She Left Her Cheater a Goodbye Card
She’s saying goodbye to her cheater husband with a card and a special thank you. But not to him.
***
Dear Chump Lady,
You saved my life.
I found out my husband of 19 years was having an affair. I listened to your book, gathered the evidence, and then listened to all the shit that came out of his mouth. Everything you predicted a cheater to say and do, he did. I was absolutely floored, but I knew then what I had to do.
Yesterday, I dumped his ass. I then listened to your book again and although I know the next few months will be painful, they will be nothing compared to the emotional and psychological abuse this man has put me through.
I left him a card that you might like.
We had a reading of that damn poem at our wedding. I prefer my modified version now.
Thank you so much for your book and experience in helping me to get through this.
Kind regards
Liberated Chump
****
Dear Liberated Chump,
Wow. That is one hell of a book endorsement. If I had a better brain for marketing, I’d come up with a line of cheater goodbye cards. (But then would advise you not to send them, because if it feels good, don’t do it.)
Nevertheless, you left him with some panache. He’s probably wondering where his wife appliance has gone and has only a subversive blogger to blame.
I’m not worried about the blowback.
Over the years, I’ve occasionally heard from disgruntled cheaters whose chumps got uppity and left. They send hate mail like: Your book is the reason my husband left me. Yet, here I am.
Please acknowledge YOUR bravery. I didn’t tell you anything you didn’t already know. YOU are mighty. It takes guts to leave a cheater and start a new life. My book is part of a larger community rejecting the narrative that we have to put up with infidelity. We’re more like cheerleaders encouraging you during the leave-a-cheater marathon. (There’s a lot of puking — and pride — at the finish line.)
Thanks for letting me know my book helped you. It’s letters like this that keep me going.
Oh, and if your cheater is reading — GOODBYE!
If OP is asking for opinions, lose the “love” and “x” part with your name. Actually don’t even bother sending the card. I wrote a sappy letter about us losing our family & I regret it now. I realized after Fuckwit didn’t care. If they’re cheating, it means their heart (and genitals) have already left the building. Save your breath & time. It’s hard though, I get it. I heard if you cut them out with very little drama, your supposed uncaring reaction hurts them more than any drama could. Glad you found your way to Leave a Cheater!
Haha, I actually don’t regret one sappy “breakup” letter from my youth since it ended up acting as a kind of prank. The college boyfriend who turned out to be a “Don Juan-abe” tried to hoover back about half a year later, reminding me of the letter I’d written him. But, haha, I had no memory of even writing it much less what was in it.
He tried to prompt my memory with things I’d written in the letter and it was hysterically funny watching him falter and seeing his face fall as he realized I wasn’t playing games, I’d really just erased the event and had happily moved on. He didn’t even get the satisfaction of any lingering resentment on my part. Though I typically have no problems with memory and have cinematic recall going back to the age of one, I honestly still don’t remember even writing that letter. 😛
The moral of the story is probably mainly that players trying to get one over on happy-go-lucky teenage social butterflies do so at their own risk. Obviously, it’s a much different kettle of fish getting screwed over after twenty years of marriage and kids. Still, in retrospect I thought the experience might explain the mystery of why so many fuckwits keep circling back around and showing up like bad pennies in the lives of former victims or are so psychotically enraged when victims escape: because the love offered by people with integrity is actually real and tends to haunt like the memory of that once-in-a-lifetime meal you once had on a faraway vacation that makes everything you’ve eaten since seem a bit drab in comparison while the “wuv” offered by FW’s and their co-conspirators is basically gas station sushi or off-brand Cheetos in the final analysis– eminently “forgettable” either because one would rather forget the resulting violent nausea or because there was no substance to it.
I think that’s the upside of being chumps as the LW alluded to in the greeting card: once we recover from what was probably just Stockholm syndrome, anything that once passed for love completely disappears like it never existed… because it didn’t, not in a meaningful reciprocal way. Anyway, now I don’t really cringe over any wasted sappy or sentimental gestures expressed in the throes of confusion because I’ve seen how those things come back to bite assholes, not so much us.
I think the love and x were meant to be sarcastic.
They definitely were!
I feel dumb, but I can’t read the word that replaces “it” in the card.
Your deceit
Ah of course, thank you. My eyes are just not working clearly today.
Congratulations Liberated Chump!!! You are indeed mighty and all of us chumps are cheering for you!
Bittersweet win for sure but a masterclass on the best way to leave a cheater. Remember this as you move on to the “get a life” part. We are all cheering for your brains and bravery. But know that we are all here for you as you navigate the days ahead.
You did what so many of us here wish we could have done and I personally thank you for showing your cheater who is really the better one. He did not and never will deserve you.
And you are 100% correct when you wrote “Thank you Tracy Schorn” ❤️
Funny thing was, my divorce took over a year and it went before the judge on Valentines day, so the date stamp was 14 Feb 1991. Asshole never remembered my birthday or valentines day after the first couple years of marriage. Finally a Valentines gift.
😀
“Finally a Valentines gift.”
😄
I left a one-page letter during (low contact) separation reminding FW of all the challenges we had successfully tackled as a team. I thought he was simply overwhelmed by the idea of the emotional work of couples counseling. He never took it with him. I don’t know if he read it. It was a clear indication that our 30 year marriage was over.
For chumps who are frozen, look for reciprocity. It’s your clearest evidence.
I wrote him a note saying that I guess I would always love him. I hate that I did it, but it was the truth in real time. I had no way of knowing that of course that was not true, and that that I would soon start seeing who he really was and accepting what he did.
I think in my own way I was trying to touch a heart string so that he would snap back to the person I knew, I slowly learned the person I knew existed primarily in my mind, he was never anything but a cheating liar, only difference was now everyone knows.
This was in 1989, so no real support anywhere that I knew about. Aside from my family.
Read my comment above. I think it’s great that you pranked him because, haha “psych!”, you didn’t actually love him forever, did you? 😉
My 30-year-husband did everything he could to demolish me: moved us out of a house I loved and put so much time and effort into, to move me to another state with the promise of a grander house, only to one day say to me “we need to talk”. I got the “we’re not happy” speech and that nothing could be done to save the marriage. I nearly vomited and my heart was racing. I felt I was there but not there. My response to him was “get your stuff and get out.” I was left behind in a drafty rental on the coast of Maine in winter with no job and no home. He ran off with his 21-years-younger coworker. They eventually married and I hope she or he suffers the same fate as I did some day. I have no compassion for husband usurpers and if I ever met her in person I’d probably call her out to everyone in the vicinity. You’d think a 30-year-old woman would pursue a man closer to her own age. What does that say about her? She took away my partner in old age and all our memories together and she took away my security. She is a very selfish woman.
My also 30 yr marriage was destroyed when he was preyed upon by a husband poacher coworker, but my therapist told me the bulk of my anger needed to be directed toward HIM because she tried it with lots of man and only the ones with lack of character and integrity and other cluster B disorders became entangled in her sick web. This is her game, this is what she does, go after married men and break up marriages. He could have said no, he could have had her transferred (she was his subordinate), he could have done a million other things to honor his marriage vows and respect ME but he made the decision to cheat and lie and almost kill me with the pain and trauma. I don’t think their little soulmate love affair lasted very long but I’m 100% no contact. She was his life lesson and he failed. Now he will never EVER see his grandkids. He’s a pariah, toxic to all of us. I hope it was worth it. I never have, but if I ever saw the poacher, I’d pretend she doesn’t exist because she and him are dead to me.
Your therapist is right, but the AP’s deserve their share of the blame as well, lesser though it may be. My FW’s AP was of the same ilk as yours.
Oh she’s not exempt from blame, but you’d think that 30 yrs together would count for something and not run away with someone they have only known for a couple of months. It’s on him, the lack of character.
“I have no compassion for husband usurpers”
I agree, I think many (not all) of these poachers are looking for easy street, and they don’t have the attributes to attract successful young men, or even wealthy rich married men; so they go after the married middle class old goats. In hindsight I say thank God for them, and if I could change anything; I wish it could have happened when I was 30 instead of when I was 40.
I think most (not all) males going after married women are not after benefits, or money; they are just looking for cheap thrills, and it is likely rare that he marries her.
My favorite part of this is knowing the first thing Dickhead did was Google Tracy Schorn 🤔😯😆
OMG. I didn’t even think of that. But you are right, and I hope they started reading because no one has anything nice to say about FWs here.
Your book and your blog do really help. I remember how alone I felt and no one seemed to care or believe me and I couldn’t understand how he was acting. Then I found your blog and it was like wait, this is normal for them?! This is how cheaters act! I read so many stories and so many comments and was shocked to read other chumps sharing exact things he had said to me that their spouses had said to them!
I work retail and a woman asked me if I liked living in my city and I said yeah and asked her if she was considering moving. She told me about how she was getting divorced and her husband was a cheater. I said I was sorry and told her my ex was one too but I got called away after only talking to her for a minute but then I thought chump lady! and I tracked her down and asked her if she’d heard of chump lady. she said no and I told her there’s a book and a blog, find the blog. There are so many great people who participate there and they all get it. It really helps. I really hope she did.
Thanks for sharing CN with her.
I had penned a lovely “goodbye” letter filled with gratitude for all of the good parts and times of our marriage. I accidentally deleted it recently. When I found that I couldn’t recover it, I saw it as a sign to stop looking back and focus on my future. That, and I found his “goodbye” letter. A page long rant filled with all of my offences he’d had to endure and how I made him feel ashamed. Another classic example of “It’s not what I did, it’s your continuing trauma response to it that’s the real issue.”
I got the same “all your fault and you suck” rant from my FW, a few times in emails. For him, I wrote a eulogy in long hand and burned it in my fireplace. The smoke rose to heaven and God can do with it whatever she wants.
When we got married, he also got a new job with a lot of travel, so I wrote some little love notes on colored paper and sticky notes, and put them in his clothes. He then made it clear he not only expected them for every trip, he also expected one in every piece of clothing. He’d say there weren’t any in his socks, or he was disappointed there weren’t any in one of his t-shirts. It became a chore to write new ones every trip for every pair of socks, briefs, .undershirts, shirts and pants. I wrote little poems specific to what he was doing on the trip, where he was going, what clients he was meeting, how he would succeed, the wonderful things they’d say about him. It took a lot of effort, since he traveled a lot, and we were married for decades.
I also traveled for work, and he reciprocated just once. He was also stingy with gifts and other expressions of love.
I didn’t see the notes again until I was sorting out his stuff during separation. He had two gallon-sized plastic bags of my notes and the lavish cards I’d either made or embellished for every special occasion. I also found some cards from a colleague, and the inscriptions strongly hinted at an affair.
I assume he kept them because they fed his ego. I did NOT send them back to him with the rest of his stuff. I did send back the boxes of grocery bags full of receipts, everything form a hamburger to hotel bills, he’d saved and moved interstate since 1980. I mixed them in with the boxes of his clothes and other stuff I put outside for his friends to pick up.
I thought about burning the notes, thought about sending him photos of the little fire, then decided someday I’ll make artworks out of them, interspersed with the “wonderful poetry” his AP sent. He thought she wrote wonderful them for him, but when googled, they come up as five to seven lines from posts like “Fifty ways to say good morning to your lover.” They were always disjointed and discordant, since the tone of each line was different–chirpy, goth, profound, silly., etc. Haven’t made those collages yet, either.
This reminds me of something then tween did during separation. Cheater had hoarded hundreds of mostly empty cartons in the garage, and we had to flatten them for recycling. Tween would first write cheater’s name and words (including “liar” and “thief,” which were correct) on the boxes with markers, then stab them with a pitchfork before stomping them flat. I was concerned and talked to his therapist and mine, plus a few other professionals, and they all agreed it was cathartic, healthy, and should be allowed, particularly during COVID lockdown when tween had few outlets for anger.
I think the best notes we can all write are letters to editors and columnists when they run the RIC cheater apologist narratives, and maybe support letters to people we know are chumped. And refer all to LACGAL.
Wow. Just … wow. 😳 Unceasing entitlement.
I burned a lot of things. I dismantled a desk and put it out in the garbage. All of that felt great. He never deserved you. Put all that love to yourself and your child.
Liberated Chump, you are truly mighty! Your goodbye was courageous and creative. Way to go. Tracy’s book is fantastic. Her community gives us power when we’re demoralized and destabilized. I, too, feel stronger and righteous after discovering LACGAL. I internalized FW’s narrative for a year and a half. He suddenly informed me after 28 years of marriage that “we” were very unhappy together. He refused to go to counseling. He agreed to let ME buy the Gottman Method therapy course and try to repair the marriage on my own. I was so devastated by his sudden cruelty and contemptuousness that I begged and groveled in my attempts to ‘save’ our marriage. I discovered cold hard evidence of an affair 1.5 years after his behavior suddenly morphed from Mr. Nice Guy into Dr. Evil. Two weeks later, with lots of support from loved ones, I kicked him out and told him I wanted a divorce. But it wasn’t until I discovered Tracy’s community and book that I realized none of this was my fault. So many of his blaming tactics and non-apologies are EXACTLY as written in Tracy’s book. It’s like there’s a script for cheaters. Cheating for Dummies Who Think They’re The Smartest Person in The Room. I could go on. But just know I am standing with you, Liberated Chump. We will get through this, all of us, together.
Yes finding this community – I found it so late, but someone wrote “it takes the time it takes” here- made me realize there is a script! Who knew! It’s amazing how the three channels of self pity, charm and abuse go round and round. Lately, my “ruminations (working on it) go to- that his “romancing” of the other women was “poor me” stuff, or as Tracy says, “sad sausage” HAHA – “I never loved her” and “we don’t have sex ” (we did!) and so on. HAHA.. It makes me laugh. Good luck with that. He did that to me. Never again. Finally ( I repeated the pattern for years, as is common in DV relationships.) I am 3 and a half years now of a clear mind. It was not my fault. I did not deserve his abuse. Free (mostly) at last.
New here old chump — I hear you on the sad sausage stuff. These phrases are all things we can add to the script when we self-publish a satirical manifesto for cheaters. I can add: “We can’t help it if we fell out of love,” “we’ve basically been roommates for years” [roommates with benefits, actually…I didn’t get the full line up of STI tests just for kicks], “we have been unhappy for a long time” “we have had problems with our marriage for years” etc. And about that “we”: Are cheaters endowed with mindreading superpowers? Why do they blithely assume that chumps are on the same warped page as them? Ugh. So glad to hear you’re mostly free and inching closer to meh. The ruminations are tough. I’ve also been having nightmares about FW and his family, a hotbed of disordered personalities. I’m three months out from DDay and hoping the dreams fade away with time. Stay strong!
Kudos to Liberated Chump for being creative with her piss off card!
Sadly, the Fuckwits don’t really care. Their cheating is a clear sign that they are not invested and don’t love you. These people aren’t capable of love, only of abuse and destruction.
She said she was floored when she found out who he really is and all of us here can relate to having to pick yourself up off the floor after D-Day for sure. It’s so shocking to find out the person you loved and trusted with your life, was not only NOT who they claimed to be, but a really awful person you had no idea they were capable of being. We all want to get justice, get back at them and the only way to do that is to leave them. THAT is the only thing that hurts them because they lose the cake and kibbles and other services that us chumps provide. They will have to find someone(s) else to find it from and it will never be the same or as good as what we give them. That is our only retribution, is that we know they will never have it that good ever again!
It’s like Tracy has always said : It’s not our words that mean anything to the FW’s, it’s our actions. And really, just one action: dumping their asses!
Have a great weekend fellow Chumps!
Sorry to have to contribute to this one … Cummings (author of the poem on the card) was a total cheater fuckwit (also antisemite). He fathered a child with his first wife long before she divorced her then-husband, who was one of Cummings’ college pals. And that pretty much sets up the model for his relationships. And there was the daughter who found out as an adult that he was her father. She approached him at a party and introduced herself. He just looked at her and said something stupid, then ignored her. That must have been fun. Another day ending in y.
I’ve given up boycotting FWs and their art/science/politics. There’s too many of them and for whatever reason many, many of them are smart and talented. I was heartbroken when I found out that Paul Newman was a FW. Dave Grohl, Albert Einstein, Brad Pitt, Ingrid Bergman, LeAnn Rimes, Antonio Banderas…. (I now sound like my FW who told me it was okay that he was having an affair because everyone does it. He then rattled off names of people we knew who were betraying their spouses so, you see? It’s okay.)
My FW googled some stats and presented them to me. “See? The majority of people cheat!” he said, obviously thinking he had a gotcha.
I replied, “And….? The majority of people suck. I already knew that, have been saying it for years. You’re proud to be among the contingent that sucks, are you?”
FW then looked daggers at me and had nothing to say.
Oh wow my fw did that. Listed all his police buds who were cheating, and his best friend, whose wife was my best friend. I didn’t doubt most of the police officers were manwhores, but I don’t believe for a second his (our) good friend was cheating.
If I had it to do over again I would have told our friend what he had said about him. Not to hurt him but to let him know who he was dealing with. I never would have told his wife because I don’t think it was true and I wouldn’t up set her life for a liar.
Thank you for all the love!
I wrote this card for me, not for him, but then figured it seemed like a nice touch to leave it next to the oven for him to find. I also apologise for the atrocious hand-writing, I didn’t intend for this to be seen by many people!
It is very early days but Tracy’s book and blog helped me not to even entertain the ‘pick me dance’ (which I would have been tempted by) and realise my worth.
Dickhead probably hasn’t even bothered to google Tracy Shorn. He’s so far up his own ass.
I think the hardest piece of advice to take is that if it feels good, don’t do it.
LOL!!!! So many times I just wanted to do something after all of the things that have happened from D-Day and post-divorce regarding myself or my children. My lawyer is also told me “wear the halo” why do I want to take that halo off? Oh well. In the end, I’ll feel better that I didn’t retaliate. I just stuck to the contract and keep my emotions out of it.
Liberated Chump – Confidence, courage, communication and clarity are so important in a marriage. Congrats for mastering all of those in one shot!
I left my FW the lyrics to this Elvis Costello song written down on a piece of paper the day he came to move out his stuff. This was a week before I found Tracy’s work. I’m not sorry I did it.
The twitching impulse is to speak your mind
I’ll lend you my microscope so maybe you will find it
Is it in that ugly place that’s just behind your face,
Where you keep my picture still
Despite the fact that you had me replaced?
Say goodbye
Baby, can’t you act your age?
You know why
I’m gonna give it to you straight,
Although I’ll never be,
Unhappy as you want me to be,
Still it’s all the rage
I’ll probably play along
Left to my own devices
Spare me the drone of your advice
The sins of garter and gin
Confession may delay
You know the measuring pole
The merry boots of clay
I’ve heard it all before,
You’ll say it anyway.
Say goodbye
Baby, can’t you act your age?
You know why
I’m gonna give it to you straight
Although I’ll never be
Unhappy as you want me to be,
Still it’s all the rage.
Alone with your tweezers and your handkerchief
You murder time and truth, love, laughter, and belief
So don’t try to touch my heart, it’s darker than you think,
And don’t try to read my mind, because it’s full of disappearing ink.
Say goodbye
Baby, can’t you act your age?
You know why
I’m gonna give it to you straight
Although I’ll never be
Unhappy as you want me to be,
Still it’s all the rage.
Great lyrics. Sadly, Costello was a serial cheater in his first marriage. However, he may actually be a unicorn in that he has admitted it, taken responsibility (stating that he was an “arrogant bastard” in those days) and says he never did it again after seeing how heartbroken his first wife was when she found out.
It could be bullshit, but wouldn’t it be nice if there was one person who learned a valuable lesson from it.
Yep. Huge fan of the music, and unfortunately, totally aware of that detail as well! Over time, I have come to the conclusion that I’d never get to appreciate most art or entertainment if I screened all of my favorite pop culture through the same set of standards that I apply to the people in my personal life. Partially, these song lyrics were also a dig at my ex who is a musician and desperately wanted to be famous for his own material. Haha!
I love the shade!
Before I really understood what I was dealing with, before chumplady and a whole lot of therapy, I wrote him a letter apologizing for everything I must have done to cause him to cheat, deceive, and blow up our family. He was still coming over, trying to get me to fire my attorney which is what they do because they don’t like consequences, and I was feeling very guilty. He read the letter but left it here, thank goodness, because when my brain fog cleared, I was so happy he didn’t get to carry that around for impression management. And no, I didn’t fire my attorney and we watched him have a 3 yr long narc rage about losing control of me. Not listening to him was the best thing I ever did.
I sent my ex a 10 page email to his g/f’s email address. I did a lot of writing that felt really good when I was writing it. I went into his P of Fish that he forgot to close when he used my laptop and sent all the women on his favorites list each others emails. Sent a few personal emails to the ones he was professing his love to and changed his profile on POF. And was quite proud of myself.
Later I realized all I had done was feed his ego with my pain. The new girl friend stayed with him because my God, he must be really special if I was that heart broken over losing him and she must be REALLY special if she won the “pick me competition”.
Ten years later she’s going to court trying to get back the money she invested in this wonderful man with so much potential. And he had moved on the another “investor” who He is now taking to court because she didn’t invest her life savings into him.
The best way to leave is with no warning, no goodbye, crickets. Pack up and be gone when he gets home. No forwarding address, no contact.
Believe me, the faster you stop feeding his ego, the faster he will get bored of the new chump.
Write it all out if you feel better but then wait a couple of days before you send it.
A few months ago, UXWorld posted a few samples of crappy writing KK had done about her cheating. I laughed so hard at those and it inspired me to look at some of klootzak’s writings again. They were a hoot.
There should be some Friday challenges from this:
1) What you would want to write to FW but will never send (because if it feels good, we don’t do it – thanks Mr. CL!)
and
2) Examples of crappy writing from FWs where they think themselves special with poetry and “deep” thoughts.
It’s better to laugh. Beats the hell out of crying.
This one comes to mind immediately, and I quote: “You are cold, cruel, and heartless. I will miss you.” I have no doubt he does miss me, as Mrs. Bendover could not add two plus two using two hands (he fired me and gave her my bookkeeping job). The first sentence however…..
Haha
Good riddance to the clown.
He might get extra kibbles and love the centrality, but you did it for you, not him.
I sent a final text some time ago and he probably just laughed at it but it was for me- now there’s nothing unsaid and nothing more that needs to be said.
No regrets.
Congratulations!
Thank you! I know it gave him kibbles but I don’t regret it. He will throw it in the bin, just like he did with our marriage.
Just last week I was reading in my archeology blog of the statues they dug up in Italy. They found evidence of textiles drapped on their marble bodies, perfumes, and paint 🎨 to add the pop. Writing to a cheater any last words, Hallmark good- bye cards, closing remarks, whatever..is just like draping clothes, pouring perfumes and painting colors on a marble statue. It does nothing for the marble statue. Everything you see and hear is an act to either save cake 🎂 or stab you on the way out. I did the same and wrote a letter of all we had together and how much I loved him. I put in pictures of anniversary trips spanning 30 years. Crickets and a message from my lawyer that stated he was cutting my health insurance, wanted money or the house, needed his motorcycle from the garage for a trip to Colorado and lots more…Do what you feel you need to do, but yodeling would work better. At least you hear an echo.