When Did the ‘Pick Me’ Start?
The Friday Challenge is: when did the pick me dance start? Before you knew there was an affair partner? Discuss.
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Dear Chump Lady,
This occurred to me because I was looking back at old photos. The passage of time allows me to see them more impartially — and I what I see now, is a nice woman trying very hard.
I have realized, with a sick feeling, that my marriage was a pick-me dance from very early on.
Somehow, the authenticity left. I spent the ensuing 20 years living some kind of internalized ideal of attractive, loving wife and homemaker. Dollars to donuts, I bet that my FW started cheating back then, a year or two after we were married, and that was when the trying-harder began.
I had moments of clarity, later, but looking back, the morph from being an actual partner in a true, safe way, to being an isolated person acting the part of the attractive, loving, successful wife must have begun soon after we were married. I was increasingly lonely for a long time. But everything he did was hidden from me and it did not occur to me to suspect him.
I think he started cheating way back then and on a subconscious level, I knew.
I was looking at old photos and now I see it.
He would lose weight periodically and I think it was because he was chasing someone. He looks disengaged and checked out , and also frankly just kind of basic in the photos. I was in denial.
So the pick-me dance might reach its apex when an affair is uncovered, but I believe that, subconsciously, I was performing a pick-me dance — for someone unworthy — for a long, long time. That was our dynamic, though I didn’t recognize it. The secrets are like poison ivy roots that grow and spread underground for years.
We women are taught to cheerlead and to never give up, and to be positive and selfless, and lower our expectations for our husbands at the same time we raise our own, and those lessons keep us pick-me-ing.
What do you think?
Chumpty Dumpty
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Dear Chumpty Dumpty,
It sounds like a good topic for a Friday Challenge.
I do object to the idea that chumps “unconsciously know” about the cheating. There’s victim blaming in that interpretation. It puts the emphasis on our faulty senses and not on the actual deception going on. You don’t have a decoder ring.
Of course you sensed, as most of us do, that something was very wrong.
That your partner was checked out. Uninterested. Bored. In the day to day, that could mean a bazillion different things. Job stress, that particular event was dull, you had an earlier argument, he slept badly. Whatever. We don’t imagine that our partners have double lives. But with the arc of time — and the revelation of D-Day — we see the patterns we missed before.
This man let you invest in him. Because that benefitted him, up to the moment you expired as a wife appliance. He feigned an investment to extract your devotion.
Add in the freight of misogyny — that women are supposed to accept men’s entitlement as natural, make our needs small, work harder to be worthy, you’re nothing if you’re not coupled — it’s harder to question. Why so shady? Why does this feel so lopsided? Am I wrong to feel unsafe and ill at ease? Have I misjudged him?
There’s nothing wrong with asking those questions of yourself if you’re with a normal partner. It’s good to reflect, question our motives, and offer grace. But cheaters weaponize those very generous qualities.
All to say, quit beating yourself up.
CN, when do you think the pick-me began?
TGIF!
In retrospect, it began when I questioned his predicable absences. He said he was with his “car buddies” or “visiting a sick friend”.
I eventually accepted that our brief time together needed to fit in both errands and recreation. Our last regular date was at a food court in a large grocery store.
I also planned a wreconciliation vacation filled with all his favorite things.
What things did he plan for You?
After DDay, I tried the RIC and pick me dancing but it lasted around two months. I was just sheer BS!! The poor FE was confused and lost. Nope, couldn’t buy that! He knew exactly what he was doing when he made his homemade porn with her, showered her with gift and booked vacations.
Now almost three years from final divorce and 5 years post DDay, I am at peace! I do notice that pick me dancing is everywhere though. My friends who want to find their next life partner dance like champions in order to gain attention from a man. No Thanks, I will pass. There is so much placed on being coupled. I am content either my BF and seeing him and doing things together when we want to and agree.
I know there are way to many errors on the original because I was on my phone.
I am just amazed now that I have started noticing things more, how many of us do some version of the “pick me” dance. I have noticed what I call the “dating face” where one partner puts this weird facade where they try to say and do things that would please the other person. I just can’t anymore. I am at the point where you have to take me as I am or not at all.
I so rarely rarely disagree with Our Patron Saint of Chumpdom the Divine Miss Tracy BUT on the subconscious thing …
I can tell you that if nothing else, my BODY knew it. From a bad back to a virus that reactivated due to stress (in the way that shingles does) that took out the hearing in one ear (plus tinnitus thanks v much. Yes I have been completely deaf on one side since two years before Dday.)
How can we not sense that something is off? Which we chumps interpret to mean, oh, as Cheater points out, it is ME that is out of whack. Cue gaslit self doubt, therapy, medication for whatever flavour of mental health issue is decreed.
And when I think about the years – the decades I was a kibble-dispenser – omg.
I actually think both Chumpty Dumpty and CL’s response are brilliant and applaud both. Just nitpicking. What is the difference anyway between “unconsciously know” and “unconsciously sense”? Semantics.
I also got shingles during this process! My doctor told me I was 40 years too young for them, haha.
Stress can definitely reactivate the chickenpox virus in your body. It happened to a manager of mine who was in her 50s, a bit young for shingles. She had 12 people reporting to her directly.
Sure, we knew something was not right, probably consciously in most cases. But we didn’t necessarily know cheating was involved. I knew FW no longer valued the marriage, I just didn’t know why.
Yes, this was me too. I could tell something was wrong for years. I would ask him and he gave me stupid excuses often sending me on wild goose chases I now see were intended to keep me distracted.
There was a time when my body was screaming that something was terribly wrong, but I dont remember ever having the thought that he was cheating – chronically or otherwise. I felt cold all the time, I had no libido..I thought I had hypothyroidism which tests showed I didnt have.
We had sold our house and moved the 3 kids across the country because he was accepted into grad school. We were older than most of the other people there and because they were all “studying” , they had unlimited chances to give bogus excuses for evening get-togethers.
Before we even moved, he suggested that I stay behind on the east coast and not move with him. I seriously thought he was joking, but much later, I realized that he wasn’t. I only wish now that I had enough info to have made a prudent decision for my life at that juncture.
I believe that it was during that time in grad school when he was advised by a fellow cheater to “never get divorced”. Cheater told me what his friend said and I mistakenly thought the friend meant “be kind to your wife and cultivate a good marriage”. His friend was juggling an ex wife, paying CS for his kids and his follow-on romance who was pushing hard for marriage. I think he told my Cheater that one wife having expectations was better than 2 and to go deep underground with his fucking around. My Cheater seemed to go into some bizarre dark emotional basement at that point.
But like someone said, I think I was unknowingly doing the Pick Me Dance as soon as I felt him disconnect very early in our marriage. I was living on emotional scraps from that point on. The PMD went full tilt when he told me (18 years into marriage with kids 9, 14, 16) that he intended to divorce me (because I was such a bad wife). I bought him gifts, I gave into too many of his foolish ideas, I tolerated abuse, I dropped my weight from about 145 to 113 and was falling apart for a long time.
I had an STI for 2 years…my X blamed me100%…Our Patron Saint CL knows that gaslighting is a learned behavior of believing lies..since baby days..so ingrained we can talk ourselves out of anything. Is that a lump I feel?? Naw!!!!So yes we might know way deep in our brain and our body keeps that score…but we just take our childhood pillows and smother the life out of any doubts.it.Thats what I did anyway. And I got tinnitus, deaf in one ear, hypertension, obesity, sadness, hypervigilance, this feeling of grief plus miscarriages, and much more…the body held the lies for me until I could see.
My body did also. It knew long before D day 2
“I do object to the idea that chumps “unconsciously know” about the cheating. There’s victim blaming in that interpretation. It puts the emphasis on our faulty senses and not on the actual deception going on. You don’t have a decoder ring.”
I agree. I even questioned my fw when he seemingly turned his back on us, less than a couple months after he got his big promotion. The promotion we worked years in the community side by side to build visibility, and in politics to help him in his career. I don’t see anything wrong with that, as long as you are doing good work. It is prudent as a young person (persons) to think about their life and how they can both do good works and build their future.
But here is the rub, if you are living a secret life while asking your spouse to support your dreams, that is where it goes off the rails. It is however, not the fault of the unwitting partner that they did not know they were being lied to. Especially when that liar is pretending to all and Sundry that he/she is a devoted family man.
Did I see red flags in hindsight, as I scoured our past without my clouded lenses. Yes, of course, but in real time these were easily explained, and we spent a lot of time together, with a solid intimate life, why on earth would I think that.
Now after the promotion and he started distancing him self, yes I noticed that and asked about it and he said from the first Chapter “Cheaters Handbook”. Oh I am just under stress with this new promotion, and “Mayor” is having me work a lot of extra time. So I backed off and gave him the space he needed to arrange his side peace into his new wife, while progressively growing apart from me. It was incremental; and I got pretty stressed over a lot of it, so I am pretty sure it put me in a mood, and that depressed/anxious mood was what he pointed to to blame me for the fact that my his own words “he never loved me, and he had been “dating” for ten years out of a 20 year marriage.
DD1 was in 2021 but I did not realise it was DD. She was just a work colleague, a junior who is working hard (with all orifices it turned out later). We went to marital therapy not to reconcile but to work on our relationship. Had to do date nights so I was working hard at pick me dancing, without realising that I was doing it. God it was so tedious and boring to go out with someone who was not interested and screwing someone else. We eventually stopped “dating”. DD2 was May 2024 – everything came out. I was not pick me dancing but was doing everything that I did not have a chance to do before cause was afraid he would not like it – changing my hair, piercing my ears, wearing different clothes. I look 10 years younger now – they really do suck your energy cause I used to give into a black hole of nothingness and now I am using this energy on myself and my kids.
I arranged a “date” for us to go to the local arboretum. Planned it all, paid for it all, got my hopes up. I mean, Nature! Who can resist such a Cultural Outing? He could. It was like dragging around a bored toddler, except I didn’t have a wagon or snacks. He marched around the flowers in such grim silence that I gave up and we left after an hour.
When we had 3 little kids and I worked while he was in grad school, we have very few evenings out because our social circle had zero babysitters. Towards the end of school, his buddy was getting married and I WAS SOOOOO looking forward to the event. I got 2 babysitters, a nice dress, etc. We got to the wedding (where I much later realized some of his side fucks were) and looked like he wanted to rip his own limbs off to get away. He ignored me and was cranky and hostile for no reason. I was heartbroken. I had ZERO suspicion of cheating. He was just SO MEAN all the time. When I get to Purgatory, I hope God lets me pull up the video on that scene for Cheater to explain to me.
If he didnt want to be married to me, he should have just said so and let me go live my life. He had, by that time, figured out exactly what sorts of scraps to throw my way to keep me hoping.
I experienced this, too. It was infrequent and would extend for periods. Sometimes days, sometimes months. I particularly remember the times it happened when I had my babies. Unprovoked, sudden viciousness from him. I would have a horrible sense of the bottom dropping out and bewilderment. Having the babies with me made it particularly painful. It was always scary because it seemed like a different personality emerging. Finally I realize the root cause was just plain old cheating.
For the entirety of my Time of Crisis (he asked for divorce, Dday, wreckonsillyation, his death) as much as he was a quirky guy who acted strangely on the regular, I really truly believed that Susan of Seattle was his only affair.
That was blown out of the water when (after his death) a person he had confided to told me that my Cheater had had many affairs. Other than the affair, this person is older and didnt know Cheater that well. At first, I thought “was he confused? did he get Cheater mixed up with someone else in his mind?”
but with my mind opened to the possibility that he was a life long cheater, once I saw it as possible, even if the person who told me recanted, I now believe he was a life long cheater and what you said above is the reason
He didnt get difficult because of anything between us, he would be fine then out of the blue act like a monster. The idea that women were coming and going in his life makes perfect sense and I believe it to be true.
I was thinking recently …wondering if Im now reaching too far assuming there were dozens of women who there might have been 3 or 4 over 25 years. I decided thats not my fault…he died leaving proof he was a cheater and liar and selfish man who did not fulfill his vows. He did not tell me the truth so Im not at fault for assuming most things he said were lies. If he threw any truths into the mix which I mistook for lies, well…that is what you get when you are a liar.
Oddly though…Ive read stories like yours where men get worse when babies come along. Mine was opposite – he loved babies and he was super dad right after the babies were born – especially the youngest…but once the novelty wore off (at about 9 months old) he returned to his unpredictable, miserable self.
Been there! So many dates tanked by her bad mood. Eventually this matured into her refusing to go anywhere or do anything with me.
We once had an anniversary dinner at a nice seafood restaurant and he was so unpleasant and begrudging, I remember thinking “If he were to blurt out ‘I really hate you’ in this very moment, I would not be surprised”. I was, however, being remarkable accommodating and compliant and I couldn’t think of any way to try harder, so I sat there in silent misery.
On other dates, he would get mad and rage.
Ugh, this! When they’re not happy, and they have to let everyone around them know it. Everyone must pay for my discontent!
This hit me hard. I think it was from the very beginning.
Sometime early on, my ex told me that I was the key to him remaining faithful. It was part of the evangelical cultural belief that men were “unbridled” and that their wives had to provide the outlet so they wouldn’t stray. Even his preacher father gave me that. I read it in marriage books.
Of course, I wanted a successful, long-lasting marriage, so I bought it, but it bothered me. What if I had a business trip? What if we had a baby? What if he had a sexy coworker? It made me feel very insecure.
My ex also had an old girlfriend that he talked about in a way that made me very uncomfortable. She apparently was his ideal woman, but he broke it off for religious reasons. So what about me then? Turns out, she sent cards and called the house periodically, usually every few years. I was at home with the kids, and she’d say that he was the “best man she had ever met” and that she was checking up on him. In the last few years of our decades-long marriage, he talked about her more.
When he left the last time, he landed in her area of the country. And he also told me that “if” he cheated with some “cute blond” it would be my fault because we were separated.
It took me a while to process, but no, I was not responsible for his fidelity. I didn’t have to perpetually play “pick me” to keep him faithful. That was on him.
What a convenient doctrine…for men.
Exactly. They aren’t responsible.
I am so grieved that you experienced this as well. FW told me that it was my fault if he lusted. I told him that I was not able to control his sin and that he had the spirit of self control. Similar to you, the X liked to triangulate with his ex’s and I always told him that it made me uncomfortable. Well, all of them can keep him because I want nothing to do with him!
So very messed up.
I have male friends that I’ve discussed this with, including one who is a retired pastor/therapist. And they assured me that blaming me for his adultery was wrong-wrong-wrong. We all make choices, and humans in committed relationships aren’t animals who can’t control themselves when they are around another potential sexual partner.
So glad to be in a chapter of life without my ex.
After he left and continued to call me at night to say goodnight like he used to in person…. Beside myself with grief, I begged him to please come home and Why are you doing this? I looked up sex therapy, sent him date stuff we could do that I thought would help us reignite the spark he said he lost for me……. uggghhhhh! I am embarrassed of that person that I was, but grateful I put in the work now to see no amount of pick me would have changed his sick twisted version of us he created to make himself feel better. It has been 3 years post BD, and yes it is still a process to understand that it’s not me that was unworthy, he just couldn’t live up to the man I thought he was. Sad because we could have been GREAT!
There was no “Pick Me Dance” post D-Day … Ex-Mrs LFTT’s “it’s an open relationship or a divorce” ultimatum put paid to that, even though the ultimatum was delivered in the same breath that she denied having an affair.
But …. and it’s a bit but …… about 10 years before D-Day, she started becoming very critical of me, to the point that I started to wonder if I would ever be able to match up with the idealised version of a husband/father of our children/wage earner/you name it that she had in her head. I guess that I was competing with (and trying to be) that guy for almost 10 years, even if he existed only in her imagination. Unless, of course, she was (and still is) just a miserable excuse for human being who got her kicks (and made herself feel better) by knocking me down at every single opportunity that she got.
Given that she’s the type of person who makes her own candle seem brighter by blowing other peoples’ candles out, I’m pretty sure that I know the answer to that question.
I have not missed her once in the 10 years since she left.
LFTT
Wow, this is a triggering Friday.
Yea, I was constantly begging for time for and the kids. I would have to check in on Wednesday and Thursday to “remind” him of kids activities. Otherwise he was booked with his things. Constantly protecting his rest/naptime, when he never let me rest. Especially during the week when I had to work!! (Breadwinner)
I will never forget during the first year of dating I made a scene how he never saved a seat for me to sit next to him. We performed with a dance group and at the end the restaurant would feed us. I would save a seat for him. He never did for me. He also stopped dancing with me too after a year. I had to beg. Whew, trigger.
So…you and your kids were never a priority for him. Sheesh.
it was all a performance, i think. and i was in a perpetual audition for the parts of girlfriend/young wife/new mother/older wife, and i didn’t know it. but i know it now and the feeling is deeply uncomfortable.
i feel like i was a puppet and he the puppeteer. it’s all about control.
i remember when we were dating and my X went to toronto on a short business trip, and he wanted to catch up with an old uni friend, a woman i had not met, and he triangulated me against her. “she’s great. smart. i always wondered if we would get together, but she moved to toronto.” watching for my reaction, that kind of thing. i was worried while he was away, worried he was interested in her. i cringe.
today i would just break up with a guy who was manipulative in that way.
this is a triggering post. it hits to the center of my self.
There was no pick-me dance after d-day because he said he thought he’d “be happier with her” and left.
But was I pick-me dancing before? I don’t know. I never knew he was cheating. He’s always been a quiet, mildly depressed, and moody man, so that behavior simply continued. I didn’t notice a huge difference, except maybe for the longer than usual work hours, which he chalked up to his having difficulties with the electronic medical records at work. I believed him. 🤦🏻♀️ And he fly fished more, but that also made sense to me. He was addicted to the sport. Looking back, I see that “fly fishing,” which took hours, gave him ample time for trysts with the AP. Ugh. I was damn trusting.
So, I didn’t knowingly engage in any pick-me-dance beyond the usual efforts to be fit and thin (for me but also for him), That said, I’m sure he was comparing ME to her during their 3-year affair and the AP was engaged in a fierce once-sided pick-me dance. She knew about the competition. I was unaware. That part kills me.
Six years post d-day, and I’m glad the AP “won” the pick-me dance. He’s no prize. And now those two cheaters and liars are stuck with each other. [I’m just stuck with shitty memories–the gift that keeps on giving.]
“Fly fishing.” I’ve never heard s*x called that before.
I get you Spinach.
Completely unaware and would never have suspected such a thing- but the AP knew and were doing their damdest to ‘win the prize’
Neither AP got the men they thought they were getting- serves them right.
Such an interesting question. I was dumped almost exactly 6 years ago after 26 years together, 18 married. I didn’t discover the affair (for which there was physical evidence – I can think of at least one other co-worker ‘situation’ which ended when her husband moved her to a different part of the UK) about 8 weeks later. An affair was denied both before and after discovery, but, as I say, this time I had proof. I started divorce proceedings quickly after seeing that evidence. However, in those 8 weeks, I pick me danced like crazy for about 4 weeks. And then I became terrified of having to have any contact with the ex at all, primarily because I was sick and ill and even more sick of being hurt. Before I discovered the affair, ex moved back in (because he hadn’t organised anywhere to go). I tried to find out what was going on and I was extremely kind to his ‘mental distress’. He saw that as an opportunity to list my copious faults to explain why I was a failure as a human being and how it was a huge surprise to everyone that he had been able to endure such a horrible, disgusting woman for so long. Finding out about the affair with his ex from high school was exactly what I needed to create the anger to give it right back to him. I’m a lawyer who has drafted many divorce petitions. I enjoyed doing my own, and the ex enjoyed reading it – not so much! No room for image management there.
But on the ‘photo’ point, on my goddaughter’s 21st, my friend sent me a photo of me holding the baby at her christening (she’s now 24). I looked at the photo and felt deeply sad. I look as if I’m suffering from an episode of total madness. My eyes are deranged, my hair cut so short, my skin drained of colour. I was 42 and I looked my current age, 65. I discussed this with my therapist and it didn’t take much for me to see that I had been dancing for the ex for all of the 26 years together. I didn’t just walk on egg shells – my whole life was built on and around them. My mother and the ex share so many characteristics and I had, in effect, continued a lifetime of trying to please my mother, to earn her love, with the ex. It was an earth-shattering moment when I could see that pattern as plain as the nose on my face. It was life changing and almost nothing helped me more in moving on. My therapist does not hesitate to call out the ex’s behaviour as cruel and abusive and that too has made all the difference. I’m lucky to be able to be completely no contact, and I hope never to see his face again.
I have come to believe I also “married my mother”. And you know what? The FW had her number. I remember early on in our marriage, she asked me to sign a small trust over to her, and he called it a grift. He knew! Because it takes one to know one. And I think the betrayal of the cheating runs deeper for me and is an echo of my mother’s confusing behavior when I was a child. I was chumped by my mom before I was chumped by my husband. So yeah, there was a pick-me dance for my mom (I also applied to, but didn’t get into, law school!)
At the same time, as a young woman with a toddler, my mom was abandoned by her first husband, who by my aunt and uncle’s account was a cross between Rasputin and Bluebeard. I had the hubris and smugness for twenty years to believe I’d broken the cycle. The hand from the grave!
Photos, yes. I have photos from my days of being a busy mom of kids married to a mean monster and I look like I am barely holding it together.
Cheater also had this schtick where he “jokingly” acted like he was trying desperately to get away from me in photos. He contorted his face and arched his back away from me as if I were a zombie about to bite him. If I called him on it, he accused me of having no sense of humor.
Photos of me now are real and I look happy because I am
I too am a lawyer, although d-day happened right as I was starting law school. There’s probably something to be said that a certain type of cheater likes to attach to a partner who has their shit together. They also like a busy partner who has less time to put 2 and 2 together.
Thank you for posting this. I was hesitant to chime in as I know codependency explanation for chump behaviour is not popular here (I agree that it is not an explanation for FW behaviour in any way). I also pick me danced for my mother for almost 48 years and for FW for 26. I believe it was part of my attraction to FW that he could provide me with a familiar opportunity to compete in an unwinnable game “for as long as we both shall live”. If a guy didn’t make me feel on edge, I thought he was boring. FW provided me with a lifetime of excitement and “motivated me to be a better woman”. Like you, I’m also a lawyer. This pattern is common in the profession as this career offers shiny achievements and milestones (not to mention sacrifices and martyrdom) we can bring to the feet of our dance judges. I remember paying close attention to traits of my FWs mother as we were dating (including professional achievements) and trying to fit the mold to “keep his interest”. It’s very sad for me to look back on these decades of self-rejection and “role playing” that alienated me from FW, myself and others but I am grateful for an opportunity for starting over and for hints of budding self love. I feel like I am finally living in reality. It’s not pretty but it is so much better to be awake.
Isn’t it extraordinary, but also wonderful, to find that we are not alone. That’s why I read along here regularly and post intermittently. Everything you say resonates with me. Sometimes being largely free of that need to please feels very uncomfortable. But I’m learning to breathe through that feeling. And I agree with you about lawyers and the fact that they are hardwired to please and speculate about motives and how to manipulate our presentation to achieve the best outcome for the client (I’m a litigator but it applies across the board). As well as living life in 6 minute units of time (been doing that since work experience at age 19 and, thanks to the ex, I expect to be doing it until I’m 69). I reckon only another lawyer gets how the 6 minutes unit thing wrecks your ability to be rational about time passing! Perhaps there’s a claim in there somewhere! The ex was a second rate lawyer (never as successful as me) but, blimey, did he explain how the law worked to me on a regularly boring basis. He was skilled at applying the 6 minutes unit thing in the bedroom. Whoosh and it was gone!
We have very similar stories, Mighty Warrior: I was dumped after 18 years of marriage for the AP with no hoovering, blamed for all of it, etc. I also went through a brief period of active pick-me dancing before I finally accepted that divorce was the only viable option. But with some good therapy I realized that not only had I been pick-me dancing since the beginning of our relationship, I’d been doing it *my whole life* to try to get the attention of emotionally unavailable parents. My fears of abandonment were so intense I’d twist myself into all kinds of shapes to avoid losing people. That’s one of the biggest blessings of my discard and divorce—that I got the therapy I needed to start believing in my right to myself and the things I love and need to thrive. Wishing the same for you, sister!
I totally agree with you about the discard and divorce being an opportunity – to get therapy and to rebuild. I think there’s a theory called ‘positive disintegration’ (HOAC will know about it) about rebuilding from psychological trauma. To be honest, there are probably easier ways of effecting personal growth, but hey, if you get a lemon, squeeze it on a pancake. My mum is nearly 90 and behaves just as she ever did. People say ‘but she’s old and scared’ and I can now say ‘no, she’s always been like this, it’s just marginally worse’. Without the discard and divorce, I’d be tearing my hair out. But, thanks to the therapy, I’m in my garden with my whippet (ex hated animals – red flag much!), in the sunshine, with a glass of fizz and a bowl of twiglets. Go me! Sending love to you and all fellow people pleasing addicts.
“…in the sunshine, with a glass of fizz and a bowl of twiglets”
I don’t know what two of those things are, but your day sounds heavenly!
Chuckling away here. Fizz is any sparkling wine (champagne or prosecco for example). Twiglets are baked snacks shaped to look like twigs, and coated in a marmite flavour. The ex hated them and I just can’t get enough!
I would argue that Pick Me starts at the moment of the betrayal. We may not know the formal start of the dance, hence the disadvantage from lack of knowledge. We are all already behind when we become acutely aware of the danger the relationship is in. Hence the initial panic.
If you are reading this and D-Day hasn’t come: don’t do the dance. A real friend/lover/spouse should have already made their pick: you. The only dancing you should be doing is on their grave otherwise.
For me, I have told the story before. I was diagnosed with Diabetes and was having…well…a moment that I am less than proud of emotionally. Rather than show empathy or support she asked for an open relationship as “that would make the relationship stronger.” And when I asked if there was somebody else she dodged initially until she stated that the friend she told me not to worry about was making overtures and that she didn’t want to hurt him.
I said no. “Work on the relationship you already have.” She agreed.
She opened the relationship anyway. Just didn’t tell me and “was special friends” with him.
That’s when I started dancing-me and my two left feet. I spent the remaining 9 months of the “marriage” in constant fear that anything I did was the last straw. Everything I could do to placate. All for nought-she still cheated and she still left anyway when the getting was good.
What also left were my mood swings and constant fear of being abandoned as it happened anyway.
Not worth it. If I have a second regret in life-it’s not kicking her to the curb when I got done feeling sorry about myself that my Beta Cells were in open revolt.
Have a Fuckwit Free Friday!
He had his first major infatuation within three years of dating. He was an expert at using intermittant reinforcement. When the next female of interest came along, I experienced the high of his limerance through attention, guilt gift giving and trips. Then came the discard. Punishing silent treatments filled with disdain and contempt. Surely I had to be the cause of his disappointment and subsequent poor treatment. So I laced up my dance shoes and did the pick me polka.
Wash, rinse, repeat for decades. I am so happy to be out of that cycle.
Intermittent reinforcement (IR) is a hell of a drug, indeed. Good for you for breaking out of that cycle. Some folks never do.
IR is also rife in dating in 2025. People look at me cockeyed sometimes when I tell them to block him the first time the guy they hardly know yet disappears on them or uses the phrase “I’ve been busy.”
Rensselaer- it’s that spinning cycle that kept me off balance and dizzy. The ups felt so good…exhilarating, the downs so horrible..but it’s the spin that kept me holding on. I can’t describe how joyful I am to be out, not dancing, not on that Rollercoaster 🎢anymore. I have never ever felt better after such a cruel life of one betrayer after another. I am no longer naive and can pick a disordered person out of any crowd. The world is full but I am mighty now.
I called it the rollercoaster of intermittent reinforcement and the carousel of circular arguments that happened when I was trying to get off the rollercoaster. I’m now walking on the midway towards the nearest exit from Disordered Land.
Mighty joy is on my horizon!
I was addicted to the highs just like a high stake gambler. What was on the table was a marriage, house, children, my illusions, connections of decades…I knew they would evaporate if I let go. When I lost all the chips I saw the agony I was in. Joy is now mine..a joy i never before knew. Freedom from the cycle of abuse.
My pick me dance was invisible and my only hint is NOW looking back. When the devaluing and meaness started. When he didn’t care about my pregnancy or our son and was gone so much. When I was never good enough with #2 cheater and he was unhappy, gone, moody, mean, devaluing, demanding, gone out “shopping”. Talking about all his woman friends at work…looking way back the pattern is clear that my hold was slipping or gone. So I call it my invisible dance. I was dancing so I would be of value to him. But I never was.. it was so sad….for me. I valued commitment and honesty they did not.
i so relate to the invisible dance.
it’s okay to be sad, 2Xchump.
Sometimes I cry😢 when I write here. ✍️It just breaks my heart 💔to see myself trying so hard to be loved
I cried a lot all through my marriage to Cheater. I cried when he marginalized me a thousand times, I cried at the divorce speech, I cried when he moved away, I cried when he died, I cried a lot for a long time.
When I learned 2 years after he died that he was a serial cheater, I didnt shed a tear. When I found (about 2 years after he died) the document he wrote himself stating “I never loved my wife” I didnt shed a tear. Its like my body knew a truth on some deep level.
If I cried for me, that would be fine – Im not sure why I generally dont
Its like when my body and soul fully and completely gave up on him, even though he was already dead…I retroactively gave up on who I thought he was. I literally fell out of love with him after his death.
Unicornomore…My first cheater was 38 years ago. My children tell me he’s in very poor shape. He was my childhood sweetheart. The way he hurt me, i don’t know how I would feel if he died. His mother died last month and I loved her even though at age 98 she had only started being more open with me 3 years before..but she loved our children and moved to be near them. So I cried alot during her death process. I’ve been grey rock with her son.
#2 cheater was so awful at the end that my illusion exploded and his mental illness impoded in loss of all control of his compulsions i knew it was a disaster and if he died, i knew the truth and woukd feel sad for his choices….that would be all.
It must be horribly mixed feelings and finding out your Xs true regard for you, trusting now that he was awful..must be shock after shock after shock. I’m so sorry for such a drastic ending of your reality. Just makes me ill to think of all the damage done.
Big hugs girl- we understand.
2xchump, it is sad, so crying is natural. It shows you have a heart and a soul. And those are very loveable attributes (FWs have neither). You don’t have to try. Love will grow (for yourself in particular) if you give it space, a bit of plant food, and lots of rain.
We have something called Desert Island Discs on the BBC radio here in the UK. Today, I was happily driving and listening to a gardener I liked and admired choosing their discs. She was asked how she met her husband. She described how they met, and said ‘he was married at the time and had three little boys (who I love) so it was “complicated”’. As soon as I got to Tesco, off she went, and I won’t be listening to any more of her podcasts or buying any of her dahlias. To dismiss the damage she had contributed to so glibly tells me all I need to know about her character. And she chose to bring that up on the show! The content was informed by what she wanted to share, and she’s been married to this bloke for decades. Discretion would have been the better part of valour, but she’s a cheater so, hey ho!
Mighty Warrior..I had to smile reading your note. I do the same thing…I have an Elderly cousin who speaks of the woman he is now using as appliances he is using them…..and his wife whom he cheated on with his wife’s nurse. All the cheater apologists saw..oh well he was lonely..or he’s old..other people I listen to what they say and see that whispy user character bleeding through their words. I’ve had to cut that old cousin off and other people I grey rock. There are many others who can take it all that charming talk of using others to promote their agenda..but like you, I cannot.
My husband’s sister started her affair with her current husband when they were both married. (He’s a flaming miserable jerk all by himself, but that’s another issue…) Their “storybook romance” is big-time triggering for me and I leave the room whenever they discuss/brag about it. Husband tries to excuse her by saying “Well, she was in a bad marriage at the time” to which I reply that I have also been in a couple of bad relationships but it never would have occurred to me to cheat, even after I realized that I was being chumped (I just left). [DH also uses the “he’s old” excuse for the guy’s abominable behavior – he’s 20 years older than any of the rest of us – but a FW is a FW at any age.]
Sleepy head, do you think that cheaters who marry their cheater AP- get a frisson of excitement finding each other because they never know if their new cheater on cheater partner will cheat on them..so it adds chaos, which they love more uncertainty.. to the mix?? Unpredictable??Chumps were so nice and too loving, forgiving, cheerful, forgiving, good appliances etc..but this cheater to cheater couple means they could dump you or you them anytime. Keeps one on their toes!!!!. Part of the unknown keeping them both alert. I’ve seen so many cheaters on cheaters stay together after their separate affairs that I just wonder. Chumps were too predictable.. I have no idea but this just popped into my head. Untangle untangle..
Maybe the excitement factor works for some; I also suspect that there are others who tell themselves “that would NEVER happen to ME…” As I mentioned above, the in-laws think they have a fairy-tale relationship and are totally smug about it, always bad-mouthing their respective chumps; they fall into the second category, I guess. By the way, my husband was a chump too, but he still idolizes their marriage and makes excuses for both of them, for some reason.
Risk management for chumps: the more cheaters who marry each other, the safer we are from harm.
(((hugs))) to you 2x. Have your cry when you need to, and then get back to mighty.
Best thing..I believed I was loved so does that count? Those years sprinkled with 🧚♀️ fairy dust? Thank you, that was very kind
2x -If you believed you were loved that does count as being loved. Until your heart was shredded, and that is why we are all here. That time of your belief is as real as this time of your heartache. It is a part of you and your history on this planet.
Looking back, he started getting mean when I was pregnant. He would take jokes way too far but he would always apologize afterwards. And he was helpful and involved. He checked off the good partner activities (and it was literally a checklist, I found it after he moved out. He had notes on how to be a human. I was horrified that he needed to write things down like “say something nice to her” and “don’t insult her”)
My body was also never good enough after having our child and I was in really great shape at several points and have even had cosmetic surgery to fix issues he had with me. He was not in great shape just for the record. He was skinny fat. So it was really the whole time. Things would be good for awhile and then I’d get the rug yanked out from under me. I started to get used to that happening. It wasn’t cheating all the time but it would be something. It was an exhausting way to live. I never felt like I had safety or stability. It’s no wonder my illness got so much worse with that level of stress.
Katiepig..sending loving hugs..the pregnancy devaluing hits me the hardest. That was 38 years ago right,,? But EVERY SINGLE TIME I see a beautifully pregnant woman I say to myself..I wonder if he’s cheating or I wonder if he loves her. Even if the partner looks kind and solicitous I say..hmmmmI wonder how long that will last or wonder what hes hiding?.Terrible
Sending you hugs as well. I don’t know that it ever goes away. It’s 25 years for me now and I still think it when I see pregnant women too. I hope she’s being treated well. Because mine was amazing to me in public and people thought I was so lucky. The bad stuff only happened behind closed doors when we were alone. I think I just realized why I liked having company so much during my marriage. I would entertain all the time, even when I was exhausted. No problem, I’ll cook for everybody. Now that I’m out of that, I have zero desire to have company over. I like my peace. Eventually I’d like to be able to host my bible study group but I don’t have enough seating or parking currently but other than that, I enjoy solitude. I think having people around just made me feel safer even though I didn’t consciously realize it.
Katiepig..just wow!! I was invited today to a woman’s Bible retreat. There will be hundreds of woman. I said no to my friend because I cannot do crowds anymore. I feel suffocated. I used to go places all the time but now I just want to be home 2 years post divorce. . I still teach a kids Bible class and attend church, do zoom 12 step groups, counseling..but I had not been truly single except for a 3 year period between husbands…for 47 years with a man. I don’t know how to fit in. My pastors wife is pregnant and I am triggered..I even told her a tiny bit of my story. I should not have!..not every husband is a jerk but I guess it’s the high points in life you remember or the very low. Like someone telling you that you look fat in your wedding dress on that very day. Just can’t wipe that away. I’m so sorry for this in your life journey. These men were very low characters especially when you are carrying their child. I do have a very sacred and restored relationship with God and maybe that was what I needed after all.
Skinny fat reminded me of many years ago when my son was a swimmer on the HS team. His friends mom took them all to a pool where they measured body fat my using the water method. His friends mom was super skinny. She wanted to show my son how little fat she had on her body. He was of course much bigger, but muscular. They were both 5’10”. I don’t remember the exacts stats, but she was shocked to learn her body fat was much higher than hers.
My fw too was good at mimicking decent human behavior. It was in part why it was so hard for me to accept that the new him was really the old him, with his mask dropped.
That’s really funny and weird for her to do. So many people don’t understand body fat. Like, women need more body fat than men so of course she would have more. I’ve heard women say they only have 2% or 5% bodyfat and it’s like, no you don’t because you would be ded. 20% is athletic and healthy for women while men can get under 10%. When I was a hardbody in the Army I was at 17%. I was very lean. Women in bodybuilding competitions sometimes get below 10% but they can literally only sustain that for a couple days and they’re probably still doing significant damage to their bodies by doing that.
Sorry for the rant. I used to be a trainer back in the day and honestly, that was my passion. I don’t mean to lecture, I just get excited about stuff like this. The body fat claims are something that always make me shake my head.
I relate to masterful mimicking and the challenges of accepting the new him as the old him. My Mr Pretender gave me the gift of a visual cue to help me stay on track by using a mental trick. In a reversal of the “dropping the mask” analogy, he grew a beard for the first time after he left. So, the “new him” has a beard. So, now every time I think of him in the past or look at photos, I mentally add his gross grey beard to the image (even where he is 20) and I know who I’m looking at and what I’m “missing”. He has always had a “beard” but with the smoke and mirrors convinced me for a time that he didn’t.
What is it with that grey beard thing. My fw when he retired grew a long gray scraggly beard, I mean navel length. Looked horrid. He looked like an old mountain man. I am so glad I missed that. I only saw it once at my grandsons graduation. GAH.
The friend’s mom sounds a bit sad and desperate.
That’s right, and add “bizarre”. She wanted to show a high school boy how much body fat she had?? Erm…. WUT?!?
I didn’t know her well. I think she was just having fun with the kids. But could be. Her son and mine were close friends for several years. They drifted apart by later HS years.
I think I was supposed to be pick-me-dancing but it totally went over my head, and so I guess I failed from the beginning LOL. When we first started dating he made it a point to bring me to an after work function of his and point out a coworker who had been a friend-with-benefits (I could make an educated guess now that she may have not shared this understanding based on how she looked at me when we met). Then I think of another time when I personally noticed and pointed out to him with a laugh (which I think ruffled his feathers) that it felt like he was going off some movie script/romance trope with how he was acting or expected me to act when something “romantic” was suppose to be in play. Beyond the tingly thrills they feel from us vying for their affection, I think they need us to be engaged in their fakery to make it all seem more real for them. When I look back on it, I don’t know if much of who he is was ever genuine. Toward the end, when he did the stereotypical proposal of polyamory, I got extremely sad, then mad, then took the stupid book he thrust at me to the perpetual library book sale. I was not supposed to have to argue to someone who MARRIED me why they should choose me like some kind of f*cked up Groundhog Day scenario. Like others before me have said here, these people should remain daters for life — leave us alone! Of course they can’t though, they’re life vampires.
It wasn’t until my oldest son was in his early 30s that a therapist offered the possibility that son was on the autistic spectrum. My first reaction was “that is the stupidest thing I ever heard” as son was so social and had lots of friends etc.
In discussing it with son, he explained to me that he didnt really understand people, he just mimicked them. When that mode of functioning quit working, it sent him into deep crisis.
It makes me wonder if Cheater was also mimicking what he thought people expected from him (which would likely be most of our relationship). He also told tales of romantic intrigue but if asked about it later he would recant either saying he didnt remember saying that or he was joking or otherwise refusing to discuss something he had freely offered earlier. For years he spoke a romance with a college roommate and when I referenced it after his death, his friends from that time told me he never dated that gal.
He used to tell me that men “spin yarns” (tell lies) as a normal way of functioning and it wasn’t wrong at all.
If Cheater had some mental disconnect, it still wouldn’t excuse his behaviors. He still chose his actions and words and was unkind and unethical in his dealings.
Ouch! And O.M.Gosh! I was supposed to be pick me dancing but because I trusted him his behaviors went right over my head as well. Another necessary but painful realization.
He told me that the attention he solicited from other women was a game to him. His life was a game and he made my life a joke within his game.
Ooh, apt description, “life vampires”!
It began on my wedding day, when he inexplicably acted bored and mean, and spoke only to his best man, who he’d told me was gay and in denial. Turns out he wasn’t the only one, unbeknownst to me.
I didn’t realize until after he’d dropped off the face of the earth with nary a word, that the FW I was dating was trying to goad me into doing the pick-me dance for him. He was always going on about all these other women who were ostensibly hitting on him and seemed pissed off that I wasn’t sufficiently jealous. Then he started in on why didn’t I dye my hair blonde or why wasn’t I a teacher or how I should be getting my PhD. I never took the bait. I found out over a year after he ghosted me, that he’d married a blonde teacher with her masters degree. They’re divorced now. Shocker.
Speaking of photos.
In not a single photo of us at any point is he genuinely smiling or looking happy to be there- there’s just no one home in those dead eyes.
It’s chilling to see – I just didn’t notice at the time.
Just the one when I was photographed during a union demonstration with him did he look reasonably happy- because I was doing what he wanted and he knew he had the power over dynamic going on.
Maybe this is a way of identifying these people. I used to tease him that he always looked like he was the security detail in photos. It was particularly noticeable in those group family pictures you take on special occasions. Something was off in the body language. He didn’t look like part of the group.
This is a really thought-provoking question! I really appreciate this one.
My ex had an “exit affair” so the classic pick-me dance was not something I experienced, but WOW do I relate to this. About a year before the relationship ended she pulled away hard and became super withholding.
There was just nothing I could do to try and repair our connection. Any attempt to pick-me dance just made her look at me with hatred and disgust. I could feel our relationship slipping through my fingers.
One thing that I think chumps understand from experience is that cheaters are usually already unpleasant in a myriad of other ways. People who haven’t been cheated on want to believe that there would be obvious signs from their partner. But when your partner is already stubborn, angry, perpetually depressed, and/or detached, and cheating only turns these qualities up by 10%, the “signs” can fly under the radar.
“One thing that I think chumps understand from experience is that cheaters are usually already unpleasant in a myriad of other ways. People who haven’t been cheated on want to believe that there would be obvious signs from their partner. But when your partner is already stubborn, angry, perpetually depressed, and/or detached, and cheating only turns these qualities up by 10%, the “signs” can fly under the radar.”
THIS is such a great observation. The FW was absolutly already unplesant in a myriad of ways” to say the least. That line was so accurate it made me laugh out loud.
No doubt I am spackling myself but better me than him! I don’t think I pick me danced. I was fighting every day for him to show up and be accountable to me and our kids. He just lied and lied and the lies piled on top of lies. Maybe that was a form of pick me dancing, that I kept fighting? I guess I gave him a lot of negative attention.
It was weird, I now realize I was unconsciously pick-me dancing against a dark shadow from the very start.
In a bewildered head-in-blender state, I asked for a divorce before I knew of the cheating … but then I backtracked, that’s when he got very abusive psychologically, sexually humiliating and physically violent.
I still didn’t accept until he had moved in with schmoopie and discarded me after 5 years and 2 kids together, (saved me from my internalized anti-divorce religious guilt that was keeping me trapped and in denial)… to my relief, peace and delight 20 years later.
I thought about this question for a long time, and thought I had nothing to contribute to this discussion, because I didn’t pick-me dance after D-Day. I was too exquisitely, incandescently ANGRY to pick-me dance. All of the casual cruelty, the deliberate nastiness, the control and manipulation, the ABUSE that I’d put up with in the name of my marriage, and THEN he goes and CHEATS on me, too? I didn’t leave right away — our whole state was covered by a monster hurricane, and I was stuck with him for the duration. And, it turned out, I was still stuck with him until six weeks later when the drawbridges were repaired, the flood waters receded, the debris cleared off the roads and cars were once again available to rent. But I didn’t beg him for another chance, or vow eternal love, or even consider reconciliation. I was too. Freaking. Angry. In retrospect, I was angry enough to risk my life standing up to him . . . and so he backed down.
No pick-me dancing post D-day. That’s when it STOPPED.
I don’t know when the pick-me dancing STARTED, and every time I really think about it, it seems it started even earlier than I thought it had. Maybe five or six years after we got married and we sold my house and moved across the country? Maybe earlier than that, when I started placating him when he started getting grouchy, hoping to avoid the full-blown tantrum. Maybe it started soon after our wedding day, when he had an official wife appliance and was beginning to exploit that fact. Maybe it started during the four years we were “just dating” before we decided to marry?
By the time I left him, I had been tiptoeing around him, walking on eggshells for YEARS in a mostly vain attempt to avoid “setting him off” because his tantrums were so fucking scary. And I excused the behavior — he was “stressed at work,” or he was “upset about his mother’s Alzheimer’s,” or he was “not sleeping well.” Even though I worked the exact same job he did in the exact same workplace (and for much less pay), my mother also had Alzheimer’s and I was running myself ragged flying halfway across the country every six weeks to take her to doctor’s appointments, do chores at her house, measure out her many prescriptions and pack enough pill sorters to last until my sister’s visit three weeks after mine. And I worked night shift so I clearly was not excelling in the sleep department, either. But I didn’t have tantrums and scream at *him* three times a day.
I kept my hair blonde because he liked blonde hair best, and I kept it as long as it would grow, and if I came home with a “too-short” hair cut, I apologized and blamed the hair stylist who really was over-medicated. I planned vacations that he would like, and activities that he was interested in. I planned dates, even knowing that he’d casually cancel them if he didn’t feel like that particular activity at that particular time. Or he’d be “in a bad mood” and I’d be too busy trying to prevent a meltdown to actually enjoy the activity that I had been looking forward to. I wore the clothes he liked best, the colors he liked. I cooked his favorite meals, a laughed when he swung swords around because *HE* clealy thought it was funny. I parroted his political opinions to avoid those three hour lectures at full parade volume, and when his “opinions” changed on a dime, I parroted those, too. And I cannot, for the life of me, remembered when all of that started. I turned myself inside out to please a man who could not be pleased. That was me, pick me dancing at it’s finest.
I am so LUCKY he cheated. Cheating was always a hard boundary, the one thing that I vowed not to tolerate from the very start of our relationship. Abuse should have been a hard boundary, but I always thought I was SAFE with him, even as I was tiptoeing around, placating and pleasing him. If he hadn’t cheated, I might still be there, placating and pleasing him, pick me dancing every minute of every day while my soul shriveled up and died. Instead, I rented a car and drove away with my dog and the few possessions I managed to save from that shit show. I left him eight years ago, after the hurricane, and we’ve been divorced for six years now. My life is better in every way. My walls sing, and my dog is calm, not nervous. But I cannot for the life of me pinpoint when the pickme dance started. Perhaps it didn’t “start,” perhaps it was just baked into our relationship.
Excellent post.
thank you for this thoughtful examination. i really appreciate it
When was I not pick-me dancing?! From the very start to the discard.
My ex did very little heavy lifting. Lucky him.
I too thought about this question long and hard before I could come up with an answer.I am embarrassed to tell the truth but here I am.I started the pick me dance before we were married.He cheated when we were young and dating. He cheated once that I know of when we were engaged, and obviously he never stopped. I thought that this man was my one chance at marriage and a family and I did whatever it took to stay married and hide his double life from my children and our closest friends.Each time I confronted him, he told me that he “chose with his feet” and would never leave me.I actually took that as a compliment.All of these other women were nothing to him, but I was the one true love.If any of my daughters had dated a man like this, I would have said run don’t walk, get out of this relationship. Fast forward 37 years and he decided cheating behind closed doors was not enough and he was going to stay married to me, of course, but was going to date publicly and squire a certain woman on his arm in public.I told him if after 37 years of covering his tracks for him this was my thank you, then I was going to divorce him.He stepped out publicly and I filed for divorce. He then spent three years telling me how much he loved me and this plan of his could work.He was happy and we had so much good in our marriage there was no need to give it up. I did not look back. It was the cold water I needed thrown in my face.Date publicly but stay married and be warmly welcomed back in to our home when he felt like it ? NO !
He still doesn’t understand why I won’t include him in family vacations and Sunday dinners.He honestly believes he has done nothing so egregious, that he should be “punished” ( his words) and left out of family gatherings.He now fully blames me for breaking up our family.I wish I was making this up.
I had a very similar situation. He wanted to move his long distance AP to our home state and have her live nearby. He not only expected to be welcome at holidays and Sunday dinners, he thought SHE could come too. We’d all gleefully go to family holiday parties together.
So as absolutely nutty of a suggestion it was when your FW made it? It isn’t rare. And to be clear, this wasn’t an offer of polyamory or an open marriage. He wanted me to become some
He also contends that I “threw away decades of marriage”. Me. Not him. Why? Because I refused to get onboard with the above wacky ass idea.
And yes, he thinks my leaving and having little contact is a too harsh punishment for him. In actuality, it is just me staying away from someone that caused me egregious harm. If I were to actually punish him in a manner that matched the offense? Laws would be broken to say the least.