Dear Chump Lady, Leaving my cheater has been a real struggle for me. I started going to a trauma therapist to get some help with my issues. I’ve learned there are several internal walls that are blocking me from making my exit. A big one is what to do when I leave. My plan was to […]
Trickle Truth Is Neither Trickle Nor Truth
Add to the list of Reconciliation Industrial Complex euphemisms I despise — “trickle truth.” I’ve ranted about “wayward” before and the “fog,” but it only recently occurred to me that “trickle truth” is equally moronic… or Orwellian. (Moronically Orwellian? Deviously Orwellian? Anyway…) “Trickle truth” is like “truthiness,” the term comedian Stephen Colbert coined for the rebranding of […]
Dear Chump Lady, What if there was no sex?
Hi Chump Lady, What would you do if your husband did the following behaviors in an 11 year marriage (two early elementary kids)? He says this is all that ever happened. 1). Went to the strippers about 15 times since the year we had our kids). 2). Had 4 lap dances where strippers put breasts […]
Hopium Translations
Chumpy hearts die hard. Armed with the smallest evidence that a freak still cares, a chump will assign great significance to scraps. HE CALLED (to ask that I pick up his dry-cleaning.) HE RETURNED (to get his kayak). SHE WANTS ME (can I babysit tonight?) Sigh. It’s what makes us chumps — idiotically ascribing decent […]
What You Thought It Was, What It Really Was
How many times do we write “tip of the iceberg” around here? When faced with a D-Day, chumps never get the full picture. And, fact is, many years out, you realize “the whole truth” is unknowable with a cheater. There are skeletons you will never unearth. Meh is walking away from the shovel. But I […]
Dear Chump Lady, Don’t confess an affair?
Dear Chump Lady, A lot of advice nowadays paints confessing an affair as worse than having one. Can you please rebut the following arguments? Confessing an affair is disrespectful and selfish. Only confess if you’ve been caught or you’ve contacted a STD. If neither happened and the affair is over, keep it to yourself. Cheating […]
Dear Chump Lady, He “can’t cope with the guilt” of who he is
Dear Chump Lady, I was cheated on by my ex, for the first year I hadn’t any idea. There were 5 to 6 other women. There have been several sex messages, pictures, arranging to meets, and other indiscretions. Nineteen other women in total and I found the majority out when I was 7 months pregnant with our son. I left when […]
The Compassion Trap
“What we want most is only to be held…and told…that everything (everything is a funny thing, is baby milk and Papa’s eyes, is roaring logs on a cold morning, is hoot-owls and the boy who makes you cry after school, is Mama’s long hair, is being afraid, and twisted faces on the bedroom wall)…everything is […]
The Trickle Truth Is Neither Trickle Nor Truth
Add to the list of Reconciliation Industrial Complex euphemisms I despise — “trickle truth.” I’ve ranted about “wayward” before and the “fog,” but it only recently occurred to me that “trickle truth” is equally moronic… or Orwellian. (Moronically Orwellian? Deviously Orwellian? Anyway…) “Trickle truth” is like “truthiness,” the term comedian Stephen Colbert coined for the rebranding of […]
Dear Chump Lady, How do I support my friend’s reconciliation?
Dear Chump Lady How do I support my friend through “reconciliation” with her abusive cheating husband? Last year one of my best friends, “Leanne” found out her husband, A-hole, had been having an affair for six months, he told her they only slept together once, yeah right. When she confronted him he walked out on […]
