traits and brought out the worst in him. He didn’t suddenly go crazy and the seeds of it were always in him, but it all came to a rapid crescendo after years of a slow creep that always felt off to me but I could never really put my finger on it until my marriage appeared to blow up rather suddenly.
If asked for details I would start with things not related to infidelity and lead up to that in order to highlight his pattern of love it to leave it and his series of impulsive actions designed to completely reinvent himself in various ways in the last few years of our marriage. This is what has helped me to understand that I really wasn’t to blame for what happened. It really was temporary insanity in a way. Being able to provide those details might help others to see that too and if not, then they aren’t people I need to know. My ex of course would dispute all of this. Mid-life crisis would imply that there was something wrong with him and he would fall apart if he tried to face the reality of his own imperfections. He seems to have stabilized now (although I don’t live with him anymore so who knows). I still resent that he is with Schmoopie but if they ever break up and he finds a different girlfriend, then I will hope he has gotten over it and can be a decent partner again.
I think this is just one variation on the theme of “things to watch out for while you are fixing your picker”. For me, one of the things I watch for is TMI too fast. If a man is telling me in great detail before I even ask why his previous relationship(s) ended, I am immediately wary. Especially on a first date. I don’t need to know every detail of your previous relationship the very first time I meet you, especially if it’s all about blaming the former partner. If you’re telling me every excruciating detail before I ask for them, I’m going to assume you’re throwing up a smoke screen of some sort or you’re not over that other relationship and either way, it makes you a bad bet for a date much less a relationship. It doesn’t matter what the reason is, “bitch be crazy”, “she wouldn’t have sex whenever I wanted (yeah I heard that one of a first date)”, or “she took all my money”, if you give me too much detail I didn’t ask for, I’m going to throw a red flag.
On the other hand, my ex was weirdly secretive about his previous relationships. Would not say a word about why they ended. Given that we were together for thirty plus years that was very strange to me. Why would it matter if I knew why he and his high school girlfriend broke up? But it did for some reason. So not giving any information is a red flag for me as well. Maybe someday I will meet a man who shares just the right amount of information but until then, I’m over here with my five dogs living my life. 😀
Some tools I like with this topic:
– You can’t take the effect and make it the cause (also a great song);
– I refrain from “practicing” any type of medicine (especially psychiatry/psychology) with my “driver’s license”. Education is helpful, but if I’m looking up DSM definitions as the clock spins, time to step away and go for a walk/read fiction/make art/phone a friend, etc.
– I watch body language with people- if communication is actually 80% non-verbal and 20% verbal, my chumpy self had adopted this as a litmus test for the sketch factor. Hands/feet/eyes/mouth- giveaways. Mostly this is about trusting my gut and dodging the sneaky expectation spackle with new people (friends, colleagues, dates).
Can’t say that I was the most perfectly aware post-divorce chump, but I always smelled me a narcissist when anyone tried to minimize their previous marriage with any kind of hand-wave that placed blame fully on the ex. Also the sign of a pretty shallow emotional IQ.
x says we grew apart. I just admit that I outgrew my usefulness when our youngest turned 18.
Never going to settle with a parasite again.
My cheater has been more clever than using words like crazy. However, what he implies his something similar and I honestly do not want to know how he talks behind my back. Although I can imagine just comparing to how he talks about others.
His red flags were:
– Prior girlfriends did not understand him
– Prior girlfriends were stupid and gullible
– Prior girlfriends were too clingy
He told me that the one girl he liked the most, they just grew apart when she moved away and he lost her number. I always thought this story was extremely odd.
The biggest red flag was the friends my STBX hung out with.
I only know Highschool friends. I never met any friends in the city where I followed him to. He had been living there at least 3 or 4 years. And he talked a lot about these friends. I did not meet any. The only stories he shared included drugs, drinking, and sex.
The friends he introduced (very few and only coworkers / subordinates) typically were sexist and enjoyed drinking. He always claimed he was so supportive of women, yet, all friends he had were sexist and openly talked about how crazy their wives were. He claimed they were fun to hang out with. I always thought it was odd — now I know he was just one of them with better image management. My cheater actually believes women are inferior and uses his “feminism” to lure unsuspecting women in. His OW (now girlfriend) is his subordinate who he promoted twice while sleeping with her. Once the affair was made known, she had to leave the company. Not him. He did not end up with one scratch. He manipulated her into voluntarily leaving.
Yes, I am probably the crazy, angry, controlling bitch x. I mean he has triangulated me for years with comments like:
– John said he feels sorry for me, because of the Facebook posts you make. (No idea what he meant, I rarely post anything, other than the typical 1st day of school comments)
– Sam really felt sorry for me, the way you went off on me the one time (… 10 years ago… that I do not remember at all, so I am not sure anything happened)
– I am never invited to work events anymore, because of how you acted this one time (… not true, we are invited to all parties like usual.. and that was when you actually ignored me all day, did not keep promises, drank too much, and then would not leave so we were already 1h late to visit a friend, instead ordered a beer… and that was also 10 years ago)
Yep. I am one of those crazy ones….
I am fairly certain that I am “Bitch be Crazy” in the eyes of the XH and what he tells everyone, especially his girlfriend that he started a relationship with about a month after I said I wanted out of the relationship. After being married for almost 26 years and together for 28, I tried to divorce responsibly, and I thought that we had mutually agreed because we no longer had shared goals in life, his music was more important than anything else, (it was always more important than anything else), I knew he did not love me anymore, (if he ever did) and wanted it to be done amicably and reasonably for our daughter. At the time I did not realize what I was dealing with. He decided that his best action plan was to get involved with someone else, while we were still living in the same house and divorce proceedings not even begun, rubbed it in my face and abandoned our daughter in the process. I had to kick him out because I couldn’t take the abuse any longer and that is why I am a crazy bitch. He moved in with said new girlfriend a week after he left our house. He had only met her about 2 months prior, that I am being told anyway, who does that? I have heard his narrative is that I BLINDSIDED HIM, I REJECTED HIM, when he had always tried his best to be a wonderful father, and FAITHFUL husband. I’m also pretty sure that he tells people that I alienated our daughter from him as well. No, he did that himself. There is so much that I do not know and will never know but I can only assume that he had his girlfriend lined up way before he pushed me to decide I wanted out because he didn’t have the balls to do it himself. I know he wanted out, he was relieved when I called it done. It doesn’t matter what he tells other people, I do not care what they think. I have nothing to be ashamed of. I loved and supported him for nearly 28 years, with all of his “depression” and phantom illnesses – so many tests/MRI/CT scans done and nothing found all being paid for by my good job and insurance plan, him not being able to work because he wanted to be a musician full time I worked 12 hour days 6 days a week for nearly 5 years to keep our house only to have to give it up because he refused/couldn’t find work at all, he is not diagnosed but I believe he has very narcissistic tendencies and he used me up for everything I had until there was nothing left. Literally, nothing…So I get to be the Crazy Bitch now? Fine by me. Will he do all of this to the girlfriend? Probably. I wish I could be dead to him and his whole enabling family. In exactly 13 months our daughter will be 18 and then I can be completely free of all of them. Counting the months down.
Apropos of Bitch be crazy” (and the related “bitch be sooo angry”; hence, “not my fault!”), these are the salt sprinkles that wasband spread all around my former community, definitely before divorce, well before D-day, and, I now think probably for years. Laying the groundwork carefully, as they do, these human-creep chimeras.
The best thing for me to ease the pain of all that mess was EMDR. If you have triggers and flashback and all that nasty junk, I highly recommend it! My therapist was very well trained and experienced. I now realize that she also was personally depressed and very ill. But it still worked really well!! And covered by my insurance. Some kind of miracle. Curative.
This Bitch totally not crazy!
Well, it is complicated, isn’t it?
It can be hard to separate the mental illness from the fallout from the affair.
When a person does something that their personal morality and ethics find offensive it creates a conundrum. They alleviate their cognitive dissonance by lashing out and blaming others.
Crazy making.
My ex had been taking anti-psychotic drugs. People were out to get her! She told me parents and teachers were plotting against her. Her psychiatrist prescribed drugs. So it turns out she was partially right about people out to get her. It was because she was doing the janitor in her classroom and hitting on other men in the school.
So which came first, the mental illness or the cheating?
That question became moot as her continued behavior forced the divorce.
When the question comes up about my divorce I just say she was adulterous and unrepentant. The rest is beyond my ability to know.
Actually, it’s so NOT paranoia, when people actually are out to get you! (Whether they have good reasons for that, as in your Ex’s case, or for any reason at all.) So the incomplete picture she gave the psychiatrist led to a completely wrong diagnosis, and wrong medication. There was no actual mental illness there, at least not one with a main symptom of paranoia!
Not the whole story!
The paranoia expressed itself in other ways too.
Just because people are out to get you does not mean you are not paranoid!
Perhaps this is a topic for another column, but how do you avoid fixating on fears that your next significant other is constantly wondering why your ex left you? I have been in a wonderful new relationship for nearly 3 years with a wonderfully understanding man … but STILL worry that he and his family and friends are looking at me and wondering what is wrong with me or what I did in my marriage to force my ex to flee. Worse still … I also worry that I am somehow doing or will do whatever the mystery thing is that caused my ex to leave me for someone else. It can be HELL in my own head!
I am lucky, however, in that my new guy is someone I grew up with. Helps with the confidence and trust on both ends. I did explore online dating for awhile, and that was horrible … trying to make myself appear “normal”, “sane”, sympathetic — and constantly looking for the other person’s flaws and unspoken history. Gives me chills just to think about it.
And if being open and honest isn’t enough to reduce that anxiety, then professional help is needed! Cognitive Behaviour Therapy is the gold standard for treating anxiety. A good therapist will see that your anxiety arose for a good reason, but that now you’re applying it too generally and disproportionately. They would also help you work on why you are still carrying the blame and the shame for the end of your marriage.
Lillian, just be honest and open with your boyfriend about it.
I’ve said that if they wrote a Hollywood moving about my Ex and the things that she did, people wouldn’t believe it. So, I’ve been open and honest and told my friends and family that it is OK to discuss my Ex with my GF (now wife). She heard stories from them that I had never told her and rotten things my Ex did to them over the years that I didn’t know about. My wife realized that it was all true and that it had nothing to do with me.
From my experiences, I get the 2 sides of the “Ex is crazy” coin.
My brother’s ex-wife was (after the divorce several years later her illness sadly led her to commit suicide) a very nice lady who was certifiably mentally ill. My brother loved her but because she refused to continue treatment, he had to divorce her because she made his life a living Hell. To this day he feels sadness and regret at having to leave her and rarely ever talks about it.
The other side of the coin is mine where my Ex has Narcistic Personality Disorder (diagnosed).
She knows EXACTLY what she is doing at all times and simply does not care if it harms others as long as it benefits her.
The difference between the 2 women and situations is starke in that my Ex SIL when she was having an episode was delusional and had difficulty controlling what she did or said in that state. My Ex planned leaving me for years, had all of her ducks in a row with financial traps set for me all while on the surface playing “happy wife”. When Dday hit, her plans all played out in military precision and she left me for OM #3 and had her new life with him mapped out in short order.
Yet both women could be said to be “mentally ill”.
I believe that there is a BIG difference between my Ex SIL who had delusional sometime violent episodes that she couldn’t control vs my plotting Ex who know what she was doing at all times, knew it would be considered wrong or evil but justified it in her own mind and didn’t care about the pain of others.
Cherry on the top is I found out about my Ex’s NPD diagnosis when she was a teenager (before she met me) by her Aunt AFTER the divorce. She said that when we were together “it wasn’t her place to tell me”.
Gee…um thanks for letting me know after I wasted 16 years on that relationship ….
So Laughing, and tell the truth, did you want Auntie to tell you while you were married? When, exactly, during the marriage? (Say she failed to alert you before marriage.) How far into it? And does it matter what you were doing at the time? Going back to school. Working long hours. Parenting children. Say you were doing all three, and had no time to talk. Then how was she going to tell you? Should she make sure you were told in confidence, so spouse would not find out? When is the good time to tell someone that their spouse has low character?
Yes, I agree, it should be said. But how?
Her Aunt & I got along very well and she didn’t say anything before because my Ex begged her not to before we got married. My Ex’s family is highly dysfunctional and her Aunt is a licensed social worker and the most stable in her family. Ex lived with her as a teenager and Aunt had her going to therapy. When her brother found out (Ex’s f’d up Dad), he stopped it and had her move back in with him and his abusive schmoopie (Ex’s Mom was living with a guy and an alcoholic).
The conversation about Ex’s diagnosis started after the divorce was final and the Aunt said on the phone “I was afraid that this might happen…..”.
She also thought that I was a good influence on her niece and hoped that the good parts of her personality would override the bad with my influence…well they didn’t.
I wish I had known because before the wedding my friends and family were begging me not to marry her and that info might have stopped me from making the biggest mistake of my life.
I’m so glad you’re rid of her now and I’m sorry you had to live through such a hard lesson.
Hindsight is 20/20 and foresight is blind, as they say. If I knew then what I know now…
I would want somebody to tell me before I sign that marriage certificate/license, at the latest. There should be a pause during most wedding ceremonies where the officiant asks the guests “Is there any reason these two should not be wed in matrimony ? Speak now or forever hold your peace.”
As my late mother used to say, “Engagements are made to be broken”. No rushing into marriage.
Funny thing happened after my Asshat’s narrative of his first ex wife’s “bitch be crazy” (which, I initially believed.) They were married for 20 years. I was not the OW, I happened along 3 years after their divorce (after his consecutive APs went south). I was with him for 14 years, co-parented his teens with her, since he couldn’t be bothered, and dragged one from being a high school dropout to a college grad…see- after meeting his ex, I became very good friends with her. That was a huge fly in his image management ointment, still is, particularly with his kids. She received a box of very nice chocolates from me this year for Valentine’s Day. She sent me a beautiful hand-crocheted scarf. <3
Yup that also happened to me too, after I married my now ex I
Brought up my stepson from age 4 to 19 working together with his mom(“crazy One”)
After dday stepsons mother told me that was how their marriages ended too, even exact same “ unhappy” words were used…
Freedom is a beautiful thing
These cheaters are ungrateful fuckwits
After three years I still have Christmas with stepson, ex’s first wife and her Hubby
They have been there for me, we are all friends and I am grateful.
“My ex-wife went bat-shit crazy when she found out I was cheating on her. She called man an asshole, and told me to get the hell out. Crazy, I tell ya, crazy.”
I have PTSD and servere anxiety because I was married to a covert narcissist/BPD (cluster B). Abuse started on the honeymoon and never stopped. New girlfriend wanted to know why we divorced. Told her my ex had numerous affairs. My new GF had to deal with a crazy ex-wife of her XH (GF is a chump herself). She wanted to know if my XW was crazy also. So I gave her the clinical rundown of my ex (GF works in medical field). Answered all her questions without going into to much detail. GF just wanted to know what she was walking into first. I rather find out sooner then later if my ex is a dealbreaker. I just let who I am speak for itself. I learned it’s best not to go into too much detail about the crazy side of your ex. Just tell then you refused to put up with the cheating anymore. I wasn’t always the best husband when you are under siege all the time. If my ex tries to blameshift I will just tell my GF of all the improvements I have made since I am not in an abusive relationship anymore.
bich-be-having-needs-and-making-me-accountable-for-my-stuff-and-i-can’t-be-bothered-with-that-shit-so-i’m-gonna-fuck-you-for-a-while-instead-until-you-start-to-make-demands-or-otherwise-bore-me-etc
My cheater applied for a job in his field where one’s character is key and used a former co-worker/friend of ours as a reference. When the prospective employer followed up on my ex’s references, our friend was specific about his skills (which he has) but vague about the reason for his being fired from his last job (adultery with someone in the company). The employer asked, “Is there anything else we should know?” Our friend was silent. The employer interjected, “It’s okay. We know he is divorced and all about his former wife’s mental illness.”
Our friend said, “His ex-wife is not crazy. She’s perfectly sane. She and their children live in (new place) and have started their lives over.” There was silence on the other end of the line before she was asked, “He has children?”
I told our oldest, “Apparently I’m crazy, but you don’t exist.” “Of course we don’t, Mom. How could he explain why the courts gave full custody to a crazy person?”
This isn’t a new thing at all. Women have been locked away in asylums, only up until recently, by their husbands for whatever reason their husbands thought was significant enough. The “HYSTERICAL” woman. There’s a ton of interesting history out there about the mental health industry and how most of the patients abused by mental health practitioners are women. So it’s no surprise that any man will use “that bitch went crazy” as his excuse. It’s literally been said about women since the dawn of time.
Thanks to Sigmund Fraud/Freud and his ilk.
In my case, the bitch did go crazy at year 20! Reality was she hid it prettt well for those years. During years 20-25 while she was banging 26 year olds and exbf, I learned I was just the guy who got her out of a bad home life. Never was anything more.
My ex got worse as time went on. When I read about Cluster B personalities they get much worse as they get older. By my 40’s I attempted sucidie because of the constant abuse. I couldn’t leave the kids alone in her care or so I thought. It took me 24 years to leave her. I had to save myself first, like the oxygen mask. I can now help the kids. My ex, in hindsight, never loved me. She was using me to raise the kids and then kick me to the curb after they were raised. Mine went crazy big time in her 30’s. When I say the “Bitch Be Crazy” I have witnesses to her craziness. My roommates say that she is the most scary person they have seen. Especially the shark eyes and her personality switching like a light switch. Not all of us who say that are cheaters (I was a chump who doesn’t knows how many times she cheated). When their mask is dropped they go to a whole new level of craziness. Ask questions, especially of men, of what behaviors their exes have. It was actually a friend who first suggested that my ex was a narcissist. My GF asked specific questions. She is familiar with NPD/BPD as she works in the medical field. So it was a very clinical conversation.
Used to raise the kids and a paycheck! Once my kids became mostly independent, she changed to a level of crazy I did not know was possible. I saw a lot of her communications from the 20-25 year time frame. Made it all make sense. I was the unlucky bastard that got her out of her bad homelife but was never what she wanted! I will never know how many there were in total, I do know of two for a fact….. and probably 10 other high potentials! End the end, the bitch went crazy is a factual statement!