Her Husband Had Sex with His Patients for Decades
Her 74-year-old doctor husband confessed he had sex with his patients for 23 years. He’s now in treatment for sex addiction. Her world is destroyed. What next?
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Dear Chump Lady,
I am 69 years old and was a television anchor/investigative reporter for almost 30 years. I’ve heard and seen a lot — interviewing murderers, U.S. presidents and everyone in between. But I never saw or heard what I’m about to tell you. Ever.
In March, my 74-year-old physician husband of 32 years told me that he had had multiple affairs with multiple female patients over the last 23 years of our marriage.
Yup, that’s right. Nine total (he says) and others that he tried grooming for sex. Often, these were overlapping affairs. One woman patient he had sex with for about 12 years, another one six years, others for two years, one year, etc.
One is even in federal prison right now for making synthetic drugs at her place of business. In addition, he admitted that he brought four of these nine women, individually, into our home and into our bed while my daughter and I were away at horse shows.
He also gave me two STDs because he never wore a condom. Why? You guessed it. Because it didn’t feel as good. Direct quote.
To say I had an ABSOLUTE EFFIN’ NERVOUS BREAKDOWN about all of this is an understatement.
He has ALWAYS come across as charming, compassionate and has a great sense of humor. My closest friends cannot believe this side of him. None of us can. TOTALLY BLINDSIDED!
The day after the disclosure, we found a marriage counselor and we both got a personal therapist.
Our marriage counselor told him he was a sexual predator and needed to go to an inpatient facility for sex addiction. He promptly went to a well-known one that has seen its share of celebrity clients and stayed there for 90 days per his psychiatrist, therapists and counselors there.
There he was diagnosed with compulsive sexual behavior disorder, abandonment issues and narcissistic traits as well.
While there, he agreed to self-report to our state’s Physician Healthcare Program(a liaison group for problematic physicians and the state medical board) and he told them everything in detail.
When he was discharged from the in-patient facility in July, I did allow him, against our marriage counselor’s advice, to come home and sleep in one of the guest bedrooms because I was in shock, depressed, enraged and suffering from PTSD.
MY internist, who has known my husband for more than 20 years, was absolutely furious with this news when I went in to see him. He put me on Lexapro because I was a total wreck and told me to get a lawyer and make our daughter and myself my top priority.
Shortly after he got back from his 90-day sex addiction therapy, I told my husband he had to surrender his license and never go back to any sort of medical work or I would leave him on the spot. Our therapist was in total agreement with all of that so he did surrender it and retired.
The state medical board was briefed on his decades of behavior by the PHP.
Two weeks ago they posted a Public Letter of Concern about him and his inappropriate sexual misconduct with multiple patients over multiple years.
Anyone who looks him up on the state medical board’s website can read it. But believe it or not, not one of his affair partners has come forward to file a complaint. Probably because each thought they were the only one, (not including his wife, of course.)
Currently, we are spending a King’s ransom in weekly therapy. He sees a personal therapist, a Certified Sex Addiction Therapist, our marriage counselor, a psychiatrist and goes to daily sex addiction group meetings six days a week since his discharge. I see the marriage counselor as well as my personal therapist weekly also.
How does he treat me now?
Like the most loving husband you can imagine. He constantly tells me he loves me. Cries, thanks me for standing by him, and says no matter what I decide to do he will always be there for me, financially and emotionally. He brings me coffee every morning, feeds the dogs, vacuums the kitchen and even goes to the barn with me to help groom my horse.
Also, he says he cannot believe what he has done to me, to our marriage, to the trust I once had in him.
Our marriage counselor has told him that what he did altered his life, but it destroyed mine because it destroyed my reality.
I ask myself, as well as him, why he did it.
In the beginning he said he was angry and resentful that I quit my job to have a baby and constantly overspent.
My personal therapist says that there might have been reasons why he felt like he did, but there are no excuses for DOING what he did.
By the way, he also had sex with someone when I was pregnant with our daughter.
It’s a lot to hear which is why my therapist says “You’ve actually got a book!”
When I asked my husband why he confessed, he told me he couldn’t lie to me any more! Really? 23 years was finally enough?
That’s why I no longer believe that this is sex addiction.
To me, this is entitlement, selfishness and abuse — he is a prime example of someone having a secret sexual basement. And by the way, thanks to you, I have read it and so has he and our counselors!
Luckily, I have a loving, supportive, beautiful 23-year-old daughter and two loving stepsons, all of whom cannot believe what their dad did.
I also have wonderfully supportive friends, a beautiful home (I re-did the master bedroom) and a lifestyle that I’ve enjoyed for many, many decades.
But in all the books that I’ve read about betrayal and sex addiction and all the therapists I’ve talked to, no one has ever had a client whose husband did what mine did CONTINUOUSLY FOR TWO DECADES?
Even my badass divorce lawyer says she cannot imagine what I’m going through.
But here I am, at the age of 69, and I’m stuck.
Stuck because I’ve spent almost my entire adult life with him, stuck because I feel sorry for him AND us and stuck because divvying up the finances would be difficult.
So does that mean living apart and never divorcing? I’m not sure that’s sustainable.
But there is one thing I know. This is the saddest thing that has ever happened to me.
So now I pose the same old question but with an ageism twist: At 69, should I stay or should I go?
Sincerely,
Not Dead Yet
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Dear Not Dead Yet,
You asked the Leave a Cheater lady. You know what I’m going to say.
Let’s start with: you’re not stuck. You just hate your options. Of course you need to leave this sick motherfucker immediately. I’m glad you have a divorce attorney lined up.
I assure you, you’re not the first person over 60 to divorce a fuckwit. Nor are you the first person on this blog to discover their partner has had sex with their patients. We’ve had doctor FWs, shrink FWs, and my personal favorite — Jesus Cheater FWs, the sinister ministers. The common denominator with all these freaks is that they thrill to a power imbalance and cannot be trusted with vulnerable people.
You are a vulnerable person.
And I don’t care how much therapy you throw at this monster, he is NEVER going to be person you can feel safe with.
Radically accept that.
And make your escape plan. It’s imperative that you do NOT tell him, but play along like you’re reconciling. I know part of your hopium-sick shocked self wants to reconcile (MARRIAGE COUNSELOR?!), but even your MARRIAGE COUNSELOR told you the guy was a SEXUAL PREDATOR.
Game over. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200 more dollars in therapy bills.
You could go down the rabbit hole of do sexual predators reoffend? (The data is spotty because so few predators are prosecuted. How’s that for your morning dose of misogyny? Here’s another fun factoid: Of 1,000 rapes, 6 result in jail time!) My point is, despite a therapy industry treating FWs for sex addiction, there’s very little data that these people can morph into cuddly, respectful, safe partners.
Which brings us back to the question I ask here constantly: Is this relationship acceptable to you? Not the relationship you hope for (with enough therapy thrown at it), but what it IS? A man with a deep double life, who fucked his patients, and thrilled to your abuse for 23 years.
Why do you want that guy?
I realize I am asking you to undo a lifetime of programming that you need a guy, and being a doctor’s wife is somehow enviable. But I promise you, every person in your life from the rubberneckers to those who sincerely care about you, are wondering why you’re still with a sexual predator.
The kinder of them don’t want to hurt you with their judgement — but you wrote me and asked me to judge you. And I’m telling you IT DOES NOT GET BETTER. Do you think at age 69 you’re not going to be vulnerable? That you can grow old with a man who was happy to abuse you for decades? I’m sure you’re of use to HIM, as an agent of his impression management (I’m not so bad! She stays!), and for all your wife appliance tasks. (He might need a nurse.) But why do YOU think you need HIM?
Let’s untangle your letter.
Why is he admitting it?
When I asked my husband why he confessed, he told me he couldn’t lie to me any more! Really? 23 years was finally enough?
Chumps put a lot of stock in confessions. They stupidly project their values and think that the weight of a sociopath’s non-existent conscience has weighed on them, and now they must spill their guts. Because they feel so sorry.
It’s more likely he’s telling you to get in front of the story because someone else was going to tell you. Or because telling you would destroy you. And he enjoys destroying you, as evidenced by his 23-year hobby of destroying you.
he admitted that he brought four of these nine women, individually, into our home and into our bed
He enjoys being transgressive at your expense. Your unknowing humiliation turns him on.
He also gave me two STDs because he never wore a condom.
His dick tingles are more important than your health.
Read that again. Let it sink in.
His dick tingles are more important than your health.
Now tell me you want to invest more of your remaining precious life with this man.
My personal therapist says that there might have been reasons why he felt like he did, but there are no excuses for DOING what he did.
Yes. And consider that he was quite happy to blame you — which is the mark of every abuser.
He constantly tells me he loves me.
Some “love” isn’t good for you. Pedophiles “love” children. Hannibal Lecter “loves” fava beans.
Cries, thanks me for standing by him, and says no matter what I decide to do he will always be there for me, financially and emotionally.
Yeah, how’s he going to be there for you financially when he can’t work any longer? You realize you’re entitled to half of everything, right?
He brings me coffee every morning
Small price for avoiding consequences. He’s lucky you don’t pour scalding coffee in his lap. Enjoy your dick tingles now, motherfucker.
That’s why I no longer believe that this is sex addiction.
Who cares if you call it sex addiction?
Call it sex-with-patients-itis. Cancer of the imaginary conscience. It’s HIS affliction, not yours. The “disease” manifests itself as abusing you. RUN!
I also have wonderfully supportive friends, a beautiful home (I re-did the master bedroom) and a lifestyle that I’ve enjoyed for many, many decades.
Fuck your lifestyle.
I’m sorry, you wrote to me, the Leave a Cheater lady and I have the perspective of doing this for too long. I’ve seen people leave FWs while undergoing chemo, after years of stay-at-home parenting and zero job skills, or in their second trimester pregnant with twins. Fuck your redecorated master bedroom.
I know this feels harsh, but listen to me, every single person on this blog has suffered terrible losses. Most of them without the comfort of financial privilege. You have MORE options than most people, not fewer. I know it hurts, to leave the comfort and perceived safety of your well-ordered life, but YOU WERE NEVER SAFE.
You can divorce this man and rebuild a life that is comfortable and free from abuse. But you need to be clear about your values. Know that YOU are more important than a FW and his impression management. Examine your own impression management. No one is buying that this guy is a prize, or that there is any value (beyond martyrdom) in staying married to him. Your redecorated master bedroom is not that compelling.
You’re not stuck.
Stuck because I’ve spent almost my entire adult life with him, stuck because I feel sorry for him AND us and stuck because divvying up the finances would be difficult.
People leave people they’ve spent their entire adult lives with every day. Stop feeling sorry for him, he fucked his way into this mess and deserves every consequence. People divvy up their finances every day.
YOU CAN DO THIS.
You are a talented, accomplished person in your own right. And you do not need a monster to complete you. Sane people run away from monsters.
How did she have two std’s and not wonder where they came from? I’m sorry she’s in this situation, but how do you explain two std’s?
GAS
LIGHT
ING
This is my question, exactly. You don’t get an STD from a toilet seat.
My prolific cheater first ex-husband wasn’t even a doctor — he was an accountant. The (male) doctor I went to said nothing about chlamydia being sexually transmitted. Instead, he asked me if I had been using damp towels. It wasn’t until after many rounds of Flagyl, I happened upon a female doctor. SHE gave me a pamphlet explaining the causes of a chlamydia vaginal infection and gently suggested that I might have a discussion with my husband because one of us was not as monogamous as I thought we were.
He is a doctor. He may have convinced her she got it from sitting on a public toilet seat. She trusted him.
Here’s how he might have explained the STDs:
My ex is a physician who gave me an STD very early on in our marriage. He told me he got it (genital warts) because he was taking care of a patient who had them. I said, “Yeah, but don’t you wear gloves.” He just shrugged and muttered something about gloves not always working. I was 23, newly married, and trusting. FW took advantage of my trust.
The male military gyn who treated the genital warts supported my ex’s theory. 😡
Fast forward to 2019. On D-day, I was 59 and knew I needed STD testing because I’d just found out about FW’s nearly three-year affair with a much-younger nurse. When I told the gyn about how I had a bout of genital warts when I was 23 and told her that my ex had gotten them from a patient, she said, “He only got them from a patient if he had sex with that patient.” 🤦🏻♀️
So, basically he lied, the male gyn covered for him, and I bought it all. I’m quite sure he did not have sex with a patient like the OP’s FW, but I do think he had sex with another woman in the early days of our marriage. Dammit. Also, so much for the “we grew apart” excuse. He was an entitled FW from the start. Oh, and skilled in the dark art of gaslighting.
💯 My physician ex had help from some of his other physician colleagues – including the closeted gay/straight married OM – to cover up whatever he was doing. My ex tried to convince my OB/GYN (who was his colleague) to waive the standard HIV test when I was pregnant. I demanded to take it. My ex tried to say if the test was positive it was probably due to a past accidental needle stick on an HIV+ surgery patient. Luckily it was negative.
Nobody tells a better medical lie than a FWit MD, unfortunately.
I got a similar lie and accepted it until I told my doctor what he said about toilet seats and also how it could stay dormant in my body (for 30 yrs!!!) and he shook his head and said he was lying. That was the beginning of the end. I trusted my doc who also refused to have him as a patient after that. I’m sorry your doc supported the gaslighting liar.
Presumably she was getting most of her medical advice and information from her husband, who (not surprisingly) took pains to convince her that there was some reasonable explanation for the STDs that didn’t involve him cheating on her. Being a doctor, he was in a uniquely good position to lie to her about medical issues.
I have a more sinister guess. She tested positive and her doctor FW gave her a line of BS about how she must have contracted it from a public restroom or lack of cleanliness or some other ridiculous explanation. And he’s a doctor and her husband so of course she believed him. Makes me so sick and angry. This alone fully demonstrates this is not a safe person.
I’m assuming she got tested after he disclosed. That said, there are a bunch of examples here of people who get STDs and were gaslit about where they came from.
Just as Tracy said, 100% someone was going to tell. AP followed us to airport on my 60th birthday. Not Dead Yet you perspective and No Contact from this predator. It’s hard pill to swallow but NDY you can do this, you deserve a FW free life.
Hi, I am so sorry, I know how this feels. Same here, no-one who knew him can believe it. I was completely blindsided. Also after 23 years, and we have two daughters aged 17 & 21. Funnily enough, mine is an investigative journalist, like you (ABC) — won an Emmy the year he walked out on us and never even told his girls. And doesn’t send *any* money for them. I’m 58.
PS Tracy’s right — if you have money, you’ll be fine. The rest is reckoning. Give yourself five years to come to terms with it: it takes a really long time to absorb these new facts. You have undergone a major trauma, like a major limb breaking off a tree. Be patient while the healing and regrowth do their good work.
PPS: marriage counseling and the courts prolonged the gaslighting for me. The secondary betrayal by “experts” compounded the pain and was worse in many ways. He is worse than you can currently imagine. Save your soul and get away as quickly as you can, so your daughter can see what integrity and self-respect look like.
Well said.
I’m turning 68 this week. It will also mark the 5th anniversary of my final move from the marital home. My ex-FW wasn’t going to fully admit or end his affair.
Chump Lady explained why your marriage will never recover. Here are two more reasons to end it. Your marital assets are at risk if there are lawsuits brought against your husband by patients or former employers. Your self-worth is at risk if you think being with him is better than building a new life.
Take your half (or more) and move forward. It wasn’t what you planned, but you have the resources to remain safe and true to your values.
Agreed, this is a very real possibility.
Additionally, his defense attorney is not interested in protecting the chump’s half of assets. The attorney is going to be paid from them. So many other people currently know more about the chump’s future than she does . That’s why chumps need their own lawyer.
a thorough forensic review of finances may show a lot of spending around affair partners–this can help with requesting more than 50% in the settlement. and ensure this writer isn’t left in the financial dust at age 70, especially if lawsuits are brought against the doc.
i’m about to turn 60 and it’s a relief not to deal with a narcissist anymore. writer, set yourself free.
Yes, and never mind that financial abuse is a hallmark of narcissists and predators. I too lived a comfortable lifestyle married to Mr. Moneybags, with no idea that he had secret spending habits and accounts over the years that could have financed me for the rest of my post-divorce life. If I hadn’t filed when I did, exposed the finances, and gotten a fair settlement, who knows how much more would have been lost.
Seconding the recommendation to divorce and get a settlement before potential sexual misconduct or harassment lawsuits completely wipe out all joint assets.
Smack in the middle of settlement negotiations my FW was hit with a sexual harassment complaint filed by an employee (although not from employee Mrs. Bendover) to our state’s labor board. My attorney told me that this could be the first step to an actual lawsuit, and that we had better get the settlement done sooner rather than later. She further explained that any assets awarded against FW could come out of the marital assets (that being the practice evaluation of which he would pay me half), but might not. She said it depended on a judge’s ruling: Judge could rule that the practice was liable for the doctor’s behavior in which case the practice eval would hit near zero, or Judge could rule that sexual harassment was not a function and responsibility of the practice but of the doctor as an individual, and the practice would have not been liable for any payout.
Keep in mind that all of this happened because at that point (about 7 months after D-Day and FW fighting me on everything he claimed not to care about) I was not insane enough. As Giles Corey said “More weight”.
I posted nearly the same advice before I read yours. Doctors have a clear mandate to not take advantage of patients and Im guessing that it would be relatively easy for former patients to show wrongdoing which could have financial liability. If she stays married to him, her nest eggs could shrink away to nothing.
Excellent point on the lawsuits. There’s no such thing as financial security with a predator.
I’m 72 and left my client screwing psychotherapist husband 6 years ago after finding out. It was not easy but it is possible and life is better not living with a narcissist. I didn’t realise he was until I fell out of favour. There is life after this. I moved a long way away and then he moved closer so I moved again (exhausting). Watch Joni Mitchell singing “I’m still Standing” at the Gershwin awards for Elton John and Bernie Taupin or find another anthem that works for you. https://www.pbs.org/video/joni-mitchell-and-friends-im-still-standing/ If Joni can still be standing so can we all. I could say more but I hope you will find more support here.
IF–a big IF–he actually feels guilt or remorse, now is the time to use it. His 90-day treatment at a luxury resort–er, celebrity rehab–came out of YOUR joint pocket. If he gets sued now, by any one of the nine patients you know about–and there may be more–before you are divorced, that money will come out of your joint assets. He’s been calculating risks for decades, and this may be another financial calculation–stick with you so you pay half the cost of HIS cheating transgressions and professional violations out of your shared purse. Malpractice insurance generally does not cover sexual misconduct. And you are paying half the King’s ransom you mentioned in HIS therapy costs, which he may embrace as a source of attention. You’re paying for him to pal up with celebrity sex offenders. Who knows when he’ll want another narcissistic fix there?
You took strong action to protect his current and future patients by getting him to surrender his license. You did not trust him to have contact with these women. It’s time to protect yourself.
I would not tell your friends what you plan to do until you have filed and all your assets are accounted for. Quietly get and pass the financial records to your attorney and a good forensic accountant. He managed to hide these affairs for more than two decades. Chances are that he’s hidden money, too. You may be forced to give up your lifestyle. Your children, too, will suffer financially.
Tracy said it so well: you’re not stuck. You just hate your options. You may think that the worst has happened, but worse is yet to come. A power-mad man is going to tire of brining you coffee, vacuuming, and taking care of the pets. He will resent you for his loss of license and social status among the friends that know. He will be furious about the public humiliation of that very public letter. He has smugly screwed you over for decades and will be happy to have you share any lawsuits and loss of social status that come his way. And your friends are likely to tire of the whole mess and your stress, and want to move on.
The window for remorse is small and closes quickly.
The whole sex addiction thing… bah. It’s not just that CSAT founder and sex addiction guru Patrick Carnes is a massive charlatan, victim-blamer and abuse-minimizer. It’s the whole construct of an addiction to using human beings that’s much darker than other “process addictions” like eating disorders and gambling.
The distinction is important because, even if other types of addicts eventually lose empathy for people around them and can end up abusing/exploiting others as addictions snowball, in early stages their addictions do not functionally require direct abuse and/or direct callousness towards other human beings. But compulsive sex does.
Right out of the gate and in the larval stages of so-called “sex addiction,” even compulsive porn users have to numb themselves to the humanity of the real individuals depicted in videos and photos. This is particularly true since those who develop “tolerance” require more and more extreme content which–let’s face it– goes in one of two or both directions: more violent or more pedophilic. Those who take it a step further and use or betray the living, breathing human right in front of them especially require pre-impaired empathy.
I think it’s an insult to other addicts to use the term “addiction” for sexual compulsion, akin to tarring them with the idea that serial killing is an “addiction.” I don’t even like categorizing it with the alternative label sometimes proposed for serial killers — “Harm OCD”– because it tars people with more garden variety OCD. I mean, what’s next? Calling domestic batterers “punching addicts”?
THIS!! This is how you protect yourself and your financial future.
“You’re paying for him to pal up with celebrity sex offenders“ PERIOD. The true term for “sex addict” is A B U S E R. You are being abused. Please get to safety and protect yourself before it’s too late.
You’re not dead yet. Take the money & run. Enjoy the peace on the other side.
23 years is a long double life. These are deep rooted habits of a highly disordered person. Run! Get your ducks in order quietly and run!
Emphasis on quietly. Do not tell him (or anyone except your lawyer and maybe your personal therapist) what you are doing.
I learned after he was dead that my cheater likely cheated (on and off) throughout the whole relationship (29 years). I have wondered a million times what I would have done if I had known while he was still alive but I will never know. Yea, we here get how profound it is to learn that what you thought your life was actually wasn’t.
The biggest flaming reason you need to divorce his ass asap is that he is liable for a lot of wrong-doing and when his former victims learn he was a predator and that “romance” they thought they had was immoral abuse. They may come calling with lawyers in-tow. You need to get your half now and forget about the big house you are accustomed to …find happiness in a bungalow where what is yours is yours and he can be sued by his former patients without threatening your well-being.
Im no lawyer, just a cheated on chump…but as much as I struggled to make some sense of what I learned about my life, I was able to do it in a place of safety and calm where what was mine was mine. Having a safe haven was helpful.
My deceased cheater was always a selfish, mean person so on some level I wasn’t entirely surprised. I have a friend who was married to a great guy for about 20 years and he confessed to her like yours did “I cant lie anymore” and she learned he had a deep, secret sexual basement. This crazy stuff really does happen.
Can I ask the obvious question: why were you married to “a selfish, mean person”? Did you make excuses for him or did you think you were causing his behavior?
This is an excellent point. Take your half and run. You do not want to find yourself with half of nothing in a few years and still with the same awful FW.
Get OUT of there. I know it’s so hard. It’s so hard to wrap your head around the truth that you mean NOTHING to him, except what use he can extract from you
I’m having a tough weepy day today, Pennywise is making this divorce as difficult as possible, and I just feel so sad and exhausted- I just want it to be DONE
I’m angry with him, my adult children for not sticking up for me (awful I know, and not fair, it will pass ) and myself most of all
But the only way out is through. I hold on to the vision of having my own home again, once this is finally over. There will be peace and love and a beautiful garden, and a dog and cat, and grandchildren
There will be other bedrooms. Let this one go and move on. Hugs.
I have a feeling the bedroom renovation was about throwing out the old tainted mattress, etc., that the FW desecrated. Instead of necessarily representing excessive attachment to material things, the gesture could represent one of the incremental moves NDY is taking to sterilize her life and erase memories of her history with FW.
I have a friend of over 39 years (I’m 70) whose spouse has cheated almost their entire marriage. She dated a lot prior to marriage, and chose her spouse because he was the most respectful of all the young men she dated. He mainly did SWs and random hook-ups. Arrested for soliciting. He left proof of affairs for her to find.He leaves his unlocked cell on the kitchen counter. I’m FB friends with their daughter who told me she learned of his infidelity when she was 6 years old! The drama in her parents lives actually caused her to move from the US to England, and her older brother soon joined her. The daughter told me her mother enjoys her lifestyle, that’s why she stays. It’s not that they are very affluent, my friend is a retired nurse and often made more money then him because he was often unemployed. But she likes going out to dinner, to visit friends, go on vacations, etc. I look at the life I made for myself after I left my OB/GYN ex who loved porn more than he loved me, and I just can’t understand why she still stays. Untangling the finances was left up to my attorney and forensic accountant, it was no problem for me. I do the same activities as my friend but don’t have to worry about STDs or marriage policing (I remarried at 54 to a former chump). And like you, I have horses (and donkeys!) Not dead yet, you can do this, you are stronger than you think.
I’m with others in suspecting the “confession” wasn’t spontaneous but likely prompted by a disgruntled affair partner who threatened to spill the beans and tell Not Dead Yet or report NDY’s husband to the licensing board.
What’s more concerning is that, from NDY’s two STD infections and the former AP’s drug conviction, NDY’s husband already seems to have a history of consorting with shady, unsavory and unstable elements. Especially considering the high statistical association between “mate poaching” and psychopathy/dark triad traits, APs spilling the beans is probably among the more minor risks when cheaters play around with crazy. Aside from potentially deadly infections, another way FWs play Russian roulette with family welfare is bringing potentially murderous side pieces into the mix.
For instance, there’s breaking news out of Las Vegas that a 43 year old realtor was shot dead by police after calling 911 to report a violent home invasion, apparently by one of his rotating affair partners who was enraged and suicidal at discovering she was one of several aside from the victim’s wife. This happened while the victim’s teen daughter was in the house.
There are other horrifying elements to the story, such as the fact that the officer on the scene shot the victim presuming the black man had to be the aggressor– and kept shooting while the victim lay bleeding on the floor. Whatever this guy did, it should not have been punishable by death and he’s still a victim. But there’s a cautionary tale in there nevertheless.
There are other cautionary tales of murderous affair partners whether they were acting on their own or in cahoots with cheaters:
Sheila Keen-Warren dressed as a clown and shot then-affair partner’s wife, later going on to marry him. Both are suspected of plotting the murder: https://edition.cnn.com/2024/11/03/us/florida-killer-clown-sheila-keen-warren-release/index.html
Astronaut Lisa Nowak stalked and assaulted new girlfriend of her formerly married affair partner: https://www.biography.com/musicians/lisa-nowak-lucy-in-the-sky
Mentally ill Ailsa Jackson was compelled by married lover to kill his wife. Husband prosecuted and family of victim forgives killer: https://nypost.com/2020/02/11/wife-murdered-by-husbands-mistress-forgave-her-moments-before-killing/
Latoshia Shunta Daniels killed married pastor affair partner https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2019/apr/08/little-rock-social-worker-arrested-fatal-shooting-/
Carla Hughes killed her affair partner’s pregnant fiancee: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carla_Hughes
Karin Cain. Texts show married affair partner James Craig discussed plans to kill with with Cain and took advice from her on how to do it. Cain may have dodged charges by testifying against Craig.: https://www.denver7.com/news/front-range/aurora/aurora-dentist-accused-of-killing-wife-discussed-it-with-mistress-district-attorney-alleges
Margaret Spooner. Allen Morgan, 73, and 75-year-old Margaret Spooner, who are now married, deny conspiring to murder Carol Morgan more than 40 years ago so they could be together.: https://www.yahoo.com/news/husband-mistress-hired-hitman-hack-200515808.html
Neonatal nurse Lucy Letby is suspected of killing infants under her care in order to get the sympathy and attention of her married doctor affair partner: https://www.pressreader.com/uk/scottish-daily-mail/20241010/281908778585425?srsltid=AfmBOopHyyXK6i7NFXs8ReUV1SOqFeThSt_0A7BHg4MLfpQxA5LfmLlU
HOAC,
This is so dark yet so close to all of us. It’s made me finally start reading the Ochberg book on post-traumatic therapy. I got it by your recommendation from another thread. But it felt overwhelming just skimming through so I never really got into it. But somehow seeing these news stories afresh, it feels like it’s time to think through it. The cards are so heavily stacked against chumps especially women.
Congrats on finding a copy of the book. When I tried to replace the hardcover copy I lent out and never got back about fifteen years ago, Amazon didn’t offer any copies for less than $200 usd. It’s still pretty steep at $60. At least it’s finally available on Kindle.
Stark and Flitcraft’s chapter on DV covers a lot of dark issues of course but the light comes from their courage in squaring off against the traditional mental health apparatus. Also inspiring is the deep respect they express for survivors as they flip traditional presumptions about victims’ supposedly self-defeating (read: “masochistic,” “codependent”) responses to abuse and argue that, instead, victims’ strategies are often brilliantly effective in promoting survival. But it’s clear that the only way to appreciate these survival strategies is if onlookers also understand how tight the trap of domestic abuse really is and how intensely committed to control abusers tend to be.
I’m not sure what common ground you identify between the “killer side chick” list and domestic abuse though, in a roundabout way, I think there are a lot of overlaps. There’s nothing about cheating in the chapter but the authors’ description of victim-blaming concepts in domestic abuse that many mental health professionals stubbornly cling to has a lot of overlaps with more current social research on something called “rape myth acceptance.” Quite interestingly, “rape myth acceptance” or RMA is a sort of “sun” within a conceptual “solar system” around which all sorts of other statistically correlated ugly belief systems seem to orbit, one of which is “infidelity tolerance,” another is “authoritarianism,” then there’s “hostile sexism,” general sexual aggression and racism.
In short, both abusers as well as abuse apologists and victim-blaming mental health professionals and bystanders seem to share a lot of shitty core beliefs. And it’s predictable that people with those shitty beliefs might, at times, become more than merely blaming bystanders but active aggressors.
Even more interesting regarding the “rape myth acceptance” fallacy is that both women and men who subscribe to RMA tend to display more sexual aggression and sexually coercive behaviors. It sounds a bit counterintuitive since it would seem that women who’ve internalized this belief system would naturally support patriarchal entitlement and female subordination so one would expect those women to display more cartoonishly soft, demure, passive and squashy feminine behaviors, not be more aggression than average. But apparently they are– to both other women and men. They’re more likely to use aggressive mating strategies (“mate poaching” is commonly listed among these), engage in aggressive intrasexual competition towards other women (“mean girl” behavior, indirect reputational attacks against women they see as more attractive, mate poaching) and, most surprisingly, sexually coercive behaviors towards men.
It’s hard to explain what I man in a brief way but, summed up, the “killer side piece” thing is pretty predictable as is the “murderous cheater.” That seems relevant because apparently Dan Savage just made a sweeping generalization that cheaters, when busted, don’t tend to attack their chumps. At which point a reader asked to see the data on that.
I mean, simples: cheating and polygamy (the Sister Wives type) are narc/Dark Triad entitlement behaviors (with some exceptions… example: if a woman or man in a forced marriage cheats, it’s somewhat different, of course).
narc/Dark Triad are also linked to violence and empathy-that-can-be-switched-of (real empathy cannot be switched off).
Mate poaching: I dunno. Research would at times disagree with you. Check out “Do women really like taken men? Results from a large questionnaire study”. There is quite a lot of research on the fact that women mistakenly believe that a man who is taken must be… marriage material. Often this is subconscious. But in my case: when my last “abuser” told me that he had been with that woman for 8 years and another woman before that for 7 years, because I’m a chump thought “oh, that’s a long time! Green flag!” If I had read women’s red flag lists (I have since), I would have seen that it says “serial monogamy is a huge red flag”. In this case it was: he cheated on and abused the first one and the second one too. In fact, he was not as he claimed, long broken up with her when he started seeing me with her having dumped him – oh no, he had just popped the question to her!
I’ve read quite a bit of research on women being “attracted to taken men” but tend to chalk it up to “agentic personalities”– i.e., people whose characters are so flimsy and unformed that they blow with every cultural influence.
That’s not to say that the “culture” isn’t a powerful and coercive influence. My guess is that you’re deeply struggling with some of the things that influenced you to get stuck with abusers in the past. I recommend reading the work of psychologist Jennifer Freyd, particularly her book “Blind to Betrayal” which presents a kind of mathematical algorithm of social vulnerabilities and liabilities that make people far more susceptible to abuse and exploitation. The humanistic part of Freyd’s approach is that she recognizes that the concrete disadvantages that victims have that set them up for abuse are not the fault of victims but relate to other forces like socio-economics, race, gender, etc. The overall message is very kind and healing.
I only just checked some of your links – whoa, Ailsa truly does not fit in that list. It does with your later clarification, but wow, just wow. So he was just looking for any mentally ill person who he could lovebomb and convince to take the fall for him to cover up his 100s of affairs and child porn. Wow. I wouldn’t call that “in cahoots” with – her story reminds me much more of the vulnerable suicidal AP of my very first FW. Uff.
You guessed partially correctly: I am struggling with humanity overall and yes, my blindness. For those who abused me, but even more those that we all abuse (what I mean by that: homeless people should not exist. Period.) I don’t see any light anymore – any hope. I understand that the vast majority is bad and acts only selfishly, no matter who or what they destroy. I did not see this/understand this, (did not want to see this maybe?), but now I do. And I understand that there is no light at any end of the tunnel for me. What does one do then?
I know what always makes me a victim. The problem is that it is incurable – neurological disability. If there are good people, they don’t find me attractive (why would they?) and what’s left are abusers. And that’s my life – not just romantically, but in all areas of life, incl. my parents.
One of my sons has a diagnosed neurological disability. I hardly think of him as a chew toy for psychopaths and, if I have anything to do with it, he’ll never think of himself that way either. In fact, his slight lack of filter makes him the absolute bane of psychopaths. He makes it clear where he stands and his favorite gallows humor targets are Harvey Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein and Andrew Tate.
That is really great, but I do think gender matters here – NPD has the largest gender gap of any mental illness. I prefer women, but have never been able to crack that dating scene. I feel you need queer women friends already to get in, because it is so insular and so few women on dating apps are actually looking for other women.
I highly recommend the book “Women who love psychopaths” which has some good stuff on why women with ADHD end up with them.
As for autism: it took me a long while to understand the connection, but I do now. Autistic/ADHD/AuDHD women seem immediately unattractive as potential partners to NT men (research as put the speed at which this assessment is made for neurodivergent people at 4 seconds). ADHD women are identified as disordered/messy/odd and autistic women as odd, but especially lacking emotional warmth, a key characteristic for men being attracted to women. Men (yes, and women, but with the caveat I mentioned earlier) with NPD are autoerotic and are according to studies on this willing to engage with/abuse partners who lack warmth if they possess something else that can act as narcissistic supply. So that’s the link. It’s slightly different for NT women dating autistic/ADHD men, but I can fill in those blanks as well, if you’re interested.
Here is your first clue that AP and FW are unbalanced at the very least: they both consent to deception of the Chump. From the jump we are not dealing with the best of the best here.
Yes and I don’t get why most people don’t immediately perceive that this statistical risk is built right into the dynamics of cheating. It’s so glaringly obvious that no one would ever agree to form a little triangulating bully cabal to gang up on and deceive a clueless third party unless they were deeply sick and twisted to begin with. It’s even arguable that APs may tend to be sicker than cheaters since APs are willing to do this to individuals who’ve generally never done anything to them, with whom they’ve never had direct interpersonal conflict nor even an argument over loading the dishwasher.
At the very least it’s a toss up regarding who’s more twisted. But all affairs in which APs are witting participants are Russian roulette by nature though only time will tell what the nature of the bullet in the chamber is. Are APs merely sick in a kind of chaotic-borderline/daddy-issues/internalized misogyny/intrasexual competition/embezzling/sexually-incontinent-high-risk-STD-vector kind of way or full blown murderous psychos?
It’s not a gamble anyone sane would take which is why it always comes back to the issue of consent for chumps since chumps don’t choose to end up in triangulated clusterfucks with rough trade and rando kooks and didn’t choose to hold that gun to their heads and spin the chamber.
I actually disagree with you here: I think women have been fed again and again the truth that “good men are in short supply.” Unfortunately they and I in the past have not been taught what sparkly actually means – instead we constantly see Sparkly (as in: Dark Triad abusers) in media presented to us as highly desirable mates. There is enough research that in the short term/beginning/loveboming phase women deem partners with NPD (so negative value partners!) as more desirable and attractive as mates. Which checks out because they also show higher levels of empathy during lovebombing phase in trials than sane men.
As for my very first AP (others since both with that same man and other men – I am not “lovable”, no not in the sense you think. I like myself very much and that’s part of the issue): there wasn’t a second when I found out that I was mad at her. Why? She was on suicide watch when he made a move on her. He knew that. He was not in any (psychological/financial etc) trouble but deemed her an easier target than a sane woman. I read an email from her to him. Nothing could ever have made me more ashamed – of him! She was debasing herself to such an extent; it was so clear that she thought she was not worth the dirt he walked on. It was really grim. Seeing just how ill and unwell etc she was, made his behavior so much more psychopathic. (She did not know of me.) Even now thinking of it, makes me feel so ashamed of him.
Many years later, I was that person: I ended up being the AP – without knowing it. And that was in a deeply vulnerable phase in my life (I am much worse off now because I lost my job because of him.) I had no idea that they were not actually broken up, but… newly engaged. You read that correctly. She had been with him at that point for 8 years. I still can’t get over the fact that she desperately wanted him back and new of his cheating the whole time, while I had no idea that she was still in his life. It’s so bizarre to me.
I may write in a letter in the next few weeks.
I don’t agree that the perception of a “man shortage” or confusion over sparkles is ever a rationale to poach a mate. If someone with those beliefs only harms themselves with it, they are still victims. But the second someone harms another, they’re no longer a victim but a participant.
I certainly understand that there are toxic and incorrect beliefs that underlie all sorts of ugly, unethical behavior but understanding isn’t the same as offering amnesty for it. To quote Margaret Atwood, “Ideas aren’t responsible for the people who believe in them.” White supremacists truly believe that minorities are subhuman but if they act on those beliefs and violate someone else’s rights, they belong in jail.
That said, I totally agree with the rest of what you’re saying, particularly because nothing I originally said actually contradicts your stated views. Though– oops– you’re totally right I should have included disabling mental illness as another exemption from the AP-as-co-abuser perspective. Great point and big oversight on my part.
It goes without saying that the other exemption would obviously be minor children but even adults in catastrophically vulnerable states and situations like, again, starving single immigrant mothers fearing deportation and, as you brought up, severely disabled mentally ill people are so coercible that servicing a domestic abuser/cheater with greater power may not actually reflect on their underlying values or character. I think that gets into the moral “gray zone” issue that Auschwitz survivor Primo Levi laments about how Nazis systematically and deliberately pitted victims against other victims as a way to demoralize death camp prisoners– drag them down to the level of perpetrators– before killing them. I get why you see your ex as evil because there’s really no greater mark of evil.
All the same, from what you say the mentally ill AP in your situation didn’t know you existed so the point is actually moot. She might have shown surprising character had she known you were in the picture but it’s impossible to guess that because she didn’t. And you had no idea you were being used as a side appliance by a cheater/abuser either. Everything I base my view on– the social research and a certain degree of armchair personal observation because I once worked in a FW-glutted industry– applies only to witting participants in domestic abuse and betrayal. But you added the important dimension that “witting” also means having all their wits.
For the record, I don’t believe Cluster B personality disorders like malignant narcissism and ASPD are “mental illness” per se because the former tend to be far too wily and skilled in evading consequences whereas people who are genuinely mentally disabled don’t have the wherewithal to manipulate on that level. I think of cluster B offenders as more criminally disordered. Even if these types manage to skirt around breaking existing laws, the mentality shares a lot of overlaps with criminal mentality, particularly things like “neutralization” (fancy clinical term for blameshifting).
Yeah, I also don’t think that narcissism and ASPD are mental illnesses in that regard. Unfortunately they end up harming others much more than those who have it, in most cases.
I would also argue that in some situations FWs have a much greater power than APs – just watched a documentary about a cult. One of the cult leaders, who was married, kept trying to mindcontrol other massively younger women in the cult that they needed to sleep with him “for their salvation”. He was not attractive in any way and I actually was like “holy crap – checks out! He brainwashed them into allowing their own rape, basically”. Sleeping without a condom all the time with patients seeking help like this guy here… comes quite close.
I actually grew up economically deprived so I understand a bit about power differentials. But I can never forget Malcolm X’s “house slave” analogy. There’s something particularly hideous about those who have every reason to understand disadvantage who would still sell out and throw under the bus other victims of the same system for their own slight gain.
Malcolm X used this analogy to shame those in the black community who “sold out” others in the same community simply to buy themselves a bit of marginal safety. I feel the same about some women selling out other women on the excuse that they, the sell-outs, are victims.
What is that in response to? The cult members? I don’t quite get the analogy, sorry. (But Malcolm X … was a literal pimp himself. Not sure he fits on ChumpLady nor am I sure he can talk about selling out. Unless he meant that he used to be someone who abused others for his own financial gain. Well, ironically given all his cheating, neither would MLK fit on here.)
Cult, huh? Malcolm X was not only a pimp but a junkie and thief. Then he wasn’t. The FBI had him under full surveillance, tapped phone, etc., and were hoping to catch him at least philandering like MLK. They were apparently very disappointed.
I think X’s stable reform and recovery likely relates to the fact that his parents were solid, even extraordinary role models, particularly his mother who’s an unsung hero of civil rights. It’s arguably the horrific and unjust ways his parents died that drove him over the edge for a time but, in the end, he had the original family model to return to and emulate.
You can’t build a Ferrari out of scrap from the salvage yard.
The best line in Shirley Glass’ book, Not Jist Friends, is ironically in the chapter To The Affair Partner (?!)
“A man with a history of infidelity is a poor choice for a life partner.”
Did she even read her own book?
Cheaters and side pieces are a species best left to themselves. If you are a loyal monogamous straight shooting upfront decent person of integrity, you will be guaranteeing your 24/7/365 unrelenting misery by partnering with a person who is cool with cheating, and trying to change them into who you thought they were.
DETACH stands for Don’t Even Try And Change Him/Her.
I didn’t have a marriage. I had a MIRAGE.
Welcome to the lifeboat. Please stay here with us. Nothing hurts like what you are going through. The only worse thing I can think of is the death of a child. Yet I can promise you, you WILL feel better, you WILL be glad you divorced him. It takes a long time and lot of inner work and an ungodly walk over the hot burning coals of the emotional roller coaster, but you will avoid the fate of those who stayed on the Titanic swapping deck chairs.
….I thought this got deleted and I posted again from memory below. Sorry! Maybe it needed to be said twice? 😜
You sound like a really strong, smart person and I’m sorry you were abused like this.
Like others I’m wondering why he told you after all this time, and I wonder if there aren’t other secrets about to come out especially if he’s trying to keep you stuck. My worry is that those secrets could have a financial component. Was he being blackmailed by the addict AP? Who knows the depths… I’d file immediately to establish a separation date and stop paying for his pricey therapy. I wonder if you could save that money to hire a forensic accountant. The divorce process takes time and backing away from investment (including emotional investment) in his dubious recovery will give you time to process and decide what kind of future you want.
Coffee or no coffee, he’s not your friend. I wouldn’t trust him with anything, including money that is rightfully yours. Unfortunately, like CL said, you’re vulnerable and this limbo situation makes you more so.
Good point about the addict AP–it touches on CL’s rule of thumb that what we know is ALWAYS the tip of the iceberg. You can bank on it and in this case, NDY, you literally should.
I left my now-ex when I was 64 years old, after thirty-five years of marriage, three years after he revealed his own secret sexual basement (fetish crossdresser who gets off on imagining himself as a woman). So I understand the theft of your reality and the doubts you then feel about your own ability to judge anything. I also understand your reluctance to give up the life you have had, which can lead you to want to see change and contrition where there is only cold self-interest. He brings you coffee, but he also brought you STIs. He says he loves you, but he was willing to risk your health (HPV can lead to cervical cancer) and lie to you for decades.
If you compromise with yourself and stay, you will demonstrating to your monster of a husband what you are willing to excuse.
Divorce him. Take your half. Live well. Be glad one of these women hasn’t already sued him, and realize that as long as you’re married to him, you’re vulnerable. Do you really trust a man like him to care for you when you’re vulnerable in a medical situation?
I’m here to say that it can be done, and I’ll add my voice to those who say you will find that it’s better on other other side.
“So I understand the theft of your reality and the doubts you then feel about your own ability to judge anything. I also understand your reluctance to give up the life you have had, which can lead you to want to see change and contrition where there is only cold self-interest.”
Wow, this is beautifully put, Adelante. ❤️ It’s exactly how I felt in the early days.
I’m 70 and I did it. I left and divorced after 30 years. He gave me an STD too. I know about the one cheating soulmate he proudly confessed to, but since he travelled a lot for work, I have no idea what I DON’T know, and now I frankly don’t care. I don’t want to know what I was too innocent and trusting to have any idea what went on while I was waiting for him to come home. His secret sexual basements are his burden to carry, not to unload on me, crying to get sympathy as the poor little boy sad sausage. That game no longer works on me. No contact was and is my savior. A doctors wife should have a lot of investments and savings. Talk to your attorney about all the money he spent on others which can be forensically tracked and part of your settlement. Leave him before he snaps out of the “good” husband mode. You have no real idea what he’s doing. You have time to live a joyful and peaceful life. If I can do it, so can you.
A bit of advice for the LW —
Do NOT show him this post. Do NOT share CL with him, his therapists, etc. This is YOUR safe space. You are just giving him more vocabulary with which to abuse you.
I say that because you mentioned telling him and everyone involved in his treatment about the “secret sexual basement.” That knowledge is for YOU, not for him to figure himself out. It’s so YOU can be equipped with the truth you need, not so that he can twist it into another way to extract pity from you.
Great point.
You can’t build a Ferrari out of scrap from the salvage yard.
Cheaters and side pieces are a species best left to themselves.
The best line in Shirley Glass’ book, Not Just Friends, IS IN THE CHAPTER TO THE AFFAIR PARTNER.
“A man with a history of infidelity is a lot choice for a life partner.”
Did she even read her own book?
If you are a decent person of integrity, loyal and monogamous, someone who is cool with cheating is not for you. You guarantee your 24/7/365 misery by partnering with someone who isn’t at all like you, trying to change them.
My experience has been that being on my own is light years better than being with him. I didn’t have a marriage; I had a MIRAGE.
I could not be more grateful that we are divorced. I found out my life was a lie when I was 54. I had been with him half my life. We have a daughter. COUNSELING WAS A REGULAR PART OF OUR LIVES THE ENTIRE 27 YEARS. At my request, because we both came from super dysfunctional families and I did not want to repeat either of the marriages modeled to us in our families of origin. He lied in that room FOR TWENTY SEVEN YEARS.
HE STILL LIES. To everyone. About everything.
He is a liar, a cheater, and a thief, still, at seven years past DDay. He is also a criminal. He and the primary side piece, whom he met in a massage parlor, opened an illicit massage parlor of their own! And he is still not honest or monogamous. He treats women like objects. The woman he lives with agrees that women are objects. And they are both making dirty money off of treating women like objects.
They are making money off of hurting people. What they are doing hurts children as well.
Good riddance. But it took a lot of time for me to internalize that.
But everyone thinks he is Such a Nice Guy!
To this day, he gets up and polishes his Nice Guy mask and wears it.
But I know different. Our daughter knows different. The therapists know different. The lawyers know different. People in my life that matter know different. He treats people like shit. Including his own child.
This site is the lifeboat. I am very sorry you are here but so glad you are here. The alternative is to stay on the Titanic swapping deck chairs. This is where the confusion clears up and you can heal. If you stay on the Titanic trying to fix the gash in the hill you will die.
It hurts like hell but I promise you, you will feel
better. It takes a long time and a lot of work. But you will NEVER get better staying with a a cheater, someone who is intentionally hurting you, enlisting hitwomen to help him, whose behavior shows he doesn’t know the first thing about the meaning of love.
When the meat is rotten, throw it out.
❤️
He’s a piece of work. #understatment Glad you’re free, VH!
Finding out that your life is a lie when you’re 54 sucks. #anotherunderstatement
I was not much older than you when my life blew up. And, although it’s been 5 years since d-day, and I’ve moved on in most ways, the after taste of my 35 years of a mirage (thanks to you for this) linger in my mouth.
It’s the betrayal and lies. Some thought pops into my head, unbidden, and I find myself trying to connect old dots. “Wait, maybe he went to see her then? Was he really fishing that time? Those nurse’s notes with recommendations for places to visit that we were on our trip to Seattle–were those written by her? Why did he want me to take his picture by that landmark and send it to him? That was unusual behavior. He must have wanted to send it to her! Dammi. Why didn’t I question it? Oh, wait. I did and he lied that he wanted to send it to his male friend…” And on and on.
I thought that after 5 years I’d be free of such intrusive thoughts, and yet here I am. Newbies, I don’t mean to alarm you. Life DOES get so much better. But it speaks to the lasting effects of the betrayal that many of us continue to struggle a bit, even after we’ve gained a life.
Same here. The weirdest questions still pop into my mind about my years with FW.
ugh typos:
“when we were on our trip” not “that we were on our trip”
“Dammit” not “Dammi.”
TYPO…the line in Shirley Glass’ book is
“A man with a history of infidelity is a POOR choice for a life partner.”
So is anyone cool with being a side piece.
Lots of people settle for mediocrity and poor choices.
Don’t be one of them.
I am sorry to hear this, you still have a great future ahead of you without an unethical, sleezy loser. Take the money, house, farm, and run. Reading your story makes me glad mine decided to leave when she did; I shudder at thinking she could have turned out like your husband. Now she is married to a guy that slams doors during arguments and threatens to leave.
He’s a monster. Leave his ass. Fuck the renovated bedroom that’s been fucked up and fucked in. Take half the money (or more! I got 55%) and run.
Don’t feel sorry for him. Hell to the naw!
Also, engage in value shifting. Sure, your financial situation may take a hit, but who cares? Some things–like your freedom, self-worth, and dignity–are more important than money.
“Some things–like your freedom, self-worth, and dignity–are more important than money.”
Exactly. I allowed my ex more than his 50%, but I considered it the price of freedom from his crazy.
Dear Not Dead Yet. I am also not dead yet(age 62) and going through a divorce. I also lost a beautiful house, which sold instantly because it was so beautiful and unique … and a lifestyle as we retired out to Mexico and I am now back in Canada with 6 suitcases. My heart goes out to you, however you need to find the courage within you to leave…you didn’t deserve any of this and precisely because of that you need to leave. Don’t minimize the value of financial freedom, it makes life very bearable and as others here have said get it now! I am doing exactly that…there is a window to get your money out and you need to take action when the window is open. Sending you courage and resolve, life can be good again. I am banking on it!
reading this letter this morning reminds me of how long it takes to understand these disordered freaks hate us. it’s the weirdest thing.
Yes, the gratuitous detail that he fucked four (or was it five?) of these women in her bed really rammed that hatred of her home. He enjoyed hurting her with that information.
Yeah, I feel for her and the “stuck” feeling. In some cases, people are stuck, for a time at least. In my case, I had been a stay at home mom for 26.5 years when I had my D-day, no job except for a few part time jobs to help cover when he lost a job, and there were many of those times. He just couldn’t keep a job for whatever reason. I am sure I don’t know the whole truth about some of the “lay offs” he had. Whatever.
But I spoke to an attorney about 6 months into the “reconciliation” and “pick me” dance and she told me flat out, “you can’t afford a divorce with all the debt you have.” We had no assets and a crap ton of debt. So even thought I had started working and had a decent income, there were no guarantees that I would be able to make it on my own and I would lose health benefits. As a diabetic and someone who also has hypertension, I was very scared by this thought. I will ask for him to pay for my benefits once I do file (and no guarantee I will be awarded that), but for now, staying and paying off debt and keeping health coverage was the best option for me.
Fast forward almost 3 years and I know that there is light at the end of the tunnel, and that is what I care about. I am just biding my time until we get the debt paid off. It is paid down, and I believe I am almost to the finish line where I can finally file!
But I would prefer to be in her place as far as having lots of money and the option would have been there for me to leave much sooner. However, better late than never! I will be free soon and I cannot wait! Will it be sad that 30 years was just flushed down the toilet with his choice to betray and cheat? Yes, it is. But we can’t go back in time and change things, so this is where his choices put us, and I don’t want to be with someone who was willing to betray and abuse me. Life is too precious and short!
It is truly unbelievable how I was taught that unacceptable behavior was acceptable. Rages, male dominate behavior, people pleasing, try again, be nice..good girls don’t talk like that. Later even therapists normalized my unstable X husband’s behavior making how he talked to and treated me and my daughter as normal because her own Dad did the same to her! Not learning to say NO and mean it, taking the blame as it’s your fault in all areas..the list is endless. My OB doc was arrested for using woman in his office practice and FINALLY accused of rape in the 1980s, but but he was so nice to me!! Times have changed a bit but the traffic of entitlement, power, money and compulsions, and those who intentionally lie and gaslight us, will never end. I don’t want to be an enabler any longer and have learned how to protect myself with letting go of 2 cheaters. I’m very well educated finally. I feel terribly for those who are trapped. Thank you Chump lady for teaching us the skills of a cheater and the means of escaping that cycle.
I agree with you, but looking at Trump etc I don’t think times have changed at all. I feel like they have become worse in some regards. Narcissism is celebrated to such an extent, it’s absurd. I recently watched “Social Studies” – scary stuff!
This is like we took the cheater back because he/she was better than being alone. Maybe 4 more years of abuse and we’ll catch on. Perhaps as a county we are mostly Chumps or cheater apologists or just afraid. Time to start on the exit plan or will we retake our vows??
I think narcissism is celebrated in our society; Trump is an uber-narcissist – checks out. Wealth is being celebrated instead of service. But I am extremely jaded about politics in general.
Aside: do you think there are instances in which it’s better to take back the cheater than to be alone?
Dear disfor, you asked me, 2x Chump if there is ever a reason to take back a cheater. I say yes sure IF you follow a few simple rules. Get a post nup #1, separate finances 200%#2, get your own credit cards and have a back up plan#3, always have him wear a condom 100% of the time no complaining and no any other variety of sex unless there is a barrier#4. Get a job, get your own friends, #5never believe one word that is spoken out Loud#6. Notice ANY rudeness, putdowns, sarcasm, pushing, guns present, meaness to children pets or woman and get out immediately at the first sign of him hurting others, not just you.#7BE PREPARED TO LEAVE, #8 Find a good lawyer and keep them very handy at all times for consultation. #9. Never skip a gyn visit and let your doctor know you remain with a ” former cheater”. Lab work should be routine condoms or not. I would add stay in counseling but I’ve had some therapist that liked both my cheaters and gave me advice that almost got me killed. So you’d have to find a therapist that support getting you safely OUT not those who want you to stay and play house with an unbalanced person.#10. Never close your eyes, the cheaters I had developed basement lives with increasing porn and computer use over years! I was with a sweet quiet second cheater who developed a second life over 30 years very slowly and stealth. When D day came it was out of control so it was OBVIOUS. Know cheaters are never cured but they can be nice for awhile. I believe taking a cheater back is like eating a poisonous blow fish. It can taste good for a long time until you take a bite of thr poisonous sac and then you die. I say SURE TAKE A CHEATER BACK but never close your eyes again. These are only suggestions from 46 years with 2 different cheaters. But what do I know?
Interesting. My response would have been entirely different: take back a cheater if otherwise you have no money and/or are homeless and if you are unable to work.
Whether you live under a bridge or in a mansion, listen to Chump lady. KNOW YOUR WORTH, FIND YIOUR WORTH, get on your own 2 feet and PROTECT YOURSELF. Otherwise, you may turn into someone elses, an abusers dependent victim. This is my experience. Hopefully never yours.
I’m wondering if Not Dead Yet’s experience working in the narc-filled media industry made marriage seem like a refuge in contrast. In other words, in trying to get a shield against workplace creepery, she fell– frying pan/fire style (or vice versa)– into the “protection racket” of marriage to a predator. What increases the risk of this is the fact that most predators excel in playing “rescuer/hero.”
I bring this up because I worked in media, though not the mainstream news and hardly on the level of interviewing presidents. But there’s one common denominator that a lot of women working in all tiers of media share: frequent brushes with the pervy, icky, sometimes downright dangerous Weinsteinian set.
I can attest that I probably got married too soon and had fear-based reasons for doing it and staying in it because of several extremely harrowing experiences working in independent media. Those harrowing experiences along with a thousand other less life-threatening creepy brushes also left me with a fear of economic hardship because that in itself– like any kind of perceived disadvantage of vulnerability (e.g., minority or immigrant status, etc.)– acts like blood in the water attracting creeps. I was told before I even left school to never act like I needed anything from anyone because it would put an instant “rape me” target on my back. But it’s really hard to feign financial security when you’re struggling. The dogs can smell it.
In short, what I really wanted was a body guard and somehow thought the ring would act like Wonder Woman’s bracelets to magically deflect perv barrages or scare a few back. I, too, quit after having kids. This was after I discovered that even being blatantly pregnant didn’t actually shield me from creeps because a psycho boss– who later ended up in global headlines after allegations surfaced that he’d sexually assaulted almost a dozen teenage interns — triangulated with another creep he’d contracted (who also ended up in headlines for later emotionally abusing child performers) and nearly drove me into preterm labor.
Over the years, I’ve learned never to share all my scary workplace perv sagas with people outside media or showbiz because “uninitiated” people either think you’re making it up for attention or “must have done something” to “attract” so much creepery. But the fact is that related fields are simply glutted with it and it’s unavoidable. In fact, if I meet women who work or worked in showbiz or media who don’t have similar stories and act like they walked between the raindrops, I end up wondering if they either went along with it or served the rapey honchos in other ways like pimping other women or covering up harassment. Or else some who are still working in these fields may be too terrified to bite the hands that feed them by talking about it or even identifying it.
Maybe more than money or power, malignant narcissists and psychopaths may be especially drawn to any field promising fame (“immortality”). The media can often dangle all three brass rings, plus it creates the perfect conditions for sexual harassment and exploitation because of the endless supply of aspiring young people grappling for very few opportunities at success in these fields.
In other words, there’s an alternative way to view someone’s seeming attachment to married status and economic security other than simply an idle excess of materialism or internalized patriarchal bias against single women. Both things– married status and the trappings of economic security– can be perceived as shields against very scary realities and as refuges from trauma. But, like the Roman poet whatshisname wrote, “Who will protect us from our protectors?”
THIS SO MUCH! I couldn’t agree more. All of it. I have had to deal with a lot of NPD also in my workplace and don’t know what to do anymore.
“ny kind of perceived disadvantage of vulnerability (e.g., minority or immigrant status, etc.)– acts like blood in the water attracting creeps.” Yes, that as well. My abuser explicitly wanted to find out whether I had been abused and was close to family because he wanted to abuse me (and did).
NDY – “Fuck your lifestyle.” Unfuck your mind, unfuck your heart, unfuck your soul.
LOOK at this man you are considering spending your golden years with! Others in Chump Nation may disagree with me, but I believe there is a huge difference between a FW who ostensibly falls in love with another person, and a FW who you are describing here who repeatedly preys on the vulnerable. By which I mean: I assume that most people who go to a doctor do so because they are physically ill in some way. (If they are not ill and are just in for a yearly check-up I don’t see how a relationship would develop, I could be wrong.) A doctor is in a position of authority and specialized knowledge, whose entire job is to help those in need. And your FW decides to help himself instead. I don’t mean to absolve all of his APs of their responsibility, but the person in the power position (your FW) should be the responsible one. Having been married to a doctor for so long I’m assuming that many of your friends are also in the medical field. What percentage of them do you think are abusing their authority? Is it okay with you if they are? Is it normal, reasonable, sane?
LISTEN to your self: I’ve got some STDs and an “absolute effin’ nervous breakdown” but my master bedroom is to die for! NDY, we’ve all been there. Denial, hopium, crushing fear of what is in the future. But please do this one thing if you decide to stay with this predator: live your life with him in joy. I am close in age to you, so I understand that at this point in life we hear the countdown clock tick tick ticking… So if you decide to stay, drop the nervous breakdown, accept the reality of your husband, accept the reality of what you yourself value in life. There is only time enough to live each day we have left in peace and contentment. Choose carefully. And if you do choose to kick the sob out on his arse know that Chump Nation has your back. We have lost money, health, status, extended family members, etc. and I would say 99.999% of us are SO EFFIN’ RELIEVED to have our dignity and peace of mind back. Along with recovering our money, health, our own status, and friends and family that truly care about us.
You make some really great points but I don’t quite agree with your view that FWs who “fall in love” are a lesser tier of creepy than those who abuse their authority or power for the sake of short term bangs. For one, it presupposes that any domestic abuser is even capable of anything resembling love. Secondly, chumps are the most vulnerable, disempowered victims in either dynamic. Thirdly, all witting APs– unless they were, say, economically desperate single mothers who feared being fired or worse by pervy bosses– are co-abusers.
In an ethical sense, I admit it’s a tricky comparison. For instance, I think it’s still evil for one member of an organized crime gang to abuse and kill another. The law agrees that the fact that the victims in cases like this were likely terrible people doesn’t take away from the fact that the perpetrators are dangerously sadistic criminals in their own right. But I think most people civilized societies still see it as morally worse when innocent people are abused or killed even if both acts should be prosecuted.
In that sense, the deception and abuse of a clueless, unconsenting chump is, at least in a moral sense, considerably worse than weaker sharks– particularly those who are knowingly sharking against the innocent– getting eaten/exploited by bigger sharks.
I see your points, and it’s not a black and white issue. I would really like to hear other Chumps’ pov on this. Anyone else have thoughts?
I agree with HOAC. They’re all users. The ones who leave for “twu wuv” are no different at their core from the ones that want to keep their appliance in place while they serial cheat. The “Twu Wuv” ones just use the noble “love” theme as a means of securing more / greater / new supply. It plays better to the punters in the social sense too. But how many did they cheat with before the “twu wuv” too? The chump will never know the truth.
It’s all part of their game. They are the predators, we are the prey. Cycle of abuse is the same in its essence.
We all need to get off it, for good.
Good points Samsara
I don’t think chumps are always the most vulnerable in the situation. See my comment further up. The very first time I was a chump, I was not the most vulnerable. The other woman who was on suicide watch was. (And that’s why he chose her.) In my last “non-relationship” (if it always consists of abuse, it ain’t one), I was more vulnerable than his fiancé – she knew of me, I had no idea she was in his life nor that they were engaged. Having said that, what she does not know is that all he wanted was financially abuse me. Nor does she understand that he is pretty much exclusively autoerotic – bar a few men. Grim all around.
Sleeping with your patients must be more of a thing than I (chumpy, naive me) thought it was. I’ve been married three times; twice to registered nurses. I met them at work — I am a registered nurse as well. BOTH of the RN exes slept with patients or the family of patients.
The abusive Jesus cheater (AJC) slept with a teenaged patient at the residential eating disorder clinic where he worked — he was in his 20s. He later slept with an in-patient in a mental health facility. (Had I known that while I was still dating him, I would not have continued to date him. Sadly, he saved that gem for one drunken night AFTER we were married.) Every nurse knows what a horrendous breach of professional ethics it is to fornicate with the patients. I could not believe it at the time. There may have been more, but. not long after that, he tried to strangle me to death and dumped me on the highway with the clothes on my back and my dog.
Eleven years later, I married another co-worker — different hospital, opposite coast. The CAD (Cheating Abusive Douche) had slept with the wife of his patient. Another colleague told me this story, AFTER we had dated for five years and then got married. When I confronted the CAD, he said he was doing her a favor because she had “needs,” and her hospitalized husband couldn’t satisfy them and she couldn’t have an affair because she lived in a small town. (Huh?) Turns out that wasn’t the only time . . . . After the 23 years we were together, I heard other, almost as unsavory things about him, but that shocked me to the CORE.
I’m 69. I’m divorced for the third time. At the age of 62, I left the CAD with what I could carry and my dog. I had no home, no possessions except what I could carry in four LL Bean boat bags, no car, no family or friends within a thousand miles, no job and no income. I drove a thousand miles to my best friend’s home. She had just lost her husband who was a good man with a bad disease — a rare and universally fatal form of cancer. I lived in her basement for 2-1/2 years. When the divorce was final six months after my 64th birthday, I got a job. (Because I was NOT going to pay alimony to the CAD.). It’s been seven years since the day I left him. I own a car, my own condo and the furniture to be comfortable. I did much of my shopping at Goodwill for awhile, but I am happy. I love my cute, quirky and PEACEFUL condo. I love the scent of my hickory floors when I open my door. I’m happier than I have ever been with one of the shitty men I chose.
To the letter writer: Money isn’t everything. At 69, you have a decade or three left. Wouldn’t you rather live it happy in a smaller home surrounded by things that make YOU happy?
Wow, that “I needed to service her” thing is DERANGED! Uff.
Well, for what it’s worth (and yes, I know you’re an RN as well) the mothers of all three of my FWs were nurses. I think it’s the power aspect that draws some NPD/Dark Triad to the job.
Ruby you are indeed mighty! Feels great to be a badass, right?
Dirty toilet seats? Lapses in personal hygiene? Gusty winds? Spontaneous bacterial generation?
I don’t know about everyone else, but when I was fully in love and invested in my former partner, I was looking for ANY excuse not to believe the truths staring me in the face.
And yes, speaking as a male, condoms suck compared to bareback sex. But, you use them if you have to for your partner’s peace of mind and/or actual need.
This guy never thought about his wife’s peace of mind or needs in promoting a healthy, monogamous relationship. Because he’s an immature scumbag.
And I haven’t read further, but is anyone else getting that feeling that this situation is reminiscent of Gisèle Pélicot? Not the same, obviously, but older woman discovers the long marriage she had with what she thought was a loving husband turns out to be a nightmare husband type of thing? That was my immediate thought as I was reading this.
I hope she gets a grip on what matters in life and gets away from this scumbag as quickly as possible.
The bit about someone discovering they’re married to a monster– not the upstanding, loving individual they were led to believe– also reminded me of Gisèle Pélicot.
It also made me think of a theory related to pessimism that, the reason a lot of people adopt pessimistic attitudes is so that they’re only falling from a shorter “height” in the case optimistic views and assumptions are crushed by misfortune. In other words, people will do almost anything– even preferring to feel sort of blue all the time– in order to avoid that kind of catastrophic crash.
How can you even look at this pervert?
I’d say a change in lifestyle might be just what you need. Give up the big fancy house or whatever else you think you need and figure out how to live a life that’s authentic. You don’t need marriage counseling, then, and you can carry on with your individual therapy as you work on building that more authentic life. Let him figure out how to pay for 5 different types of therapy for what ails him–which strikes me as way over on the sociopathic end of Cluster B disorders.
How can you look at him knowing he abused not only you but the patients in his care? A young friend of mine married her college sweetheart and had kids with him before she learned he was having an affair with a student. She left immediately and never looked back, two traumatized kids in two, one of whom was just a few years younger than the high-school age victim. There isn’t enough money in the world to make living with this guy worth it. If you sell your house, your share will almost surely allow you to buy a nice condo someplace. You (and I) are at the age for downsizing and preparing for the issues of aging. But leaving gives you a chance to re-align a value system that’s been corrupted by living with a sex predator.
Your blog and book have been in my life for years and so very helpful. Today’s post really hit hard, in a good way. I was never safe! Those are the words resonated to my very soul when I read them. I’ve been searching for and needing to hear those very words. It makes so much sense, something that is hard to find in your own self when your in an abusive marriage. 35 years with a cheater who f’d friends and members of my dance company, hid money and made me scrape by and use any money I got to support me and the kids buy all presents for birthdays and holidays cause he never had any money. 7 years divorced with Narcula taking almost everything from me, which he always threatened to do, and leaving me poverty level while he enjoys a lifestyle I helped created with the latest idiot who still believes him. I wanted it all back because I thought he took away my safety net for old age. But I was never safe! Truer words were never said.
Dear NDY,
The one thing I want to add to the many good comments above is this: the fact that you’re still living under the same roof with your husband is greatly clouding your judgment.
Like you, I was powerfully attached to my then-husband, even after D-Day. And though we immediately went into separate bedrooms when I discovered his cheating, I wasn’t able to identify my true feelings about him (and about the marriage) until we moved out of the shared house. Every time your husband brings you coffee or speaks to you in a loving voice, your deep imprinting takes over, and you get pulled, pulled, pulled away from your better judgment. What will bring clarity is physical separation. (Sticking with CN will help too.)
Now that I’ve been physically away from my ex for seven months, I can see what a menace he was to me. He wasn’t ever abusive in any of the more obvious senses, and in many ways was a good, supportive friend and ally; but I can now see the degree to which I was a “thing” to him, and it shocks me. I am glad to be away from that darkness.
By “darkness,” I mean things like this: You mention that your husband explained his (utterly compulsive and sick) transgressions by saying that in the beginning, “he was angry and resentful that I quit my job to have a baby and constantly overspent.” So this is a person who, like my own ex, handles the ordinary tensions and resentments of a marriage not by coming to you to share his heart and his worries, but by planting grenades that in time will blow up in your face (the STD’s, the devastating discovery of infidelity, the desecration of the marital bed, the introduction of people like the drug-making criminal into your world). This is a really poisonous personality problem. It extends way beyond infidelity, and makes your husband a danger to anyone who gets close to him, even though at first it’s hard to believe this.
Speaking for myself, it’s still quite hard to accept that I chose this character-disordered person to build a life with. But I did, and now must do the work of rebuilding.
Wishing you strength in this part of your journey.
Yeah dick tingles. It took me a few minutes to work it but CL is right as per usual. I was working through all my brainwashed conditioned responses first (as to why the confession now) – obviously I’m not so naive that I thought he had actual remorse, but dementia so no filter, or some victim finally threatening to expose him – but nah, dick tingles.
My idiot FW confessed to all sorts of baddie moves, doubt even half of them were true – just an irrelevant loser, just like this old wrinkled up sack of shit.
Dear NDY, was he a known cheater in more conventional ways? Did he cheat on his ex-wife? It sounds almost like you had made peace with the idea of him occasionally cheating or flirting, just not as a sexual predator on his patients. If so, that’s just very wrong and sad and might make it that much harder to leave. But CN is here to say, ‘No’ to any form of dishonesty and disrespect. It’s all abuse. It’s not acceptable. Just, no. Cut all ties, and you’ll begin to heal.
Not Dead Yet needs to understand that when you don’t have any “good options” from which to choose from, then you need to look at the options that you do have and choose the least worst. And staying with her FW because ….. “lifestyle” …. is not her least worst option. She should be looking to get out, get a fair settlement and make sure that she is well and truly insulated for the time when the crocodile of consequences comes snapping at her husband’s ass ….. because sooner or later that is what is going to happen.
And I did have to laugh when Not Dead Yet said that her husband was making her coffee in the morning. Ex-Mrs LFTT used to make a lovely chicken, ham and mushroom pie, but that wasn’t reason enough to stay married to her; it was reason enough to work out how to make my own version, and make it better than she did,
LFTT
I’m guessing that what is most holding her back is the fear of a lifestyle downgrade. Having a horse can be expensive. And not to blame the victim, but her FW’s accusation of “overspending” , along with the comment about her beautiful home and redoing the bedroom (ugh, glad Chumplady pointed that out), suggests that she really likes having lots of money to spend. It’s kind of like having a “golden handcuffs” soul-eating job that pays extremely well and not wanting to consider a more fulfilling, though lesser-paying job. I hope she comes to realize she’s NEVER going to get back what she THOUGHT she had—a devoted, high-earning husband. Even with a good settlement, she will have to change her mindset about money—which is not a bad thing at all.
I hope she takes the time to read the accounts of the many heroic, mighty men and women on this site with little money and the responsibilities of caring for young children. (including Chumplady) who have gained magnificant, happy, fulfilling lives after they left a FW. The process of divorce sucks, to be sure, but it beats the prospect of being tied forever to someone who repeatedly betrayed you and is still making your life miserable.
If it came down to keeping my horse versus keeping a toxic sex addict husband and living in the house of my dreams, I would move into the barn with my horse 🏇
She does not have financial security with him now anyway. He could be sued — by multiple people — at any moment. She loses a lot by staying, on every level.
This morning I commented on this story but I just reread it. Now I don’t feel so bad!! My husband –now big X husband only told me about ONE coworker he grabbed in a patient room at work and she called HR and he was under review. I called my lawyer and filed in 10 days because I knew he was a preditor by his own description with one coworker along with his entitlement. And I saw most but not all of his lies. I was 69 and divorced at 70. I lost half of everything and I’m lower middle class. I have my self respect back and my courage. I am so proud for standing up for myself. Every day I am proud. Yes I have PTSD as I now see and understand the snake I was living with and how he charmed a whole church,x2 pastors , elders and woman. These people are PREDATORS and there is a reason they are charming and can vacuum and take care of everything for you while they extract your worth and poison your mind.
I don’t feel sorry for volunteers who stay for wealth, titles, good behavior or believing lies after they know what they have. All the therapy in the world will not buy courage or self Worth. I don’t care how old you are.
First, I am so sorry you are here. It sucks. Really totally sucks. And as someone who is actually older than you (Yes! it is true! There are women in their 70s on this site!), I can tell you, there is stil life ahead. No, you will never recoup all the years you lost.But there is a good life ahead. It is waiting for you. You do have to go through some hell first, I am sorry to say. But the sooner you get going, the sooner the better life will emerge.
My ex FW cheated on my for over 3 decades. Many women in many locations, many time zones. Road trips, lots of drinking, bars, beaches, golfing, restaurants, shopping, shows, movies, cruises, lots of boat rides all over the coasts–he liked that–parks, concerts, museums, you name it. He did it with one of many women, before and after what went down in his hotel rooms, their homes, friends’ homes, cars, cruises, and more.
I ws in my late 60s and he was in his 70s when I first began to discover all the sordid years of cheating. I am 6 years his junior, an educated (PhD.), multi-lingual, successful, very slim, petite and attractive life-long athlete who holds all sorts of age-group records in 5Ks and 10Ks. And still races 1-2x/month. He “traded down,” for all sorts of women, some of whom were sex workers, and others who felons, alcoholics, and generally failures at life. He recorded phone conversations, took videos and photos, saved emails, voice mails and texts, and boy, reading and listening to some of that…how low can you go.
So, though we may have slighlty diferent stories, I pretty much get you. And I can tell you this. You will eventually be okay. If you were here in the western US, we’d meet up for lunch and I’d listen and hear you.
I had a great theraipst I stiil see once a month. Couples therapy was brief and a waste for us. There was no coupleship. He was fraud for over 3 decades.
Yes, I have a fabulous adult child, who I enjoy visiting with and texting and talking to you.
But I live alone, happily and healthily. I travel. I go to the gym, book clubs, religous services, lots of lunches with friends, weekly manis pedis, weekly massage thearpist,all the good things in life, with no risk of STDs.I made my final arrangements, got a plot in the cemetery, and am living it to the max until the end. I was at tues the major bread-winner and at times an equal bread- winner. And did almost all of the parenting and everything else. More than pulled my 95-pound weight. Much more.
Get a great individual therapist, good, supportive friends, ditch the ones who are not helpful and stay on this site. It wil really suck for awhile. But Tuesday will come.
Stay on here.
Dear NDY,
I guess I want to add another comment to my earlier one. And I say this with the utmost respect and sympathy.
Like 20th Century Chump, above, I see flags in your letter that make me wonder if you might have an attachment to spending (and lifestyle) that you haven’t entirely investigated, and that is really holding you back. I say this, again, with great sympathy. A sibling of mine has a spending addiction, and I’ve seen how it can affect a person’s life for the worse.
I urge you to have a look at websites devoted to compulsive spending, to see if there’s something there that might speak to you. There’s also a 12-step group (I’m a great fan of those) called Spenders Anonymous, though I don’t know anyone who has joined that group in particular.
Just offering that thought, in case it helps you on your path toward freedom. Sending hugs.
I was wondering the same thing. A house with guestrooms, not just one, and I can attest that horseback riding can be a very expensive hobby if one participates in shows. Owning a horse and all its expenses, a riding kit to wear, entry fees, a trainer, etc.
I am curious what happened to this creepy, pervy doctor’s first marriage ? How did it end ?
I read online obituaries posted in the news from the town I grew up in across the country. Learned the parents of one of my classmates had a gray divorce. They had a long marriage after meeting at Brown and the first Mrs. S. was an equestrian. Dr. S’s second wife survived him and she’s twenty years younger. Seems to be a lot of cheating amongst doctors.
As someone who left a 35-year marriage in mid-life, I relate to all the struggles you outline. But I want to encourage you that with distance comes clarity. Right now you are still so trauma-bonded to this man that it’s difficult to imagine life without him. But it’s time to stand up for yourself, and a part of you knows this or you would not have written your letter.
Have you been following the case of Gisele Pelicot in France? She’s 72 and voluntarily taking public the horrific sexual abuse perpetrated against her by her ex-husband and scores of men with secret basements. Her bravery gives us the courage to stay angry, because it’s only justified anger at the outrages of abuse that will propel us out of these relationships. As she says, “it’s not for us to have shame; it’s for them.”
Besides a daily (maybe even hourly) dosage of Chump Lady and Chump Nation, I recommend you read Why Does He Do That? by Lundy Bancroft. It takes a while to get it through our heads that the partners to whom we devoted our lives are abusers, and to, as Tracy writes, put down the hopium pipe. The very nature of abuse makes it incredibly unlikely that an abuser will change. Your abuser didn’t disclose this to you now because he’s remorseful; he did it as part of a strategic calculus for his own sick reasons, and to benefit him, not you.
One of the things I loved most about attending the Chumpalooza conference a year ago was meeting in person with over a hundred people who are all in various stages of leaving cheaters and gaining new lives, and finding that it’s almost a ubiquitous experience that as we begin the legal proceedings, and our cheaters are confronted with the financial consequences of their actions, that we experience the true horror of the monsters behind the masks. Take courage, friend. Gisele is standing up to her monster, we have all stood up to our monsters, and we’re here with you. You can do this, and one day you will be writing messages of support to someone who comes behind you.
My mom was 64 when she kicked my Dad out. He had just inherited a lot of money which she wasn’t entitled to, so it sure shocked him. Being treated like a second class citizen while his Royal Narcissist feted other women never made her want to make a deal with the devil for a more comfortable lifestyle.
Not Dead Yet– my D-Day was a long time ago and Chump Lady gave me the clarity and gumption to get out and survive the trauma. You will too. You have gotten lots of good advice here I won’t repeat. But I will tell you two things.
First, don’t let the sad sick story of what he did to you be the last story in your life. Get out, divorce his ass, and start your new life. Maybe you’ll eventually date, maybe you’ll meet someone else, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll travel with your kids, or start a new business, or rescue more horses, or vacation in exotic locales. But the story will no longer be “what he did.”
Second, once you get your ducks in a row with your divorce lawyer, you must go no contact with and about him. Never lose sight that he is a sick and dangerous man. And every contact with him will set you back immeasurably.
When my divorce was granted, my sister texted me- “You are finally free of the lies.” That is what I want for you. Sending hugs.
Oh wow, this is horrible! I’m so sorry you are going through all this. My husband was buying prostitutes for 17 years of our 24 year marriage. He is a documentary film maker, many of which focuses on abuses of women. He’s made fast friends with many of them and they see him as a hero for shedding light on how they were abused. It’s completely crazy to me that he could emotionally abuse me for so long AND abuse women who are most likely trafficked, coerced, or stuck in sex work. My husband is also deeply regretful, is doing a lot of therapy etc., and has registered for Dr. Minwalla’s intensive course as he feels that his model resonates most to him (he has said that he felt entitled to prostitutes, and he knows that makes no sense). My therapist has also told me I should write a book about our situation. Good luck to you. I’m waiting to see how the Minwalla course goes before making any decisions, but after 7 months from discovery day and emotions of shock and sorry dwindling, I’m feeling more disgust and indifference.
Wait, you know that he chose that subject for his documentaries so that he could abuse more women, right? So that he could have greater access to sex workers. The hypocrisy and deception and cruelty are mind-blowing.
It doesn’t matter how the Minwalla course goes for him; do you want to be married to someone who can abuse women and yet act like a hero / savior to women?!? How would you ever be able to trust a word he says, or a single action he takes? Why hang out with that?
Spot on FYI. Dude is “virtue signaling” (image management) and yet his “work” with his “fast friends” (like all predators) conveniently puts him exactly where he wants to be: among sex workers and trafficked women. Access for him in other words.
Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. Just so gross.
Oh and now he is doing Omar Minwalla’s course??? WTAF
So he learns all the CSAT lingo so he can gaslight the very victims whose abject abuses he claims to be “shedding light on”
Jfc
This guy is bad to the bone and worse.
HOAC needs to chime in here!!
I’m with FYI here. Reading that was painful – cause we can see it and she can’t or doesn’t want to.
My FW was cheating on me from before I supported him through med school and continued right on along until D-day 30 years later when I was 52 and he confessed. He spared me a lot of confusion by not weeping or bringing me coffee. It took me a couple of months, but I left his MD ass. Believe me, it was EASY to untangle with no dependent children and a big house to sell (also, I managed the investments, so that was helpful!). You and I are so lucky. I now have a cute little house that I am decorating in stages.
Thank you all so much for taking the time to respond to my post today, especially bc it was as long as Pride and Prejudice! I will follow your kind counsel and I will make you proud and myself as well. Shortly after Dday in March, this saying floated across my Instagram page: “I don’t walk away to teach you a lesson. I walk away because I learned mine.” I may get that tattooed on my butt for Emancipation Day. I will be back to write a sequel.
Don’t tell him you’re leaving! Keep everything between you and your lawyer and move in secrecy.
I don’t mean to be dramatic, but your husband is a criminal and a serial sexual predator. Please be careful as you get away from this dangerous person.
I can tell you now that with the perspective time has given me (from d-day), despite my remaining love for him, I’d be leaving if I had the financial means to. I feel trapped with my financial situation and that my options would be much wider if I could. That doesn’t mean that I don’t still love him, I do, it wouldn’t be so agonizing of a choice if I didn’t, but what Chump Lady says above, I was NEVER safe in this relationship, I was just a frog in a pot of boiling water. I was unaware of the hot mess I was in. And my husband sounds very similar to yours in recovery. He is really trying. He is remorseful. He cries at stupid unrelated small convos because he’s terrified these will be the last moments like this with me. He’s registered for Minwalla’s intensive program. He’s let me put any tracking apps on phones, cars, computers that I want. I can tell he really wants to be better. But in the end, it was 17 YEARS of buying human beings for sex, 17 years he stole from me – that’s nearly my entire motherhood tainted by his cum-trail across the globe while filming documentaries. Filming documentaries about vulnerable people, about abuses to those people – one film was literally about how sex workers were manipulated into doing crimes so they would be jailed rather than the abusers – and right after filming them, he’d be back in his hotel perusing his for his next fuck with sex “workers” (I hate using “workers” because many are trafficked and that’s not “work”). I love the quote you shared. It resonates and in this political climate that I’m personally unhappy with, I fear misogyny will grow, entitlement to women’s bodies will grow, lack of regard to fidelity will grow… on & on. As a woman of the world, what message am I giving to my children by staying? To the world, whether they know it or not? To the vulnerable women in the sex trade? To myself? I really hope you can find a solid answer that you feel confident about. Remember that he was abusive not just to you, but your family, finances, patients, job, etc. Can you get past all that? I’m unsure I can. I’ve told him that in the end, I know I can get past this (forgive it? Nah.), but I don’t know if I can get past that he did this to our sons & all those women (hundreds!!! and tens of thousands spent – like over $60,000 as a conservative estimate). He lined the pockets of the men in power of sex cartels. That’s not even including the probable tens of thousands (hundreds of thousands???) women he lusted over online with porn. Can he change to be a “good” person, maybe? or am I being manipulated to save his reputation in his field? and with family & friends who know so he appears “worthy” of the fight to stay together? or to keep his relationship with his one son who is on non-speaking terms with him? or because he’s now in his 50’s and he realizes living in old age without a partner might be a little tougher than while young, especially if he becomes ill or injured? or, maybe, just maybe he really does love me and wants to do better – but why should I believe he loves me NOW when he didn’t for 2 decades? Love is an action. He ALWAYS had one foot out the door and now he wants to jump in with both feet suddenly? I’m skeptical.
Dozens, if not hundreds or thousands, of people on here have left without a financial safety net.
Get. a. lawyer.
Do it now.
Agree with Samsara that you are toking deeeep on the hopium pipe. How do I know? Because you keep focusing on him and what he is up to (taking a course, crying, worrying about his reputation, staring down the future, etc. etc. etc.). Also because you are flat-out stating “maybe he really loves me” and “can he change to be a good person.” 😱
No, and no.
If it gives you any perspective, yours is one of the most horrifying stories I’ve seen on here.
You should be skeptical.
You should also run like your hair is on fire. (CL quote!!)
Don’t stay to help him manage his image.
Leave to save your own: pride, dignity, integrity, authenticity…
All. The.Things.
None of which your husband has. None. Don’t let him drag you further into his evil cess pit of his own choices and making.
That’s all part of the con.
He lives to see if he can get you to accept this toxicity and accept him.
Duper’s delight (part of his game)
and also:
Forgiveness grooming as 2 x chump calls it. This term is so accurate!
And you are toking super deep off the Hopium Pipe. Deeeeeeep.
Put the pipe down.
Hundreds of sex workers / escorts / prostitutes / trafficked women???
How safe is your health??
What about the underaged ones you don’t (yet) know about?
What about all the lies???
You can never trust this person
You do not know this person.
He does not want to jump back in to your relationship with both feet!
What he wants is to avoid consequences!!! And groom you for the inevitable “relapse(s)” as you try to work through this with him.
Why should you though?
He broke any covenant between you.
You owe him nothing.
He didn’t need you to work through anything with him when it was all about his hundreds of extra-marital dick tingles, and when you did not know.
Why should you participate in his “recovery” now? That only helps him but it hurts you. And it will never stop hurting you.
There is no love in him…. he is a great pretender. He thinks he has you fooled.
Buys flesh? Objectifies women? Virtue signals about abuse of trafficked women?
This man is a sexual predator, a deviant and a deeply fucked up unit.
I met loads of these covert altruistic deviants in rehab. They don’t change. They just go deeper undercover. Not one of them stayed in sobriety and did not relapse. To clarify these guys were admitted sex and porn addicts. I was in for depression anxiety and PTSD. They were in our group therapy sessions so i heard many many testimonials of what they all got up to. It was horrific.
You can’t un-know it.
You can only save yourself!!
Please accept this well meaning 2 x 4 and please please leave him.
I didn’t read the blog yesterday, so sorry I’m late. My friend, I know about horse people. Your horse is one of the reasons you hate your options so much. Here’s the thing…if y’all get sued you could lose everything to bankruptcy, and in bankruptcy a horse is an asset. That you have to sell. Divorce this monster so you can take care of your daughter and your precious horse.
It’s nice to be in a big comfy house with a man bringing you coffee and doing the vacuuming. He’s being fake. He could be fake for 23 years, so faking it right now is easy for him. It doesn’t mean that he’s not out looking for more strangers to fuck.
He will eventually show you just how much he hates you. You know he hates you because you “made him” retire. That’s one gigantic narcissistic injury. Hell, I could imagine that he’s planning an accident for you. He thinks he’s smart enough to get away with it.
RUN!!
That physical danger is very important.