posted February 23, 2001 02:00 PM            

But it occurs to me to try to think through her side of this:
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"I divorced my husband last year after it became clear that it was just going to be one thing after another, and I was never going to have a life even close to what my parents had. Despite a serious chronic illness I built a successful career, while he hooked up with a local attorney he allowed to use him, drag him down and discard him, then started his own incorporation website but refused to do the marketing things that would have made it a roaring success, then wasted our money on abortive side ventures. Finally, when I had made it clear I wanted to move out of this town, he paid lip service to the idea but soon I realized that nothing was going to happen. So as I tried one last time to get him to give me some reason why he couldn't get his sh*t together, he tells me he just wants to succeed by giving good service to the customer! While his office was so messy and cluttered there was no way he was even doing that! I wanted him to go work at a law firm, or at least go get a second job to prove he gave a damn about me, especially if he was going to be trying these crazy things on the side. I mean, assuming I can or even should have children, why would I want to do that with someone like that?

After that, I knew I had to get out and I froze him out. I did hold out the faint hope that he might start to "get it" and change his ways, instead he just pushed, and went into a freakin' spiral--and get this! He decided it was because of my medication! Well I'd only been on it 10 years--because I was married to him! So now he's airing his version of our dirty laundry all over the internet! See!: http://www.marriagebuilders.com/forum/Forum15/HTML/000164.html

Oh, did I mention what the sex had been like? Let's just say that half the time I tried with him I discovered that it was painful for me (my psoriasis), and half of those times he never realized. And if I wasn't in pain, he was inevitably way premature. So 1/4 of the time (if that) it was sort of OK for me--but only because he would stop and we wouldn't keep trying to do it. We basically lived as brother and sister except that he had internet porn and a few magazines mostly I had bought him (I once bought some kinky stuff at a sex shop and he excoriated me over the expense!) and I had a vibrator.

All the next spring, it was him sleeping on the couch, then acting like everything was OK, then trying to occupy the bedroom when he knew my back wouldn't let me sleep on any other bed--I had to go sleep several nights at my brother's--with him on a cot! The look in XH's eye sometimes!

I mean, one time I let him take me to dinner when I was going to have to go back to the office and work late, and I brought up a subject I wasn't supposed to (I mean, what kind of a**hole conditions going to dinner on not discussing who sleeps in what bed? Yeah, I told him I wouldn't, but that was the #1 issue at the time, and my back hurt! He was just on some power trip and I wasn't going to stand for it!) and wound up on an involuntary ride through two counties with him screaming at me! Then we got home and unbeknownst to me, he yanked the coil wires off both cars, and got back into it with me knowing I'd try to drive off and he could smirk "engine trouble?" and go after me again! Yeah, he did show me how to put them back on after I promised not to drive off, and I did laugh with him and let him sleep next to me that night out of sheer exhaustion, but he scared me, and after that I knew he had to go, at least for a while.

And for me it was all-or-nothing, I had to break that connection. I did go to a Gottman workshop with him, knowing he was hoping for a miracle (and secretly, so was I), but when we got back the counselor we wanted was out of town, and the other one didn't hit it off with me on the phone, and there was no way I was going with him to his shrink again, he'd already convinced the doddering old fool that I was the one who was nuts!

So I start the divorce proceedings (like he hadn't prepared the documents to start it for his own signature--twice! Supposedly just to make me think), and all he wants to do is negotiate to get as much of the money and property as he can! Never even begged me to stop! Just "I want this ... this ... and this", well let me tell you, it was a small price to pay, even though he insisted on stuffing humiliating boilerplate into our marital settlement agreement.

Then he buys himself a killer condo in a part of downtown that's headed straight for redevelopment, and offers to let me stay there if I don't have a place to go when we move out. I slept on my brother's cot instead. Like I'm going to stay with him! And he can barely plan well enough to get all the stuff out of the house by 6AM the day the new owners are moving in.

So do I get any flowers, any contrite phone calls, any apologetic e-mails? No, the occasional link to some factoid, or a short breezy note it took 2 minutes to write. And the way he broke up our credit card debt, I owe him $5,000! While he still has my name on one of his cards, and all the credit union accounts! And I can do nothing to get it off (he says he'll pay it off once I get him the money). I can't get him to put the 1040 together and I can't get him to answer the phone, and I have to go over there whenever I want anything from him and I have to pay for my own friggin' parking!. I'm looking over his new place and it looks so nice and he tries to be cool but I can tell he looks at me like I'm an intruder. I was his wife! He can't help dropping that he's datiing a 5'11" Brazilian! Damn right I'm going to go see if I can dump my crap job and work in Milan.

When that didn't work out, I moved back and tried to put myself where it wouldn't be out of the way if he wanted to drop by. The next thing I hear he's got a different girlfriend--and I'm pretty sure he moved her in! And I'm still hearing a fat lot of nothing from him, except on the very last day of our extension, he does have me over to get the 1040, and gives me a file with a whole bunch of papers he says will help us settle up the final costs and windfalls, but I can't make sense of it. And I learn that the $4,000 he thought we owed to the IRS (and which I stupidly sent them a check for in August on his say-so), was actually not owed because he didn't have the mortgage interest keyed in correctly, so now he's having the refund electronically deposited into his account to "defray what I owe him". Excuse me? His incompetence (or deviousness) entitles him to deprive me of the use of $4,000 for two months, and he expects me to let him get away with it? But I swallow this one. Except I'm having that 1040 looked over with a fine-toothed comb.

I even asked him to keep the dog which he did, grudgingly--I mean it was his dog too. For 10 years! He did a slow burn because I had 20 minutes to get to a flight and I forgot to bring food and a leash! So the next time I want to have him take the dog, he completely disses me.

Then, right before Christmas (thank you very much), I get an e-mail from him saying that he wants to out my deepeset, darkest secret ... to clear his conscience. Yeah, like he's got one ... look what he did to me. I'm not gonna answer that. And the next thing I know he sends me an e-mail saying he sent an anonymous note to someone about it? Doesn't he think that the person will know who it's about? Hell, he probably made it look like I sent the damn thing. And that's not how we do things in this family. There's a warning to be given, and I would have given it at the right time in the right way. Jerk.

The next thing I know he's doing a steady drip, drip, drip of e-mail wanting me to finish up--or just sending me facts, or jokes or stupid e-cards (I mean, if my mother dissed my father like I'm dissing him, there would have been hell to pay--XH is either doesn't care or is too wimpy to say the right things to motivate me) ... and I can guess why he's finally getting around to it. His new girlfriend wants him to clear the decks so that he doesn't have to think about me anymore, she can get him to marry her. Well she can have him, but I'm not going to pay him $5,000 to help him get her. And do all his stupid paperwork. I don't have time because I went back to my old job on outside contract.

I still haven't sent that 1040. And I'm not going to. I wanted to put some of my expenses in, so I wanted the disk from him, and he just told me to send the details to him and he'd do the entry. Do I trust him to get it right? No. Give me the software ... and I'll get rid of that stupid direct-deposit too.

And get this: I changed my phone number (not that he used it anyway), but I guess he had my cell. I blocked his number. Took him weeks to notice, because the first time he called and left a message and I didn't call him back, he didn't try again. So then he lamely sends me an e-mail asking me to take it off, and when he calls it again and leaves a message I don't get any kind of apology, he just chirpily asks me to get in touch. I just changed the number this time. And he won't ever get it from me.

The final straw: He's writing my brother and my father e-mails like he's Mr. Innocent, asking them to help him with me. Hasn't he learned anything about this family? No matter what happens, we stick together. There are brothers in his family who haven't spoken in 30 years over who got hired to sell the dead grandfather's house! My father just said "Looks like he is going to start being a pain in the a**. Let me know if I need to get you a lawyer again down there."

There's nothing I'm ever going to do for or with him ever again!"
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So much for channeling my XW. Doesn't look like I'll be getting much cooperation in the near future, does it?

posted February 23, 2001 04:00 PM            

First, I think I'm going to join you and do my best to put myself in my spouse's shoes--see if I can see things through his eyes.

Second, I want to congratulate you on something: it's pretty scary to look at yourself honestly through your X spouse's eyes, so congrats on not kidding yourself.

Third, I want to say that for all the debate and talk and challenging and advice that you give out on this forum, I hear the hurt behind what you're saying here. I understand that you are going through a majorly tough thing right now.

So, since we're friends, let me know if there's anything I can do for ya. I'll debate you until the cows come home, if that will make you feel better I'll even share with you my goofy "abuse survivor" way of thinking. But here's one thing I won't do. I won't leave. Okay?

CJ

posted February 23, 2001 04:55 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by FaithfulWife:
Second, I want to congratulate you on something: it's pretty scary to look at yourself honestly through your X spouse's eyes, so congrats on not kidding yourself.

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Well, on further reflection "her rant" could have been at least three times as long. And I could write a long one too if I wanted to take a totally jaundiced view. Which I tried never to do--throughout the marriage. But maybe when stuff bothers you and there's nothing you can do about it (whether it's her fault or not), it has to ooze out through a seam somewhere.

This has been pretty cathartic. That I'll tell you.

posted February 23, 2001 05:47 PM            

I told I was going to join you and do my best to put myself in my spouse's shoes--see if I can see things through his eyes. It should be interesting: a WS who has now returned and is trying to work on it again. But before he came back, he was the "you don't love me so what are you upset about" kind of guy. I'll even go you one better--I'll share it with you here on the forum.

You're right, this is cathartic. I'll bet you even learned a lot about yourself and your XW. But, Sis, the trick here is not to martyr yourself...the angry rant really would not be productive, just destructive. My hope here is that you can learn. You may not like the lesson, and it may still seem like illogical thinking to you, but at least you have gone where most fear to tread. Now you have some concrete idea of why she is not talking to you and how she feels.

BTW, this is just a thought, but there is more than one way to express anger at someone. Some people rant and rave and raise their volume, and some shut down, clam up and withdraw all communication. I bet her anger is not just leaking through--I bet it is pouring through. The dike is not gonna hold!! Run for it!!

CJ

posted February 23, 2001 11:12 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Sisyphus:

But it occurs to me to try to think through her side of this:

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Brilliant idea, Sis. Now why didn't I ever think of that?