Hi everyone,
I just wanted to give everyone an update and how this has all transpired nearly three months out. Things have been very up and down, but overall the trajectory is moving upwards in regards to me coping and my general outlook. My WW moved out (basically while I was away in the US for work), and her life is now looking a lot different than it was before. I have the kids every other week which isn’t ideal, as I miss them desperately on my off week. This has also raised my ire.
For what it’s worth, I have also managed to piece together the broad timeline (no thanks to her) of what happened. She slept with the married polyamorist while away on course (she said they were both drunk) in Nov 2020, and as discussed before, she was one of three side-pieces he was ploughing/maintaining relations with on the side of his marriage. In talks with my therapist/counsellor, we have surmised that he would have chosen her as the perfect side fling; a married woman with kids would not have been amenable to getting ‘emotionally needy’, and so he could have screwed around without worrying that she’d get too clingy…or that she’d open her mouth if things went south with them both. I am guessing she did get slightly clingy around the end of 2021, and he completely cut her away around Nov/Dec of that year. He allegedly got divorced and also went ‘monogamous’ with one of the girlfriends.
This would time in with her messages to her childhood friend bemoaning that she was ‘going through a break up’ and that she ‘as selfish as it sounds, she had a lot invested’ in that relationship. To add insult to injury, barely a month or so later would see her logging into that dating app to look for polyamorous partners. It was like she NEEDED to replace her ex-bf with someone else – all while gas-lighting me and telling me that we needed marriage counselling to connect in a better fashion. Bear in mind that she told the therapist at this time that she was ‘85% happy with the marriage and that I was a loving husband and father’. I know I should have accepted this by now, but thinking about the sheer audacity and betrayal (especially in light of what I went through in her original affair in 2013), has just made me angrier and angrier since separating. I’m not going to lie, I have been in some dark places the last few weeks, and every time I think about how much she has screwed our family, screwed the kids, and screwed our finances and futures; I just sob.
We are going through the financial separation now, and I will have to pay her out around $300k via a re-mortgage of the house. This is on top of the ~$90k she has already been given via taking our second car on (which was completely paid off), as well as money from the joint offset account to re-establish herself. All in all, her dalliance with this beta-male PoS has cost me (and vicariously our daughters) ~$400k. The thing that enrages me is that is feels like she is being rewarded for her extremely poor life decisions – she gets a nice subsidised house to rent and a six-figure payout put into her bank account, and I get a massive mortgage to pay off in a period of rising interest rates. Yeah sure, I get the house – but what’s the point when the whole point of me keeping it is to give the kids some stability in their family home?
I still can’t believe I am divorced. It’s like a bad dream I can’t wake up from. Ex-WW is by all accounts, a depressed human being. My daughter’s babysitter told me the other night that my oldest told her that ‘Mum cries in her bedroom all the time’. In my ex-WW’s interactions with me, she is overly friendly, and I get the sense that she is genuinely bewildered that I have no intention of being friendly with her. I don’t respond to her conversational texts, and I refuse to engage on any topic that doesn’t revolve around finances or the kids. It’s hard to reconcile my own (necessary) attitude to her against the fact that mere months ago I adored her and had so many plans for our future together. Life really does change rapidly.
It’s not all doom and gloom though. I jokingly got on some dating apps – at my friends insistence I might add, they wanted to live vicariously through me I suspect! – and I have been somewhat amused to find that the majority of women that message my 43yr old arse are in their 30s and 20s. This has been somewhat of a revelation, and I brought this up with my counsellor. He grinned at me and said, ‘you have no idea how much academic work has been done on this topic!’ Basically, he said that women in their 30s and 20s likely see a (well-rounded?) older man as quote, ‘having their proverbial in a sock and therefore present as a very safe option.’ I have gone on a few casual dates, and women seem to have absolutely zero problem with me having three kids. To quote one, ‘I find it very attractive that a man can raise three kids practically alone.’ I caught up with an old female school mate the other week who has given up on online dating – she is extremely attractive and when I asked why, she lamented that the only people who message her are ‘guys in their late 40s and 50s inundate me, I get barely anything from guys my own age noting I have a kid.’ This floored me. And while I don’t wish my ex-WW any sadness, my counsellor indicated that her dating pool is going to be completely different from mine accordingly. Add on a reputation for cheating, and it isn’t looking good for her. It’s somewhat nice to know that cheaters eventually get theirs in the end. To also quote my counsellor, "I know it seems like she is being rewarded at this point in time – but believe me, the chickens will come home to roost for your ex, and she will reap what she has sown."
I should also add that for anyone going through this, or about to go through this, I can offer this advice: GET A COUNSELLOR/THERAPIST. Funny quotes aside, mine has been a godsend. Even if at times it’s just to be a neutral sounding board to vent frustration.
I have started very tentatively started seeing someone; she works in my field. She’s 9 years younger, and does not give one flying wahzoo that I have three kids. She got out of a relationship 6 months ago that involved infidelity, and the concept of cheating horrifies her. I am in no rush to start anything – but it’s nice to know that there are good people out there and that the future looks brighter, whichever way it takes me.
I’d also like to thank all of the people who offered very sagely advice over this whole ordeal; I still cling to a lot of the advice very fondly. This site is fantastic – albeit we all wish we never heard of it! If anyone has any questions, ask away.
Also BluerthanBlue, yes she is delusional. She thinks we'll do all the same family stuff, that we'll do brunches on the weekend, and that I'll just forget about the part where she chose to denigrate me as a husband to her friends while actively dating and screwing a married workmate who had two other girlfriends for over a year without protection. F*@% her, and f*&% that.
[This message edited by Hurthalo at 5:39 AM, Friday, September 30th]