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The Next Woman

/ Candid Journei / Leave a comment

I’ve reached an interesting place in my journey. It’s difficult to explain, but I’m uncomfortable. They say discomfort is a good sign of change. Not sure if I fully buy into that, but let’s hope so.

I’m in between jobs. Fun-employed, if you will. I had to leave my previous job because I reached a level of anxiety that ushered in suicidal ideation. I hadn’t felt that in months, so I figured it was time to move on. I found a contract job, but it was only for about a month. Now I’m attempting to find a job that will allow me to officially be independent. I still have to rely on my…ex? Estranged husband? I don’t know the title, but we are still legally wed and sharing custody of our Gremlin. We don’t hate each other. Never have, but the way he has treated our marriage, one would assume otherwise.

I’ve been out for over a year now. It has been difficult to nail down a job that offers a livable wage with benefits. This country is deep in the pits of hell, but we move, until we can’t. I’m trying to be grateful for my circumstances until I get to the next place I need to be, wherever that is.

My therapist, we’ll call him Bob, and I have discussed next steps a few times. Employment continues to pop up because I have transferable skills, but no one is letting me transfer them. It’s infuriating. He has provided different ideas/avenues for me to explore. Thinking outside the box. I consider applying for lower wage jobs, but I NEED something more than that. I have a child. If it were just me I wouldn’t care. Outside of employment, I’ve been contemplating relationships.

When speaking with Bob we stumbled upon the subject of PDH (previous dear husband) and him dating. He has a high sex drive and hates being alone, so it’s something I’ve had to think about. It’s nauseating. He suggested that I open up the line of communication regarding these types of activities. I inquired if PDH was interested in dating. He was trying to get me to go on dates, but that wasn’t going to happen. Recently I incidentally discovered he is dating someone. We were out at an event for autism with our Gremlin and she called him. I didn’t recognize the name and he nearly fell into the grass trying to answer his phone. I could tell by the tone of his voice that it was someone he liked. I was peeved. Caught of guard.

He never confirmed his desire to begin dating. I asked who he was talking to and he told me that it was indeed a woman he met. This man downloaded a dating app and met a woman. The dreaded day arrived. I wasn’t sure how I was going to feel. It’s that double edged sword of knowing you can’t stay with the person you’ve loved for over a decade because they continue to disrespect you, while simultaneously not wanting them to date because of feelings. Bad feelings. I suppose jealousy is what I’m feeling? Defensiveness because of trust issues?

One out of two of the last affair partners trashed the place he was renting after I moved out. He gave her the key to the place so she could clean, which made absolutely no sense. She’s not a maid. Just a trashy woman. I had to clean up that mess. She also kept a car he lent her. It was still in his name and not paid off. Getting it back was a pain in the ass. The second out of the two mistresses was driving while he was in the car and he got a ticket because of her ganja. He fell on the sword to protect her, apparently. He went to court to deal with that and they let it go. I’m the best decision he’s ever made. I’m wary of anyone new.

I found myself triggered upon seeing this new name. I was flashing back to the times I caught him cheating on me. He still has the phone number of one of his original affair partners. We’ll call her Danielle. Mind you, he first started messing with her in 2014. Eleven years ago. He still has her number. Do y’all understand how shitty that is? I just left him last year. I’m now remembering that I saw him texting Danielle after I texted him before that day, that he could date other people. This current lady didn’t show up until recently.

We were at our son’s swim practice a couple of weeks ago and I brought up dating, again. At the time, he changed the subject. Looking back…I wonder if he had already downloaded the dating app and just decided not to tell me? He has a history of lying, obviously. I still can’t fully trust him. He lies by omission as well. I was irritated after seeing Danielle’s name on his phone. He was texting her while picking up Gremlin. I wasn’t really surprised, but I was insulted. It further solidified the fact that he wasn’t to be fully trusted. It further validated why I needed to leave. An indication that he still wasn’t committed to me. Because why the fuck does he still have her number over a decade later? He was never fully in. Especially not after 2014. Some time before I decided we needed to separate, he reached out to the weed head to see how she was doing. I felt it was a big red flag. For some odd reason our couple’s therapist didn’t think it was a big issue? He must’ve been having an off day.

I don’t believe I’m fully healed. Especially with the discovery of the relatively recent events, mentioned above, prior to leaving him. I think I have to type out my feelings to assess them. Bob is on vacation for another week, so this is all I’ve got. I could pull out a diary, but why do that? LOL. That would be too private and would make too much sense. Then y’all wouldn’t have the privilege of reading my thoughts.

I’ve known that, if nothing else, the next woman needs to be great. She needs to not be a red flag. Not be a troublemaker. I told PDH that anyone he dates cannot know where either of us lives and they need to be well vetted before going anywhere near our son. I told PDH that if Gremlin is put in jeopardy because of his choices, then he’s in jeopardy. I hope he understands the significance of what I said. He nodded in agreement at the time.

I have considered dating as well. I’m not sure if I’m ready for that. There is emotional vulnerability to a certain extent when dating. The dating scene also seems ghetto as hell from what I’ve observed. PDH knew I was agitated after I asked who he was talking to. I scoffed and walked off. He asked if we needed to talk about it. I just reminded him to keep things kosher. There was more I could have said, but what’s the point? Would it be fair and reasonable for me to tell him to wait? I don’t know. Is it hurtful for some strange reason that he’s dating? Yes. Why? I’m not absolutely sure. I could date just because he is dating. Maybe it would be therapeutic? It could also make me feel worse.

After we left the event, I took our Gremlin with me. Ideally I would like for our child to stay with his dad for a few days. He prefers being with me, mostly. Gremlin didn’t want to go with dad upon leaving, so he was picked up later. I wasn’t sure how it would go during pick up time, but there were no issues. Gremlin is known to throw a tantrum that can lead into a meltdown, if he’s not mentally prepared to spend time with his dad. We have a more predictable schedule for now, so that might be what’s helpful. We are just winging it for the most part. We’ve played around with different types for schedules. Gremlin has a hard time adjusting to change as most autistics do. PDH picked our son up pretty late. It was after 9 and I was surprised he was still planning to come. It was the same day as the event.

I made sure Gremlin was ready to go with dad and he confirmed he was. I figured that PDH went to see the woman after the event, since our son didn’t go home with him, and he had talked on the phone with her earlier. Before picking up Gremlin he had to put air in his tires. I got a text message from the place he went to, thanking me for choosing their service. We literally live around the corner from each other and the place he went to was further away, so I was confused. There is a place to air up tires the next driveway over after leaving his apartment complex. I unintentionally have become a detective when it comes to him. It’s triggering.

I asked if the scenario I came up with in my head was correct and he confirmed. I’m usually right. Sometimes it’s a curse. I know him much better than he knows me. I’ve pretty much studied him. He has been my special interest from the day we started dating. I was all in. Not ride or die because I have questions. I want to know where we’re riding to and why death might be involved, but I was very committed. More than him. I think that’s one of the things that gets me to this day. He wasn’t as committed. It surprised me because I thought he was. I guess I’m still grieving the failure of our marriage and the absolute disrespect thrown my way. The complete and utter betrayal. The other women he claimed to love.

I’ve looked back at the timeline. We were married for only three years when he decided to cheat. He has cheated on me for at least half our marriage? I might still feel like he’s cheating on me. It’s possible my body doesn’t know the difference. There’s a chance I have some form of PTSD from what happened, if that’s possible, given the circumstances. It could just be garden variety trauma. Something I need to ask Bob about. It’s said that the body keeps the score. There’s a book about it. I bought it. I haven’t read it yet. The book addresses how our bodies hold onto our traumatic experiences, even if we have consciously moved on from an event. Our bodies have kept record. Like anxiety, for example.

I was diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder. I started taking meds before my official diagnosis because I had a(n) anxiety/panic attack in my sleep. It happened after the first time I left him. In 2018. My anxiety was so high. He was still fraternizing with those women. He claimed to feel hurt that I was leaving him, but continued doing what he was doing. Now here we are, separated again.

The Body Keeps the Score.

You Make Me Do Too Much Labor

/ Candid Journei / Leave a comment

10/10/24

He creates false narratives and lives by them instead of latching onto reality and dealing with the actual situation at hand. He often focuses on the wrong thing. Led by poor self esteem, yet defends himself with the utmost pride to his own detriment because he hates when I’m right. It’s not about who’s right, it’s about what makes sense. Sometimes there are multiple options, other times there are a select few answers.

This man has refused to problem solve. It’s possible he’s dealing with internalized ableism, while still trying to cope with the fact that he’s paralyzed. He’s under the false assumption that I left him because of his paralysis. He’s mad that I became tired of mothering him. He behaves as though I owe him servitude when he hasn’t granted me true partnership.


So many times I’ve been betrayed. Forgotten. Disrespected. Taken for granted. No more. This man is astronomically unaware of what reality is. He tricked me into wasting my energy writing him a letter to explain why I left. After the explanation he has continued to behave as though he never read it. He tells me that he loves me as if I’m unaware. As of love alone is enough.

I take issue with how he loves me. There are positive things I can say about the relationship, but those positives pale in comparison to all the concessions I’ve made and how much I’ve sacrificed and poured into this relationship. I’ve poured so much into HIM. I wasn’t receiving the same in return, thus I could no longer continue on the same path.

The saying that you cannot pour from an empty cup is vehemently accurate. My cup was fully emptied. I sought at least something back in return. Only to be met with incompetence. Willful incompetence, wrapped in the excuse that he’s paralyzed. He’s capable of so much more, but chooses to do the absolute bare minimum, which isn’t much different from his approach prior to paralysis. He lacks self awareness in the most detrimental way.

I understand just as well as most people how hard life is. I have to force myself to get up most mornings. I was essentially living a life of luxury as far as not having to go to work every morning, but I labored in a much different way. He wanted me to be his brain.

He wanted me to think for him. I cared more about his personal wellbeing than him. I put more energy into finding solutions and doing research to help him conquer his internal and external battles. I was only met with apathy. Apathy has been his state of being most of the time. Doing only what may keep him alive. Not realizing that even the minimum he is doing isn’t even the bare minimum. Upon really thinking about it, he does less than the bare minimum. He does just enough to get by, for now.

I cannot be responsible for the entirety of this man’s being. His extreme carelessness toward life forced me into the position of overextending myself because he couldn’t be bothered. Everything one must do in order to maintain a life was left up to me. Any help he offered, I usually had to ask for. Sometimes I would be surprised by him independently stepping in to help without prompting, but it didn’t happen nearly enough.

He asked me what he could do to alleviate some of my anxiety and stress. I told him that taking better care of himself would be a step in the right direction. That didn’t pan out very well. Unwillingly and forcefully being placed in the position of mothering your spouse is very unattractive and exhausting.

We each have our baggage, but we cannot expect anyone else to manage it entirely. We ask for help. Seek out resources. Find solutions, but this man doesn’t do that without prompting. He’s having to learn how to do things on his own now. What infuriates me is that I was actively trying to teach him how to do what he needs to do for the best quality of life, but everything fell upon deaf ears.

We went to our couple’s therapist a few times after I moved out. The last session we had, our therapist was blunt with him. Our therapist essentially said to stop wasting our time if he doesn’t plan to make changes.

I didn’t expect him to change, but I know he needs to.

Unfortunately…I’m baaaack

/ Candid Journei / 2 Comments

My husband and I are almost 13 years in and I’m leaving him for the 2nd time. I can’t even remember the last bit of shenanigans I discussed. I think I mentioned the dissolution I was going to lay down…

I’m older now. Wiser, I think. I’m medicated and caffeinated. I have a nine year old who has ASD. I wasn’t sure if I’d be in this place again. There was no guarantee that I wouldn’t be. I suppose there was never a part of me that truly believed things would go the way I wanted them to. I’m leaving again, assuming things go the way I am planning.

This time I will likely fill out my own dissolution paperwork to save some money. I’m trying to set an actual budget. I need to prepare to return to the workforce. I believe I’m more prepared now than I was roughly six years ago. I know certain fields of employment aren’t appropriate for me. I discover I’m likely autistic myself.

I’ve exhausted myself in this marriage. I’ve tried to compensate for so much of what he lacked. I have experienced anxiety attacks and mental breakdowns. I’ve stressed myself beyond what is reasonable.

This is all I will post for now….

Dissolution

/ Candid Journei / 2 Comments

After the second D-day I started gathering as much “intel” as I could. I found so much. He was going behind my back financially on top of cheating on me with other women. Oh, the joy (heavy sarcasm).

I was trying to decide my strategy for leaving him because it was definitely going to happen. I thought I would go through legal aid because I’m a SAHM. I’ve heard they get screwed over in these situations. The man I used to know wouldn’t do something like that, but finding all the documents I found freaked me out.

So much betrayal has happened. I felt like I wasn’t safe. Some people had asked me if I felt safe and I couldn’t say, unequivocally, that I did. He had not abused me before, but I didn’t want to take any chances. I waited quite a few weeks before I decided to contact a lawyer. I saw we had some money in one of our joint accounts that would cover the cost of representation.

I had a quick consultation over the phone, met with the lawyer in person, got the papers, and made an appointment to meet up with him again the following week. From that moment I was pretty anxious. I had to make copies of everything, fill out the affidavids, while looking after our son, and trying to transition him to a better daycare. What our son has been facing is a long story in and of itself. He needs speech therapy and some other intervention.

To jump to the point, I ended up telling him I discovered he’s cheating, again. “Again” meaning I found out again. He never stopped cheating though. The same mistress he had last time, the so called emotional affair partner, is still around. He also has others. I told him I wanted a divorce or a dissolution.  We had the conversation over the phone.

He was trying to process what I was saying while trying to convince me not to leave him. We had a long talk. My sister and my son were in the car. It was kind of late for my son to be out. He was trying to be patient. He’s so sweet. I told my husband to stay elsewhere. He stayed at a hotel for the weekend.

I allowed him to come back Monday night. Hotels are expensive. He has extended family out here. I thought he might even try to stay with the hoes. He claims he is trying to focus on “our family” right now. It’s funny because he wasn’t concerned about us before.

All the distance I felt between us. The bad felling in the pit of my stomach. I asked him directly if he was cheating, he said no. All the blatant lies. It’s literally like the Sam Smith song.

“You say I’m crazy, cuz you don’t think I know what you’ve done. But when you call me baby, I know I’m not the only one. I have loved you for many years. Maybe I am just not enough. You made me realize my deepest fears, by lying and tearing us up.”

He has said that he wants us to be friends. The wild thing is that I can see it happening. Mainly because I want my son to be at peace. We also used to be friends. I know the truth now. I can’t say my feelings aren’t hurt, but I am able to maintain the point of view that he has deep issues. None of those issues have anything to do with me. I’m not internalizing any of it.

The more we talk, the more he confirms things that I knew were true. The more he comes clean about the times he lied, the more my resolve is strengthened.

His nephew had stayed with us for about four months. He took him back. The consistent affair partner of his lives in the same area as his nephew. I didn’t go because I didn’t want to deal with paying for all four plane tickets and going through the airport and all that. I would call to check on him and chat. He would be out really late. Said he was hanging out with a friend. I had a feeling he saw her, but of course he lied. He told me the truth recently. My instincts were correct.

I’m not crazy. It gives me joy to be able to say that.

What gives me anxiety is coparenting with a man I don’t trust.

He has said he doesn’t want to cause me any more grief, which is why we are having a dissolution, but he still wants to spend time with his son.

He hasn’t been making great decisions and I don’t want our son encountering any of the other women. I also don’t want any of the hoes knowing where his new place is, in case he pisses someone off. It’s likely to happen. Not outside the realm of possibility.

Parents separating is also hard on the kids. I can’t see myself having anyone else in my life anytime soon. I don’t want either of us bringing any one around unless it’s serious. Like, “we’re going to get married” type of serious.

This is all very surreal though. Having to think about these things. Part of me still loves him. Not the cheating part of him, obviously, but the other part. The part of him who I met years ago. He’s in there somewhere.

He has admitted to narcissistic traits. He also says he wants to try to make things easier for me. Make things as amicable as possible, which I appreciate. He has made it clear though that he would love to stay married to me and keep having sex with other women.

It’s pretty wild.

He likes the variety other women bring. I can’t be other women. I can’t have sex like other women. He asked if we could have an open marriage, but I’m simply not interested. I don’t want to be one of many or a few. I want to be THE one.

There are married couple’s who have open marriages or engage in other non-monogamous activities. Good for them. That isn’t my ministry. That’s not the life I want. I’m too boring, apparently. He didn’t correct me when I said this. He usually defends himself if I’m wrong. I wasn’t wrong about that.

As I said, I can’t pretend my feelings aren’t hurt. I can’t wallow in my emotions and I’m not taking responsibility for his lack of interest in me. People change. Especially when a parent dies. That was his catalyst.

At this point he uses his mother’s passing as a crutch or an excuse for infidelity. The irony is that he’s doing the exact opposite of what she would want him to do. She told him to honor his wife. He doesn’t care about that anymore.

He wants to go to couples counseling, again. We went the last couple months of last year. He was cheating while we were getting counseling. He even took notes. He went to counseling to pacify me. I asked what he hopes to gain this time and he said he wants to see if things will be different since he will be honest now.

Honestly, he doesn’t really want me and he doesn’t want marriage. He doesn’t want to be accountable to someone else for anything. Financially, emotionally, or sexually. He wants to be independent. He also has a big hole in his soul and heart that he’s trying to fill with vagina and money.

He has said that he still loves me. His love doesn’t mean much at this point. I’m not sure what kind of love he thinks he has for me. He has shown no remorse.  He’s not sorry for hurting me. I said I hoped the other women were worth throwing away our marriage. Throwing me away as a person, beyond the physical. He was silent after I said this. He probably feels it was worth it.

I’m a kind person. Understanding. Loyal. Loving. Affectionate. I don’t always agree with what he wants to do, so he wants to throw me away. Funny enough, his consistent affair partner is getting on his nerves because she’s too demanding/bossy. She feels he’s required to do whatever she asks. He finds that I annoy him in that way as well. I don’t demand things of him, other than communication and honesty.

He said he wants to be friends with me, but we won’t be besties.

I don’t trust him. He said he knows he has to earn my trust, but if this is anything like last time…I will end up screwed over. You can understand why I’m not too optimistic.

If he wants to betray me, that’s one thing. My concern is if he betrays my son. I don’t want him making bad decisions to put him in danger. I don’t want him to put these other women before our son any more. He hadn’t just abandoned me as a wife, he shurked his job as a father. Our son knows he’s not reliable.

He’s worked himself into the role of a part time father while he had the opportunity to be so much more. I don’t know exactly how things will pan out from here. I’m not really holding onto hope anymore. Not for him.

I’m hopeful for my own future and my son’s.

I’m also very nervous.

Wish us luck.

Revenge of the Asshole

/ Candid Journei / 4 Comments

Not quite sure if the title really fits, but I know it has been a while since I posted a blog here. I have been busy raising a child, who is now three. I can’t remember where I last left off, but we have relocated. I haven’t worked since I’ve had my son. I need to get my life together.

I discovered he’s still cheating on me. No surprise there. I would say he’s cheating “again,” but I feel that would be too optimistic at this point. He’s really starting to look like a borderline narcissist. I say borderline because he’s not tearing me down. He will try to punch holes in my logic, but they’re really futile attempts. My mother in law passed away 4 years ago, which I believe I mentioned. That was the catalyst. So wild.

Let’s catch up.

My husband’s new nickname will be POS (Piece of Shit). He’s not respectable enough for me to utilize the title of husband.

POS started working at a strip club around the spring of last year, as a bouncer. If you’re thinking that sounds like a bad idea, you’re entirely correct. Our nephew, who was 5 at the time, moved in with us for about four months because his mom was having her routine struggle of surviving. About a month before Nephew was taken back to his home state (we flew him out to us) POS started working the second job. Nephew resides in the state we moved away from. Guess who else is there? One of his affair partners.

I wasn’t about to schlep all four of us onto a plane just to take this young man back. Too expensive, so POS went by himself. Was it a great idea? Nah. Was I gonna go instead? Heck no. Am I interested in monitoring him like he’s a child? Definitely not. Was I concerned? Of course.  Every time he was out until midnight he claimed he was hanging out with one of his friends, who could have possibly been spending time with him. I doubt it though. After finding the recent evidence I’m pretty much 1000% sure he was dating and fucking the bitch he had an emotional affair with. I have also realized that his affair with her was probably more than emotional. They most likely fucked.

I was unsettled. I felt like he was lying, but could I prove it? No.

You might be wondering how POS ended up with a job at a strip club in the first place? What’s a retired church boy doing there? Well, I started questioning my sexuality. I’m a communicator, so I told him I felt like I might be bisexual. I will also acknowledge that at the time I was feeling a void in our marriage. Go figure. He suggested going to a strip club to get my feet wet, so I could explore this side of myself. He also gets his rocks off, too, of course.

He was excited about the prospect of me exploring my sexuality because he was seeing threesomes in his future. I did not. He said he would be fine with me dating other women. I suppose he felt like he was about to live out his fantasy of a polygamist lifestyle. The only problem for him was the “bi” in the sexual. That includes men. He wouldn’t want to bring them into a threesome. It’s not as sexy for him.

We enjoyed ourselves at the club. The dancer who was entertaining us mentioned they were hiring and POS was too excited about the prospect of working there. It sounded completely asinine to me. I wasn’t pushing him to do it.

He claimed we needed the extra money.

Knowing what it know now. We didn’t. Not really.

I went on a date with a slightly younger woman. We both discovered she had issues she needed to sort out, as did I. I cried because I came to the realization I was trying to fill a hole that my POS was supposed to be filling. I decided I wasn’t really interested in polygamist lifestyle. Go figure. It seemed complicated. Besides that you need a lot of trust to pull it off. I did not and do not trust him. He didn’t trust me either, but for different reasons. He didn’t trust that I wouldn’t leave him if he told me his truths.

The truth that he’s not satisfied with just me.

The truth that he’s obsessed with sex.

The truth that he enjoys making multiple connections with multiple women.

I gave him windows and doors of opportunity to come clean. Let me know he’s not really interested in a monogamous marriage anymore and we could get divorced. I think the idea is scary to him.

He was running himself ragged this past year not getting enough sleep from two jobs. I recently found out he was also run ragged because he started up a second life.

The second D-day (if that’s a thing).

It was a Wednesday night. I had a two hour massage to unwind from the stresses of being married to a POS while being a mother. I got home, feeling relaxed. I walked through our son’s play space (in the dark) and I stepped on something. It was his work phone. It was the jackpot or pandora’s box depending on how you look at it. He was cagey about me looking through it before, so of course there are things hidden in there. It doesn’t have a lock on it, so it was easily accessible.

Why was it on the floor? Because it was about 10:30 at night. He was incredibly tired from having worked the night job the day before. He and my son were asleep. He slipped up. I capitalized on the situation. This time I took pictures. I needed evidence. I went straight to the text messages and I found an orgy of evidence, again, of his infidelity.

You can imagine the knots that came back upon this discovery.

I was literally shaking.

This blog is already long. I’m tired, but basically he’s been spending money on other women. He sent the bitch at least a weeks worth or more of money (her words in the text messages) and he was paying another woman for sex. I doubt she’s a prostitute because he works at a strip club. Why would you look for a prostitute when there are plenty of women desperate for money all around you?

On top of the infidelity he was doing other things behind my back.

He took out two loans (that I found) without telling me. One of which is so expensive to pay off monthly he opened a secret bank account. It’s $425 a month of automatic withdrawal.

He has at least two bank accounts he hasn’t told me about.

He bought a car without telling me, which was paid for by one of the loans. I found the tittle, the receipt from the auction, and the registration.

My friend, who happens to now be my cousin in law, thinks that he has another child I don’t know about. Looking at the correspondence and because of the secret accounts, she might be right.

I will also add I’ve told trusted friends and family what is going on. I haven’t confronted him because I’m plotting. It would appear he might be as well.

In the basement he had our marriage license and freshly printed bank statements. Usually things you need when filing for divorce. There’s a lot. I will come back and give updates when possible.

Ugh.

You Say I’m Crazy

/ Candid Journei / Leave a comment

It’s been a while and this morning I find myself adrift in a sea of emotions since last night. I was triggered. My husband came home from the gym (allegedly) in his clothes he wore to work. You might be thinking, “that’s not odd, he could have showered at the gym.” To you I would say, you don’t know my friend, you don’t know. He doesn’t like showering at the gym. He prefers to shower at home. We will go together sometimes when the stars align and the moon is high in the sky. He will typically want to go straight home when he is DRIPPING with sweat. He sweats a lot when he runs. It drips onto the treadmill. The only time I remember him showering was when I asked him to because we had to go somewhere afterward and it would save time. He feels awkward showering at the gym, which is fair. Naked strangers walking around, you amongst them, I get it.So, when he showed up dressed in street clothes it set off alarms. I guess he did smell like the cheap soap that’s available for use at them gym. It’s like showering with hand soap. It’s dispensed like hand soap. He could have been telling the truth

BUT…

It made me suspicious…..

I distinctly remember how my husband made me feel the first time he blatantly ignored me to spend time with another woman. I’ve talked about it in another one of my blogs. I was pregnant. He was working out of town mostly and stopped in here and there. When he was here I would ask him to run errands and didn’t think much of it. My only worry was that he might get into an accident or something else terrible. Who knows. I’m slightly paranoid about freak accidents. This one time, though…he was taking a while. Him taking a while isn’t out of the ordinary, he moves slowly, generally. Kind of saunters through most things in life. I usually call him when my internal clock goes off. YES I have an internal clock for when my husband should have completed a task. I don’t know if this is specific to me and my husband, but that’s how it is. I called him, as usual, because he was taking a while. Wanted to make sure he was ok. When I called him I was hit with the “I’ll call you back.” At the time I thought it was just my pregnancy hormones, but I was pissed. Turned out I had a reason to be pissed. It wasn’t until much later I found out that she was one of his bixches.

He wasn’t completely honest with who she was, of course. Once he got home I confronted him about being blown off when I called him, melted/soggy/warm food in tow. I had bullet points for how and why he messed up. I of course told him that he needed to NOT blow off his wife for other women. Especially not his PREGNANT wife. It was suspicious. I remember he made me feel like I was crazy. Getting upset with me.

When I was trying to make sense of the infidelity I Googled. One of the things I discovered was a video on how to know when your spouse is cheating. One of the signs is that they will be unnecessarily irritated/upset/angry/agitated. That’s how he behaved towards me. Granted, the timing was really bad. His mother had passed the same year I got pregnant. He very well could have been agitated about that, but he was really upset that I was circling the truth. I just didn’t know how close I was. I won’t forget that feeling though.  Like the Sam Smith song says “YOU SAAAYYY I’M CRAZY, CUZ YOU DON’T THINK I KNOW WHAT YOU’VE DONE. BUT WHEEEEEN YOU CALL ME BABY, I KNOW I’M NOT THE ONLY ONE.”

To be clear, I didn’t know he was cheating on me. I hear people say that a woman knows. Really? Does she really know? A man can be acting sketchy for any number of reasons. It doesn’t mean he’s cheating, which is the frustrating part. I now think that since I found all the info on his phone last time, if he wants to cheat he will know to be more covert this time, not leave evidence behind. I feel like woman’s intuition is overrated. Like it’s something someone made up so when something goes wrong and woman doesn’t act upon some small suspicion she had, she feels this sense of guilt. Like, “Oh, I should have known that my otherwise fairly trustworthy, helpful, sweet husband was cheating.” Really? I call bullshit. I’m not going to blame myself for not knowing. Even in a court of law there needs to be evidence or at the very least a witness. You can’t prosecute someone without those things. Feelings are fickle. Not very reliable all the time. Valuable, valid, yes, but reliable…? Feelings of suspicion need to be verified.

Beyonce had said in one of her songs that she wanted the Lord to reveal what her husband’s truth is. I’ve pondered this statement. I’ve been struggling with completely trusting my husband. I tell myself that unless there’s proof I needn’t jump to conclusions. It’s hard not to. Once you’ve fallen for something the first time it’s hard not to be paranoid it will happen again. A family member of ours recently separated from her husband because he left her for another woman, but he had also cheated on her years prior. It’s hard to know that it won’t happen again.

Do I really want to know what his truth is? That’s what I ask myself. Of course, just because I ask doesn’t necessarily mean the truth will be revealed. God knows all. It might be something I don’t want to know! I’ve pondered what I would do if he cheated again. I don’t have finances. I don’t have a job. I don’t really have anywhere to go, permanently. Part of the reason I’m a stay-at-home-mom is because I am very picky about the level of care my son receives and we don’t have the means to provide him that outside of ME. I need to make some money. I want to work from home but I think I’ve been battling some anxiety and depression. I haven’t really paid attention to my behavior. I’ve fallen into this trap of just trying to get through the day alive. Making sure my son gets what he needs. Doing mostly the bare minimum. My husband is the breadwinner.

My mom has taught me to always prepare financially. She and her mom have been through some stuff with their husbands and she wants me to be prepared. She doesn’t believe that Brian is a bad guy but disaster can strike when you least expect it.

 

 

This Bixch

/ Candid Journei / 2 Comments

I haven’t been on here in a while. It’s mainly because I’ve been taking care of our son, my sister is a head case, and I’ve just been living life to the point where I can’t be bothered to do certain things, but I had to hop on today. I was taking a glorious nap, then I heard our son on the baby monitor and thought he was waking up so I grabbed my phones. One of them is one of my husbands work phone that he doesn’t use. He lets me use it because we have no Wi-Fi in our new place, but his work phone has a lot of data available and it’s a hot spot. He set up his gmail account and google hangout on the phone so I get notifications unless he gets to them first. After I awoke I saw a google hangout out request from what looked like one of the elephants. I thought “it couldn’t be” and it was! After this I started freaking out.

He hadn’t seen the request, yet but I told him to take a look and see who sent it. He then ignored the request so they couldn’t start a chat. I copied down her email address and I have contemplated emailing her to tell her off. Tell her to leave my husband alone. Tell her she’s a dizzy bitch if she really thinks that he wanted to leave me for her. My husband and I are moving forward. I’m still trying to get to a place where I can fully trust my husband again, then this happens and I’m really trying not to lose my shit.

I don’t make a habit of cursing, but this really threw me off. It’s crazy. It has caused all these old feelings to crop back up. I guess they’re not that old, but they were more in the background. Now I’m remembering the pain. Hubby has felt in the past year that I basically should be “over” it, but nah. I can’t just “get over it.” This incident has caused the questions in my mind to go into overdrive.

We moved to another state because he got another job, but I sometimes wonder if he found someone else. He tries to do what he can to set my mind at ease, but not too far in the back of my mind I still feel uneasy. I still remember when I was pregnant and sent him to the store and he took a long ass, fucking time to come back so I called him. He said he would call me back and all the while he was talking to the same bitch who just sent him a chat invite. Fuck  her. I hope she gets injured. Dumb bitch.

Sigh. I hate this. I don’t have anyone to rant to or just talk with. There is my father, but it’s not the same. He was able to talk me off the ledge so to speak with emailing her. He suggested that it might no be a good idea because it could fuel her desire to connect with hubby again. He has a good point. I just hope she gets the hint and stops trying to contact him. I almost wonder if this is going to be a yearly thing for her. I’m sure she thought I wouldn’t see her. Dizzy bitch. I hate her. I don’t usually hate, but for her I’m making an exception.

I’m posting to get this out of my system.

 

Sprouts…Is Nothing Sacred?

/ Candid Journei / 2 Comments

Haven’t been on here in a while, obviously. I gave birth to our baby and he’s beautiful! The labor was super quick and husband was helpful as usual. He’s been kind of antsy since he had arrived and told me he plans to go to an event tonight. He mentioned it days ago and I informed him that I’m not really down for him to go to this event. I don’t trust him out of my sight, especially if I don’t know how long it’s going to take him. I mentioned my concern that one of the elephants would be at the event and he said she doesn’t go to that type of thing. He said he’s only seen her two places and one of them was at Sprouts.

Let’s talk about Sprouts. We shop here fairly often. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before but this event is significant to me. I was about three or for months preggo. I sent him to the store to grocery shop. He was taking longer than usual so I called him. This man answers his phone and said “I’ll call you back.” For what?! I wondered. He needed to bring the food home. He calls me back about 20 or 30 minutes later to tell me he was talking to some woman. He gets home and the groceries are warm/melting. I expressed my irritation and told him it was inappropriate for him to be interacting with women in the way he was. Today I find out that the woman he was talking to was one of the fucking elephants! When he got home he had the AUDACITY to act like I was crazy and overreacting. He tried to say it was ok for him to have female friends. I didn’t know it at the time but he was already cheating on me.

It’s amazing. After he told me this I was somewhat poised but pissed and I kept it to myself. I keep quite a bit to myself. I still wonder why he fell in love with the other woman. He told me I didn’t want to know. Maybe I don’t. I’m trying to enjoy my baby but occasionally I find time to be “in my feelings” and feel hurt about what he’s done. I didn’t know I identified so much with Sam Smith’s song. He tried to make me feel like I was crazy. I told him that he tried to make it seem like I was crazy and he told me that he was the crazy one. He only has about a week left to be here. I love my husband but I don’t trust him. Every time he’s on his phone I wonder if he’s contacting the local elephant to meet up when he goes on an errand. It makes me a tad crazy but we are supposed to move forward.

Getting on the Same Page

/ Candid Journei / 4 Comments

My husband is back in town today. It’s usually exciting when he comes back, but I also have a sense of unease because of what has happened, then I see him. I had an appointment so my sister picked him up from the airport but we arrived at the house at pretty much the same time. As he came up the walkway, bumbling and fumbling with his luggage I couldn’t help but melt a bit and beam at the goofball. This goofy man cheated on me.

It’s so hard for me to wrap my brain around, but it happened. My husband is attractive, caring, helpful, compassionate, has a big heart, but he can also be selfish and short sighted because he reacts from an emotional place and doesn’t always think things through. He really wasn’t thinking things though when he cheated. I’m forever scarred by his infidelity and little did I know, he actually thought I trusted him now.

I’m not sure what led him to believe this but it dawned on me today when I asked him if he would consider marriage counseling. He said he would go if I felt the need but he didn’t see why we needed to go aside from the fact that he’s not a big fan of counseling. So I asked him if he thought I trusted him and he said yes. I didn’t laugh out loud but chucked inside and informed him that he was incorrect. My husband can be forgetful. I hope he remembers that moment.

I expressed my grievances about him going certain places alone and he said that if I’m not comfortable with him going somewhere or doing something, then he wouldn’t. He feels pretty confident that he won’t cheat again. I told him if he ever feels like I’m not enough, to let me know and we can deal with the issue accordingly. My husband is really good at making me feel as though I can trust him because he has such a genuine nature about him, but I’m not totally convinced yet. I hope he and I are on the same page now. I, am so in love with him, it’s ridiculous sometimes. I just wish I felt he loved me in the same way.

The Voice

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It’s been about a month since my D-Day. I struggle somewhat with the use of tense. The infidelity is my present and my past. Dealing with the aftermath is not over and I don’t know that it ever will be.

It’s hard to find the words to accurately express myself. I know words mean things, but sometimes it’s difficult to find them. When I was faced with the reality of my husband’s infidelity I was crushed. Among my thoughts was the fact that I loved him and wondered how he could betray me. After I probed him for information to a somewhat satisfactory point, I was faced with a decision. Do I stay or do I go?

I am pregnant and had been for the entirety of the time that my husband was being deceitful. I felt foolish to be carrying our child thinking that our marriage was something others could strive for then my world came crashing down when I was told the truth. I had suspected on some level that something was amiss, but I figured it was other outside forces going on in our lives. His family has a hectic life. Looking back, I realized that he hadn’t looked me in the eye for months when he spoke to me. He seemed to be grumpier than usual, overall. It may have been the guilt. I also just had this weird feeling that our chemistry was off. He has been away for work for the majority of my pregnancy and comes back once in a while. I figured the disconnect was due to the distance and I’m pregnant so I can get moody at times. Sex wasn’t an issue though because I was ready for it whenever he came back, generally.

Our baby hasn’t even been born and already I was faced with the decision of staying or leaving. My husband’s reaction to my tears and sadness was not really that surprising. He was very quiet and knew he didn’t have much defense and listened to what I had to say. I let him know how hurt I was but at the same time I informed him of how much love I have for him. At some point in time he apologized, somewhat teary eyed, and has endeavored to do his best to win back my trust. My husband and I are usually very open with one another which is one thing that made our relationship unique to all the other ones that I’ve had. I felt as though there was on open line of communication so his infidelity is quite ironic.

He didn’t promise that he wouldn’t cheat again. This made me mad of course, but at the same time I understood that he knows he’s not perfect and doesn’t want to give me false hope. He said he will do what he needs to do in order to restore the trust that has been broken. My husband has knuckle head tendencies and he knows this, which also explains his response. I decided to forgive him and I do believe that he is remorseful for what he has done. He has a tendency to react to situations from an emotional place with very little thought to the rational and he is aware of this, but still has work to do, obviously, when it comes to using logic over emotion.

He thanked me for my compassion towards him. I informed him that I questioned his love for me and he tried to reassure me that he does love me; however, he also told me he had fallen in love with one of the elephants (this is how I refer to the two other women). I told him it is not possible to love two people at the same time. There are those who believe it is possible, but I don’t know if that kind of love is what love can truly be at its fullest.  I informed him that “loving” two people a the same time waters it down. It takes away certain levels of intimacy. It divides his attention to the details of ME, his WIFE. It had already occurred. Confiding emotionally in the elephants distracted him from US and I tried to explain this to him. I let him know that I cannot stand for infidelity and I will leave if I have to. Some guy on YouTube said to avoid saying such things when your spouse cheats emotionally, but my husband cheated in both ways, with two women so, I figured I had to make my position clear. I love him but I cannot be one of many. It hurts too much.

I wanted to die upon discovering the infidelity. Today I feel less fatalistic, but I am still hurt. Making the decision to stay wasn’t as difficult as I imagined it would be, but it was still difficult none the less. Before I married I had determined in my mind that I would pack my stuff and turn tail at the first sight of infidelity, but reality is much different from imagined scenarios. I had to rely on the voice within me. I’m not really sure what the voice is. I don’t know if it’s me or if it’s God or if it’s both, but I’m here. Everyday I’m here. He is away from me right now but is flying back for his paternity leave and the birth of the baby. The voice inside had told me to stay, but has also informed me that it is entirely possible for a relapse to occur. I can’t control my husband, obviously. If I could he wouldn’t have stepped out in the first place, but I’m endeavoring to trust him again.

I always aim for balance in my life. I let him know I love him and I try to remember to give him positive feedback when he does the right thing. I don’t want him to feel discouraged, but I also don’t want him to become complacent. I remind him from time to time that we aren’t that far from what brought us here in the first place and I still hurt. I don’t even tell him the half of what I go through emotionally each day with triggers.  Some days are better than others. Unfortunately, at this point I’m not getting much sleep and I feel pretty unmotivated and I’m not sure if it’s because I’m pregnant or if it’s depression caused by the infidelity or both. Part of my problem is that my husband is generally, a genuinely sweet man. His sweet nature can lure me in. It’s what got me in the first place. Even in his infidelity he felt like, in his own INCREDIBLY WARPED way he was helping these women to love themselves more. He has a hero complex.

The voice. It tells me to stay and it tells me to hope for better. It tells me I will survive if it all falls apart.