Cheater Hoovers to Say He’s ‘Lost His Way’
Her ex-husband (a cheater) hoovers to say he’s ‘lost his way’ and wants her to know the divorce has been very hard on him.
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Dear Chump Lady,
My ex-husband of 20 years had an affair last year (second one during the course of the marriage, that I know of). After 2 months of humiliating pick-me dance and wreckonciliation (I was gaslighted into taking responsibility for his cheating by both my ex and our marriage counselor), he brutally discarded me 1.5 weeks before Christmas. During this time I was made to believe that the affair was over and he was “working on our marriage”. I soon found out that the affair was never over and he conspired my discard with his affair partner. (She was just trying to save him from a bad marriage of course).
Two months later I discovered your book and the fact that I have married a covert narcissist. Since then, I’ve put all my energy into healing and gone no contact. I’m doing well now and I’m proud of my progress.
I never got a closure or an apology, but I got hoovered quite a few times.
I’m glad I did not fall for it because of CN and my therapist who was once a chump herself. I forwarded his latest hoover email and would love to see it go through the Universal Bullshit Translator.
Thank you so much for your wonderful work.
Kind regards,
Thriver
***
Dear Thriver,
The UBT has been very obstinate lately. It rejected an NPR story over the sheer magnitude of bullshit, however cheater hoovers are like cheese doodles. Empty apologies are very snackable. Also, I made threats. So, the UBT is yours today.
Hi,
Firstly, I want to apologise for writing to you.
I express apologies by doing the very thing you asked me not to do. Similar to the way I express marriage vows.
I truly don’t want to disturb your peace, so please don’t let this message do so if you’re not ready or willing to read it.
You read it, ergo you really want to read it. #consent
Cheater… must… hoover
I’m writing because I feel I need to. It’s been eating away at me inside.
Like that worm inside RFK Jr’s head that makes him spout nonsense. I have an internal parasite that compels me to send insincere apologies.
I had hoped that with time things would get easier and in some ways they have, but it’s also become harder to come to terms with the consequences of my actions.
Consequences are hard for me.
Looking back now, it’s painfully clear what happened. I understand the mistakes I made and the completely wrong way I handled things, probably the worst possible way.
I made a mistake. Like when you mix the darks and lights on hot cycle and the colors run together. I handled things in the worst possible way by doing my own laundry. It’s painfully clear I need a wife appliance. Don’t leave me alone here with actual appliances.
It hurts.
I did everything I said I would never do, and I have to live with that. It hurts. It’s painful to sit with the fact that I gave up on us so suddenly and so foolishly.
It’s painful to sit with my head up my ass. I’m a giant hemorrhoid of a man.
Whatever led up to the end, I let it all go in a moment of madness. I walked away without stopping to think, without turning around before it was too late. That is something I regret every day.
Whatever led to the end? I have no idea. Nebulous madness!
I regret walking away without thinking. Like crossing those sidewalks in the UK where you should’ve looked right instead of left. I regret going splat. Every day.
What pains me most is knowing that I caused you so much hurt.
It thrills me to know I caused you so much hurt. Come back here so I can hurt you some more.
I’m not the same person.
Over time, things have become clearer. I’m no longer the same person you last saw. I’ve returned to myself, but the world I now live in doesn’t feel like mine.
The world I live in should be MINE. You were mine. I’m not the same person since I lost control.
I’ve made it work, but it’s not where I truly want to be.
You should care about what I want, says the guy who cheated on you for 20 years.
I respect your peace and your choices, and I still care about you deeply despite how my actions might have said otherwise.
You made a choice to never hear from me again and I respect that. I hoover because I care.
In my heart I know that if you were ever to extend an olive branch, I would take it without hesitation and do everything in my power to make things right.
Olive branches are for warring parties. You should offer a peace gesture to me. If only I had the power to make things right, I would pay your legal bills and leave you alone. Alas, I am feeble and weak. Only you can make me promise to do ethical things.
I know it wouldn’t be easy.
There’s that massage appointment with Karen on Thursday. My calendar is so full.
I would have to face hard truths, break hearts, and shake foundations but I would do it if it meant returning to the life I knew and cherished for 20 years.
Mental struggles and me
I’ve struggled mentally over the past four or so years, often brushing it aside, just getting on with things. But these struggles were never about you. They were about life, about me, about feeling lost and unfulfilled in ways I didn’t understand until it was too late.
“About me” pretty much sums up my mental struggles.
In 2024, I made a terrible series of mistakes. I chased the idea of feeling whole, thinking something external would fill the emptiness. It didn’t. It all came crashing down, as it inevitably would.
I chased a lot of holes.
I tried to come back and fix things with you, but not hard enough. I wish I had, I see that now, painfully clearly.
I hoovered, but not hard enough. That’s painfully clear. Zip ties and duct tape next time.
This time apart has given me space to reflect deeply. I was an idiot. Blinded and disconnected from reality. But I’ve gained perspective, and I’ve worked on myself mentally and physically. I’m not the same person.
I’m an idiot disconnected from reality, yet also capable of deep introspection.
Let me remind you again that I’m NOT THE SAME PERSON. You’d be crazy to take back the guy who cheated on you for 20 years, so let me introduce my changeling “Bob.”
I know this email might seem selfish.
Bob would never be selfish. He just wants to fluff your pillows and draw you a warm bath.
I don’t mean for it to be. I’m just someone who’s broken in places and trying to find healing, even if it’s one slow step at a time.
Selfish, broken, and slow! I’m the total package!
I wanted to fix the pool last Saturday, hoping for a moment over coffee to speak, so I wouldn’t have to send this email. But I understand your reasons, whatever they may be.
Whatever they are, I understand your reasons. They’re whatever. If you only hadn’t ignored me, I wouldn’t have to batter-ram your boundaries. Let’s have coffee!
Please don’t let this message bring you any disruption. It’s not my intention. I only wanted to speak the truth of how I feel.
Please be disturbed by my message. That’s my intention.
Life is short and often hard, and I keep asking myself: Why did I throw away all the good? How could I do that to her?
My dick is short and often hard.
I need help.
And the answer is: Because I lost my way. I didn’t let anyone in. I didn’t get the help I needed.
People get lost. It happens. If only you were there to pin my address to my sweater and tuck me in at night.
Now, I’m learning to care for myself again and make sure I never repeat the same mistakes.
I’m a big boy now. I can pin my own sweater, but I miss my mommy.
I accept the outcome of what’s happened, but I can’t help wondering if there’s still an alternate path.
Could we just bypass the sweater pinning and not expect anything of me? I’d prefer that.
Most of all, I hope you and your parents are doing okay.
Kibble! Look at me pretending to consider people that aren’t me!
Be best
I’m doing my best.
To hoover you back into a shitty relationship with a cheater.
Things are okay on the surface, but there’s still work being done inside.
I’m all surface with nothing inside.
I don’t expect a reply, and that’s okay.
A few lines up I expected coffee. I’m a mindfuck and that’s okay.
Take care of yourself. If ever you do want to talk, I’m just an email away.
I’m never going away.
Twice a Cheater
Twice that you know of.
I made a terrible series of m.i.s.t.a.k.e.s.
This right here is the tell that every other utterance is self serving dribble. The disordered simply cannot take responsibility for their c.h.o.i.c.e.s.
Yes to HOAC, they get diabolical kibbles out of the spiral of destruction. They’d love to drive you to your deathbed just pleading for a crumb of their golden ‘wuv’.
It’s all disordered types. My FW and narc mother both got peculiarly similar kicks out of seeing me reeling. But I got right back up and on with life.
Yes, they gaslight like mad that they’re concerned about you so they look good to others like just trying to fix it why can’t you forgive??? Every so often there’s a hoover attempt but I laugh and ignore. No contact.
It’s hard to explain but I have the sneaking suspicion that one of the c.h.o.i.c.e.s these FWs make is not just about self-gratification but also destruction for the sheer purpose of eventually being forgiven for it and taken back– as if that were (on some demented s.u.b.c.o.n.s.c.i.o.u.s level) the end game all along and would complete the cycle.
As usual, when something is difficult to pin down, I’ll resort to movie analogies. In this case more than one. Spoiler alert for anyone who hasn’t seen Devil All the Time (worth it if just for Robert Pattinson’s perfect illustration of fuckwitty victim-blaming, smear-campaigning, coercive control and DARVO) or Dangerous Liaisons.
The FW email brings to mind the scene where the hillbilly faith healer stabs his wife to prove to himself he can bring her back to life. He waves his hands and shouts over her bleeding body, commanding her to “Return spirit! Resurrect!” with increasing panic. But, oops, she stays dead.
As marriages tend to when one stabs them in the neck with a screwdriver.
And then the email brings to mind the scene in Dangerous Liaisons where Malkovich as the Vicomte de Valmont (weird casting) sadistically rejects his lover on a dare and, when it basically sends her to her deathbed, he declares that his next exploit– the thing that will bring him even greater glory– is to win her back. Except, oops, she basically says “fuck off” to his emissary in her last breath.
As marriages tend to when one Brooklyn curb stomps them.
Anyway, speaking of choices, there’s something about this typical progression from doing the completely unforgivable thing to hoovering back that seems purposeful, as if “wuv” (i.e., the centrality, domination, power and control that passes for love for disordered personalities) is only “wuv” to these freaks if it endures beyond acts of sadism.
Man. This is on the nose. I have often felt that my fw chose to blow my life up because she wanted me to prove to her that she could do The Worst Possible Thing and I would still love her. Aw, how romantic! Too bad.
I think it relates to something called “compulsive reenactment” of domestic violence witnessed and/or experienced in childhood.
Before I write anything else, first let me say I’m not offering sad sausage “bad childhood” excuses for abusers even if, statistically speaking, seeing or being subjected to domestic abuse in childhood seems to be the main training ground for future domestic abusers. But free will and all that. Most abused kids don’t grow up to be abusers so choice is clearly involved.
But that said, I don’t know how small children witnessing DV are supposed to understand all the complicated dynamics keeping even adult family members entrapped (financial disadvantage, gender politics, etc.) in abuse dynamics when modern social science still seems pretty confused about it.
Kind of falls into the “this is an explanation, but not an excuse” category.
My ex had not the best of childhoods, but neither did I. I don’t have an abusive bone in my body. So like you said, free will and all that.
I would also be so bold as to over-simplify it and say even if the FW was dealt a bad hand of cards from the start that contributed to their poor behaviour, for our purpose here at CN? The grain of truth to take away would be that we can sympathize with their plight, but we sill gottta get the hell out.
I feel bad for him at times because he is clearly disordered and that faulty wiring has lead him to make egregious mistakes in life. It cost him his marriage but more importantly, it cost him a relationship with his oldest child. That sucks for him. Even worse? I don’t know if he is capable of changing enough for that kid to give him a second chance further down the line.
I sometimes feel bad for him for that. But it doesn’t change the fact that he harmed me and I need to stay the hell away from him. And it doesn’t change the fact that his kid wants absolutely nothing to do with him.
Sometimes I think I’m pretty jaded because I can know some offender’s tragic backstory and still not pull a single punch. I might feel sorry for the traumatized kid they once were but have no sympathy at all for the predatory adult.
To me, understanding backstories is about either predicting the next moves of a dangerous offenders and supporting social policies that prevent people from becoming adult offenders in the first place. The closest I get to sympathy is doing some mental time machine exercise and “wishing” various individuals hadn’t been turned into sociopathic thugs. For instance, my kids have their own version of the “baby Hitler” exercise. Rather than smothering baby Hitler at birth like many people say they’d do, my kids figure that, if you kidnap baby Hitler and raise him with groovy gentle attachment parenting, things would have turned out a lot differently for countless victims, Poland, France, etc.
Obviously they were raised to lean more towards the “nurture” theory of human violence than the “bad seed/genetic criminality” view. Even if current studies are finding that head shape in men can signal greater or lesser capacity for reactive violence and are viewing this as proof that humans are very gradually evolving to be less reactively violent, even the authors reject genetic determinism because upbringing and whether or not individuals internalize negative role modeling still determine how and why that reactive violence may be expressed or whether it ever is.
I think the old film Boys From Brazil played with the above idea a bit: the idea that Mengele may have only been partly right about tendency for masculine aggression to be genetically determined but completely wrong about ideology and character being determined since the little Hitler clone unexpectedly sics his attack dogs on the Mengele character to save the Nazi-hunter.
It’s funny, because I was the one with the trauma history. As far as I could tell, her family was very normal, though they seem to have an impaired sense of empathy and an attitude of entitlement which they hide very well behind a sort of glib, shallow friendliness.
My violent upbringing left me with a strong sense of moral certainty, and I think my fw was attracted to that. I think it bothers her that she doesn’t have any real values or morals. Perhaps she was hoping I would make her a good person.
It makes her discard of me make so much more sense. She did the worst possible thing, I rejected her, and she had to utterly destroy me in order to convince herself that I’d never had any moral authority in the first place.
But who knows with these people.
Horrible analogy but what you describe as your ex’s demoralizing agenda bears a resemblance to what historian and Auschwitz survivor Primo Levi described as the Nazi campaign to not only kill their captives but morally drag the latter down to Nazi level so captives wouldn’t even have the consolation of their own innocence.
I think what makes Levi’s insights so enduring is that you can see echos of the same thing in all forms of inhumanity from macro political atrocity to interpersonal abuse.
I absolutely love reading your comments. Do you have a blog or a YouTube channel? Is there some way we could get in touch?
You’re so kind. I can’t take credit for borrowed ideas but, sort of like someone saying they like your hat, you can tell them where you bought it. 😉
I feel really lucky that my thinking was “trained” and formed on the ideas of the late Evan Stark and his wife and co-researcher Anne Flitcraft because their theories and concepts were some of the first things I read on the subject of DV and have proven more solid, enduring and relevant than all the old traditional victim-blaming psychobabble that reigned back in the day. Frankly if all that was available at the time was the moldy psychobabble, I don’t think I would have taken a lifelong interest in the subject and would probably be a confused basket case– not just regarding interpersonal stuff but politics and everything else.
For instance, I can’t recommend enough the chapter on DV that Flitcraft and Stark wrote in founding psychotraumatologist Frank Ochberg’s Post Traumatic Stress Therapy and the Victims of Violent Crime. Using facts, stats and clear arguments gained from decades at the front lines of the shelter movement and forensic research, the authors basically beat the old victim-blaming “codependency” theories in victimology to death with a sledgehammer and settle the question once and for all. You can also detect the first rumblings of Stark’s revolutionary concept of coercive control which he eventually spearheaded into a global legislative movement.
Someone once said that “facts cluster around a good theory.” By that token, you can take the collected work of Stark and Flitcraft and smush it together with great thinkers on a range of other subjects and disciplines and they all fit together beautifully like a jury giving a unanimous verdict, which is that 1) abusers of all stripes are demented, petrified infants who mask their weakness and dependence on victims through displays of control, sadism and brutality; 2) abusers dehumanize themselves to the point of being predictable and interchangeable; and 3) that victim blaming in all its forms is (as Levi put it), “a precious service rendered to the negators of truth.”
Once those ideas get absorbed and form a kind of armature, it’s like installing anti-virus and anti-hacking software in your brain but, in this case, anti-blameshifting bs software.
What do you think of Lunday Bancroft on domestic violence? “Why Does He Do That” was very, very strong against counseling / wreckonciliation in cases of abuse. And it was published in 2002 or maybe earlier? When the Reconciliation Industrial Complex was much in play. He too thinks possibility of change in abusers is quite low. (Although I gather he makes most of his money that way!)
Bancroft has been trailed by scandal in recent years– allegations of manipulating and exploiting especially female advocates for his profitable conference circuit and then smearing them if they complain. It wasn’t just one individual making allegations.
Prior to learning this, I always thought Bancroft’s work was a super-dumbed down compilation of insights and theories from various researchers and professional advocates like Stark, Flitcraft, etc. I could definitely see a value in boiling down scientific concepts and research findings into plain language. It’s not that abuse survivors are stupid but trauma is emotionally and intellectually taxing so spoon-feeding this information can be effective.
But the thing I always had a little problem was is Bancroft’s lack of citations. I just don’t trust “experts” who don’t cite as they go (maybe tucking a reference deep in a bibliography) or even give credit at all. He would mention recognizable findings and concepts but act like these were personal insights.
Hmm. I will hand it to him that his choice of things to steal and borrow is generally spot on. But, in my experience, this kind of chronic, casual plagiarism is not only a mark of personality disorder but also something culty “gurus” do because they can’t bear to share power. That’s why I wasn’t actually that shocked when I read claims about his mistreatment of fellow advocates.
Something else that doesn’t surprise me is when male “allies” turn out to be pigs in progressive drag. Some seem to be the real deal but, alas, most aren’t. For instance, Donald Dutton, a forensic researcher whose prison profiles of domestic abusers were used and shared a lot by the advocacy service I worked for, turned out to be an abuser himself and eventually did a 180 and began stumping for the men’s rights movement.
But like in Bancroft’s case, Dutton’s fall from grace doesn’t devalue the actual ideas he purported… even if many weren’t even his original ideas. Also like Bancroft, Dutton had great taste in the concepts he poached from female co-authors like Susan Painter and Susan Golant who both probably needed a male beard to get their ideas published.
Thank you SO much for this masterly analysis! I just discovered this site yesterday, and devoured many posts. Your comments are uniformly interesting, well- researched, and analytical. Such a valuable contributor! I too am never surprised when culty “gurus” / priests / ministers / pastors turn out to be abusers, the antithesis of what they preach. Jung’s “shadow self” emerging? Grin.
Jung’s shadow self fucked his patients, lol.
Thank you for the kinds words. I don’t know about “masterly” because I have no specialized certs other than those two semesters of sociology (speaking of gurus, I changed majors after the professor/department head harassed me).
For me it’s all political because we’re in an age when laws and policies are often based on science (for better or worse depending on whether its weaponized junk science or valid inquiry). So I think anyone with a voter ID has not only the right but the duty to make themselves at least functionally literate in sciency-speak and methods and to check for author and institutional bias or conflicts and untangle findings so they know what they’re voting for and can warn others if proposed legislation is based on a crock of sh*t.
Yes, I remember you’ve recommended Evan Stark before. I found his book about coercive control very helpful. I recall that you’ve also recommended Donald Dutton, but I haven’t gotten as much use out of his work; he seems to have gone men’s rights activist in recent years.
Ochberg and Flatcraft are new names to me, I will have to look them up.
My DV support group alerted me to the work of Don Hennessey, who has probably written some of the best stuff about abusive relationships I’ve ever read. He talks about how perpetrators get into their victims’ heads and force victims to adopt their rationalizations for the abuse, and he is very clear about the ways that perpetrators are gifted at persuading experienced professionals to side with them against the victims. Hands down, his work has helped me more than anything else. Have you read anything by him? I’d be curious to know what you thought.
Yeah, Dutton, erg. I never mention Dutton without caveats about his ideological shift and the harassment charges (he reportedly harassed a student and was married when he did it).
I figure any good that he did might have come from some especially internalized and deep cover ruse of playing an “ally” to get laid– until he realized it wasn’t working. But, before the 180, he seems to have hitched his wagon to far more brilliant female co-authors like Susan Painter and Susan Golant who probably just needed a male beard to get their feminist concepts published.
It’s a bit hard to believe that such a disordered personality would be insightful enough to apply Erich Fromm’s political “masked dependency” concept to domestic abusers so I suspect that came from Golant. All the same, I have noticed that, on rare occasion, certain types of offenders might be so radically compartmentalized that they end up actually contributing valuable insights as a kind of “confession.” For example, one of the reasons I don’t outright “cancel” Roman Polanski is that many of his earlier films are probably the best exposes of how predators isolate, coerce, confuse and discredit victims in order to take control and prevent bystanders from intervening.
Go figure.
It’s almost as if it’s a test. Will mommy still love me if I’m bad? If mommy does I’m sure it temporarily soothes the ego panic that plagues them due to the subconscious knowledge that they are, in fact, abject losers.
Exactly.
Come on now, Rensselaer. He acknowledged more that one SINGULAR mistake. That’s more than we see most of them do. Throw him a bone. Preferably right at his big, dumb head.
😀
Wowee, a lot of b.s. here. The UBT’s transponders must be smoking right now.
There are a lot of candidates for the most chilling part — how he never (not once!) names what he actually did (i.e., by using the word “cheat” or “betrayal” or “infidelity”), or how every syllable is me me me!
But the most chilling part for me was when he said he “would have to break hearts and shake foundations” in order to reconcile. Whose heart? Whose foundation? Some other woman’s? He absolutely thrills to the idea that yet another woman will be devastated by him! Ick! Who thinks this way? He’s deranged.
Also, he absolutely does expect a reply.
The Schmoopie and her children’s hearts I suppose? I also got a sense that the FW must have felt superior and powerful when he was typing these words. (Not that I care about the Schmoopie, she is a sociopath just like him)
He loved writing this letter. I can just see his ego stroking as he does it. I am so glad you are free. Thank you for sharing this, too. It sort of is my dream- because it’s “karma”. I am very happy to be no contact but I do have fantasies – this is the problem, he’s still in my head- that things are bad for him. But as he left me when he started making serious money, for a woman who had serious money, I think he’s probably fine? But I don’t miss a man who was capable of doing the things he did to me, even though I still would like him to suffer which isn’t very meh of me. I dream of meh!
Yep. That’s where his love of sounding profound makes his mask slip. As I said above, in addition to blithely contemplating wounding other women “(hearts” is plural) he’s also cueing the pick-me dance: “Chump, you can still be the winner of this FW@”
My exFW does this too. He learned how in his SA groups. They didn’t “cheat” they “slipped”. He wasn’t “abusive” he made “mistakes”. It’s bullshit designed to help them discard the blame for the things they actually did. It’s maddening.
“I slipped and somehow my dick wound up in her hoochie. It could have happened to anyone!” The “mistake” narrative makes me laugh so hard. I have had my slutty phases, but never, not once, did I slip on dick by mistake. I might have later realized a guy was a mistake, but sex doesn’t happen by accident.
Oh, yes to this. My exFW learned all that BS in SA, too. Went (and perhaps still does) to his 6 days/week 12 noon meeting regulalrly. Then out to lunch with the “other guys.” He was really “working his program,” while keping secrets, playing the victim, and “becoming a better person.” No remorse, empathy, amends, no changing into a kind, caring, mature man (he’s 76 years old). Such BS. He also made “mistakes,” for nearly 4 decades with a myriad of women all over North America. SA is BS. Don’t buy it.
I never bought it either. If it’s an addiction, it’s much darker than substance addiction or even gambling. For one, it seems the decline in empathy in most substance or process (i.e., gambling) addicts is progressive. The individual may start out very bleeding heart and kinder-gentler but, as their addiction progresses and they end up having to use, deceive and harm other people to get their fix, empathy is corroded.
But in so-called sex addiction, impaired empathy seems to be required right out of the gate or very soon after entering that arena. For instance, it’s not like bottles, vials or poker chips cry out in pain when being consumed. But human victims do. And who could watch most porn videos and assume performers actually enjoy a lot of the degrading and physically taxing shit that goes on them? Only someone who assumes women are some kind of separate species who don’t actually mind humiliation and violation.
THANK YOU FOR THIS!!! I don’t believe in Sex Addiction either. And at times, I have felt a little bad about it. I have 2 recovered addicts in my life, a family member and a friend. They were addicted to substances for a long time, did deplorable things, got sober, changed their lives for the better. Went on to do great things. I have all the sympathy in the world for addicts. So I felt bad thinking Sex Addiction was BS. I see I am not the only one and here you are providing some actual good logic begind your stance. LOVE IT!
I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. But you’re right, it’s about empathy.
When an addict gets their first hit of coke, they are likely just trying coke at a party the same way plenty of other people have. It’s not until much later when they are in the deep throes of addiction, have moved onto crack or heroin that they are stealing their grandma’s tv pay for their next hit because their entire body is screaming for that relief. The need overcomes their empathy.
A cheater has to put aside empathy to get their first hit.
It’s not the same.
Oh and I wanted to add that my sympathy for addicts depends entirely on the type of addict– whether they’re using to quell conscience for the heinous things they do or whether they started using due to being on the receiving end of trauma.
That twain does not meet because one uses in order to abuse and the other uses because they were abused. When I worked in advocacy, I noticed how victims of abuse who developed dependencies simply to cope (or just not prematurely die from prison camp level sleep deprivation) were typically being subjected to exactly the same philosophical prescriptions (and actually much more bitch-slapping) in recovery groups as alcoholic batterers. It really raised my hackles because the blurring of lines wasn’t helping anyone.
One very solid friend who’d been in AA since his teens and took from it what he needed and left the rest lamented that AA was basically a hotbed of un-redeemed domestic batterers because AA is not a science, doesn’t address the root MO of domestic abuse and there’s no “Assaholics Anonymous.”
From what this friend and other friends in long-term recovery have told me, even addicts in the harmless-but-traumatized category can end up doing things they’re not proud of as the addiction progresses just like you described. But I think there’s more hope for people who started out with basic character to be able to rehabilitate themselves since they actually have souls to be reclaimed.
For instance, the way Malcolm X was able to turn himself around and straighten out after a period of heroin addiction and petty crime isn’t really that surprising considering the events that likely turned him into an addicted grifter to begin with– namely the gruesome ways that both his civil rights activist parents died.
I don’t know that many people who could live through atrocity and injustice like that without ending up mainlining something, particularly in that era. But it seems he had a pretty good “factory setting” to return to since, try as they did, the FBI under Hoover was terribly frustrated that they could never find any evidence that he was a bad father or abusive or cheating husband despite constant surveillance and wiretapping.
Since terseness isn’t my forte, I love how you were able to boil down my many rambling paragraphs into two concise sentences:
A cheater has to put aside empathy to get their first hit.
It’s not the same.
If I ever write for some online publication again, I’m going to beg you to be my copy editor.
Laughing at this as I am pretty wordy myself.
What is SA?
Sex Addiction
Thank you!
So I woke up angry. Actually told staff “I woke up and chose violence.” I’m trying to have a good day. Then I see this.
Am I the only one that is struck by how the cheater here is still assigning their happiness and stability to our chump friend here? I was particularly stung by “and I have to live with that.” Yes, you do. That’s what happens when you make choices. The whole email smacks of “please take me back and things go back to normal for me,” They identify no benefit to their victim for taking them back other than “I will do better this time.” They’re back to who they were before the current affair? Great! It sounds like they already cheated once though.
Like, is that supposed to be reassuring? There is no “here is what will be different”, it all smacks of “and then I won’t be sad anymore.” You committed significant abuse. Sad is the field you sowed your seeds in. If your happiness or pursuit of wholeness entails “it only works if these 2-3 people that are not aware of each other are totally ok with everything being about me with no expectation of communication or reciprocity”…um…no.
Like, Buddy, you rejected our friend here. You ruined Christmas. You picked somebody over a 20 year relationship in search of wholeness. It blew up because those things blow up. By your own admission you broke promises and said you did everything that you said you would never do. If you were THAT unhappy, THAT incomplete, how did it take you 20 years to figure that out? And why wait until Christmas?
Our friend here has now rejected you. They have chosen their peace, safety, and sanity over you and your bullshit. You threw 20 years away because you didn’t like what you were getting at home anymore (if you ever did.) You are not getting another chance because you don’t deserve one and never gave one yourself. You have proven yourself unsuitable as their partner and there is no guarantee that you will not break your word again and cause even more misery. Our friend deserves their peace and happiness.
True happiness is not with other people. It lies within you.
Feliz Jueves!
“You are not getting another chance because you don’t deserve one and never gave one yourself.”
Exactly this. The FW here never gave Thriver a chance to be in a respectful, mutual and EQUAL partnership to begin with. He gives the chump no quarter but expects to receive communication, access, mercy, forgiveness, and a time-machine on demand.
The entitlement reeks off the screen!
A whole bakery to the UBT for this one 🍪
Everthing you said was so spon on.
” I was particularly stung by “and I have to live with that.” Yes, you do. That’s what happens when you make choices. ”
My ex will occasionally send a woe is me email. One of our kids went no contact. I am very low contact. Strictly kid business. That’s it. His emails frequently say things like “it is as if neither of you care about me at all”. Well, that may be because we don’t. Why would we?
He also has also asked when we will be done “punishing him”. I am not punishing him. I want nothing to do with him becuse he was awful to me. Absolutely awful. The affair was just part of it. He also was just so incredibly cruel during the discard. It did not have to be that way. Nevermind that there are ethical ways to leve a marriage without cheating. Skip to the end, ok you cheated, the marriage is ending, can you just be decent through this part? No? You had to be an absolute monster through it all. Ok, so now I want nothing to do with you. This shouldn’t be that hard to understand.
You are not being punished. You are experiencing the consequences of your choices. Much as Jeff said, Yes, you now have to live with this. Why are they so shocked?
Same same here. They’re shocked that someone they abused for years or decades wants to finally get away from them. Because they expected chumps to stick around for more pain!
Their selfish entitlement never ceases to amaze.
Amén! I’ve been so no contact that I kind of am jealous of this letter because it’s so reassuring that Thriver did the absolute right thing. It was just what I needed today. F that guy so hard. Once I got a letter in the mail after a bunch of financial abuse that cost me $7000 of legal fees to put it into. I had an anxiety attack because it was too windy to burn. So I placed it in the garbage and then poured cat litter on it. The reason why is that I do not believe that it wouldn’t anyway help me because this man is never apologized in his life. And as you say it wasn’t just cheating at all for me. My ex became insanely cruel in the end – endless humiliation and sexual violence . I’m actually proud that I’m the one who asked him to leave, but of course I then lost 20 pounds and was a wreconciliation with him…anyhoo! It took seven years for me to understand that it wasn’t just at the end that those things I forgave in the beginning and during we’re also endless humiliation with bouts of sexual violence. I just blocked it out. I spackled my own brain. And now the truth sucks, but I am so free. I hope this woman finds this letter very satisfying because I find it satisfying for her. This guy is an absolute sack of garbage. Good riddance to it! Go buy some cake or a pair of shoes and celebrate that he is no longer in your life!!
“My ex became insanely cruel in the end – endless humiliation and sexual violence.
Par for the course of cheater behavior. Saying this is not to minimize your experience. That kind of abuse is always catastrophic. But I’m still in a state of amazement that the hack who was attacking CL– Jezer-Morton-whats-her-name from The Cut– is still campaigning to prove cheating bears no relationship to standard domestic abuse.
On what planet is this not abuse?
She’s clueless. I would even say dumb.That magazine has a lot of hacks… I sort of sadly think that until you experience a thing it can be hard to understand. Special clubs- the dead parents club, the other sort of griefs, the being cheated on/abused/dumped (the dumped part or leaving the bad person becomes a win eventually…but at what cost?) . I went to a posh high school near NYC after growing up in a bland middle class midwestern small city, and I met all these families where the husbands got rich and had new wives…and it was wild. I knew inherently, that it was gross.But I never knew it was profound abuse, until I experienced it.
All I ever got were “woe is me” emails. Poor him. Same with asking when we’d be done “punishing” him. I just shook my head. He didn’t comprehend, he’s a shell of a human, no empathy unless it’s all about him and his sadness. Now I’m 100% no contact but once in a while an email shows up in my spam folder. He “cares” about me and wants to “help,” I don’t respond. His kind of help involves cheating after 30 yrs and running away. Never tried to repair the damage, made the D last for 3.5 years just to be a jerk.
“He also was just so incredibly cruel during the discard. It did not have to be that way. Nevermind that there are ethical ways to leve a marriage without cheating. Skip to the end, ok you cheated, the marriage is ending, can you just be decent through this part? No? You had to be an absolute monster through it all.”
Ditto x 100. And for as many times as people have explained it to me I still just don’t get it. Month after month of vicious abuse while he delayed the settlement to end a marriage he hadn’t wanted for years. After two+ years of therapy I’m still trying to come to terms. I’m at meh about him, but still dealing with myself I guess.
I don’t miss him, but he still takes up too much of my brain space. I’m also afraid of him. But mostly, I celebrate my freedom.
I could have written this.
Give yourself a break. My ex takes up too much space in my brain too, and I don’t like it. It feels, well…weak might be too strong a word, but I just don’t like that he has ANY space in my brain. I resent it. I think it has a negative association for me because it reads “bitter bunny”. Or like “you aren’t over him”. But I don’t know, don’t most people have inconsequential exes that they occasionally reflect on and it’s not at all about bitterness. weakness or still being attached but more just that it was a crazy chaper of your life. My friends are all married and every once in awhile an old ex from our 20s gets brought up. Like “oh, do you remember when Jake tried to move in with me without asking?” And we all laugh. The guy lived with his mom and just slowly started staying at her place more often, and leaving things there, but never asked about moving in OR splittting bills. She had a small studio and loved living alone so him trying to take over half her limited space did not go well at all. She is VERY over him, but it is just a funny story.
Well, the “stories” for us chumps are more recent and aren’t all so funny and the memories might shake us up a bit. But I don’t think it should be so surprising that they still pop up in our heads. We are talking big relationships that were a major part of our lives.
I am afraid of my ex too. The divorce papers are barely dry and he has displayed some scary behaviours so I have good reason to be. I would like to think that the fear will lessen with time. His access to me is limited. We have kids so there is still some access. But in a few more years, that will not be an issue. I definitely am free now and with time I will be more free as once the kids are 18, I can just block him entirely.
I do try to celebrate that freedom. And focis on how much better I am today than I was when we still lived together and I was terrified and trying to figure out how to get out.
I don’t tend to read the length of time it takes victims to live down their terror of ex-abusers as “bitter bunny” or “you aren’t over him.” I see it as a measure of how covertly murderous and psycho these abusers were and basically how close to the brink of death survivors sensed they came.
They like to monkey branch or at least mine did. He made sure he had someone else hooked before he left.
Mine too! Completely would not leave because he hadn’t finished setting up his new life when I kicked him out. Just cowardly.
He said SHE didn’t want him to be married. I was in SUCH pain but managed a bit of snark and remember saying, “Go for it.” How did he not know me after 30 yrs? I don’t compete, I am never an option. You cheat, you’re gone. Bye. But like all coverts, he didn’t file for divorce, so I did.
Mine as well had Mrs. Bendover as his “true partner”, so why the delay? What was the point? He said that neither one of them cared about the money, but dang did he fight like a badger at every mediation session. So was he lying? Or lying about the lies he had lied about? Back then my head was spinning like a tilt-a-whirl, and I had my lawyer check every single detail after every mediation meeting.
Are lying about the lies he had lied about? HAHAHA. This is why the UBT is so much fun because it’s fun to laugh at them.
BT, I’m going to venture a guess Mrs. Bendover wanted something from your FW that he was not ready to give, or, for whatever reason, he wanted to hang on to some level of control over his own life that he might have to share in the next relationship. But, I do understand the frustration and resentment over dragging the whole thing out and being unnecessarily uncooperative in getting the thing you want. F him.
All I want now is peace. It would be hard to trust anyone. I’m sorry for your experience, too.
Mine delayed starting the divorce process at all. He wanted to go to a mediator, not litigate. On the advice of my therapist, I obliged him.
DISCLAIMER I don’t recommend this route. Common advice is that ideal candidates for mediation are couples where both are on equal footing and will hence, both speak up for themselves equally, and who are not overly contentious. Probably helps if you don’t have too much to sort out either. If the above is true, mediators can get you divorced faster and cheaper. We did not meet the criteria, I was terrified of him and speakig up for mysekf did not come easily, but I did it anyway because my therapist sensed that his personality type would be easier to handle in mediation vs litigation. It did work out ok for me, but I went into it thinking “I can alwys bail on this process, lawyer up and litigate if I have to”. I also had a friend that had a connection to a great lawyer. I booked her for an in depth consult, paid a discounted fee for her time (thanks to the friend) and ran some things by her. She was able to give me some advice. She knows how the judges here think. And she said I had a case to get more than I was trying for, but that it wasn’t a slam dunk. She also was able to give me an idea of how much more time and expense going that route would be. Add in the fact that my therapist said the FW was the classic case of the guy that would drag it out and make it as hostile as possible. It was not a hard decision on my end.
Anyway, the fact is HE wanted to mediate. And he didn’t take one step to get that ball rolling. I had to research them, call them and book them. Even then, he was incensed that I was in such a hurry. It was 4 years after DDay. The affair had gone poof, and he had a new girlfriend that he met post-separation that he was planning a future with, his words, not mine. Yet, starting the divorce process was a step too far?
They simply do not make sense. I see a lot of posts here that make some sense of it. A lot of things that for example, Hell of a Chump posts that are about the psychology of abusers, that sorts some of the confusion. But often I have to just accept that some of it is NOT logical. You and I both had FWs that clearly wanted out so bad that they couldn’t even be decent humans during the discard. There are many of us. And we all have the same story of “and then they dragged their feet on the actual divorce” It doesn’t make sense, we aren’t crazy, loads of chumps see the same pattern whether it is logical or not.
My ex had his new partner divorce me basically. It all went through the lawyer, but it was her. He likes people to do shit for him. He also likes to pretend he’s helpless. Anyway, yes we don’t need to make sense of it, but it is good to note and share. The mind Fuckery knows no end.
“Anyway, yes we don’t need to make sense of it, but it is good to note and share.”
I think all the sharing helps to accept the irrationality of it all. When I found CL/CN, I read all these stories that were SO much like mine. And it wasn’t just the broader things, it was all the very odd smaller details that matched. It got to the point where I didn’t need to understand WHY he dragged his feet on the divorce despite running full steam ahead with another woman, I saw that there were 10 other chumnps with the exact same experience and it kind of made me less interested in the “why?”. It was kind of like “oh, ok, I am not crazy, he really is doing this and despite it not making sense, here are 10 other FWs doing the exact same thing. So, it is a thing even if I dont understand it. Ok. Monving on”.
My attny definitely said NO to mediation. He said it never works with a narcissist, they’re just trying to avoid consequences and further manipulate me. Some of the best advice I ever got.
I agree with your attorney. It is absolutely the common advice. Despite my not taking it. It’s why I wrote the huge disclaimer bc I didn’t want any new chumps coming here and not being aware that mediaton is not always a great idea.
In my case, I think it made him feel like he was in more control. And that helped. If I got a ball buster of a lawyer, it would only have brought out the worst in him. My therapist has dealt with folks like him nad knew a thig or two. She was right in my case. But it was a risk for me to try. (The risk factor was actually low because if we started the process and it was going terribly for me, the option to walk out the door and move to litigation was still there. We’d lose the $2000 we paid the mediator, but if you are hiring a lawyer, $2000 is a drop in the bucket anyway)
I was gonna say it made him feel more in control!
Whew, I’m glad it worked for you! In my case, he was very disordered at the time, one therapist we actually saw together said he needed to be in a mental hospital for a full evaluation, and under the evil influence of the serial howrecker, who I learned did this kind of thing before, broke up marriages and got a lot of money from her victims. I wasn’t about to be another one. I had to be firm. It was VERY expensive but felt I had no choice.
Yeah, to be clear, getting a good lawyer is probably NEVER going to be a mistake. Whereas going the mediation route, especially with a FW who by very definition is untrustworthy and selfish, absolutely can be a huge mistake.
I knew I couldn’t trust him to do the right thing. Maybe with someone else, it would have been different but I had to have a gatekeeper and a protector. My narc ex turned into a monster or maybe he always was and the mask fell off. Anyway, I’m free and at peace most of the time.
Yes! He wants back in but spends no breadth on explaining how things will be different for the chump. It’s all me, me, me, me.
My ex is a covert narcissist. I heard much of the same BS–so full of regret, didn’t mean to hurt you, sad EVERY DAY, didn’t expect to be so “unfairly punished” and blah, blah.
It’s been 5 years since my divorce (after 35 years of marriage), almost 6 since d-day. I was a puddle for months (years) but have finally arrived at meh, thanks in no small part to CL and CN.
I hope today is someone’s Tuesday.
I could have written your post word for word. And therein lies the power of this blog, in the sharing of so many stories and exposing the patterns in serial cheater FW so we can see we’re not alone or crazy or deserving of such abuse.
My narcex once wrote me a snail mail letter with only one word on it written very tiny…”sad”. Usually I got word salad but this was a different tactic. Didn’t work, either.
I know that 100% no contact is the only way to go, but I would have been SO tempted to send him back a blank page with only the word ‘So?’ written in tiny letters!
I know!!! But at that point I knew I couldn’t take the bait. Poor him, always the victim. If I ever unleashed the snark within, he’d burst into flames.
Hahaha- that’s so funny
Way to go, Spinach!
I’m glad you’re at meh. I’m still on the path. 30 yrs to heal from.
I too have 30 years to heal from and a few therapists- I did everything when I was in the shock phase- said I may never fully “get over” it. So I try to focus on my freedom from his abuse, but yeah, I’m not at meh. I’m somewhere better, but he still takes up so much brain space. It’s been 10 years since I have seen or spoke not him but since we share grown children- one he has groomed, I swear to God it kills me a little bit when I talk to that son – the other he has discarded. It’s just that I cannot save my son. I cannot- I think I cannot- tell him about all the behind the door abuse. I can’t get involved..anyway.
I think that is beyond trauma we should have to deal with. I’m so sorry about your son that he groomed. I hope he wakes up one day.
30 years IS a long time. Healing takes time. And it’s non-linear.
Perhaps I need to define what “meh” is to me. I too was married for decades before FW had a 3 year affair and left me to be with the AP. That was 6 years ago. The pain of that rejection and betrayal still stings. I still get shaky when I think that I trusted someone who wasn’t worthy of it, who lied with ease and thought only of his own needs and desires.
So by “meh” I mean that I don’t think about him every day or feel that his rejection of me means that I’m unlovable/undesirable. He’s not the arbiter of my worth. I know that he sucks. I know that I didn’t cause him to cheat. Most of all, in a weird way, I’m happy he left me because I have a better life now that he’s not in it.
I wish you well, my fellow chump. ❤️
Meh for any length of time is VALUABLE. I respect that. I still do feel unlovable and ugly and all of the above but I mostly stopped vomiting my pain to everyone like I used to. My grandkids love me and that’s worth more than that cheating POS. My life is my own now too, and that really is priceless. xx
I am still shakey about the fact that I trusted my ex too! It makes me worry I’ll make a mistake again, so my life is quite small and I keep myself protected and that feels safe. Coming here I see a lot of people like me, so that helps. It’s a huge life trauma. Huge, to know the person you thought was on your side for life- a good thing! my parents had that!_ was never on your side.
Love your comment and your insights, especially your perception that the cheater makes absolutely no effort at all to address what’s in it for the chump if she takes him back. I’m sure he thinks that the “benefit” for her is that she gets to have him again. What a prize!
What benefit could there possibly be to resuming a relationship with a man who has cheated on you twice, and who characterizes himself as lost and broken. The appeal he makes–only you can make me whole!–presupposes that “Thriver” would respond to devoting herself to whatever he decided would be required to make him happy. This letter is nothing but the “poor me” phase of the three sided triangle of narcissism (along with charm and rage).
I once had a boyfriend in college who broke up with me twice (he wasn’t cheating, just wanted out of the relationship), and then came back apologizing and saying he wanted me back. The first time, I took him back. The second time, I realized that if I took him back again, I would never trust that he wouldn’t do it again, and would be forever waiting for that shoe to drop. It hurt like hell, but I declined. Thriver, living without trust in your partner is an awful way to live, and I hope you will reject his narcissistic appeal for what it is.
“The second time, I realized that if I took him back again, I would never trust that he wouldn’t do it again, and would be forever waiting for that shoe to drop. It hurt like hell, but I declined. ”
This is something that I was thinking through the entire letter. Even if he changed* and was a completely different non-FW-esque person, if Thriver took him back she would likely spend her days worried that he was still a FW. If he did betray her again, she would be hurt AND likely angry with herself that she let her guard down. If he never did do anything again? She still would live a life on edge.
*I personally think that “people” can change. But I don’t think most FWs will. If you are a grown person in a serious relationship that might involve marriage, kids, cohabitation and you cheat? It’s probably not the first or last time. There could be exceptions, but I’m am betting the guy that wrote that letter full of “me, me, me” isn’t one of them.
After D-day my ex thought we’d do a round of pick-me dancing and him-centered couples counseling for his self-diagnosed sex addiction, but I shut that down right away. I was already considering leaving him for his selfishness, his laziness, and his deplorable grooming habits, but was giving him grace because his father had passed away earlier that year.
Why on earth would I keep him now that I know he is a cheater, too?
“Why on earth would I keep him now that I know he is a cheater, too?”
I should have left so long before the cheating. I have come to understand why the cheating was the straw that broke the camel’s back for me. (Thanks HoaC) But yes, he tried to reconcile and I was uninterested, and he was shocked. Sir, you have been an unmitigated FWheaded monster for years, and you gave me a get out of jail free card, what makes you think I would ever pass that up?
Yeah, even if he is back to who he was before (?), who he was before was also a cheater. “In 2024, I made a terrible series of mistakes.” Uh, no. You
made mistakesbetrayed your spouse once before — but probably more.I swear on all that is holy, as soon as I read it, I really thought it was from my narc ex. Word salad for word salad. The circular and disordered thought process. Still the victim, always always about him. Painful to read. Are they really all the same person?
I have to add more to this. I was cleaning out the office just now and found a small journal where I had written some of the crazier things he said after proudly confessing to have fallen in love with coworkerwhoresoulmate. This is some of them: “I can’t be around you when you’re crying all the time.” and “I can’t be your source of comfort.” and “I might need to be divorced to find out if I want to be married.” It was a habit I learned from my lawyer dad of writing things down during phone conversations as I’m hearing all of his BS. Really cold and callous. The mask slipped. I was no longer needed as he had monkey branched to the cowhoreworker. Very very traumatic even now reading that but I’m glad I did it. Facts don’t lie. Narcs do.
This is what my FW said when he discarded me: “I no longer want to be responsible for your anxiety.” Anxiety HE caused by lying, cheating, deceiving, triangulating and gaslighting.
narcissistic serial cheats don’t want to be responsible for anything uncomfortable or difficult or even just mundane. They just want a steady stream of external validation the way dementors drift about sucking the soul and life out of victims.
I should start calling FW the NPD Dementor!
Geez, aren’t they all the same? My tears, your anxiety, neither of which we’d be suffering from if they were pieces of shit.
HE CAUSED IT! Mine said “I feel like I’m torturing you” and he was!! So that was his reason to leave. Same! Why are they all the same HAHA
I thought it was from mine, too, but everything was spelled correctly. 🤔
LOL the credit probably should go to ChatGPT
LOL, same here haha. Makes me want to vomit.
Same here! Heard these same things in conversation form just last month (two days after he told me he’d broken up with the AP.) Honestly it’s like a script!
Poor you! I heard the “broke up with her” BS too. Then found his burner phone so that lie got exposed.
Oooh that happened to me too, found out about the burner phone when I was uncovering a whole piles of audacious lies… including the entire 2.5 years of couples counseling. 🤪 When pleading for reconciliation, did he also tell you that “we both” have trauma from this relationship? Lololol. I still lose my mind about that one sometimes.
In a nutshell Thriver’s Cheater is letting her know that:
His message does not warrant a response – not even an acknowledgement or a “do not contact me again” – as that would only encourage the f*cker.
I have often said that the opposite of love is not hate but indifference. I hope that Thriver is utterly and blissfully indifferent to her Cheater’s “suffering” on the grounds that he brought this all on himself. If he’s too stupid to work it out, then that’s a “him problem” not a “Her problem.”
LFTT
Maintaining absolutely NO CONTACT!
“I have often said that the opposite of love is not hate but indifference. ”
My therapist has pointed that out too. It’s one way I know I am heading towards meh, but not quite there. There is a LOT of indifference on my part, but occasionally there is also a pop of hate. I think if I was able to go fully no contact, I might be at meh. The “hate” rears it’s ugly head when he says or does some NEW frustrating thing. Once the kids are 18, I can block him completely. But I have definitely made progress because I don’t get very worked up about old news anymore. At some point, there won’t tbe new stuff to get worked up about and I think full meh will kick in then.
“I’m not the same person anymore.”
Word for word out of the cheaters handbook, because I heard this one too. Apparently it is supposed excuse them today for what they did yesterday so they can get something from you tomorrow. Nice try.
“You can’t ask for accountability because I’m no longer that cheater”
I think the UBT might have its Kennedys confused. Did it mean RFK Jr? He’s the only one alive to spout BS. Some Lebkuchen might jog its memory.
I fixed the typo thanks. I got about two thirds of the way through this whole column and lost the entire thing. (I think the UBT is resorting to sabotage…) Not firing on all cylinders today.
It’s painful to sit with my head up my ass. I’m a giant hemorrhoid of a man.
I laughed so loud I startled the dogs!
This is the most apt description of Cheater #1, BTW.
I am in complete no contact but I had a little daydream just now that I said that to my cheaternarcex. It’s just so perfect. But he’d end up playing victim no matter what. “Why are you so mean to me?” Ugh.
“I chased a lot of holes” is my new favorite Tracy phrase. LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL! The BEST!
““I chased a lot of holes”
I swear to god, as vulgar as the following is, I have to share.
Early on after d-day, we had a conversation that left me thinking that the reason he cheated was simply that he settled down before he had been able to “try out enough of a variety of holes”.
There was a lot of talk abot how when he was younger, fit, and at his most handsome, he had been in long term relationships, and then he got married. The convesation was insane. But essentially it almost seemed like he was having a purely sexual midlife crisis. He was saying that he realized that he didn’t run around nearly as much as he could have when he was younger and “should” have been free, and he basically regretted it and wanted to BE free before he got any older or heavier and would not be of interest to “new and exciting holes”.
For a short while, I truly thought that my decades long marriage would have been fine if only he stuck it in a few more holes in his youth.
There are a lot of problems to this theory.
My mind is blown by your comment. Mine also said that he didn’t get enough chance to DATE before we got married. He was 32. After about 30 yrs of marriage, I guess he wanted to relive his youth??? And it was my fault? I told him no one held him down and forced him at gunpoint to get married so that was BS. Then he said I was controlling, and I told him he needed to look in a mirror. He was searching for so many excuses for his crappy cheating behavior but it was always my fault. The AP was his coworker soulmate. At least that’s the one I know about. After he figured out she was a violent histrionic, he moved back in with his narc mommy and got together with his high school girlfriend. That was the last time I ever spoke with him. I told him to have fun reliving his teenage years and BYE.
Yes, same here, no one forced him to get married. I was in zero rush to get married actually.
I now know that no, our marriage didn’t end for a lack of variety in holes for him. It’s about character and kibbles.
I *do* think that at a certain point he started going online and meeting people in forums and cruising dating sites, and realized how easy it is to hook up these days and he regretted having not had the same technology when he was in his 20s. There was definitely a sense of having missed out on something. But if being “tied down” was the entire issue, then planning to go from your wife to moving your AP to your home state and living with her would not be the move you’d make.
Calling comp expert Elsie…
Was this partly written by AI? According the article you posted on AI detection, fussy phrases like “alternate path,” “bring you any disruption,” statements coming in series of threes (e;g. “Because I lost my way. I didn’t let anyone in. I didn’t get the help I needed.”) and especially the “painful to sit with” clunker (what is it with AI and “sitting with” feelings?) it sounds like he ran the typical barely literate faux apology through the Pretentious Douchebag App and came up with this.
IMHO, it’s probable, but my ex wrote a lot like that pre-AI. He was always a bit flowery and wordy. As a writing teacher, I would sometimes look at his separation/post-divorce emails and think, “Dude, get an editor and get to the point.” One of my grown kids actually makes their living as a technical writer/editor, and they have said the same of Dad’s emails to them.
It’s funny that your ex wrote like a bot trying too hard to sound human. “What is a ‘sociopath’ for $20, Alex.” 😉
Also interesting is that he married someone who’s professionally concise and a clear and sincere communicator, almost like he was seeking to mimic you (or wear you as a woman suit, shudder).
It fits my impression of sociopaths– that they have no stable identity or sense of self so tend to “shop” for personality traits by sidling up to people who have traits they lack, very much like hermit crabs looking for shells to occupy.
As far as your ex’s tendency to beat around the bush, urg, you’ve probably noticed terseness isn’t exactly my strong suit. In fact, I think the only reason I got the title of “editor” when I worked for an eco publication is because we weren’t paid. Otherwise, when I wrote “editorials,” I needed my own copy editor to “kill my darlings” and correct run-on sentences and my generally neurotic use of punctuation.
But I’d like to think the intent behind my lack of brevity is very different than the intent of FWs who often seem to exemplify Orwell’s warning about those seeking to deceive: “When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns, as it were, instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink.”
Meanwhile, I think my reason for flogging everything to death or grinding it all down to an overly fine point has more to do with anxiety over not being clear, especially when writing about life and death issues where being misunderstood can cause real harm.
Not all blatherers are the same lol.
While married, I actually appreciated what he wrote even though it wasn’t what I would call truly outstanding, adult writing. None of my previous boyfriends wrote more than a few sentences when they gave me a card or something like that. So I took it for what it was at the time and bypassed the professional critique.
My ex was always that way, so I don’t think he was trying to mimic me. His father and his oldest brother actually also wrote the same way, whether it was a letter or an article for a religious publication. Solid for what it was, but I had certainly read and written deeper things. And that’s fine.
I’ve read some of what my technical writer/editor kid has written, and it always wows me. Yes, everything from technical articles to flash non-fiction. Their writing is something you have to slow down to behold. Their dad wasn’t like that.
And with my ex’s borderline characteristics, the identity disturbance very much affected our marriage, divorce, and afterwards for quite awhile. I’ve discussed that at length with two different therapists, and it put a lot of things together for me. Same with my adult kids. They both have said, “Wow. That’s Dad.” Yup.
My guess is that he looked up “What to say after you’re caught cheating” or “Fifty things to say to make your ex take you back,” and copied a random assortment of lines.
When my ex fell for an online romance, the scammer would cut and paste a random assortment of phrases from “Fifty Ways to Say Good Morning to your Lover,” and similar lists. They were supposed to be used one at a time, but the scammer would throw out a dozen or so phrases , some Shakespearean, some gansta rap, some greeting card triteness, and my idiot ex thought his “sole mate” was writing him beautiful original poetry.
This letter reminds me of that.
Thriver, your silence hurts him more than anything you could possibly say. The fact that you’re thriving, less than a year after discovery and a 20 year marriage, is absolutely awesome.
UBT was en pointe today – so funny! It’s nice to have something to laugh at once in awhile.
My ex wrote like this. This could also be AI, but it’s hard to tell these days.
The bottom line is that the flowery hoovering means little in the scheme of things. And maybe this FW should just stay lost, frankly. Or using a phrase that my attorney had variations of, “Sometimes the garbage needs to stay outside.”
This isn’t honest and real, not at all. So very many times when receiving this sort of thing, I’d think, If you’re that sorry, prove it, Dude. Do something other than throwing words around.
He never did, of course.
Lol, I just asked AI to write a cheater husband apology letter and it’s actually decent, with phrases like
“I am truly sorry for the pain I have inflicted upon you. You deserve so much better than what I have given you.
I want you to know that I am committed to understanding the reasons behind my actions and to making amends…I understand that words alone cannot heal the wounds I have caused, but I am willing to do the work necessary to rebuild your trust and our relationship.”
This idiot could have spent 30 seconds to pretend remorse, but no, they actually want to MOCK us with their ridiculous drivel.
Hundreds of variations, these types have. My ex was never really sorry and often would say in his long emails that I deserved a horrid life and (of course) the judgement of God.
But there were a few times he said “whatever it takes,” so I’d probe that thought. No, he didn’t mean that. It was just a phrase to draw me in. When I outlined my own thoughts and expectations, he’d just reject them. We went through several cycles of that.
When I said “no reconciliation ever” it was very clear that he would 100% be in charge of a last attempt to reconcile and that there would be no feedback loop at all. He even said that he’d take my phone and computer, and that I wouldn’t have keys to a vehicle. Nope, that’s slavery, and who knows how that may have gone down in the end.
“My dick is short and often hard.”
That pretty much sums him up.
I’m assuming schmoopies are thin on the ground at the moment and were the other times he hoovered.
This whiny little bitch can’t spend all of five minutes alone.
No he cannot! When I asked why he had to cheat when he could just end the marriage in a honorable way, his answer was: “Then I may end up being alone.” The FW didn’t have any problem for me being alone.
My gratitude is so deep because both my cheaters were so blatant and cruel, plus communication was so awful, that they did not even have the capacity to talk me back into their dark den of lies.#2 Talked sweet to the Pastor and friends but at the same time cutting my medical insurance and taking thousands out of my accounts. So I knew without a doubt that both cheaters were underhanded liars. Also, being married for so long, they were master manipulaters for my particular psych and weaknesses. Also never forget, these creeps go into withdrawal and miss the triangle thrill of behind your back. I truly doubt there were only 2 cheating efforts..it is an addictive pattern of deception and his addiction is the thrill of any response at all. Im sorry you are not full on No Contact. It sounds like you answered NO to his fishing attempt to chat with you over coffee. Any chatting, any answering, even being rude only adds to his shivers that you are still his. My first X told me point blank ” I can reel you in and toss you out,anytime i want to. Nope, don’t want to give either abuser the joy of hurting me with any response from me. They love the hunt. Nope,not me. I hope you get there and just give him a shrug…he will never give up until you do.
#Idon’tLiketheConsequencesOfMyMistakesa.k.achoices
“get over here and make this right! fix this!”
lol
never ceases to amaze me, the entitlement to not only cheat and destroy lives, but to have the chump fix it all. Sheesh.
“I chased a lot of holes.”
bwa ha ha, this made me snort a little diet coke.
I’m convinced “The Cheater’s Handbook” recommends detonating the bomb during the holiday season. It’s not enough to gaslight, blameshift, financially decimate, emotionally destroy and mindfuck their chump, but the icing on the cake is they get to celebrate the holidays with their AP like nothing happened and simultaneously, taint the chump’s holidays for years to come. And if for whatever reason, they can’t wait until Thanksgiving or Christmas to bail out, they default to our birthdays.
“I would have to face hard truths, break hearts,”
Oh, this one thinks so much of himself. He would have to “break hearts” if she would reconcile. He’s trying to cue the pick-me dance.
I counted his use of “I”, “me”, and “myself.” These appear 75 times and nearly every sentence starts with”I.” Sentences that aren’t all about FW are passive voice and word salad.
“I enjoyed the FA.
I did not enjoy the FO.”
^this asshole (and so many others)
Hi Everyone,
First of all, I want to thank you all for your encouraging and validating words. And of course, a huge thank you to Tracy—without her book, I might still be dancing the pick-me dance right now.
I was a textbook super chump during the so-called wreconciliation and endured all the classic narcissist abuse—which I didn’t even recognize as abuse at the time: hot and cold, stonewalling, gaslighting, triangulation, endless lies, and deceptions. I spackled SO hard until, 11 days before Christmas, out of the blue, he announced that he was moving out.
As I stood there frozen, he asked: “You’re shocked, aren’t you?” Then, in the very next breath: “Do you want a cup of tea?” He said it without a trace of empathy, distress, or anxiety. He was elated. Like many of you have said—“It didn’t need to be this cruel.” But much later, I realized that it HAD TO be this cruel, because my pain was grade A kibbles.
Eventually, I discovered that he had been cheating the whole time, colluding with his AP in preparation for this very moment. While I was breaking down—mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually—he was celebrating Christmas with her, showering her with expensive gifts paid for out of our joint account. It was then that I realized I had married someone who was not truly human.
Two months later, I discovered Tracy’s book alongside Debbie Mirza’s The Covert Passive-Aggressive Narcissist and came to the devastating yet freeing conclusion: he never loved me, and he wasn’t capable of it. He is so high on the narcissist spectrum that it’s tipping over into psychopathy. My FW also did and said exactly the same things Tracy describes in her book. It is mind-boggling that once the “nice guy” mask drops, they all seem like soulless androids running the same program.
Fast-forward to today: I’m doing very well. It feels as if I died and came back to life. I’m still working on my codependency, but I feel positive and hopeful. Thanks to Tracy’s brilliant work, the spirit of my fellow chumps here, and a special tribute to my therapist (a former chump herself), who advised me to treat every single word from my FW as a lie.
A BIG thank you to all of you here—I’m so grateful I found this community.
Easter Egg: After the brutal discard, I told my marriage counsellor what had happened. This was the same counsellor who, in earlier sessions, had pointed out my supposed “fair share of responsibility” in his cheating—despite the fact that I had been the breadwinner, the chef, the maid, the accountant, the PA, the tour guide, and so much more for 20 years. His response? “Do you think he did what he did because he feels inferior to you?” Yes… try untangling that skein!
ROFLMAO my FW cried he just made a mistake. Singular. Twenty plus years of cheating, lying, stealing and gaslighting on his part. Intentional cruelty a million times. These narc cheaters are all exactly the same kind of warped and evil.
I just found the CL website today and I am fascinated! I love the UBT. There are vast commercial opportunities, let’s code an app!