UBT: The Real Reason People Cheat
Esther Perel is up in the clickbait again with more nonsense on the “real reason people cheat.” Entitlement isn’t on the list.
***
Esther Perel is grasping for relevance again, retreading her mindfuckery in a Vice article: The Real Reason People Cheat According to a Sex Therapist.
Guess what the real reason people cheat is?
If you guessed “shit character” you guessed wrong. No, the reason is… deadness! Cheaters are on a quest for aliveness — a phrase I’ve pilloried for at least a solid decade. The poor sausages just want sensory pleasure. A release from your stupefying dullness.
The Universal Bullshit Translator has been sunning its sockets in northern Michigan this summer and really did not want an Esther Perel interview before breakfast. But I kicked it into gear for you.
“Hey, LOOK ALIVE!”
The UBT reminded me it is a mere machine fueled by snark and Lebkuchen, and not alive. It doesn’t dwell on being an inanimate object, but promises it would not fuck the toaster to feel less dead.
Slow creeping ‘deadness’
In an interview with The Telegraph, Perel explained that after 45 years as a sex therapist, she’s come to believe that affairs are often a response to feeling disconnected from your own vitality. “Sometimes [the reasons] have to do with the relationship — rejection, betrayal, disconnection, or alienation. Loneliness is a big one,” she said. “Other times, the reasons are internal and have little to do with the relationship itself.”
The reason you caught Chlamydia from your husband’s hooker habit has little to do with the relationship itself. But maybe a tad. Feel better?
I know what would help. A deep-dive into what motivates cheaters! Their feelings, their unmet needs, their existential ennui.
Still, the biggest through-line she’s seen is this slow, creeping “deadness,” where intimacy morphs into routine, and passion suffocates under domestic familiarity. That’s when partners may start to drift—not necessarily because they’ve fallen out of love, but because they’ve stopped feeling alive.
You suffocated them with domestic familiarity. Take the pillow off their face just long enough to pay the bills and manage the childcare.
Rediscover your partner.
To counter this, Perel emphasizes the idea of “aliveness,” which she links to curiosity and what she calls “differentiation.” That means rediscovering your partner as if you don’t know everything about them.
I bet you had no idea about the hooker habit.
“It’s about opening yourself up to the possibility that you don’t know your partner as well as you think,” she said.
Have you run a credit check?
Instead of falling into the daily grind—school pickups, grocery lists, repeat Netflix binges—Perel urges couples to carve out space for play and unpredictability. “Play is essential,” she said. That could mean sharing weird stories, trying a new recipe, starting a ritual, or simply doing something unfamiliar together. The point is to see each other differently.
New recipes keep dicks from wandering. Put down the channel remote and make him dinner. The point is to see each other differently. This is not more domestic labor — it’s PLAY.
She believes that sustaining long-term relationships also means giving up the fantasy that your partner will one day become your mirror image. “You can’t make someone be exactly like you,” she said.
They haven’t nearly enough orifices.
“You accept your differences and understand that someone can do something for you that means nothing to them, and you can do things for your partner even if you’re not interested yourself.”
Okay, so you don’t like pad Thai. IT’S A NEW RECIPE! Formulated to make you feel ALIVE. Let’s blame the recipe if you cheat again.
So why do people cheat? Often, it’s not because they’re looking for someone else—it’s because they’re looking for themselves.
In other people’s genitals.
And that search, Perel says, starts not with fixing your partner, but with reawakening your own sense of desire and surprise.
Chlamydia! Surprise! Consider yourself reawakened.
This is just another way of saying that the FW needs to be entertained like a toddler. Shiny, exciting new things are the road to happiness. It is literally TODDLER expectations and I wish someone would just say it. They are stunted emotionally. The end.
💯%
They lack the ability to delay gratification. They want what they want NOW, they feel entitled to it, and they have zero empathy for anyone harmed by their getting it.
Spot. On.
Cread, you said it beautifully. And how exhausting to be the partner perpetually in charge of creating play for another adult. #TeamIt’sNotWorthIt
I am so glad that Ex-Mrs LFTT isn’t much of a reader (and particularly not the Daily Telegraph, where this article was published) ….. if she had ever started spouting Esther Perel’s BS at me I would have blown a fuse. She (La Perel) is an odious Cheater apologist who really needs to shut her yapper.
As for Ex-Mrs LFTT, I think that CN can guess what I think.
LFTT
Although I couldn’t open the article, the headline said she explained what makes people cheat. Makes–as if there’s some force compelling them. While she’s at it, let’s find out what makes arsonists burn down houses, employees embezzle employers, abusers beat their dogs and kids. It’s not their intentional choices, it’s the Force.
“It’s about opening yourself up to the possibility that you don’t know your partner as well as you think,” she said.
No kidding. We don’t know them beyond what they tell us because they’re cheating, lying and hiding who they really are, rather than being honest.
Right? It’s their fault we don’t know them, they’re the ones lying and constructing a false identity to fool us.
EP’s schtick is recasting (i.e., mischaracterizing) character deficits including a lack of maturity, impulse control, empathy, and basic adulting skills as societal oppression of Gallant Unflinching Fabulous Free Spirits (GUFFS). Her “understanding” begins and ends with a willful anmd self-serving ignorance of how certain choices inevitably cause inestimable harm to innocent bystanders. She is to understanding relationships what Jeffrey Epstein was to understanding standards of feminine beauty: a malignant predator.
Yes, to everything you said.
But also? All her theories fall apart when one stops and interjects with “then get a divorce FIRST. Leave the relatonship and then go find a schmoopie” The chump wasn’t creating enough play for the FW, they weren’t entertaining enough? Then the FW should have put on their big boy/girl pants and got a divorce.
We wouldn’t need to delve into what “makes” people cheat if people left a relationship that wasn’t suiting them, for whatever the reason.
But the problem there is..the FW wants cake. They don’t want to get a divorce. They want the chump AND the AP. And that has #$%^ all to do with the “shortcomings” of the chump and everything to do with the entitlement of the FW.
Truth right there. He wanted the chump and the cake eating (sex trafficked cake)
FW said “the kids don’t need you anymore” as he walked out the door.
He chumped me and used me like an appliance, thankfully not for sex bc he found
Ashley Madison and
Wellhello and
bedpage and
Craigslist
and “massages”
etc.
all recommended by men’s journal and Esther perel.
He couldn’t actually get an AP so he had to pay for stuff. And I kept the house and the kids and the dogs going so he could have a bigass career like Andy Byron.
Well, he may have shocked me to death, but I found CN and I get a life now that cheater ain’t in it.
Perhaps her ignorance stems in part from her lack of professional training. She holds a master’s degree is in expressive art therapy.
According to Wikipedia, that’s correct. She has an undergraduate degree in educational psychology. I note with great interest that she doesn’t have a degree in marriage and family therapy.
Esther perel never mentions family, kids, extended family. If you looked under her hood you’d see snakes and worms roiling around in feces.
*She holds a master’s degree in expressive art therapy.
Are you kidding?!
When I wrap myself in Perel-style guilt, I remember how unbalanced the effort in my marriage was. There is no doubt that FW’s comfort, amusement and ego were paramount. I was not perfect, but I was invested. He (and all cheaters) have the option of being an adult and leaving the marriage before starting another relationship.
To me, EP uses positive adjectives to describe adults who have the coping mechanisms of toddlers to preschoolers.
Her ‘exuberantly alive’ adults are far too immature to be in a long-term relationship so it’s honestly a kindness to set them free.
Ummm….isnt this the rational for a lot of maladaptive behavior? Imagine saying the drug addiction problem is due to people wanting to feel alive, etc.
Agree. One could even justify criminal acts on the same basis. It’s idiotic.
Exactly. And who cares what the motivation is of someone who harms you? EP assumes you should want to stay in that relationship (with her help). And that the victim of the maladaptive behavior should be invested in the cure.
So THAT’S what EP and my MIL have in common! What a crap investment…
The most freeing thng in the world is when you stop trying to figure out why shitty people do shitty things.
I recall the FW saying stupid things like…It was just something to do…It never crossed my mind that you’d find out/it was a problem/there was something wrong with it…none of it matters now. But yes, they will believe and tell themselves this sort of crap while doing such clearly idiotic behavior. It feels so good to no longer be invested or care. I highly recommend it. EP can write and think as she chooses. You do not have to buy into this.
Just something to do? Oy.
Mine said she had to cheat because I’m a narcissist, and she couldn’t come to me about her dissatisfaction. This is a woman who talks to everyone all the time and doesn’t have a clue when it’s not welcome. It’s embarrassing even to strangers. A woman who lies every day to make herself seem cooler. I insisted on counseling for a long time, and this stuff finally started coming out of her mouth the exact same month her affair went physical.
I don’t think she had an “aliveness” gap so much as a cake gap.
My FW told me he did it because he had too much free time. I told him that he should have been making me dinner. I do like pad Thai.
Mine used those exact words for his perusal and membership on gay and kink websites. Kinda like a genital version of crossword puzzles. Harmless, really.
45 years as a sex therapist?? I have a hard time believing that. Perel is 66. So she would have had to start when she was 21. In the US, it takes at least 6-8 years of education to become a therapist and some specialties require a phD.
So is she having us believe she’s some child prodigy who started training at 13?
Either she’s full of shit or her education is.
Well, Esther Perel is French isn’t she? So she likely has a more “liberated” take on how far one can push boundaries with their mate and how hurtful they are “allowed” to be to their partner.
To be fair, maybe the credentialing system is different in Europe. But I very much doubt it. I’d guess she’s skirting the edge of what’s legal there.
I have encountered sex therapists who consider when they started indulging in the depraved behavior they refer to as “sexual addiction” as the point when their professional life began. I literally knew who counted her time as a pimped streetwalking prostitute as part of her experience as a sex therapist. It’s a really messed up profession with a lot of seriously delusional and screwed up people. They aren’t Dr. Ruth anymore. They’re mostly just perverts trying to have sex with their clients and getting paid for it. So, prostitution.
Over the years Esther has been assiduously building up her experience from the back of multitudinous cereal packets.
I think there’s a hideous (and dangerous) arrogance in the combination of her stupidity and self promotion.
It’s really unfortunate because genuinely vulnerable chumps might be guided by this moron. Victims who actually need help.
Look at her bio on line, she’s parlayed some art therapy studies and a quickie counselling licence into a product she can schlep all over town.
She’s a big talker – snake oil seller. Esther strikes me as being very, very Fuckwit-esque herself. Greedy, cynical and inflated.
It’s crazy how many phd type psychologists dumb down their own extensive schooling and experience by pimping her on their websites and blogs.
So it’s both.
She AND her education are full of shit.
And I have been a gynecologist for 54 years because I first had sex with a woman at 18.
You have! Now go Tedtalk your way around the labia majora
Logged in just to say lol.
🤣 😂
I have no doubt that many, many criminals experience an adrenaline fuelled thrill leading up to/committing and recalling their crime.
Doesn’t make it right, doesn’t remove the stain of harm left on victims and doesn’t mean it’s behaviour flowing from an ordered person. Just means they felt a bit of a thrill stealing the car, raping the commuter, hitting the young guy with an iron bar.
Why is the feeling the violator experiences committing the violation a determinant of anything?
EP is a profit seeking, harmful, FW apologist.
Lack of consent Esther, it’s all to do with LACK OF CONSENT. Chumps never agreed, harm is perpetrated. Breathtakingly simple.
Ashley Madison tag line: for consenting adults (whose spouses haven’t consented). I swear Esther is getting a kickback
She’s just an abusive, personality disordered person advocating for other abusive, personality disordered people to be allowed to continue their abuse of others. It honestly makes me laugh at how ridiculous it is.
I was sick through a good part of my marriage, still having sex 3 times a week with him the whole time except for the three months after my traumatic birth of our son when I couldn’t. I couldn’t even use the bathroom without intense pain. I had an emergency c-section without the benefit of pain relief, they hit me with ketamine after I felt them reach inside my body and pull my son out of me, and then I ended up with a massive infection. Nobody knew I had an autoimmune disease back then. It was a mystery why everything went so wrong and nothing worked right. I was still hearing him bitch about that in our 20th year of marriage. That happened in the first year. He had to go three whole months without sex!
Because my illness was such a cramp on his style and so unfair to him, he slept with other women. I knew this and the burden of guilt and his claim that he was polyamorous and how dare I not accept his sexuality led me to tolerate it. I would sit alone at home while he went out with other women. I would have liked to feel alive too, Esther. I’m also a human being. He still lied to me. He only told me about the more acceptable ones and he hid all the really gross, high risk things he was doing. The things I wouldn’t have consented to and would have run screaming in the night from. That’s the norm with polyamory. They are not ethical. Two poly “communities” in two different states helped him lie to me. That’s not ethical. They decide it was ok because since I would say no to some things that would make me an abusive b*tch. I was never allowed to not consent and because I didn’t want to get gangbanged for his viewing pleasure and would not do that, that made me an abusive b*tch and so I deserved to be lied to. Once again, everybody forgot I am a human being too. I even had people ask me “but why wouldn’t you consent?!” Because I don’t want to…
So I let him do what he claimed he needed to do. I stayed home lonely and took care of the home and our family. But it still wasn’t enough. When he dumped me, women I trusted said “why are you worried about disease when you weren’t having sex?” Heart stopping moment, we were having sex right up until the end. Why did they think we weren’t? Did that conversation happen in our bed while I was at work? I wasn’t denying him sex. I would have been withholding it if I had known what he was really doing! I thought he was being safe and sane, at the very least. He was not. I thought he at least cared about his own health. He did not and he certainly didn’t care about mine.
So Esther, why did I deserve to be cheated one? I did everything I could to support his “needs” except to use my own body as a cum dumpster. Are you going to claim I should have done that? I should have let people r*pe me to please him? Because it would have been r*pe, 100%. It was sex I did not want with people I did not want to have sex with. At what point do I count as a human being who would like to feel and be alive?
There’s nothing you can do to please these people. Nothing. Their entitlement will just grow and grow and grow until it consumes them. Their quest to “feeling alive” is just feeding their entitlement. See, my ex left me for a woman just a couple years older than our son who would never deny him anything. She was his sex slave who even wore a collar. She dressed up like a baby to feed his pedo fantasies. She started an onlyfans and let random men use her for his pleasure. She brought him friends to have sex with.
His response to her giving him everything he wanted was to go out and try to meet an 11 year old child for sex. He was caught with photos and video of CSA of infants and toddlers. She completely debased herself for him and it still wasn’t enough. Nothing ever would be. It’s not a boredom problem, it’s an entitlement problem and a choice to be evil and abuse one’s partner. I wonder if Esther would say that his new girlfriend should have brought him children to abuse. Since his needs are so much more important than anyone else’s. Why is the cheater the only human who counts as human in these scenarios.
Can you post this as a comment to EP? Somewhere?
Good grief that is horrendous! I am so glad you are rid of that monster.
You are completely right and I have never believed polyamory and kink communities are ethical.
I’m so, so, so sorry you experienced such massive abuse, Katie. Thank god you’re here with us now and able to work through the horrors of your former life.
It’s about opening yourself up to the possibility that you don’t know your partner as well as you think,” she said.
Oh, this right here! I had no idea that while I was going through that particular eight years of routine domestic life. You know, babies, social functions, hobbies, time with friends and family. The underlying malaise and boredom that was stifling my joy was the fact that Cheaty McLiarface was completely distracted by another woman. She represented youth, freedom, fantasy. I represented responsibility, expectation, reality.
I was adulty enough to understand that this was just a phase in our marriage. And that we’d get back to our playful, discovery relationship in our later child free phase. Apparently he couldn’t wait for that.
No, I didn’t know him as well as I thought I did. And when I figured out who he really is it wasn’t a sexy mystery. It destroyed my reality based domestic fantasy.
Im with you. Hopes and dreams. Shattered. And my adult children question everything about their dad now. It’s very disorienting. But I’m glad to have had the wool ripped right off my eyes because he used me for 38 years and I’m still alive and hope the young woman I once was can find a way to shine again.
Thank you! Actual adults understand that life goes through phases, and that domestic drudgery and boredom is a pretty-much unavoidable phase when you have kids? I love my kids, and they are a wonderful addition to my life, but that doesn’t change the fact that homework help and recitals and all the rest is less fun than just about any alternative. And even when your time is not directly required for parenting, finding both the money and motivation to plan to get a babysitter and plan an activity is asking a lot, and spontaneity is absolutely impossible. But it’s TEMPORARY!
And even if these supposedly-adult toddlers can’t suck it up and bear these phases, they apparently have the time and energy and money to improve their lives. The rendezvous with Shmoopie probably takes more advanced planning and effort than date night would. But they are so damn selfish, it doesn’t occur to them for a second to spend any attention to their partner’s needs.
Not just time. Mine spent (stole) likely a 7 figure sum over the years
After he told me he was in luv with his new cowhoreworker, he started spewing Perel. He had been dead inside, now he was “awakened” thanks to this husband poacher. He needed to feel alive and instead of talking to his wife of 30 years about how he was feeling, he found random holes to penetrate.Sometimes an affair wasn’t a “bad thing” according to his interpretation of Perel. But he still wanted to keep me, his old appliance around, and this was his solution — to have both of us. Long story short, I said no, filed for divorce, and didn’t play along with his delusions.
Let’s take a bet on WHICH SPOUSE — cheater or chump? — is doing school pickups, grocery lists, yard work, work commutes, and all the other pedestrian stuff that deadens the cheater soul?
HINT: It is NOT the person who has time to meet the soccer coach behind the stadium.
Bingo!
Yes! Raises hand! While Cheaty McLiarface went to his self induced stressful job in the company he started, I engaged on the homefront excited for him to come home at the end of his long day. While he disengaged his from his marriage on his lunch hour with the girl who worked down the street. Of course, he brough that disengagement home in a million tiny, confusing, soul crushing ways.
Same thing happened at my house too!
Uh, you know what kind of people are plagued with feeling “dead inside”? Those with antisocial personality disorder– aka psychopaths– and borderlines.
Yet Perel tries to slip that not-so-minor pathological trait into her discourse as if it happens to everyone which just made me realize Perel’s entire pro-cheating platform is just a way to normalize her own disordered personality and the disordered people she grew up with.
It reminds me of how domestic batterers, pedophiles and other sexual predators seem to coalesce and form virtual defense leagues in their single-minded mission to make the world a friendlier place for their predilections. Interestingly, that’s not merely an analogy when it comes to Vice Magazine since founder and notorious anti-feminist Gavin McGinnis is also the founder of the radtrad hate group Proud Boys which is notoriously rape-apologistic.
Even if McGinnis parted ways with Vice and majority shares are now owned by a private equity firm, Vice Media is still figure-headed by McGinnis’s misogyny bro Shane Smith. Anyway, all of this makes it unsurprising that Perel’s whitewashing of psychopathy sits well with Smith and Fortress Investment Group as the latter does what every private equity firm does and (analogously) rapes the healthcare system and wrecks everything it touches.
Anyway, I think it all perfectly explains why Perel’s morally relativist, abuser-coddling claptrap is getting airtime these days– because it appeals to the virtual and actual rapists running the whole show.
Yes, she’s personality disordered and acting like it’s normal. But she may actually think it is normal.
After my divorce, my sister brought up how if one of your friends gets a good job, you say you’re so happy for them but you’re not because what does it do for you?
I was confused. My best friend had just gotten a new job and I was absolutely thrilled about it. I said as much.
My sister got mad and said “I know that’s what you’re supposed to say but just be honest!”
I was being honest. She was getting angry at me because why would I be happy when it didn’t do anything for me?! This conversation was making me feel sick but I really tried. So I said well if you want a selfish reason for why it makes me happy, when I care about someone I worry about them. If they’re doing well, I don’t have to worry as much.
She was so irritated with me and I felt like my sister was telling me she was a psychopath incapable of caring about other people. I said gently “if you really don’t care about them, maybe they just aren’t really your friends…”
NO! THEY’RE MY FRIENDS! THEY’RE ACTUALLY MY FRIENDS!
She thinks she’s being honest and anyone who doesn’t agree with her is just lying due to etiquette and social convention. She knows what she’s supposed to say and do but she doesn’t feel it. But she thinks that’s how everyone feels. I feel that from Esther too. She thinks she’s just brave enough to be honest. She doesn’t realize that she isn’t normal and she’s flat out disgusting to people who don’t have personality disorders.
I agree KatiePig. Her assumptions about the need for ‘aliveness’ are based on her horrible world view and horrible values.
I think she’s disordered/dysfunctional in some way too.
Dang, I’ve had the same kinds of conversations with various freaks where they try to insist that I must envy the good fortune of others because that’s their response to the good fortune of anyone around them. I just cock my head like a confused spaniel and don’t get it. I don’t even enjoy board games or sports because I honestly don’t care who wins anything. I just enjoy things that are pretty and have meaning and I like it when my friends succeed because happiness is contagious.
If I have any kind of competitive traits, this only comes out regarding real life, life-and-death issues related to activism or protecting my kids where the consequences of the bad guys winning are awful.
Basically the stakes have to be very high for me to tap into my killer instincts so I don’t understand people for whom life is some zero sum game. I imagine they must be miserable and exhausted.
Agree. I have never felt dead inside in my life, not even while I was with FW. It isn’t normal. You’re onto something there about Perel.
Hah, me too. I always related to something Truman Capote said about being seated next to boring people at parties– that he was never bored because he’d be fascinated in trying to figure out the formula of what made them boring.
Me neither, even with a decades-long marriage to an addict with significant mental health issues. I had my children, my faith, and various other things that gave me joy even if he did not. Sure, things were distorted for a very long time, but I think that I got through it because I still had a fraction of happiness somewhere in there and a belief that I could survive anything.
That’s refreshing Elsie. Thank you.
Yes, Perel very much appeals to the disordered thinkers, doesn’t she (shiver)?
My ex was diagnosed with borderline with narcissistic tendencies, or some mix along those lines. His therapist told me out of concern for the danger I might be in. He had some diagnosed adult trauma, but I’ve always believed that there was childhood trauma that he just didn’t remember. All of the markers were there.
I can very much believe that my ex felt dead inside without having hear him express that. Nothing was ever good enough for him, nothing. And indeed, his wife and his children weren’t good enough either. When we were divorcing he told me multiple times that I had contributed nothing to his life, and his attorney parrotted the same with my attorney. Wow, several decades together and two kids in college, and that was nothing. No wonder he tried to squash me during the legal proceedings.
We little regular people are merely collateral to a media echo chamber which profits from fluffing the soiled consciences of global sociopaths. Perel would get no airplay if she wasn’t appealing to abusive power figures who are in the market for messages that normalize their own psychopathic behavior. I’m betting people like Weinstein and Epstein were big fans.
It’s really kind of horrifying and Kafkaesque if you think about it. It’s the essence of “anti-social” to enable anti-social behavior in others. I figure Perel specializes in polishing rationalization systems for interpersonal abuse but I’m sure there are equivalent sociopath-fluffing shills who enable and rationalize an array of niche f*ckery from financial skullduggery to union busting or the funding of violent military coups in third world countries…
I wonder if there are sociopaths who actually don’t blame others for being dead inside but it sounds like most can’t own that it’s their factory (or effed-up FOO-installed) setting and internally driven.
Yes! Dead inside, he said he learned he suffered from anhedonia which was somehow my fault, and it was supposed to make me dance faster to make him happy which really meant agreeing to let him have his new soulmate but stay married “if I really loved him”. Thank goodness for decent therapists who said he was not only a narcissist but sociopathic, completely devoid of empathy, with zero emotional IQ. At the end of the day, he knew that cheating was a dealbreaker, no matter how much he tried to cajole me or bully me. When I told him he was morally bankrupt with zero integrity, he raged and disagreed, telling me that I was trying to character assassinate him. I told him he had no character, and THAT was the problem. I’m completely no contact now but I know he spies on me STILL.
“completely devoid of empathy, with zero emotional IQ. ”
This is a really random thing to share here, but it is something that has been on my mind. Pre-Divorce, post D-day, the FW was trying to avoid a divorce. It was nutty because at the time, he was still with AP. fully acknowledged that he wanted to remain with AP, did not want an open relationship because he wanted forced one-sided monogamy, but wanted to keep me as a platonic wife appliance. I was not interested in that Sister-Wives batshit craziness at all.
He makes $150k more per year than me. It’s a very good salary even in the high priced area we live in. My salary would be decent if I was single with no kids, but to live here with 2 kids and no husband, even with child support it is tight.
One day he was talking about not wanting a divorce. And he said “you do realize how screwed I will be financially once we are divorced?” And incredulously I said “you make $150k MORE than me, do YOU realize that it is just a fact that you will absolutely walk out of this in a much, much more stable position than I will?” And he refused to see it.
Alimony isnt really a thing here. I have a modest amount of child support, for a few years until the youngest is 18. The amount he pays me probably doesn’t give him the warm fuzzies when he writes that check monthly, but he also truly can afford it. His lifestyle hasn’t had to change at all. And now that he is dating, he actually spends more on dates and clothes.
And in a few years, I will not have those checks anymore, so I will be worse off, and he will not have to pay it anymore so he will be in an even better a position.
Obviously, there is no reason he should pay support beyond the youngest turning 18. My point though is that factually he makes so much more than I do, and yet he looked at ME and complained about money. It was as if he truly couldn’t grasp that I made so much less and hence, would absolutely be worse off. I don’t think he was capable of seeing it from my side because he truly only cares about himself and he was losing my income by getting a divorce.
It is a silly thing to debate NOW. Financial pain is a part of divorce and I am sure there are chumps that have it so much worse than me. This isn’t even about being mad that he will do well.
It is just the way he truly could only see his side and not mine, to the extent that he couldn’t grasp that he makes a lot of money, and it’s significantly more than I make…and yet he thinks he will be the one to suffer?
That is pathological to me.
I could have written just about every word of this except I disagree with no payments after 18.
The depth of the selfishness still shocks me. What alien creature wearing a human skin suit was I married to for so long?
If I am being honest, I think I added that about being ok with support stopping at 18 out of societal pressure. Me internalizing the criticism that women leave men for no reason and take everything. (Silly of me to worry about that, I neither left for no reason nor got much. And I am surely not a gold digger as he had nothing when we got together, I made more, he made essentilally nothing. Moved in with me before he could even afford half the bills.)
If I didn’t need the support, I would probably put it in an account that I could give the kids when they are older for college or down payment on a house.
But I do need it. I want to stay in the marital home while they are in school. Nothing nearby is cheaper, so if I moved now, I’d either be driving them super far to school which is not really tenable or they would have to change schools. This is the most cost effective housing for now that keeps them in their schools…rentals have gone crazy here. That child support helps me afford the mortgage. Period. In a few years, I will have some decisions to make.
There are some shit sandwiches that we just have to swallow and the financial strains of divorce are one of them. It is not fair that a chump is chugging along thinking they have planned a stable future for themselves and their family, only to have the FW just take that away. I make a decent salary, but obviuosly our lives were planned with two salaries in mind, which is kind of needed in lots of parts of our country nd partuicularly here. And now that I am on the other side of 50, I am going to have a less stable financial future than I would have if the life we planned came to fruition. That is true for plenty of chumps. Fair or not, it is just reality. And if I am being honest, of course I am not ok with it. We walked out with a 50/50 split. And that is what the courts aim for here. But is it truly equitable if he can afford a new house on his own, and I can’t? I try not to dwell on it because this is jsut how it is. But it is definitely an unpalatable reality.
Consider the idea that he’s right in feeling he’s worse off than you because his dearth of empathy is guaranteed to come with a sense of haunting emptiness that you– thankfully– will never fathom.
Come to think of it, doesn’t that make us normies kind of empathy-impaired towards psychopaths since we simply can’t relate to the feeling of having a soul made of maggots and cinders?
Ouch. Sounds so much like my ex.
My attorney had a phrase that he used to characterize my case: “No empathy and no regard for the law.” Even with 40+ years in family law, he said the ice-cold vibes he was getting from my STBX were alarming. He talked to a therapist friend of his several times about my case, trying to figure out how to negotiate the settlement with someone who was so clearly disordered in their thinking.
Thankfully, we were able to settle without going to trial, but only because his own attorney was so fed up with my STBX that he pushed the line to get it done out of respect for my attorney, who somehow managed to extract a promise from his not to quit.
My ex thankfully moved many states away when he left for the last time and later said that being in this area had made him “crazy” when he came to retrieve the last of his belongings. As far as I know, he’s stayed away and is reportedly busy with a serious lady friend who has adult children who think he’s great. A retired therapist friend of mine who worked at the state mental hospital for several decades feels that I’m probably safe at this point, also because my ex is nearly 70 y.o.
Your lawyer sounds like a lovely, inquisitive and interesting soul. I never want to be the kind of person who constantly tries to point out the “bRiGht SidE” of tragic events (the same people who believe “everything happens for a reason”). But it’s nice that your ordeal had a little ray of light in terms of meeting this lawyer.
Yes, and he had an evil sense of humor. There were times when we laughed and laughed at the absurdity of it all. At times he was almost prophetic, knowing what they’d do next. It gave me a lot of peace to let go and let him figure out how to settle it. And he did, no trial.
Wow. I’m glad you’re safe and he’s out of your life. My attorney had to deal with a lot of high conflict people, had studied Bill Eddy, and wouldn’t let me be bullied. Ex managed to find an attorney that hated women as much as he did but in the end, I called his bluff a week before before going to trial (so SCARY) and he settled, but not before dragging it out for 3.5 years. My son, the stepson he raised for 30 yrs, will have nothing to do with him and wouldn’t allow him near the grandkids cos we all think he’s toxic. He doesn’t stalk enough to take legal action- he’s too cagey for that. I don’t know what he’s doing or exactly where he lives. He doesn’t exist. I don’t think he ever really did, it was always a mirage. I regret the day I met him.
I regret the day I met mine too. I actually thought it was ‘love at first sight’ but now I think it was every fiber of my being saying ‘noooooooo’
Same here. It’s like I was in a daze. I should have RUN. Lesson learned.
Wow. They have a play book, don’t they.
Mine also was a big fan of Bill Eddy and gave me one of his books. He also did a last minute bluff, giving my STBX 24 hours to sign or be embarrassed in a trial. His attorney added that he’d quit if it went to trial. He didn’t want to deal with my ex’s mental health issues and the adultery when they had nothing on me.
And he signed.
It’s been over two years since we heard from him. Our kids are grown and are acing young adulthood.
I still think it’s so sad, not just for me, but for the children who are the collateral damage of these toxic pieces of shit.
The children. It is heart rending. Welcome to real world. Hell on earth.
It’s like I want to say to all of them, how dare you harm innocent children for your selfish desires! but what’s the point. If they had a heart or a soul at all, they wouldn’t have done what they did to destroy a family. Best to stay silent.
Yes, his evil tendrils messed up one of my kids more than the other, but both are very much coming into their own. They haven’t interacted with him in years and seem to enjoy being around me still. But I’ve worked very hard to be a good parent of adult kids, too.
I feel badly for my grandkids too who don’t have the love of a great grandfather. He could have been so amazing but he chose a different path-one of darkness and delusions. What a shame. It seems like going to bars and picking up randoms is more fulfilling.
Shudder. I hope you have a security system.
I’ve had experiences where someone who seemed really charming and normal on the surface eventually revealed this glum, shark-eyed, monotone-voiced side to themselves when they either thought no one was looking or were in the company of people whose opinions didn’t matter to them. They all turned out to be demented, sadistic and dangerous.
I do, thanks, plus I have neighbors who know the whole story and look out for me, even the mailman. And yes, he also did that jekyll/hyde bait and switch on who he was. I thought he was a great family man but that was the hook. Like you said, definitely demented, sadistic, and dangerous.
How lovely that, in the midst of horror, a few people around you turned out to be protective and kind.
As far as your ex, the fact that freaks mask themselves rather belies that– deep down– they know they’re effed up, wrong, creepy, demented, abnormal and awful. Otherwise why try to hide it?
Yeah, one rare day when he was confessing before I went no contact, he said he knew he was radioactive toxic waste. If he thought I was going to play the same old game and tell him how wonderful he was, he was wrong. I just agreed with him. I said, you sure are. why don’t you get help.”
Awesome. So proud of you. That must have felt so good.
Truthfully, it felt like an out of body experience, like someone else was speaking through me. Thanks to him, I had many panic attacks and this was more like dissociation or divine guidance, not kidding. Something else took over and gave me courage to stay calm and not take the bait. That same feeling guided me through all my last interactions with him. I went to a different place is all I can describe it. I WAS proud of myself.
His brain must have fallen out of his skull in that moment. No one delivers a comeback better than someone who was formerly a saint of patience and kindness who finally gets fed up and puts things bluntly.
I have a friend like this– the sweetest, most self-sacrificing, empathic person you could imagine. But she’s also highly intelligent and has a nose for bullsh*t so when she at long last hits her limit and lets out an F-bomb, it has way more impact and wattage than any habitual potty mouth (like me lol).
Oh yes, he RAGED and raged. It was quite a sight to behold. Once you see behind the mask, the game end. I’m 5ft tall and no one expects this little grandma to let loose with a potty mouth but it’s oh so satisfying. It doesn’t happen very often but it’s always well deserved.
My attorney talked about that. Why did my ex take off for the beach and keep me in the dark about his doings when we were supposedly working on things?
Because he had a lot to hide, period. And he knew deep down that he was off the rails even though he kept that from me.
It really sounds like you’re lucky to have survived the experience. It makes you stronger than him because clearly he didn’t emotionally survive whatever horror show, hellhole background he comes from and is now just an emotionally undead zombie lurching around spreading misery and trying to eat the brains of the living.
Yup, I agree. From chatting with others. I think we’re all surrounded by similar undead.
I think of these kinds of abusers as trauma zombies or poltergeists jealous of anyone who still has a pulse and compulsively driven to subject others to the worst of whatever hell they once experienced.
That’s why I don’t believe the callousness and abuse are incidental and just because they don’t care. Most cheaters wouldn’t be so bloody mean otherwise so I suspect the “not caring” is bravado in most cases, almost an aspiration because being a perfect sociopathic cyborg would be a relief compared to the emotional muck these kinds of people stew in.
In that sense I think the suffering caused is mostly intentional and purposeful even if “subconscious” because the suffering of others is necessary for the full “reenactment” ritual– something about superstitiously displacing victim status to another person because, in their twisted backgrounds, someone has to be the victim and if it’s not someone else, it will be them.
Basically what makes a victim a victim is that they suffer so the suffering must be caused. You can always tell by how seemingly “casually cruel” people behave when they fail to land a blow because the targets are meh. It unsettles them and most will make another pass or double down.
I was reminded of this the other day when dealing with one of those garden variety bureaucratic psychos who gets off on bullying because… trauma zombie. I just stared placidly at her and cheerfully refused her pointless commands saying I’d wait to speak to someone with actual authority. Her frustration at not being able to extract fearful compliance, humiliation or discomfort was palpable and she glared daggers when I completed my task and split.
What a nut. Fortunately I’m not an undocumented immigrant because this paper pusher would have had a field day in that case. In general, I think zombies like this are going to come out of the woodwork in the age of deportation terror. So many delicious opportunities to reenact their horror show FOO dramas but with the perp/victim roles reversed!
Good for you for standing in your power with strong boundaries! I too have learned the gift of not responding, not taking the bait, and not being drawn into their toxic energy but even that takes a toll. These people are all around us and the last 8 yrs have uncovered so much hatred and ignorance, no wonder I don’t really socialize anymore. I value my peace way too much. As far as the exnarcsociopath, I could have probably supported and forgiven him his mental issues if he had gotten help, but NOT the cheating and duplicity and double life. The fact that he was so outraged that I said no to all of it is still shocking. Didn’t he have a clue who he married?
A definite built-in punishment for narcissism is that they underestimate everyone.
I’m more socially reserved and selective than I used to be but I live with the kids in a Latin country part of the year where you can’t walk a block without stopping a few times to greet and shoot the breeze. It would be very trying for a true introvert but for us it’s been very healthy. What I love most about our adopted country is the general social anarchy. For instance, unlike in the US doctors here are in it for the honor, not the money so they act like normal, vulnerable human beings and you end up feeling a kind of fond kinship towards them. And then the working class are proud, cultured and hyper-informed like they used to be in the US and hilariously unimpressed with the .001%.
We have animated and often “sociopolitical” conversations with every walk from florists, cab drivers, waiters, plumbers, artists and government functionaries, etc. And, unlike in the US, people generally don’t “turn off” if you stray into deep, dark and gritty themes. They’ll voluntarily go down that rabbit hole with you. But the interesting thing is how these kinds of conversations typically end on buoyant and cheerful notes, probably because everyone feels a little safer knowing there’s someone else in the world who sees what they see.
Now when I come back to the US, these garden variety trauma zombies just seem curiously weird and a little sad in comparison to what we’ve become used to living abroad.
Anyway, I think that’s what’s really helped me “stand in my power” as you say– living most of the year in a culture where normal is more the norm. But I can remember times when I was so outnumbered and suffocated by zombie mindf*ckery that it really got under my skin and eroded my perspective.
Maybe if I lived in a place like that, I wouldn’t be so protective of letting anyone in and I could find a community to socialize with but in SoCal, the only available men want a purse or a nurse and I’m not doing that again. Other conversations are mostly about how horrible our government is and how we’re all afraid and disgusted at the same time. I have my grandkids though, and they are the BEST.
Ok, once again Esther grinds my gears.
Why is it that the onus is on the chump for making her partner feel “alive”? EP’s message is that had you, dear Chump, made your partner feel more alive, this never would’ve happened. Had you been kind to that would-be arsonist, maybe your house would’ve been spared. Your fault!!
There is never a consideration of the chump’s own feeling of “aliveness.”
There is never an acknowledgment of marriage vows.
There is never an acknowledgment that maybe the cheater shouldn’t have gotten married in the first place, if he thought he’d get bored after so many years of sex with the same person.
I admit that I do agree with Esther that people in relationships should not take each other for granted. It IS a good idea to carve out time for each other. The grass doesn’t grow unless it’s watered.
But, she puts those watering and carving-out-time duties on the victim not on the cheater.
It fries my ass that we’re to feel sorry for the poor cheater, who, in her way of thinking, are the true victims. 😡
Just imagine how alive BOTH partners could feel if the cheater took all the effort they spend on the affair and put it into the marriage and family instead.
EP endorses the view that infidelity is merely an “act of exuberant defiance” (or something like that).
I wouldn’t be surprised if my ex was inspired by her when he wrote this to me soon after D-day: “There is a soft voice of defiance in me that keeps me going. It may be irrational and indefensible, but, if I didn’t have it, I’d be lost.”
Yeah, like I got told, “I deserve to be happy.” At my expense? At the kids/grandkids expense? It was always always all about him.
Why does anyone do anything that harms another person?
Because they want to and don’t care about how it affects someone else.
But unlike other transgressions, violations, or crimes, infidelity is dressed up as LOVE, and hides behind LOVE as a motive, and who can argue with that?
LOVE does not defraud and deceive.
Lying and deception actually do NOT make
anyone feel alive. It’s low energy behavior that drains the energy of the liar and those lied to. I personally don’t believe adrenaline from duper’s delight is a healthy feeling of aliveness.
Dr. Omar Minwalla articulates this phenomenon very well in his paper The Secret Sexual Basement.
You want to feel alive? Try being of service, helping others, practicing rigorous honesty, gratitude….concepts cheaters and side pieces can’t understand.
I have taught my daughter that someone’s ability to love can be determined by THE ABSENCE of doing intentional harm….to look not at what someone DOES but look very closely at what THEY DO NOT DO. Look for THE ABSENCE of deceptive behavior, lying, theft, etc.
The con artist is a master at wearing the Nice Guy/Gal mask. It’s what someone is NOT doing that reveals who they are. Bernie Madoff was REALLY NICE to his victims the whole time he was draining their bank accounts….I’ll bet he was on an Esther Repel quest for aliveness too….
Strongly suggest folks read Minwalla’s work. Back when I first began to learn of Ex-FW’s decades of betrayals I owuld make copies of his articles and keep them in my purse, car, briefcase, gym bag. I gave them out often to folks, telling them he explained it better than I ever could. It was helpful.
Acts of service do nothing for cheaters, except if they are communal narcissist types who get off on having a good citizen image.
I remember my FW tried volunteering for just one day shortly after Dday when he was pretending to try to change. He dejectedly reported that it was no use because it didn’t make him feel any better. That’s the cheater mentality. If they can’t get a strong dopamine hit from it then it’s not worth doing.
Yes OHFFS….the con artist is often a community pillar.
I’m talking above about being of service with a genuine and sincere motive and desire to help, not the manipulative image-management being of service that the fraudulent engage in to disguise their hidden agendas.
Those people don’t do anything for someone else unless they get something out of it, even if it’s just cover for their crap character.
❤️
Sing it sister!
I especially like this line: “But unlike other transgressions, violations, or crimes, infidelity is dressed up as LOVE, and hides behind LOVE as a motive, and who can argue with that?”
More truth from you VH. Your observations are always spot on.
The first thing I learned in college as a psych major is that degrees and years of practice under their belt are not a guarantee of the emotional, psychological, and mental health of the practitioner.
Infidelity requires lying, defrauding, and deception, and lots of it. I cannot, will not, and should not trust any therapist that defends it, no matter how famous they are or how many of the emperor’s subjects admire their non-existent clothes.
👏 👏 👏
Christian Psychologist Henry Cloud wrote, “Do not hope for the evil persons to change. It could happen, and it does, but it does not happen by giving in to them, reasoning with them, or giving them another chance to hurt you. It happens when they finally are subject to limits that force them to change.
Addicts and abusers do not like the consequences of their actions , but consequences do not stop them unless they are willing to
Change
My ex was an addict with significant mental health problems. And he was a part-time preacher. There was so very much that ultimately brought down the marriage once I grasped it all and looked back. And it wasn’t my job to fix that.
Elsie,My Ex listened to Billy Graham, watched Christian movies all the time, listened to Christian music on the car radio..Sat in church..all. the while his secret was safe inside him.
.I was fooled by his church attendance. I can’t even imagine a Pastor like your Ex..
My Ex also would sometimes be super kind and more religious, taking me to chapels, praying..I do believe now, looking back, he may have had spasms of guilt, vowed to change IN HIS MIND and started up his Christian walk again..over and over.but back into his addiction and to his devaluing…a cycle of promises he made to himself and broke. Just a thought now that my eyes are opened.
My ex preached, and thankfully didn’t lead. A previous church had asked him to be an elder when we were newly engaged, and he turned it down, saying that he needed to establish his marriage.
Naturally, he used the Bible against me. Ultimately, he divorced his “disobedient” wife, who wouldn’t reconcile, saying that God was going to judge me many times over. Never mind his side of it.
It’s worth divorcing these types, you can’t win an argument but you can walk out the door.
Doesn’t the book of Job warn that anyone trying to divine God’s will risks being sent to hell in punishment?
Yes, he conveniently forgot that part. Also, that they stoned adulterers.
I love how these types bowdlerize reality. It must have been so much fun having to defend yourself in arguments with that.
Except he denied everything and claimed that I was delusional, both with his family and his attorney.
Wrong as it could be, but his attorney’s oversharing with mine confirmed many terms over that I was NOT the delusional one.
I love this attorney more and more.
I’m always left with a question that EP never seems to answer. What if one of you (me) was always up for fun/adventure/discovery/escape from domesticity/sexy time/new discoveries with your husband but your husband (FW) was out fucking other randos and hookers anyway? She really never addresses the downright shitty behaviour of the cheaters.
Exactly!
My two cents is that there’s never enough escape from domesticity for a FW. I was reading a sympathetic biography of Percy Bysse Shelley – and I couldn’t get over how he used women/limerance/sex as a pacifier for his emotional needs.
He needed to have a woman who was madly in love with him, completely carefree, and focused entirely on him at all times.
The part I couldn’t get over was when he fell in love with yet another random young woman when Mary Shelley was “too preoccupied with her newborn son”.
First, it’s their son. She didn’t asexually spawn a baby on her own.
Second, that baby was their fourth child. The first was a 30-32 preemie who died after 10 days. In the previous year, their son William died at age 2 and their daughter Clara died at age 1. Gee, I wonder why Mary was watching baby Percy Florence like a hawk….
But that’s missing the point. Anytime Percy was stressed or bored, he found a new mistress. That’s how he rolled.
The film Mary Shelley ends with some kind of treacly reconciliation between Percy and Mary as if all she really wanted and needed was to be respected as a writer… never mind his previous financial abuse, neglect and gadflying that contributed to the death of their first child and left Mary in such deep despair that she wrote Frankenstein as a emotional autobiography. At least PBS died before he could drive Mary to suicide like he did teen wife #1 Harriet Westbrook.
Which industry does Esther represent? Who is listening to her? I can’t even read what she has to say. I do not know how Tracy dips into this sewage every day, every hour. I pay her a debt of gratitude for opening my eyes. Now I cannot read stupidity. I just can’t.
I think Esther’s message appeals to a wide range of creepy corporate media sociopaths who want to “wag the dog” and force the public to accept and even extol these honchos’ creepy private behavior. But if there’s any industry secretly sponsoring her, my guess is it’s industries that profit from cheating– or at least the cheating “mentality”– like the porn industry which is now bigger and more powerful than all other media and the film industry combined. Maybe the dating app industry as well because shareholders demand growth which means expanding the market beyond single, un-partnered users and getting married cheaters to sign up (thus being instrumental in getting the divorce rate to rise) is the logical profit strategy.
Hellof a chump. We have no idea what’s going on in boardrooms all over the world. Are we.all.up for sale?
Basically we’ve been sold for parts. https://therealnews.com/how-private-equity-conquered-america
Also, simply the media, mainstream and social. Sensationalism for more eyeballs. Our attention, and our data, is the new profit frontier. Read “The Sirens’ Call: How Attention Became the World’s Most Endangered Resource” by Christopher Hayes.
Kismet– I just saw a reference to that book on a Mensa site I was checking for gifty kids resources. The title intrigued me and I put it on my list even though I generally feel the opposite– like privacy is the most endangered resource. But then– der– it occurred to me the author meant our attention as in our time and mental focus and energy, not the attention we draw to ourselves. .
Yes sadly true…
Oooh! I know of one Perel acolyte! I’m in a FB group that is about 98% women, and talks a lot about relationships. There’s another member who is totally enamored with her. Whenever someone mentions that they’re having issues with their spouse/SO, this person immediately pops up with suggestions to read this or that Perel article. I once started to disagree with her but gave up because I literally couldn’t figure out where to start. Now I just practice my eyerolls.
Sleepyhead, many people have not been or don’t know they are being chumped. So bits and pieces of Esther seem instructional on how to keep a man. I used to page through Cosmo magazine at the Beauty Salon and lap up those ” sexual secrets to please any man”. Tips..Well I even read in the 70s 80s Fascinating Womanhood so I could figure out why cheater #1 was not as interested. So Esther might fit those who have no idea..and that is the only reason I can think of to look at her drivel.
She makes it look easy- spout any old bullshit and watch the money roll in.
They lie because they can, not because they’re on some cosmic magic carpet ride to discover they can indeed fart rainbows .
Cheaters cheat because they are selfish arseholes – bottom line.
The nice thing about this opinion piece is that Esther makes it very clear that staying with a cheater means the chump doing more work while suppressing their needs while the cheater brings absolutely nothing in return.
Since the root cause of cheating according to Esther is boredom and the monotony of those neverending adulting chores, divorcing the cheater is actually a kindness to them. Imagine how alive they will feel with all the new challenges of finding a new home, meeting with a lawyer, moving their stuff and setting up utilities!
Oh, that’s not what the cheater wanted? Well, Chumps didn’t sign up for being married to a competent adult with the emotional regulation of an 18-24 month old so that’s true on both sides.
Now I know why my ex blew up several decades of family together (cough, cough). He was newly retired and needed to feel “alive.”
He also had a significant mental health crisis in between the two times we separated that he never addressed, not at all. That flared again during the divorce, even scaring his attorney.
But yes, how is cheating different than other misbehaviors that are a blight on society? It’s not.
If he had just said, “Our relationship has run its course, and I don’t want to be married anymore. I worked with an attorney and obtained a reasonable draft agreement. I suggest that you get your own attorney to represent your interests. I’m off to the beach to find myself…” The college kids and I would have been crushed but recovered so much faster.
The thousands and thousands I spent on legal fees could have been channelled into their college expenses so that I didn’t have to shuffle and cut to the bone to keep them in school. That took three jobs on my part, and they each had jobs and scholarships of their own.
So years later, does he feel “alive”? I don’t know, and I don’t care.
Interesting! This morning, at my running group, one of the women, let’s call her A, referred positively to a new series on the BBC called ‘Mix Tape’. The plot is, basically, girl and boy go out with each other as teenagers. They exchange mix tapes. They break up. They marry other people. They make contact with each other. She lives in Sydney, he in the UK by this stage. They get together. Who knows whether they end up together. I won’t be watching it because I was the wife who got dumped for the ex school crush in exactly these circumstances, except swap Aus for Canada. I kept quiet while A said how brilliant it was, how nostalgic, how lovely, until she said ‘there were issues in both their marriages’. I spluttered through my breathless running, laughed, and said ‘of course there were!’ She looked puzzled. I said ‘I was the wife in those circumstances. Unfortunately, the ex failed to tell me about the ‘issues’ for 26 years, until the point at which I was dumped, and even then he didn’t admit the affair with exgfOW which I had to find out about via emails on the family computer’. A said she didn’t know and I said ‘it’s not something I share. But beware of believing the spouse fault myth because, guess what, the cheaters may be the ‘issue’ in the marriages, not the spouses’. And off we ran. I am so, so sick of seeing reunited past lover cheaters presented in films, books, TV as thwarted romantic innocents held back by crazy, unreasonable, unpleasant spouses. It’s never on the agenda to ask ‘hang on, was the spouse the problem, or was it the inadequate, bored, discontented, immature, facile cheaters?’ I’m sure EP believes in the romance of the rekindled love affair with a school chum! Yuck!
Thanks for the trash alert. I thought the promo looked juvenile and stupid but when I’m traveling by plane I end up watching any old POS to pass the time. But not this POS lol.
I wonder if ex-FW read through these kinds of articles , because wow all this sounds awfully similar to the BS she spouted. She was not only “dead inside”, but also “had no identity aside from mother and wife.” Except she also said that she never felt like a romantic partner. Or that our kids were in full-time daycare from the age of 6 months despite the fact that she had no job. (Supposedly working on her dissertation. The school eventually kicked her out after ten years of failing to make any progress.) She’s always going on about how gracious she was to not ask for more than 50% custody (since I should be grateful she only stole half of my children). I’m pretty sure she would have given anything NOT to have full custody, that getting away from the kids was the most important thing about the divorce to her.
If anyone wants to know what deadness *really* feels like, I’d say chumpdom is pretty accurate. And banging strangers wouldn’t help. What makes them feel alive is the deception itself, the cold feeling of superiority and getting revenge for us not acknowledging their obvious perfection.
I am wondering why Esther is still given so much credibility. She shows up on podcasts with very large audiences, the School of Greatness with Louis Howes and I think I saw her on Diary of a CEO as well
extremely top podcasts and they sit and they listen to her and they nod as she spews this toxicity
It’s cruel to people who are looking for life advice? It’s a con.
Yes, I was disappointed that Diary of a CEO hosted her. Some of his guests are just sooo good. Not her.
This b**ch again.
IMO what she does is project her own excuses (or her husband’s excuses) for cheating onto others, claiming these excuses are universal reasons for cheating. This is massively intellectually dishonest, but that’s Pester Peril for you.
She’s basically saying you have to keep limerence, mystery and naughtiness going if you want to affair proof your marriage. It’s really just another version of Marabel Morgan’s Fascinating Womanhood from the seventies, where you were advised (among other moronic things) to greet your husband wearing Saran wrap to help keep the spark alive. She sold millions of books off that nonsense. What these con artists will not tell you is that it doesn’t work. There are not enough bdsm corsets, pad Thai recipes or cock rings on the planet to accomplish making yourself seem shiny and new. Your long term partner will always be the person you’ve seen at his/her worst, the person whose crap you have smelled in the bathroom, as well as bad breath, farts, etcetera. There is no way around the fact that familiarity is incompatible with excitement and anybody who thinks otherwise is a fool. If you can’t deal with the reality of domestic life and stay faithful you shouldn’t get married or live with a partner. It’s that simple. But no, most people who are inclined to cheat want the convenience of having an old shoe to kick around while they get their “aliveness” elsewhere. Far from wanting “aliveness” in their marriage, they like having the excuse of being bored in their marriage so they can rationalize cheating. That’s what Peril does not seem to be willing to admit, probably because her con depends on denying that reality. It’s like she can’t even admit that some people are just bad actors who are never going to treat their partners right now matter what they do. I don’t know for sure if she’s a fantasist in denial or just a lying liar making money off something she knows is a crock of s**t, but I’m leaning towards the latter.
You said it. I remember that saran wrap book, too. “Peril” lolz. Right on.
Back in 2021 when I was bursting with hopium in part because Cheaty McLiarface had signed our marriage up for counseling (mistake 642). The counselor suggested we watch a TED talk given by Mz. Perel. We had watched it separately and when asked by the counselor what we thought of her “ideas”, I said she is ridiculous and completely wrong. Cheaty McLiarface looked at me and said “I knew you wouldn’t like her.” Much later I realized that he waited for me to reply first so that he could follow my lead and pretend to agree with me. I’m sure he was sorely dissapointed over my response because he was still looking for external validation for his behaviors and she provides a reascuse for every shortsighted, immature, selfish behavior that he wanted to justify and rationalize.
Logged in just to say I love your phrase
that is the perfect phrase for how absurd marriage counselling is.
As if a “marriage” could consider its triggers and traumas and learn to overcome.
“Chlamydia! Surprise! Consider yourself reawakened.”
More perfect snark does not exist. Truly.
I dislike Perel about as much as I can dislike someone that I don’t know personally.
I hate to admit it but I can see the truth in one aspect of her theory here. I think that many cheaters are looking for that excitement that only comes with a new infatuation.
I know for a fact that the FW chased that. Even more so? I think he spent a lot of time flirting because he enjoyed the validation of knowing (thinking?) that this new woman wanted him. By definition, as the wife that gave him children and stuck around for decades, I could never provide that specific kind of feedback. Not to be vulgar, but if I hung off his junk 24/7 and still asked for more it still wouldn’t be as validating as the new woman he just found online that was sending him a winky face, because he already knew *I* wanted him. The excitement came from NEW supplies of kibble.
The problem is that Perel is under the impression that a chump could solve that by taking up skydiving with her FW.
Do I think it is healthy and good for couples to continue to grow and try new things together? Yes. Of course. But I just don’t think there is anything a chump can do to provide that kind of validating feedback/kibbles if they are dealing with a needy FW that needs constant outside validation.
It is kind of along the same lines of “they don’t cheat with someone better, they cheat with someone easier” On a more basic level, if they are in need of outside validation like mine was? They don’t cheat with better, or neccessarily easier, just someone that isnt you. The only criteria then is that the AP be someone new.
I’m afraid I have little to contest with what Perel says here. I know, I know, you’re yelling at me, “What the fuck, thelongrun! Are you insane?”
Nope. She presents a valid view. Each member of a couple should be trying to keep things from getting too stale in their relationship. A playful attitude from both parties is useful. Reconnecting on at least a weekly basis through these types of activities (daily’d be great, but I’m trying to be realistic) helps keep each other in mind and the relationship fresh.
A spouse/partner that is connected in this way to their partner/spouse should have more empathy for that spouse and minimize the possibility of being disconnected from their relationship.
This should not be in lieu of doing chores to help each other out and being supportive of each other in the relationship. It should be in addition to that.
Where I, and I would think the rest of us here at CN have the real problem with Perel is, once you’ve cheated, none of this will work anymore! The chumped spouse/partner might pursue this type of behavior in a pick-me-dance for awhile, but will hopefully and eventually realize that they no longer have a worthwhile partner to do this with (if, in fact, they ever did!).
Cheating not only wipes out everything positive that went before in the mirage/partnership, but puts it severely into the negative for the chump.
So, Perel’s advice only has any hope of being useful for a spouse with enough moral compass to want to work together to make the marriage stronger. At least to give it one last try before divorcing and going their separate ways, in an ethical and moral manner.
Instead, these fuckwit cheaters tear the fabric of the relationship apart, acting completely unilaterally and selfishly. If you cheat on me and lie to me, I no longer trust you. Without trust, there is no hope of love surviving, and without trust or love, you lose all faith in that person. At least, if you can reach an emotional position that allows you to step back and see the shitshow for what it is.
So fuck you, Esther Perel. Once you’ve cheated on your partner (not that these cheaters ever saw the people they were with as “partners”), all your advice is useless. These morally bankrupt assholes you’re sticking up for have killed any chance of rebuilding a healthy relationship by their cheating actions.
The chump, having been abused by the cheater and their actions, is the one who needs someone sticking up for them. Thank God there’s Chumplady. As for Esther? I’d say shame on you, but you and your type (cheaters, morally bankrupt folks, etc.) don’t feel shame. You’re all self-entitled freaks, looking for what’s in it for you to get out of life, and fuck over whoever gets in your way. Pathetic.🤬
I agree with you thelongrun about the moral bankruptcy of cheaters and the devastating impact of the breaching of trust.
I’d also say that in many Chump-FW partnerships, the connection/playfulness/passion etc really was there right up to the point of cheating. At least flowing from the Chump to the FW.
My sense of playfulness, creativity and passion for adventure was exactly the same leading up to the cheating. I couldn’t work out why FW was so non-reciprocal with every effort or gesture I made.
Putting aside these traits of ‘aliveness’, at a bare minimum, every anecdotal story I’ve read here talks of the Chump’s authentic love for the FW right up to the cheating.
Authentic love alone is a precious thing. It’s a like a piece of rough hewn solid gold. It’s to be valued, respected and cherished (you would think). It’s enough, on its own.
FW’s enjoy the benefits of a chump’s authentic love but they don’t respect it. They’re happy to chase after fool’s gold because they are truly foolish.
Yeah, Learning, I think most if not all of us chumps had that authentic love for their cheaters right up until they drove us over the cliff with D-day discoveries. I know I did.
As for the cheaters not reciprocating our care and love for them? I’ve come to realize that my cheating, FW XW was discarding me for at least the last couple of years we were together. And, just as you’re describing, Learning, I couldn’t figure out why she was getting colder and more distant towards me.
Looking back, I can see that my fog of depression and illness muddied my mind’s ability to figure this out. Although, it’s possible that no matter what state I was in, I wouldn’t have figured out what was going on.
Because a person with authentic love for their spouse/partner has a very hard time recognizing, imagining and accepting that the person they love doesn’t give a shit about them, and is slowly (or not so slowly) performing actions that stab the chump in the back.
The idea is so hard for the chump to grasp, that their partner is so selfish and morally fucked up, that they don’t heed the many warnings in life that speak against cheating, in many cultures. If they’re so unhappy with us, it would be better to simply leave us, hard as that would hit us.
But to fuck around on us and show us such disrespect while under the cover of still being in a supposedly loving relationship with us? Not to mention being willing to damage their family to boot, assuming there is one?
It’s hard to imagine a worst crime against your partner. True murder, I suppose, is the only thing I can think of that could exceed it for villainy.
Bad as what these fuckwits did to us, Learning, I’m glad I learned an extremely important lesson in life from mine/them. Not everybody is like us morally. We’re not perfect, but neither are we willing to stab a partner in the back through such scummy actions.
I now am much more aware of people’s actions, and pay less attention to their words. It’s almost like a superpower. And it feels much better to have this knowledge, terrible though it was to get it, than continue to go through life deaf and blind to these scumbag’s real intentions. I’m not staying dumb about it, either.😁 I hope none of us are. We’re needed to counter the bullshit of idiots like Esther Perel and her like.
Wishing you all the best, Learning!
Yes to this thelongrun. My now (healthy) circumspection about what motives other people has only developed after X 2 FW’s. You’re right that it’s a Chump’s painfully acquired superpower.
It’s been a big learning curve for me, over decades. Wishing you all the best too.😊
It makes sense in a way if all she does is listen to cheaters. Wasn’t Jeff Bezos pet name for Lauren Sanchez “ALIVE girl”? Joker face made sure that and dick pics were leaked to the media
They were cheating on both of their spouses so I guess the subterfuge was exhilarating?
As for “finding themselves” again I see this spewing out of mouths of cheaters. My PhD trauma informed therapist explains that a NPD has no real sense of self or personality, all just smoke and mirrors and a black void. EP lack of education shows!
We’ll see how Jeff and Lauren truly fare in the long term. They’re so big on image that we may never know, though.
I give that marriage 2 years, max. Then it’ll be “we grew apart.”
Bezos was probably smart enough to make Sanchez sign a prenup.
If she were a real European she would’ve retired by now. Enough, seriously.
Who thinks learning French cooking or trying skydiving together would h have saved their marriage? Show of hands. Anybody??
My FW’s AP was French and they did indoor skydiving together! – tropes much 🤣
Gross. That should be a cartoon – the quest for aliveness!
Looking forward to read what you write about the Coldplay cheaters.
The universe certainly works in mysterious ways. I am just very sorry for his wife and children.
Omg I laughed so hard at this one , I snorted my tea! Doesn’t Perel see how unhinged she sounds? They cheat because they’re looking for themselves? Wth is she talking about?
It’s ridiculous BS that sells books, and that’s what she cares about. And courses to save marriages. Quite lucrative, I bet.
In side news, the CEO of Astronomer got caught at a Coldplay concert hugging his affair piece the head of HR…as her second in charge sits next to them fully aware of the affair….
And of course, the idiots doing the Esther Perel style responses online come crawling out.
Did he have a handful of boobage on camera, yes he did.
And he put out a lame “I’m sorry I got caught, gimme muh privacy” statement..
Hilarious.
I’ve had 2 laughs tonight, thanks much!
Part 2!! My ex was reported by a cafeteria worker he was having sex with in an empty patient room in a hospital he worked at.
HR investigated and deemed it consensual. She had complained he was awful to her. ( I could have saved her that step) Anyway, his punishment was 1 day suspension. HE WAS NOT FIRED for this. Her punishment? She was moved to another building and if they were ever in contact with each other, they COULD be terminated. This was HR. Political agents of corporate America.
Adultery was punishable by death, according to the ancient Hebrew texts. This is no small offense. It is a CAPITAL CRIME.