Huh… So This Happened 8 Years Ago Today

I came across this tonight.

Just to be clear the original post was simply about setting Jerry Lee up on Facebook. I added the rest of that a few years later. 🙂

We were in Kentucky for Easter when I did this. Staying with Tammy Faye and Pastor Fake. He had resisted forever and I thought it would be funny to create a profile for him. In hindsight I don’t think funny was the correct word. Tragic. Life changing. Foolish. Let’s go with a moment in time that irrevocably changed the course of my life and the lives of my children. But that’s not all!

This was the same weekend that Jezebel took Jerry Lee to meet her future husband, #3. Completely excluded me. Gave me a bullshit story about how they never got to do anything just the two of them. I was stupid enough to believe that. He was already lying and I hadn’t a clue.

By April or May of the next year, 2013, Jerry Lee was cheating on me with Harley. In May, Mother’s Day weekend in fact, he admitted to texting her and swore he would end it. In June, Jezebel and #3 got married. Good ol’ Jerry Lee went by himself to the wedding. By himself I mean without his wife and children. I’m fairly certain that they met up that weekend. They certainly had plans to. They were even going to get tattoos together. And in August I found out he hadn’t ended it with Harley after all.

This time of year in 2014 we were replacing carpet and flooring in our Utah home as we prepared to move across the country to Virginia. Two months later we would buy a home in Harrisonburg and three months later we, the kids and I, would make the move and join Jerry Lee.

This time of year in 2015 I was suicidal. My gut was screaming at me but I continued to bury my head in the sand. Surely he wouldn’t move us across the country, invest all the money we had invested in this new life, and then turn around and take up with Harley again. Oh, but he would. Almost four months to the day I would find out about his affair with Harley.

Eight years ago today I ended my life as I knew it. I had no clue at that moment what I had just done.

 

Facebook Memories, Go Away!

The entire summer is a weird time for me in many ways. If I let it it could serve as one long trigger until September or later.

I know I have shared before about how I do like Facebook. I don’t post nearly as much as I used to, and I’m finding recently I’m not even on it reading quite as much, but I like it. I generally like seeing the memories that pop up. I get to relive cute stories about my kids, see what I was up to years ago, look at the pictures of my kids over the years, and recall all the fantastic trips I’ve taken and places I’ve been.

The summer though… it can be a bitch.

On one hand I see pictures of me with my kids and visiting family as we go to amusement parks, Yellowstone, Moab, water parks, etc. There we are hiking. There we are camping. Oh look how little the kids were! Queen B towers over Rock Star and all four kids are little stair steps in height. There we are celebrating the kids’ birthdays- parties and/or dinners out. There we are at the roller skating rink with the rubber nose that you squeezed and slime came out of it. There we are bowling. There’s the video of Rock Star and her teammates as the Hummer limousine pulled into the parking lot to take them to the reservoir for her party.

On the other hand there is the picture of us on the plane, getting ready to fly to Virginia to pick out a new house. There is my post about all of our lasts in Utah. There is my post about my trip from hell getting to Virginia. Oh, four years ago today we spent our first night in the new house. Look at those pictures from your vacation in Florida or your trip back out to Utah to visit friends. You had no idea your husband was in the middle of an affair and was planning on leaving you. There you are with M, the morning you left to head back to Virginia; you told the story of how the two of you met and how in a wonderful twist she was moving to Virginia, too, and you would only be three hours apart instead of 30. Too bad you didn’t realize you had been replaced and would be moving again in a year.

Every time I see those pictures of our last days in Utah back in 2014 I want to shout to that woman: Don’t go! Don’t leave! It’s a trap. He’s taking you away from all of your friends; he’s moving you closer to his mistress. He’s going to start cheating on you less than a year after you and the kids move out there. Don’t do it! Stay there!

When I see the pictures of the kids and I back in the summer of 2015 I sadly shake my head because I was so stupid, so blind. I had no idea what was coming. I can’t say I was ignorant and happy because he had amped up the crazy by that point, but I had no idea my life was about to be obliterated. There I am smiling at the camera, happy to be eating French toast at Kneader’s once again, or enjoying the beach down in Florida, and my husband is plotting against me. He’s sending his whore money and I have no idea.

The memories that crop up on June 10th, August 10th and August 14th are a little bit trickier. Sometimes I read those or see the pictures, and I think, “You had no idea how your life was about to change.” Other times, like when I see the new pictures of the mobster with me, or I know one of the pictures this year will be the freedom cake I brought in to work last year, I smile and think to myself, “It’s just another day.”

The most heartbreaking photos though are of my kids, back in the summer of 2014. The first one is of Picasso surrounded by his posse of friends. We lived in Utah. It’s a law everyone has to have four kids. I regularly had between 3 and 6 more boys in my house than I had given birth to. They spent a lot of time together. They were huddled around each other, hugging in a circle.

I know leaving Utah hurt Picasso. He cried. He didn’t think he would ever make new friends. He was a nervous wreck the night before his first day of school. He spent many months hating it there. Just as he was beginning to find his footing we had to move again.

The second picture is one that doesn’t even belong to me. It was my daughter’s and I saw it shared by one of her friends. It was the entire optional team posing one last time with Rock Star as she said her goodbyes and thanked everyone for the memories.

Gymnastics was her life. I remember all the drop offs and pickups. The way they would yell, “Bye! I love you!” to one another as they climbed into their parents’ cars and went home. I remember all the different get togethers we did as a team. The away meets and all the fun we had with those. Rock Star spent so much time in the gym that it was pretty much the only life she knew. The guest list at her birthday parties after 4th or 5th grade included her best friend from the neighborhood, and her teammates. That was it. No other classmates or girls from the neighborhood. Those girls were her friends, and they became more like family.

I see those pictures and I  want to cry. Those pictures represent everything Rock Star and Picasso gave up. They were promised a better life, a fantastic future. What did they get? A father who abandoned them and left them to survive on their own, with a mom who hadn’t worked in years. They gave up their friends and their passions all so their dad could get closer to his mistress.

Those memories are extremely painful, even to this day. I don’t think there will ever come a day that I won’t mourn what was stolen from my children. I could accept it if they had a new life that was so much better, but they didn’t get that. They were teased with new, bigger bedrooms, their own bathrooms, a pool, a game room, and the promise of a media room. They were promised a better life. “This move will secure our future so that we can provide better for you,” they were told.

They didn’t get that better life. They sure as hell didn’t get a more secure future. Our cross country move was always about CF and what he wanted. They were collateral damage.

I look at all of those pictures and all of those posts now and I realize what a farce my life actually was. Was any of it real? Was I skating across thin ice the entire time? Was I off living my life, thinking things were fantastic and we were so blessed when the reality was my husband was planning his exit the entire time? I naively thought my kids were going to be well provided for always; they would have everything I didn’t have growing up. It turned out to be an illusion.

I’m not sure if I should say, “Thanks for the memories,” as I grow teary eyed looking at what was, and what will never be again. Or, if I should instead say, “Thanks for the reality check. My life was never real. Too bad I didn’t know it back then.”

 

Forced Civilization

Ta-da! This is it. Part 5. Aren’t you glad I broke it up into 5 easily digested pieces? Me too. As always, here are parts 1, 2, 3, and 4. Enjoy!

I’m going to say it one more time: Maintain no contact! If you’ve chosen to remain married, maintain no contact with the affair partner. Pain shopping never ends well.

Remember all those things I’d love to say? It would only result in me looking crazy. Hell, I probably look crazy right now as I write this.

It is patently unfair. They get to preen around like peacocks and we’re expected to sit quietly, say nothing, and be happy for the new couple lest we be deemed “bitter”.

Do they “deserve” to have someone chime in on their page and remind them about the kids he abandoned, or the fact that their happiness came at The Saint’s and my expense? Sure. Would it be fun to say something like, “Hey, it’s great that you can be a dad to her kids; too bad you haven’t seen your own in over 2 years,” or “Does everyone know that you could drive 12 hours round trip to see your whore every weekend for 6 months but you haven’t been able to make that drive to see your children one time in more than 2 years?”? Well, of course it would be fun!

But it will also make me look like a bitter, crazy person. Oh, look; she just can’t let go. It’s so sad that Sam can’t focus on her own life and try to find some happiness. Looks like she’s going to let this divorce destroy her. Her poor children. Obviously, Sam prefers to be bitter and hateful instead of appreciating the fact that her husband of twenty years released her from the burden of being his wife.

Even though I’m telling the truth no one wants to hear it. They want tidy. They want shiny. They want everything to fit comfortably inside a little box. As Jack Nicholson would tell you, “They can’t handle the truth!” They don’t want to hear about all the ill effects of adultery. Affairs are between two people and we just never know what goes on in another person’s marriage. Sam probably had it coming. She was probably a terrible wife and that’s why he cheated. Besides, everyone is happier now so it was all for the best. Get over it!

In playing your role as the crazy ex you give voice to their untruthful narrative. See? I told you she was unreasonable! I told you she was hateful and mean and tried to make me eat a turnip!

You’re just a big bowl of cray cray so what else could they do? They found comfort in one another. They bonded over the craziness that was their exes and all of the abuse and neglect that was heaped upon them. Thank God we found each other and can now revel in real happiness with someone who truly loves me and takes care of me.

When you go after the affair partner instead of the cheating spouse it gets even worse! She’s now the victim in all of this. You are unreasonable! You are blaming the wrong person! She’s crying to anyone who will listen to it and everyone pats her back sympathetically and nods their head in agreement. “Why is she doing this? You slept with her husband and now she’s acting crazy! What’s the big deal? Why won’t she leave you alone? You’re innocent! My God it was just a little bump and grind!”

So you stay away. You maintain no contact because there is nothing to be gained. It is a setup from the very beginning. You are destined to lose. If you point out all the destruction and pain you’re labeled bitter, vengeful, jealous. They tell you to get over it. To think of the children. Your truth is unwanted by these people. Similarly, the cheaters’ truth is lapped up like a luscious bowl of cream.

The ex would like nothing better than to convince everyone that I’m not his victim; I’m exactly the same as him so no one should pay attention to anything I say or anything he’s done. He’s done no worse than me so I can’t talk about him.

It’s not true. I’m not sneaking around behind a clueless wife’s back. I’m not having clandestine meetings in work spaces or parking lots or minivans. I certainly never siphoned off money for a boyfriend and his kids, or took money meant for someone else’s kids. The minute I start to defend myself against him, though, I lose. Facts do not matter to them. The truth does not matter to them. The truth is malleable. You can twist it and turn it to suit your purposes.

Just like he wants everyone to believe he’s a devoted father who loves his children. The only reason he hadn’t seen them in over two years was because of me and the fact that I poisoned them against him.

You end up dropping the rope because you realize the only way to win is to not play. Kind of like War Games. The only move I can make is to keep my mouth shut and let the happy couple look like a couple of idiots with a bunch of delusional supporters. I can snark away at them over here on the safety of my blog. I have to be secure in the knowledge that the only people who really matter know the truth. I realize that if he ever were to get in my face and start slinging shit my way the best thing I could do would be to say, “Dude, I know it’s really important to you to believe that story, so I’m gonna let you have it. It seems to be much more important for you to believe that you’re right than it is to me to prove that you’re wrong.”

I’ll let you in on a little secret. As hard as it may be to stay away and keep silent, it really is the best course of action. Cheaters hate not being central. They hate not being in control. If there’s one thing I’ve learned over these last few years it’s that those of us who have been cheated on have also been slowly and systematically trained to cave and give into the demands of the cheater. It’s not always an overt type of thing; I’d go so far as to say most of the time it’s not. The cheater just always thinks he or she knows best and we follow along. We try so hard not to rock the boat, to give them what they want, to make them happy, that we often end up losing our agency.

Would it have been wonderful to have put a HUGE sign on his car that said, “I tricked my wife and kids into moving 2000 miles away so that I could resume my affair with my cousin!” along with all of his clothes in his work parking lot? Oh my God yes! Would it have felt great to post signs all along the route to our house that said, “Cheater lives here,”? Uh-huh. Or maybe renting a big billboard in their new city with their pictures on it, letting everyone know to congratulate the happy cheaters. Again, yes. Expensive, but yes, it would have been satisfying. There are definitely days I wish I had called her up and told her about my crying kids or that I had ripped him a new one, or that I had even just dumped everything of his out on the lawn.

But you know what? It wouldn’t have mattered. I would have played right into their narrative that I was a crazy, jealous, overbearing pyscho and he had to get away! On the other hand, despite doing none of that I know he lies. He tells people I filed for divorce and he has no idea why. I know he tells people I rounded up all of his stuff into black garbage bags and threw it on the curb. He continues to tell people he moved away from his kids and in with his mistress/cousin six hours away because I forced him to move out of the family home (and wouldn’t let him take one single thing with him!). Ultimately though he knows none of that happened. I cared so little for him and his antics that I simply pretended he no longer existed.

I have no scientific proof of this, but I sincerely believe that ignoring him (or any of them) is much more effective than going balls to the wall with them- spouse or affair partner. Like we can’t fight against the injustice of their stupid image management, they can’t fight against silence. How do you fight against something that isn’t there?

I would like to believe that me ignoring him drives him crazy. I was supposed to beg and plead and instead I merely wiped out the bank account and gave him the deep freeze. There was no pretending to put on a united front. I didn’t protect him. I told our kids the truth. I told my family the truth. Hell, I told the lady at the vet’s office the truth. I sang loud and proud. No fucking way I was going to own his shit show. If he didn’t want everyone in our small town to know he was a liar who moved his entire family across the country to get closer to his cousin then he shouldn’t have done it.

Every time he has tried to antagonize me I have refused to take the bait. Well, except for that one time in May of 2016. Even then I kept it pretty funny and brief.

Hacking my Facebook page? Changed my password. Contacted my lawyer. Proved it was him. Sending text messages to the mobster from a burner phone? Ignored. Playing with child support? Show cause hearing which has resulted in him having to pay large lump sums to me each and every time. Sending the checks in obnoxious envelopes? Ignored. Checks cashed. Telling me to check my damn mailbox and calling me greedy because I dared to ask about support? Let him know that if it was too much for the poor dear to hear from me I’d be more than happy to garnish his paycheck. Fucking around with paying support and doing it on his own schedule. Again, reminded him of the court order and let him know I would be filing a garnishment with the state if he did it again. Doing his own child support modification? Hey, I gave him fair warning and then I contacted my lawyer. All of his lies? Confronted with the truth in court.

As far as I’m concerned I’ve been an ideal ex. I stay away. I don’t contact him unless it’s absolutely necessary. I do not and have not ever harassed him or the whore by phone, text, email, or in person. I’ve never asked him for a dime above what he’s been ordered to pay, and quite honestly, those times when he wasn’t paying and should have been I didn’t say a word. I figure out what needs to be done and then I do it. Usually it’s through some sort of court order and then he gets really pissy but that’s neither here nor there.

I’ll say it one last time. Stay away. Stay off social media. When you feed the beast it continues to grow. It feels good in the moment but it’s giving them power. They still matter! Or, in other cases, you continue to be the big, bad hinderance to true love. What’s that they say? Never argue with a fool. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience. Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty and the pig likes it. Continuing to beat yourself up by looking at the part of their lives they’re willing to put on Facebook is like wrestling with a pig and arguing with an idiot. It does no good. It will never help you. It’s all designed, in fact, to hurt you. You can’t confront them or you look like the crazy person and they come off looking like the poor, stalked victims. Focus on your own life. Take it from someone who did something really stupid and paid the price in self-doubt. Keep being the best badass you can be and, as Chump Lady would say, trust that they suck!

More Crazy Talk

We are almost done. This is Part 4. Playing catch up? Here are parts 1, 2, and 3.

I think the thing that kills me more than anything is the stupid memes I find on her page. I’ve said before, for a whore she’s very philosophical. I’ve never seen a person post as much drivel as she does. I try to roll my eyes and move along but I’m afraid my eyes are going to get stuck in the back of my head because of the unending bullshit that she posts in her quest to be enlightened and tolerant.

She is a huge fan of a group on Facebook that offers up all sorts of inspirational memes and concentrates very much on being a better person and finding your soul mate. That’s kind of funny actually. She’s a horrible person. She fucked a married man. She was sending “inappropriate” pictures to a neighbor while she fucked my husband. She continued to sleep with her estranged husband while sharing a bank account and my fucking marital funds with my husband. She’s so focused on finding true love, her other half, and her soul mate and being connected by the universe and threads of time and waiting patiently for her win and yada yada yada that she never stops to ask herself, “Hey, do you really think you should be poaching someone else’s spouse? Is that really the path to enlightenment? Is that helping you to be your best self?” You want some inspiration and philosophy, Harley? Here ya go:

Naturally she doesn’t think like that. No, instead she goes with something like this:

Interesting. This has me curious. Maybe that’s the point. Is she trying to insinuate that they never talk about me because I mean nothing to them? I find that hard to believe when I’m taking over half of his paycheck and they both seem so eager to hack into my Facebook page. I’m not the one hacking into their social media! I’m also not tracking down her ex-husband to get dirt on her. Nor am I sending nasty text messages or constantly fucking with them.

Isn’t that also a fantastic way to get your detractors to shut up? By spreading the narrative that talking about them and their antics means you care about them they force you to be quiet lest people think they matter a great deal.

I have a different philosophy. I think evil should be named. I think it should be brought out into the light so everyone can see the ugliness. It festers and oozes when it hides in the warm, damp darkness.

I think we can all safely conclude that she certainly doesn’t take the approach of not talking about her relationship with her cousin. Although it may “mean everything” she is not taking the quiet approach. Oh no! She is shouting it from the rooftops. “I stole my cousin away from his wife of twenty years and both his kids! He left them all for me and moved six hours away just to be close to me and my heathens!” Bravo, whore!

What’s next in Whore Philosophy 101?

Nicely done, cunt face! Yes, please do encourage everyone not to look too closely at what happened. You can’t change the past or the fact you’re a whore who fucks other women’s husbands; so let’s just change the narrative from this point on. You’re not the cousin/mistress. You’re the cousin/wife. Forget the lies and the money and the cheating. This is your big chance to convince everyone that this is the epic love story that would not be thwarted. It was a love that could not be denied. It wasn’t some tawdry affair. It had meaning. We can all choose to concentrate on the wrongs that were done, or we can focus on the future. You might have been a cheating whore but that was ten minutes ago. Now you can start all over; you can change the ending and no one will call you a whore again. Even if you are one ‘cause leopards don’t change their spots. Whore.

Cute little side note? Tammy Faye commented on this one: Amen! It’s almost like she was saying, “Yeah, you are a whore who fucked a married man and destroyed his kids’ lives but you make him happy. We’ll just pretend all that nasty stuff never happened and take it from here. I call mulligan!

My favorite one, though, was this:

What the hell kind of mind fuck is that shit? What do cheaters have to be angry, enraged or insulted about? Are they pouting because their duped spouses aren’t buying the lies anymore? Has that sent them into a rage? Are they enraged because people aren’t thinking highly of them anymore? Are they insulted because people call them what they are? Doubtful. They don’t typically have shame or remorse.

Rise above the bullshit? What bullshit is she rising above? She’s got me calling her a whore although never to her face. She’s got a son she’s disowned basically. I’m not sure how The Saint views her nowadays. At one point he said she was just plain mean. Maybe it hurts her to not have his adoring support and she considers that bullshit.

You want to rise above the bullshit? Try losing just about everything, bitch. Try being forced out of your home. Try starting all over… By. Yourself. And with no money because you trusted your spouse and you stayed home with the kids while he climbed the career ladder. Oh wait, that’s what you did to your husband, too. Both of you using us so that you could get further and then deciding years later that we no longer served your purposes so we were discarded.

I’ve been doing nothing except rising for the last three years. I’ve pulled up roots yet again, moved hundreds of miles yet again, kept it together for the sake of my kids, worked two jobs to support those kids when the love of your life was declining to pay support, put one foot in front of the other, and kept going.

What kind of bullshit did you need to rise against? Did you lose your home? Were you forced to move out of the state? Did your kids lose their father to another woman and her kids? Did you have to suddenly go back to work after a fifteen plus year absence and try to support your kids with no help from The Saint? Were you left wondering what was so wrong with you that your husband chose another woman over you? Did you listen in stunned bemusement at all the lies your ex told about you in his efforts to turn himself, the cheater, into a victim? No, no you didn’t, you fucking cunt. That’s what you helped do to me. You decimated my life and then want to turn around and act like you’re magnanimous. And philosophical. And so much bigger than the rest of us.

Flick your light back on and shine it brighter than ever? Seriously? Why don’t I shove a flashlight up your ass and that way when you open your pie hole to spit out this drivel you can shine a light on your nonsense? Once again, whores are so philosophical and so misunderstood. Let’s help them shine a light onto their greatness. God knows we wouldn’t want them to shrink back into the darkness.

I think the last line is my favorite though: Fall so deeply in love with your own life that anyone who tried to wrong you becomes a laughable, ridiculous, distant memory.

Brilliant! She will not be kept down. No one will shame her.  Does anyone have any doubt that the whore loves her life? She’s got everything she’s ever wanted and has suffered no consequences. Why would she not love her life? She does not need that advice. She needs advice that centers on being humble and kind!

And who has tried to wrong her? She is the one going out and wronging others. She wronged me. She wronged my children. She’s wronged her own son. She wronged her husband.

This idea that any of us should somehow become a distant, laughable, ridiculous memory is insane. She is the one who needs to fade into the darkness.

She likes to turn it around so that she’s the enlightened victim, refusing to let the haters get her down. The reality is she’s the one doing all the victimizing.

This advice isn’t actually bad. Believe me, I am doing my best to fall deeply in love with my new life, the one foisted upon me by the whore and my philandering husband. I would love nothing more than for her and her ilk to disappear and be nothing more than a laughable, distant memory. The problem lies in the fact that cheaters like her take this crap and use it for their own nefarious purposes. The people who really need this advice are people like me, the mobster, and any of you who have been duped by your partner.

With that in mind I’m going to offer this piece of advice to Harley: Take your insipid, not-needed-self-esteem boosting memes and shove ‘em the same place I’d like to shove that flashlight!

 

The Doubts

Welcome to Part 3 on my series of the folly of pain shopping. You can read Part 1 and/or part 2 if you are so inclined.

I do not want him back. He is a pox upon humanity. I am madly in love with the mobster and I am happier than I have ever been. Still…. I look at that shit on her Facebook and I wonder…

Was he right and we just weren’t good together? Is Harley better suited for him because she doesn’t mind sitting at home all day long? Will their love of Kentucky basketball see them through every hardship? Is she just better than me in his eyes, because he certainly didn’t want any part of the family life with me and our kids? I couldn’t get him out of his damn bed. I couldn’t pry him away from the TV. We didn’t take trips together. He didn’t feel the need to be a supportive dad to his own kids. He never complimented me where everyone in the world could see it.

Was he right and I was a terrible wife? I never put photo frames around his picture and declared I loved my veteran. I thanked him every year but I didn’t post pictures and photo frames and declarations of love. Maybe she is just all around better than me. I envision her working her 40+ hours a week, bringing home a substantial paycheck and still having plenty of time to cook dinner, clean house and do laundry all while being supermom to her kids. At least three of them.

I work 40+ works hours a week and bring home less now than I did when I first started, thanks to taxes, a 401k, and crappy medical insurance for me and my two kids. My mom cooks and does laundry. I rarely see my kids- Rock Star is gone a huge chunk of the time and Picasso is off doing his own thing in his room. I did begin and end this divorce with two kids so I’ve got that going for me. I’ll put that one in the win column for me.

I see pictures of them with all their pets so I know I didn’t turn him off because I loved animals and had a house full.

I sometimes even see witty memes and I think to myself, “That’s pretty funny; too bad you’re a whore.”

Was he right and I just wasn’t “the one”? I wasn’t a good fit and she is. Is it that simple? Maybe they really are deliriously happy together. Maybe it’s the love affair of the century, Kentucky style.

Maybe I just wasn’t the right wife for him and she is. Did I fail him? Did he at one point think I had all the necessary traits he wanted/needed in a wife, but over the years he came to realize I did not?

That is the fear, isn’t it? It’s not that the two people who did this to you are evil, horrible, rotten people who should be strung up and shot; it’s that those two people who did this to you are so much better suited to one another. They compliment each other. They fit together. They make a better couple. They realized it and weren’t afraid to plunge ahead while you clung to the past with everything you had. It’s about being bested by a whore with no morals who may actually be the better partner because God knows he does things for her and her kids that he never bothered to do for me and mine.

Was I the starter wife? Did he learn from his mistakes with me? Did he finally realize that barricading himself in the bedroom and submerging himself in the television all by himself was not the path to a happy marriage so now he’ll do better? Is that why he’s willing to do all the things that I would have loved for him to do with all of us?

Did I somehow prevent him from living up to his potential? Was I too overbearing when it came to the kids? Is that why he was reluctant to come with us but is always ready and willing to help out with her kids and to act like one big happy family with them?

Would insisting on family dinners around the table have helped? What if I was a better housekeeper? Maybe he wouldn’t have minded being in the living room instead of shutting himself off in the bedroom. Maybe it really was me! If I had kept the house cleaner and cooked more he never would strayed. Okay, that’s a little over the top. But maybe if I had kept the house cleaner he wouldn’t have chosen to stay in his bedroom so much, or chosen to remain downstairs in the basement watching television while the kids and I stayed upstairs. I’ve said before I think that was when the breakdown began and we began living separate lives, so if I had been better at that one thing then I could have saved this and my kids would never know a life of poverty. Her little snapshots of life are all about family life and being together and doing things together. I keep coming back to: If I had been a better housekeeper maybe he wouldn’t have retreated, and all those pictures of cozy Sundays in front of a fire, or outings with children could be us.

He kept telling me I could watch whatever I wanted on TV. He didn’t need to have it on ESPN or History Channel. I never believed him though, and truthfully, didn’t want to spend hours upon hours holed up in the bedroom. It seems like she doesn’t mind and maybe if I had forced myself to do that then I would still be married.

Was I too easy going? Did that disappoint him? Did he want someone to push back? Did he want more fire? Did I make things too easy for him? Perhaps I should have taken a stand and demanded more from him. Maybe when I sighed and took on more and more of the tasks he saw it as a sign I didn’t see him worth fighting for.

Did I just flat-out disappoint him when it came to being his wife? Were there tons of things I didn’t do that a good wife should do and that Harley the Whore obviously does? I didn’t fawn over him. I didn’t call him out on Facebook all the time. I didn’t marvel over him. I didn’t bring him a cool drink while he mowed the yard. I didn’t want to snuggle in bed all day with him. I didn’t want to watch Mountain Men with him. I fell asleep on the couch even once he “allowed” me to come back and sleep in the bed. Maybe I really didn’t love him the way you should love your husband. Maybe he is now getting the love he deserves and he feels complete and happy. We all know I couldn’t make him happy, no matter how hard I tried. She appears to make him happy all the time. If you don’t believe me take a gander at her Facebook page. Everyone there will tell you how happy they both look!

Why? That is the overwhelming question that rushes through my brain as I looked at all that crap. Why was he willing to do all of this with her and her kids? He could celebrate birthdays with them, go to the zoo, take “family” vacations, go to cheer competitions, go to the hospital with her kid and fetch candy. Why can he be Dad of the Year to her kids when all he could do with ours was sit in the bedroom and watch TV? Why did we have to practically beg him to go anywhere with us? How is it that now he’s able to go away on couple’s vacations and spend time together outside of the safety of his bedroom in the evening? Why is he getting his teeth fixed? Why is he suddenly getting involved in veteran’s groups? Why is he wearing sandals with jeans? Was it something about me? Did I lack something that would have motivated him to do those things? Is she just better at getting him out of his shell? Did he give up because he thought I didn’t care?

The mobster thought this had really gotten into my head. Maybe it has but I think it’s natural to see things like that and wonder, “Why the hell couldn’t he (or she) have done all of that while we were married? Why did it take blowing up the original family for the ex to finally act the way I wish he (or she) had acted when he was with me?

I can tell you this: I will no longer be looking at her Facebook page. I do know they are masters at image management. I know that if her head was on fire she would not acknowledge it. She’d be saying, “I’m a little chilly; anyone got a sweater?” I know that ultimately it doesn’t matter what kind of a cook she is, or how promptly she does laundry, or if she keeps a cleaner house than I did because she is a woman who has no qualms about sleeping with another woman’s husband. She’s a woman who is willing to cheat on her husband. No matter what good things she may do to cover up the evil that lies within, she is an awful person with crappy character and no moral compass.

I know I don’t want him back and that life is so much nicer without him in it. It doesn’t matter if he goes out to dinner with her daughter or shows up to support her at cheer competitions. It doesn’t matter if he goes to Show and Tell with her son, or is there to hold his hand when he hurts himself. No matter what good deeds he may perform for her children he will always be an ass who abandoned his own kids, who refused to pay child support for them while he drained a 401k of $10,000, and who tried to get out of paying sufficient support for them during his court trial. He played games with child support once he got a job and calculated child support for his “beloved” daughter down to the last half hour for crying out loud. He’s also a man who has no qualms about sleeping with another man’s wife and is willing and able to cheat on his wife. Not only was he willing to cheat on me, but he was willing to lie to me, make a fool out of me, take money away from his kids and give to her and her kids, and then financially rape me. He has crappy character and no moral compass. I guess they really are ideally suited for one another. Thank God no more nice people will be subjected to their lying, cheating ways. They can both wonder what the other one is up to. I think they are probably both too pleased with themselves to ever even consider the idea that the same could be done to them.

Stay away, everyone! Nothing good comes from pain shopping. Nothing! They make you doubt yourself when you know you’re sane. They make you question yourself and your actions even when you know you did nothing wrong. They can convince you that they are living a life of carefree joy and that all of that could have been yours if you had simply danced prettier. They’ll make you wonder what you did wrong and you’ll find yourself comparing yourself to someone who is so far below you there can never be a comparison. Even when you are happy in your new life one look at the cheaters and their life on social media is enough to make you stumble off of that path of newfound happiness and bliss; they’ll take you down a twisted road of doubt and anger and jealousy.  They are master manipulators and you will never be able to compete with their highlight reel. So don’t do it! Stay far, far away!

 

The Highlight Reel

This is the second part in my five part series on the stupidity of pain shopping. You can read the first part here. Let me serve as a lesson to you! Don’t do it!

I embarked on some “research”. First up was a new picture of her kids on vacation. It might have been Tennessee but it could have easily been somewhere else as well.

They looked like they were having fun. I don’t know if CF came along or if good ol’ Harley is finally learning the joys of life with him. In my mind he came along, because this is Life 2.0. He’s new and improved. He’s the doting husband and the beloved daddy, always ready for adventures with this new version of his family. Naturally, in my narrative he’s telling Harley how much he loves going on vacation and how I would never let him accompany us, how he missed out on so many of these adventures with his own children because of me.

Of course, I also notice the missing fourth child. I guess he wouldn’t play happy family or accept CF as his brand new daddy so he needed to be eradicated. Not even a mention of missing him.

I go back and forth between hoping he has a damn anxiety attack on the way back (or while there) that she needs to deal with and wondering if there was some magic formula I didn’t know existed that would have made him enjoy vacationing with his kids and me. Why does he do this with her and her kids when he would never do it with his own kids?

I see the pictures once again of the happy couple on their wedding day and honeymoon, I suppose. Everyone congratulating them and telling them how happy they are for them. I roll my eyes at the stupidity. It’s laughable. Two cheaters promising to love, honor and forsake all others. Yes, they’ve both got a real good grasp on how marriage is supposed to work.

I so badly want to comment and ask those people if they’re aware of the price her husband, her one son, my kids, and I all had to pay for their happiness. Do you think she’s entitled to happiness at my expense? At my kids’ expense?

I sleep on a couch. My daughter has spent two years basically with her head down just doing her damnedest to graduate and get the hell out of here, to start all over in college. My son, instead of hanging out with friends, stays locked in his room playing video games. We live on a busy street, not a neighborhood. There are no kids around he could hang out with.

But they’re happy and they deserve it because apparently I was a horrible, evil, mean person who tried to shit all over their happiness. No one cares what their happiness did to anybody else’s life.

She wants everyone to know that lazy days spent on the couch in front of the fire with her beloved are her favorite kind of Sunday. He’s got the remote in his hand so he hasn’t changed that much.

I see her incessantly calling him out, mentioning him, tagging him. “I love my veteran!”, “Waiting to watch the fight!” (from their home, on the couch, with him), and letting everyone know how they’re “getting their Halloween on”. Wow- you managed to get him to watch something other than Ice Road Truckers or Mountain Men? Congratulations! You didn’t get him out from under the television altogether but at least you’re watching together.

Again I wonder: Why not with me? Why can he suddenly do all these family and couple oriented things with her that he never could with me? Their life seems to be like a cozy, warm sweater. They carve pumpkins, sip hot apple cider, and watch Halloween movies together. I’m sure Christmas is now magical as well for him.

I see all their happy couple pictures and people cooing all over them. “Beautiful!” “Such a happy couple!” “So nice to finally see you happy!” My former in-laws are the worst offenders. And so incredibly stupid.

My late former mother-in-law shouts out to all on Facebook that, “That’s my baby boy and he’s going to make them my family, too!” Really? Aren’t they already your family? I could have sworn you told me that day you sat in my kitchen that you couldn’t cut her off because she was family. She might be a whore, but gosh darn it, Sam, she’s family, too! I see my evil ex sister-in-law gush that she loves them.

Funny side note: Maybe it’s a woman thing but I definitely noticed how Harley was always commenting on their pages once CF broke things off with her. She didn’t comment much at all before her affair with him but she was all over it once she got dumped. Imagine my surprise when I saw that she’s not falling all over herself to comment on every insipid post and each picture. Curious.

Always there are the obligatory compliments: You are so beautiful. Pretty. Great picture of you, whore.

I freely admit it has always been a sore spot that my former in-laws never missed a chance to tell her how wonderful she looked, while ignoring me.

I posted a new profile picture (obviously this was back when we were still married). Keep in mind I am not the type of person who changes profile pictures every week. That would be Harley. I think this was the first change in two years. Two years! On top of that I had just got my hair cut. I had kept my hair styled basically the same way for years! This was a major change and the most I got from any of them was, “That hairstyle looks nice on you.”

Maybe the former in-laws always thought I was very ugly and wondered what on earth their beloved prince was doing with such an unsuitable specimen. Maybe they like the Hillbilly Whore look. Who knows?

I do my best to shake my head and continue on.

I see all of the pictures of her adorable animals. Most of them purchased by my then-husband. Couldn’t give me money for a homecoming dress for his daughter but he could buy them new animals.

To inject just a brief moment of sanity in this I will note that I don’t see the pets she used to pose with. I wonder if she discarded them like she discarded her son and husband. Much like her new husband discarded his family and pets. Oh well, everything is replaceable, right?

I see her update on moving into their new home. That’s nice, bitch. I live with my mom. My kids don’t have a home of their own. It’s nice that thanks to my husband’s money (and he was my husband at this point in time) your kids are able to move into the nicest home they’ve ever lived in. It’s fantastic that things are going so swell for your kids. Well, except the one you abandoned.

Guess what? She later reveals she loves their new home. There’s so much for her kids to do! I’m so happy for them.

There’s the post about her youngest banging his head in the pool and needing stitches. Don’t worry, though, because New Daddy was on the job keeping him calm, happy, and stuffed with candy!

Awww… that’s so sweet. I’m glad he can act like a father for your kids. Too bad he’s done nothing for his own. To be fair he did manage to make a few ER trips with us (hey- my kid was a gymnast; she got hurt a lot!) but that pales in comparison to what he’s done to them the last 2 years. Maybe we should start calling her youngest, “Mulligan” since he seems to be CF’s do-over.

There were the pictures of the family outing to the zoo- two whole hours away to boot! I guess that PTSD must be in remission, huh? I suppose since he’s no longer trying to con me out of sufficient child and spousal support he can fully enjoy life as the asshole he is.

Oh, there it is! Yet another new profile picture of the whore so that everyone can compliment her and tell her how pretty she is. There’s CF chiming in, “Gorgeous!”  Really? I was married to that sonofabitch for twenty fucking years. Granted, he was not on Facebook long while we were married and most of the time I imagine he spent trying to fuck other women, but not once did he bother to compliment me.

It bothered me when I was married to him. It bothered me when we were wreck-onciling. He knew it bothered me. I told him it bothered me. His excuse? “I see you everyday! Why would I bother to comment on Facebook when I can tell you in person?”

That’s a good question. Why is he bothering to comment on Facebook when he could just go home and tell her?  Better question: If he really wants to let everyone know how special she is why doesn’t he tell her that she’s worth the thousands of dollars he has to pay out every month? I would think that would be a huge compliment! “Your pussy is so fantastic I don’t mind paying out thousands of dollars a month for it!” or maybe, “You were worth abandoning my children!” Hmmm… perhaps that does not convey the message they want to convey…

I see more pictures of the happy couple posing in front of scenery that does not resemble Kentucky. Maybe they travel a lot now. How convenient. It’s nice to know he spent twenty years wasting my life and making me do everything solo because he got such anxiety anytime he ventured outside of his house. I think the mobster is right and Harley very much is his seeing eye dog. With her by his side as his faithful companion he can go places he once only dreamed of.

One last new snapshot- one of her daughter and her two smiling sons. They’re all going out to celebrate her birthday. I think it’s wonderful that he can finally go out for birthday dinners once again. The last year he lived in the house, the last birthday each of my kids had before finding out that their family was going to be shattered and their lives torn apart, he was simply too upset and anxious to go out and celebrate. He stayed behind, probably texting the whore, while I took the two of them out. Who cares if he fucked over his own kids, right? The important part is that he’s doing right by her kids.

Once again I see the picture of CF with Mulligan at Show and Tell. It was Veteran’s Day. This year she improved upon the picture with a cutesy frame that told everyone who cared to listen that she loved her veteran. The year before though it was simply about how pleased Mulligan was that New Daddy/Cousin Daddy (Caddy?) could be there.

You know what I thought about? I thought about the time he snapped at Picasso because he wanted his dad to drop him off at school. Good ol’ Daddy was anxious and didn’t know how to navigate the carpool lane. The man can fight a fucking war and blow shit up, but a line of cars whipping through the horseshoe drive in front of the school just wipes him out.

I thought about the time he got pissy with me because I needed him to run to Target and grab a gift out of the dollar bin and bring it back up to the school for Rock Star so she could participate in her classroom Christmas party. As always, shooting people and blowing shit up is easy; a quick trip to Target is life threatening. He will probably need psychological counseling for the rest of his life because of it.

Once again I see them posing the day of her daughter’s cheerleading competition- him posing in a t-shirt with her high school name and mascot on it. Both of them gushing about how important it was to be there for her. “He must love her so much to wear that t-shirt!” “Oh, it was painful to put that Cardinals t-shirt on but I wanted to support her.”

He never saw his daughter cheer or compete as a cheerleader one single time. He never went to a single high school gymnastics meet. At the time he was saying this he had moved out of the state without saying a word to either of his kids and he hadn’t seen them in over eighteen months. Yes, it was so important that he support the daughter of the whore he’s fucking.

And always there are the comments. Comments from people I used to call family. Comments from people who still try to act like they care about me and my kids while they support that fucking whore and her kids. Comments from people who used to be family shouting out how happy they are with the jolly new couple, how much they love them, how much they love Everything. About. Them. They are so proud and this is their family. Tammy Faye cooing over the newest grandchildren. She loves them so much! Doesn’t seem to give a shit about her actual grandchildren but the whore’s kids? She was on that shit quick!

As tempting as it may be, don’t do it! Don’t pain shop. Maintain no contact (and that includes social media). You may think you can handle it, that it will be no big deal, but feelings will come. I promise you this. Even if the majority of those feelings are rage and anger it is still a lot to deal with. It can still mess with your head. Even knowing they are masters at image management, even knowing that truly happy people don’t have to make a huge show of their relationship every day and every hour on social media, even knowing he is the problem and she is a whore, it can still make you doubt yourself.

The Pitfalls of Pain Shopping

You’re in for a treat. I knew before I even began that this was going to be long; this here is Part 1 of 5. You know what that means though, right? Five straight days of posts from me!

Hi, I’m Sam. I am a survivor.  I am a fighter. I am fearless. I am kickass. I know my worth. I don’t believe a bit of the bullshit that comes out of cheaters’ mouths, excusing their affairs. I believe there is no excuse for cheating on your partner. I believe the most important question isn’t, “How can I save this marriage?” or “What did I do wrong?”, but “What’s important to me in a marriage?” and  “What is acceptable to me?” I don’t do hurt; I do pissed off. I firmly believe in no contact. I know that cheaters are masters at image management. I know they suck.

I am also not immune to curiosity. I “investigate” social media on occasion. I have recently been pain shopping. I am a dumbass.

I could easily blame this on my mom. She is the one who informed me CF and Harley had gotten married. I could have comfortably lived my life not knowing that. Who could resist sneaking a peak at the happy couple? Certainly not me!

It started with their wedding picture and making snarky remarks about the “happy couple” to friends. Harley looks terrible. She really does. Her wedding picture is maybe one step up from her most recent mugshot.

When she was chasing after my husband and finally landed him she was thinner than me. I’ll admit I was jealous. People complimented her on it. Now she looks like a beached whale. Seriously. I am not someone who usually picks on someone for their weight because God knows I’m not some size 2. But she has to have a good 30-40 pounds on me.

You’d think that would be enough. Yep, there they are. You’ve seen them. Let’s move on from this train wreck. Yes, he actually married the whore; true love won. Move along!

You would be wrong.

Rock Star announced recently that her dad had contacted her, asked her where she was going to school and if she needed anything. I guess he can afford to act like the big shot because he’s got almost an extra thousand dollars in his pocket each month now. He ended up sending her $200 so she could buy her laptop and then ordered the rest of her bedding for her and is having it sent here. What a hero! Cut off support for her the very moment she graduates and then swoop in to save her. What. A. Stand. Up. Guy.

This gets me to thinking about the possibility that he may become a part of her life once again. He and the whore may sneak up to campus and spend weekends with her. He might invite her down to his house so she can live like she used to. He could offer up the use of the pool in their neighborhood. See how nice and luxurious life could be with us?

I’m trying to wrap my mind around this possibility. It does not happen. I have come to the conclusion that I could accept her having a relationship with him. He is her father. But her? Over my dead body. I will not have that whore weaseling her way into my kids’ lives.

The other very real fear is that as he worms his way back into Rock Star’s life he could easily start to share his own version of what happened with her. His version, of course, is that I’m an evil, horrible person who deserved everything he did to me. I didn’t take care of him. I never loved him. We weren’t good for one another. I’m just a bitter, angry person who refuses to thank him for setting me free from the burden of being his wife.

I would like to think that Rock Star is smarter than that and that our bond is deeper than that. But money talks; you hear stories everyday of children who go with the parent that has the deepest pockets.

This is the background story to my pain shopping. Why I chose my next move I am not sure. I suppose I thought I could handle it; I thought I was prepared for anything and figured I could use it as snark in another post.

Oh, there will be snark. But there is also fury and anger and indignation. There has even been some doubt. Doubt that I was a good wife. Doubt that I was a good partner to him. Doubt that I treated him right.

Don’t do what I did! Stay off the social media! No contact is the way to peace and light. Checking up on them is pain shopping. It’s looking for ways to make you doubt yourself; you compare your behind the scenes to their highlight reel and come away feeling like crap in most cases. They are masters at image management; they will never admit when things go to shit. It’s all posed fantasy. I repeat: Do not do what I did!

Why Are You So Obsessed With Me?

Mean Girls, right? That’s what I want to ask Cousinfucker and Harley. Why are you so obsessed with me and what I’m doing? First, he hacks my FB page. I have no doubt it was one of them now.

“Bob” told me the other evening that CF had sent him a strongly worded message, taking him to task for the things he had said about Jezebel and Pastor Fake in our private conversations on FB messenger. So yeah, he was rooting around. Don’t know how. Don’t care.

Then he sends the mobster text messages, congratulating him on our “engagement” and telling him he’s seen naked pictures of me all over the Internet.

He goes out of his way to print images on his envelopes to me, thinking somehow I am going to be offended by being called a grinch or a robber. Hint: I’m not. It just gives me more stuff to write about and mock him for.

Now he’s signing me up for all these random, stupid things like female sex enhancement products and raw, natural made products.

And, this may just be a weird coincidence but I’ve had two friend requests from widowed men, both of whom are from out of the country but now live in the U.S.

That’s not even taking into account the text messages he’s bombarding Rock Star with, the fact that he’s been in contact with the mobster’s STBX, or that he’s trying to paint false equivalencies between the two of us.

I know it’s a small thing in the overall picture. I should let it go. He’s trying to goad me into a reaction and the best reaction I can possibly give him is no reaction at all. That must really piss him off. But there are definitely times I want to poke that bear. Hard!

Several people have said it’s turning into harassment. I continue to debate whether or not it’s worth it to say something to my lawyer and get some kind of restraining order, or if I just need to push it to the side and ignore it.

Chump Lady maintains they only have three channels- rage, pity and charm. So far I’ve seen lots of pity and some moderate amounts of rage. I’m not sure what stalking falls under. Rage, perhaps? When do I get charm? Bueller? Bueller? Anyone? Bueller?

An Open Letter to Cousinfucker, Part 3

I wish I could tell you this is the end but it’s not. I told you I had a lot to say!

Sam, let’s try to figure out a way to make this less stressful for all involved. I am saddened that you felt compelled to toss out all of my memories and my clothing.  There are so few of them in this house.  In spite of all that has happened we have a history and that cannot be erased no matter how badly you want it to go away.  So you have a choice.  You can be bitter and hateful toward me, or respect the fact that I am setting you free of the burden of being my wife.  I know you will take a hit financially but you will be well provided for, we both know that.  My attorney has you covered for the rest of your life.

So stop all of this foolishness.  Let our children know I love them and let’s act like adults and come to a healthy relationship apart from all of this.  I respect you as a mother and you have followed me around the country and I am grateful to you for that.  Let’s build a future relationship that we can both be happy for each other and our children and show them that happiness and being whole are vital to a person’s future.  I read everything you wrote on your fake Facebook page.  I know you have been very unhappy.  It’s evident in what you wrote and your depression has heightened in the past two years.  I know you will be whole without me, we aren’t good together.  So all that said I want you and I to work on this.  To be grown up about it for the sake of our children.

How dare you try to portray me as some depressed, pathetic individual! I don’t suffer from depression and it certainly hasn’t “worsened” over the last two years. No, I did not forget about your affair with your cousin the minute you said, “Oops, my bad!”  And yes, sometimes I would be triggered by events and it would make me sad.  For a day or two.  Then I would get over it and get on with my life. Yes, it has been difficult transitioning to life here but I’ve done it; I’m sorry I didn’t do it as quickly as you would have liked. You insisted that if you had to stay where we were much longer you would end up in a psych ward so we all sacrificed and gave up our lives there so that YOU would be happy.

Our daughter gave up her dream of competing gymnastics in college. She gave up her teammates and gymnastics.  She was just saying the other day, “Imagine how good I would be now if we had stayed.”  And when asked if she would rather have her life as a gymnast or the life she has here with cheerleading and high school gymnastics and her friends and boyfriend and great social life, she still, without hesitation, picked being a Level 10 gymnast. YOU took that away from her for your own selfish wants and desires.  YOU took that away from her so you could go have sex with your cousin.

And our son? Our son gave up hockey and cello.  He still talks about playing hockey again some day, still talks about how much he loved played the cello.  He likes playing the trombone (would have preferred to play the saxophone but I didn’t know what our money situation would be like and the trombone was cheaper than the sax) but he loved the cello.  And while he likes his two neighborhood friends he doesn’t really like his school and thinks most of his classmates are rednecks.

We all gave up all of our friends.  For YOU.  As for myself, I not only gave up all of my friends but also my support system.  See, when you have a husband who doesn’t think that raising the children is part of his responsibility it helps to have a great network of friends who can pitch in and help out at times.  People who can carpool with you.  People that you can call in a pinch and ask them for a favor.  It would be really nice to have all of those people around me now, now that you’ve left me for the same woman you cheated on me with two years ago. I loved my life in Utah.  I loved being active in PTA and would have volunteered to be the Associate Director of the region, if we didn’t move.  I loved my Bunko group. I loved volunteering at the schools and being involved, knowing people and what was going on.  I don’t have that here.  I gave it up for you and for your happiness.  I gave it up for our future. Our bogus future that you had no intention of honoring.

Once we got here you were no happier than you had been before. You told me you wanted to be the most important person in my life and once we moved and I had no one else you started to pull away. You constantly told other people you were convinced I was going to leave you when I would have never done that; I was committed to you, to our marriage, to our family.  You told your sister I wrote on my fake Facebook page (when you were almost “dying”) that you were annoying me and wasting my time.  THAT NEVER HAPPENED!  I double checked because I was appalled that I could actually say something like that.  I never wrote anything like that.

And as far as you dying?  Honey, they don’t give you the option of going to the ER if you’re near death.  And they don’t tell you you can be admitted or go home if you’re near death.

You know how you know it’s serious?  When they tell you you’re not leaving their office until you’ve either scheduled surgery to remove the ectopic pregnancy or been given a methotrexate shot to dissolve the ectopic pregnancy.  Of course, you wouldn’t know that because your response when I told you was that you couldn’t leave work.

I went through treatment for an ectopic pregnancy ON MY OWN and you whine because I called the doctor, made your appointment, took you to the ER, sat with you for hours, and encouraged you to let them admit you but apparently wasn’t, what, sympathetic enough?  At least I was there which is more than I can say for you.

And finally, yes, I was on Prozac briefly because I was finding it difficult to deal with all of YOUR issues: your refusal to get help, your withdrawal from me and your kids, your supposed PTSD and anxiety, your lies to everyone about me, dealing with the fact that you consistently turned to people who encouraged you to leave me, and your non-stop drinking. And yet I still hung in there, determined to stand by and help you.

I did everything I could and I never shied away from my own faults.  I immediately took responsibility for my part in the void between us the first time you confessed.  I NEVER placed all the blame on you.  Even though I should have.  Because you see, no one makes another person cheat.  That’s a decision YOU made- all on your own.

I did all the things you wanted me to do, all the things you said you felt were lacking. You wanted me to text you constantly so I texted constantly.  You wanted me to tell you every mundane thing that I did, so I told you about every mundane thing I did. You wanted to know where I was all day long so I updated you all the time. I sat outside on the porch and watched you while you did yard work and brought you something to drink when you would mow the lawn because you said that’s something you wanted me to do.  I twisted myself into a pretzel trying to be everything you wanted!

As soon as I found out you knew about the other Facebook page I shut it down so as not to hurt you any further. When your mom asked if I had ever told you I forgave you I told her I had never said those exact words but I had told you I was committed to us and I put all my trust in you and moved across the country a mere 6 hours from your mistress.  Then when I went to visit you in the psych ward I took your face in my hands and told you I loved you, I forgave you, I wasn’t going to leave you and we would get through all of this together.  And what did you do?  You started up another affair with your cousin after upending our lives.  All because you got your feelings hurt over a stupid Facebook page.

 

An Open Letter to Cousinfucker, Part 2

Welcome to Part 2 of the never-ending letter to CF in response to his vomit worthy text.

Sam, let’s try to figure out a way to make this less stressful for all involved. I am saddened that you felt compelled to toss out all of my memories and my clothing.  There are so few of them in this house.  In spite of all that has happened we have a history and that cannot be erased no matter how badly you want it to go away.  So you have a choice.  You can be bitter and hateful toward me, or respect the fact that I am setting you free of the burden of being my wife.  I know you will take a hit financially but you will be well provided for, we both know that.  My attorney has you covered for the rest of your life.

So stop all of this foolishness.  Let our children know I love them and let’s act like adults and come to a healthy relationship apart from all of this.  I respect you as a mother and you have followed me around the country and I am grateful to you for that.  Let’s build a future relationship that we can both be happy for each other and our children and show them that happiness and being whole are vital to a person’s future.  I read everything you wrote on your fake Facebook page.  I know you have been very unhappy.  It’s evident in what you wrote and your depression has heightened in the past two years.  I know you will be whole without me, we aren’t good together.  So all that said I want you and I to work on this.  To be grown up about it for the sake of our children.

You want to talk about my Facebook page?  Let’s talk about it!  I used that page as my own personal blog.  There were no friends on it and I used a fake name.  You didn’t want to talk about what you had done.  It “stressed” you.  You couldn’t handle it.  So I went off and I dealt with it on my own.

You say you read everything but you obviously didn’t or you simply ignored anything positive.  Maybe 10% of what was on there was about us and not even all of that was negative. You ignored the bone analogy where I talked about how a broken bone is actually stronger once it has healed and how I could get behind that.  You missed the long post where I talked about how your affair would be nothing more than a bump in the road on our 50th wedding anniversary.

There were casual updates.  Many times I said we were doing great and things were fantastic. There was the song that I said reminded me of us now.  There was the picture of the hearts you drew on my van. All good things. Hell, I even read one where I said:  This is where I go to vent so I feel bad only talking about the negative.  Things are actually great.

The vast majority of it was keeping an eye on your paramour, which it turns out I was right for doing because first chance you got you started up with her again!

The other large part of it was processing the feelings of betrayal I felt when no one in your family would cut ties with her despite her being the other woman since she was family and all.

You think that entitles you to have another affair with the same woman?  Unbelievable!

Hey, here’s an idea.  Instead of turning to people who you were always whining to me about maybe you should have talked to me!  Maybe you could have read that and thought to yourself, “Hey, maybe I should step it up and let my wife know how sorry I am, how much I love her, and then give her all the time she needs to completely heal from the betrayal I threw at her.”  Or even taken some of the things I said and actually done them, like defending me, or not throwing me under the bus!

But no!  Your solution was to go crying to anyone who would listen, “Oh, Sam is soooooo mean!  I had an affair with my cousin and she hasn’t forgotten about it!”  And everyone around you said, “Oh, poor Cousinfucker!  She’s horrible!  You should leave her!  Your happiness is the only thing that’s important.  Don’t worry about her, the woman who has stood by your side for the last 20 years.  Don’t worry about your kids.  As long as you’re happy they’ll be ok.  Just focus on your own happiness because you are the only person who matters!” Then again you’re so busy playing the victim that the idea you may have contributed to this is completely foreign.

I was asked to forgive your affair, uproot my life and my kids’ lives, move 2000 miles across the country, move closer to your mistress, and start all over in a town I knew we were only going to because of your affair with her all in the span of a year. Instead of telling you something you didn’t want to hear because it caused so much “anxiety” for you I handled it on my own.  And for that I’m vilified and you use it to justify having yet another affair with her.  You demanded that I forgive and forget because you didn’t want to face what you had done; you didn’t want to be reminded of it.  You didn’t want to have to do anything that was difficult. It’s unfortunate that you couldn’t handle the fact that I would *occasionally* be triggered by something.  It’s too bad you couldn’t accept the fact that having everyone in your family fawning over your mistress was distressful for me.  Turns out I was right for being distressed seeing as how it was your mother who encouraged her to call you again.

And you know what the funniest part of all this is?  I was completely over it finally!  Probably around April or May.  I didn’t want to be reminded of it or her.  Isn’t that funny?  Just as I feel completely healed from your first betrayal you start messing around with her again.  Although, according to her, I was never your first choice and you only stayed because you “couldn’t liquidate your assets quickly enough.”

I’m curious.  Was that a lie you told her or is that the lie she tells everyone to justify hopping into bed with you after you dumped her?  We both know it only takes about 24 hours to “liquidate” any assets you might have had.  And you might want to let the little whore know it doesn’t matter how “quickly you liquidate your assets” you still have to hand over 50%.  But I get it; the other story sounds better.

Stay tuned! There’s more to come!