adultery, affair, Betrayal, cheating, dating, infidelity, other woman, separatiion

I Don’t Feel Like Talking About Him

I have 18 drafts that I have started but haven’t been able to finish. A thought comes to mind, an insight, a discovery, new drama, old memories, next legal steps, etc. but they don’t hold my attention long enough to do anything more than string sentences together to form vague outlines.

I really want my ex out of my life and anything around our previous life together, his affair, the other woman, and his ongoing idiocy just bores me. I am so done with him.

Interestingly, he is still hiding the other woman from me. He must have seen me walk out from my place the other day before he came to pick up our daughter. I never saw him until I was turning off my cul de sac onto the next street. I checked left to make sure there was no traffic and there was his vehicle stopped in front of a neighbouring house just before my street. He and the other woman were in his truck. I just chuckled. Shame, fear, embarrassment, cowardice, whatever they feel that they need to still hide from me affects me little. I tried to come up with a feeling. Maybe disgust, maybe repulsion, but honestly it was more indifference. I was very happy with where I was going and who I was going to meet that my feeling was simply, “I could care less.” He is nothing to me. She is nothing to me.

It is 3 years this month since we separated. We will have another court proceeding in the near future but I feel like things are coming towards the end. I hope to have a legal divorce with our next court appearance.

I was just thinking about my ex still not doing anything to officially end our relationship and finalize ties. It is always me pushing to wrap things up. Dave continues to avoid, ignore, refuse and deny until he is forced to respond to legal documents and even then he fails to act. I think he is just floating around in some imaginary world he created that still isn’t satisfying whatever lack he feels. Even his lawyer showed his surprise at our last court date in January that we still weren’t divorced. He joked about the ways Dave is wasting so much money specifically referencing his refusal to just continue with our joint Costco membership (he went out and paid for a new one) and for not paying for “family” medical services which is a lesser amount than us all paying individually. Dave makes decisions to try to hurt or punish me but I am so used to these now. They are just obstacles he throws in my path to detract from my goal of completely separating our lives from each other and finalizing our divorce. They don’t cause me to react any longer. I just do what I have to do to remove them. I think the lousy decision to fool around with the other woman weights him down. I think his burdens paralyze him to act in any reasonable and caring fashion. I think he misdirects his hate, anger and blame at me instead of heaping it on himself. It also might just be that he is a narcissistic dick.

As for me, I finally feel like I am ready to date. I have done the work that I needed to do in order to be able to move on. There are still items to finalize but the end is closer than ever and I am feeling very optimistic about things. I have been very impressed with the caliber of men who have asked me out. I finally feel available to accept another man’s attention and I feel like I am in a great space to be able to give back and focus my attention on someone else.

adultery, affair, Betrayal, Cancer, cheating, Christianity, divorce, faith, God, melanoma, separatiion, Spirituality, the other woman

A Spreading Cancer and a beautiful Crater

I met with the doctor on Friday afternoon, last week. She was held up in the operating room at the hospital so she was late getting back to her office. There were two patients for her to see before me so it was close to 3:30 when I finally got to meet with her.

The melanoma in my right arm has spread beyond the 5 mm perimeter on one side. Therefore, I require more surgery. My doctor wanted me to come in on Sunday. I told her I was leaving in the morning for March break. I was leaving with a girlfriend and her two daughters along with my daughter for a road trip. We had reservations at the Running Y Ranch Resort in Klamath Falls, Oregon for Saturday. We booked to stay for the week (an amazing deal of only $150/week for a 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom condo) but we planned on leaving Thursday to go to Portland as our girls are in a dance competition. It would be a 1 1/2 hour ferry ride from Victoria to Port Angeles and then another 10 hour drive to our destination so I really couldn’t delay the trip for 2 days without disappointing 4 other people.

We discussed the risks of waiting. My doctor said if it was a basal cell carcinoma she would say it was okay to wait but she reminded me we are dealing with melanoma and “ideally” it should come out today. She said there were two benefits of waiting. Firstly, the scar on my arm is very tight. The longer it has to heal the more chance there is skin for her to pull back over my wound. She also said waiting until I get back would give her time to try and see if she could order a small batch of skin bond glue. It is very expensive and I will have to pay for it. She said she would see if she could order just enough for my procedure. It will cost about $50.

So I made the decision to carry on with my trip. I booked my surgery for the first available appointment my doctor had after Easter which is the end of March break.

I do not regret my decision, at this point anyway. We are having an amazing time. The resort was beautiful. We made a lot of use out of the huge pool that we had to ourselves a lot of the time. We enjoyed the Shriner circus, shopped, explored the lava beds in California, the Wildlife Refuge, climbed mountains, descended into caves, went on self-guided nature walks, visited Petroglyphs and learned a lot about the Madoc and Klamath Indian battles with the white settlers.

The highlight was being able to experience the awe of Crater Lake. We had wanted to go early in the week but due to snow storms there was no visibility even if we could make the drive up there. We were able to view the webcams around the lake from our resort lobby. There was no visibility. It was fogged in. The road was completely snow packed. The road had been closed the entire time we were in Klamath Falls but we heard that you could snow shoe from the Visitor Station to the rim in about 30 minutes. We decided to chance it on our way back towards Portland. It was a clear, sunny and warm day. It turns out that the road reopened just two hours before we arrived so we were able to drive up to the rim.

It was a very spiritual experience for me. The half million years it took for Mount Mazama to form. Then the battle that was brewing inside it until it’s final eruption 7,700 years ago. So violent was that eruption that the foundation cracked in a complete circle and the entire mountain collapsed in destruction. When all that was left was the empty, scarred caldera it became filled with melted snow to form the deepest lake in the United States and possibly the purest source of water in the world. It was a real reminder to me of how the most difficult and traumatic experiences in our life that completely leave us depleted can be filled with everything good and pure and turn our lives into the most beautiful, unimaginable creations.

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adultery, affair, Betrayal, Cancer, cheating, divorce, God, Healing, hot yoga, unfaithfulness

Stay Real,Live Positive,Practice Hot Yoga

Hope comes in many forms.

As I walk my journey of heart break, betrayal, and the devastating consequences of a narcissistic, cheating spouse and his self-seeking girlfriend in my life, God inserts kinder, gentler, inspiring people to remind me that my ex and the other woman are only two crumby people in a huge world that have lived on and crossed my path, temporarily blocking my way.

David Smith, photographed below in a standing bow posture, is one of the many better people that have appeared in my life, since my separation. He arrived at the perfect time. David Smith and I take Bikram yoga classes together. In 2015, he was so kind in emailing me encouraging messages pertaining to my yoga practice, my running and my life situation. I thought it was the coach in him but I have realized that his own life experiences, which could have embittered him, and did, (he thinks it caused his cancer) have made him the amazing man that he is today.

I wanted to share one aspect of his life, as I wait for the results of my own cancer diagnosis, just as an offer of hope and encouragement. Maybe what we interpret as a death sentence is only an opportunity for a better life.

DAVID SMITH:

MY YOGA STORY

Being diagnosed with terminal cancer is a real shock to say the least. Cancer comes in many varieties. Unluckily, mine was diagnosed as the most aggressive you can get. It had spread to twenty locations from behind the lungs to the pelvis. It was on the move to the brain, bones or both, next.

Cancer and its treatment are extremely hard on the body. From 2011 to 2014 I received four surgical procedures, the key one failed and was aborted. A dizzying array of nasty meds, fifty two radiation treatments and forty five radioactive seed implants followed. During and after all this treatment my immune system was nonexistent as all critical blood values dipped well below normal ranges. Testosterone, a critical male hormone wasn’t just low, it went to zero as did strength and energy levels. My weight shot up from 170 to 208 lbs, almost overnight.

Did I mention that I run my own business? It was not doing great as well.

Just to add another level of stress and ‘excitement’, when you develop cancer the kooks come out of the woodwork offering a dizzying array of witchcraft and untested home remedies. All unproven and most for money of course. Surprisingly the advice I found most offensive was “stay positive.” You have got to be kidding me! The best advice is to STAY REAL!

Fortunately I had great support from long time employees, my son Tyler (now a Bikram instructor and another dramatic yoga success story), a team of very well qualified doctors in the United States and the Sidney Hot Yoga studio.

Hot Yoga, you have got to be kidding!

I have an extensive competitive cycling background as a member of the Canadian National Team in 1993, and coach to Ryder Hesjedal – arguably one of the best cyclists Canada has ever produced. A Hot Yoga studio was the last place I ever thought I would be. From my sports training background I knew the importance of good nutrition and so eating habits were modified. Not to extremes. Just sensible.

During radiation treatment in Sarasota Florida, Tyler would drag me to the Bikram studio right after treatment before the negative effects took hold. I would crawl through classes, like it or not. When I returned to Sidney, I suffered through Thirty Day Challenges and even challenged myself to many a double class and even an all-day yoga, doing four classes in one day.

There have been many recent medical studies that are showing that yoga benefits cancer patients. Duhh….of course it does! Instead of “staying positive” you are “living positive.” Surrounding yourself with good energy, positive people and improving your fitness level. Its a no brainer.

My doctors are amazed at how healthy I look and how well I am doing. As one commented, “You are not the man in your medical charts, what is your secret?” I don’t know what the outcome will be. I do know that I am doing WAY better than what was first predicted.

For now the cancer is gone.

What I know too is that hot yoga has played a huge role in the success of the treatments. Aches and pains from of a lifetime of crashes and crazy boat rides are gone as well. There is still everyday stress but it gets handled with a new sense of calm, dignity and confidence. In the end, illness, arthritis, stress or not, I should have been doing heated yoga all along anyway – Wake up calls come in strange ways.

Thanks to all of you! XXXOOO David

P.S. Please feel free to share this with friends and family, maybe it will help their loved ones. I wish I had a better Standing Bow but oh well!

adultery, affair, Betrayal, cheating, divorce, infidelity, Janice Andrews, marriage, other woman, separatiion, unfaithfulness

Do I Really Need to Know Anything about the OW?

Dave emailed me this article last week, “What You Really Need to Know About The Other Woman”. I didn’t read it initially. Cleaning out my inbox today, I decided to see what he sent before deleting. He made no comment, just copied the article and sent it.

My take away from this article:

Dave is the only person to blame for his cheating.
Our marriage was one of those marriages that experienced infidelity when it was not a “bad” marriage.
We have not tried nor do I have any desire to “rebuild our marriage from the rubble”. Dave has made no attempt to do this either and continues to see the other woman so I am not sure why he would send an article from the perspective of a wife who is staying with her cheating husband.
Cheating is awful even from the cheater’s perspective.
The OW has a lot of issues to be able to be an OW in the first place and the cheater has no respect for her at all. She needs help in her life.
My ex and the OW were lonely people with something missing in their life. Happy men and women don’t cheat however see #7.
This is a big one that maybe Dave wants me to know: Statistics support that the majority of men who cheat consider themselves happy in their marriage. Affairs are an escape from other stressors in their life and a way to try to make them feel young and sexy.
What I disagree with is that there is no satisfaction in contacting the OW. I did this once after finding out about the affair and it gave me great satisfaction. I have zero regrets about that one. I don’t know one person who thinks I was crazy to do this. Anyone who knows this story has only given me high praise and expressed admiration and awe for my boldness, courage and ability to stand firm and make the OW face what she did and who she did it against.
I agree that there is no satisfaction in outing the OW. I did this on my blog to tell the entire story. It is what it is and she is who she is. I do not feel any regret about doing it. It is just fact. I don’t feel any regret about telling her husband. That wasn’t intentional. Dave told our daughter and me that she wasn’t married and wasn’t living with anyone or even had a boyfriend. The universe worked that one out and it saved her spouse from the OW continuing her lies and deception to him. Too bad she didn’t have the courage and respect for her husband to do it herself but she is a cheater so I guess that is a given.
Why my husband cheated makes no difference to me 3 years later. He gave me some reasons at the time but they made no sense (I didn’t clean out the garage like he asked) so I don’t know if he has ever really been honest with himself about why he cheated. Maybe he sent this article as a way to try and explain. Still doesn’t matter now. He has never expressed regret and remorse.
I have no obsession with the OW. I agree that she never should have been part of my life and I will do what I can to make sure that she never is part of my life. I don’t want to see her or hear anything about her. I hope she makes sure that doesn’t happen either. I suspect it is quite the other way around. She will have to live with my presence in her life for as long as she stays with my ex and I suspect that her memory of me will last a life time. Hopefully it will be a reminder to never fuck around with a married man again. And when she learns about him cheating on her, I will be the first person she will think about.

Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Warrior Post: What You Really Need to Know About the Other Woman

“Anonymous” posted her story on another part of this site in response to what she noticed was a lot of talk and concern and obsession with the Other Woman. Her words are poignant and painful but it’s clear she’s taken a clear-eyed look at her marriage and the role she played in the breakdown of it. As we make very very clear on this site, nobody is to blame for their husband’s cheating. That’s on him. And not all marriages that experience infidelity are “bad”. But some are. And Anonymous took a forensic accounting of her own marriage and what had happened in it and then used that knowledge to understand her husband’s affair and how the two of them could rebuild a marriage from the rubble. ~Elle

The OW debate seems to be showing up more and more on here, so I wanted to share a few things from my story.
In therapy, my H and I had some brutally frank conversations. It took a while to get him to open up but when he did, it all came out. One of the “reasons” behind his A was our crumpling marriage. I couldn’t deny that. We were two people who co-existed in the same house with little connection at all. Days would go by without him having much to say and I just nagged and nagged like usual. It doesn’t excuse his actions but it’s the honest truth of what we were. I learned that my nagging was actually an attempt to get him to pay attention to me. Even bad attention was attention and I was yearning for that. I would constantly yell at him to give me an opinion on something but then I would just override anything he said and make the decision on my own anyways. He felt that I didn’t value him, his opinion or his input on anything so why would he bother to give it any more. One day in therapy, I was raging about the OW, how she seduced him and my husband cracked. He actually said to me “I did this to you! I DID! You think I’m so weak and feeble minded that I’m just nothing, that I could be so blindly tricked into doing this awful thing, that I wasn’t even capable of making this f&@king decision either?!” It really was a breakthrough for me when I realized how little I have made this man feel he was that he was grasping to even be acknowledged for doing something this awful. This was a decision that he made that I couldn’t override him on. I guess the whole bad attention is still attention thing was at play on his part as well.
The other thing that stuck with me was him laughing about the OW seducing him. He told me how the OW had so many insecurities that she’d probably take it as a compliment if someone thought so much of her to have this hypnotic power over men. And that’s when I stopped giving her that power in my mind. She has nothing on me.
I do believe many affairs start with two lonely people looking for something that is missing in their life. It’s not right, it’s so wrong and hurtful but I do think it boils down to that in many cases. The majority of happy men do not cheat. The majority of happy women do not cheat. [ELLE’S NOTE: WHILE I AGREE WITH THIS IN SOME CASES, STATISTICS SHOW THAT THE MAJORITY OF MEN WHO CHEAT CONSIDER THEMSELVES “HAPPY” IN THEIR MARRIAGE. AFFAIRS ARE OFTEN AN ESCAPE FROM OTHER STRESSES, OR A CHANCE TO FEEL YOUNG AND SEXY AGAIN.] As much as it still hurts me, he found something in her even if it was just temporarily. And I blame him for that, just like he asked me to. He was right, he did this to me. I have forgiven him and we are moving towards being better together but I blame solely him. I can’t vilify this OW any more than I vilify him because he was the one who was supposed to cherish me and forsake others. He was the one I had built a life with. He had promised to be my partner in life. To forgive him and understand his flaws did make me think how she probably has her own demons that she’s struggling with. I do still have mean and nasty thoughts towards her but it’s fading every day and sometimes I hope she gets the help she needs so that she can have a second chance at life, too, just like I have given him. (And, then some days, I still wish she loses all her hair overnight, gains 100 pounds, gets horrible adult acne…!!!)

As others have posted, there is NO satisfaction in contacting her. There’s even less satisfaction in outing her to others. I say this from experience. You may think you’ll get some satisfaction but there’s none. Just none. It only makes you feel sadder. I exposed some before we started therapy. It only led to even more self-doubt and self-loathing on my part and a lot of gossip around town about how I was the crazy one. People may agree that you were wronged but they are very uncomfortable with a woman ranting and raving and pointing the finger! I heard more than a few “no wonder he cheated” comments which only fuelled my hysteria! One of my lowest moments in life was yelling at her 80-year-old parents about how their daughter was a whore and I hoped they were proud of her. If I could take that one action back, I would in a second. After I was hung up on by them, I just crumpled and wondered what I had come to. I felt I couldn’t hold my head up any higher than she could, I had handed her that power that I could be just as hurtful as her. And the shame I feel that my children know I did these things is another burden I bear. I teach them all the time that two wrongs don’t make a right, always keep your dignity… and it’s hard for me to not be embarrassed of my actions. I understand them, I have forgiven myself, I understand any one in our position lashing out but looking back, I just am not proud.

For all these reasons, I say let it go with obsession with the OW. I’ve read some stories on here of BS who admitted they were an OW long ago and we still support them because of their pain! And we do that because we are good and compassionate people on here. Take your energy and focus on him. Focus on learning why he did what he did. You have to understand why HE did this in order to move forward. It doesn’t matter why she did, it only matters why he participated. Focus on what you have done to hurt him. And then solely focus on you getting stronger as a couple. Don’t let thoughts of her continue to ruin any progress you are making as a couple. It’s easier said than done but don’t let her continue to be a part of your marriage, she didn’t belong in it before and she doesn’t belong in it now either.

abuse of power, adutery, affair, cheating, difficult personality, ego, infidelity, lying, passive/aggressive, separatiion

He is the Dick in Ridiculous

My daughter’s dance company is selling raffle tickets for their annual fundraiser. Tickets are only $2.00 and first prize is airfare for two. There is also the prize of a mini iPad for the dancer who sells the most tickets.

Ticket sales are moving more quickly than anticipated and we only printed out 3000 tickets. We are not able to print any more due to the gaming license rules. As such, the treasurer implemented a rule to try to keep the selling fair for everyone. You have to return your book of ticket stubs (10 tickets per book) with the money in order to receive another book. I had already collected money from friends before I learned about the rule. I paid for my tickets up front with their money but didn’t want to fill out the stubs on their behalf. I was given the 6 books for them to fill out.

On Sunday, Dave contacted me saying he needed raffle tickets. I asked him how many he wanted and he said, “as many as you can”. I explained the rule to him and that the treasurer wasn’t going to be available until Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. to collect ticket stubs, money and provide any new books. I told him that I had books that were already sold but that I hadn’t had a chance to see my friends yet to complete the entries. I said that he could have my books providing he gives them back with the payment by Tuesday so that I can get replacement books. He texted that he would have them sold by tomorrow, Monday. When he picked our daughter up for dinner on Sunday she gave him my 6 books of tickets.

When my daughter got home from school today, Monday, I asked about her dad’s plan to return the tickets. She said that he was bringing them over tonight on his way to pick up his parents from the airport. They were arriving at 10:30. p.m. I texted Dave at 3:34 p.m. to confirm what time he was coming and that our daughter would go out to meet him to get the tickets. He said that he didn’t sell all the tickets because people were “straggling in with their money.” I asked him if he could drop off the 3 books that he said that he did sell since he was coming this way (I live 5 minutes from the airport) and asked if he could pay upfront for the people who he knew were going to buy the other books ($60) as I needed to replace those tickets for my friends.

He told me that I had to go to him to get the tickets on Tuesday. He asked me to go to his office at 7:00 a.m. and to call him first. He would come down to meet me as I wasn’t to come up because I am banned from the premises. He told me that was my only option as he was busy otherwise.

I told him that I didn’t understand whey he couldn’t just drop off the tickets as he planned especially because he was driving right past my place tonight on the way to the airport. If he couldn’t leave 5 minutes earlier to get his parents I suggested I would be awake and he could drop them off after he picked up his parents. I reminded him that I gave him my tickets as a favour to him but also in an effort to help our daughter sell more tickets. I told him that if I didn’t have the tickets back by Tuesday that I couldn’t get any more books to sell, (I had already sold another one in the mean time) and that there was a good possibility they would be sold out. I reminded him that the ones I gave him were already paid for by others so then those people will be disappointed if they don’t end up getting tickets after all. The only reason I gave them to him is because he said he would have them sold by Monday and would get them back to me before Tuesday. I offered to go to the airport to get the tickets that night so he didn’t have to stop along the way. I reluctantly shared that I had surgery on Tuesday so that it was not possible to meet him that day. I asked him to have some compassion instead of asking me to run around to him. I told him someone else was driving me to and from my procedure and that I wasn’t going to have them inconvenienced further to drive me into town to his office so early especially when he made such a big deal previously about me ever going there.

His text response: “Compassion for what? Like you show for me and meet me half way to get (daughter)? I have a life. I won’t be coming home with my parents until after 11 p.m. If it takes just a few seconds then come sometime tomorrow and pick up. I’m not a tour delivery service. You leave everything to last minute and then try to blame shit on me. You’re on the executive. Make it work. If not it has to wait. I’m sure you’ll try to find a way to add it as an extraordinary expense and claim it later. So you won’t inconvenience someone but you’ll inconvenience my parents when they’ve come from a long day of travel and its 2:30 a.m. their time. Typical of you. I have no reason to be up the peninsula tomorrow so if you don’t come get them it will have to wait until Thursday. I don’t even have the tickets. They are at the office. Figure it out and stop being a bitch. You reap what you sow. You can’t say, write and do the things you do and think I’m doing you any favours. You have all day tomorrow so figure it out. You think I can adjust my schedule but why don’t you? You have an appointment tomorrow. So what. It won’t take you all day I’m sure. This isn’t my issue. You are the author of your own misfortune. But as usual you’ll find a way to blame me for your issue. ”

I just told him that he could return his tickets and his money to the treasurer directly himself at one of the times she indicated this week she would be at the studio, (he gets the emails with this information, too). I informed him that I would be recovering from my surgery tomorrow and that I was going to let go of worrying about how I was going to get replacement tickets.

When will I learn that there is no benefit in doing my ex a favour even if I think it will benefit my daughter. His word will never hold any validity and if he can use it as an opportunity to punish, control and withhold from me he will.

adultery, affair, Betrayal, Cancer, cheating, children, Christianity, divorce, ex spouse, family, infidelity, melanoma

Cancer

Sometime in 2012, when I was under the illusion that I was happily married, I noticed a dark mark on my right upper arm. At first I thought it was my vaccination mark. Then I realized that my vaccination is on my left arm and that it looked the same as always. This was something new.

That summer I went to my doctor’s office to have it checked. My doctor was on vacation so I consulted the locum taking her place. She examined the mark but felt that it was nothing and suggested that I just watch it for changes.

Fast forward 3 1/2 years now that my life has finally settled enough for me to consider my own health. I went to my doctor for my first physical since my separation. I showed my doctor the mark and she was concerned. She said she was sure it was a basal cell carcinoma, the best kind of skin cancer to have, but that it needed to be removed. She referred me to a specialist.

The specialist had a different concern. She looked at the cells through a special microscope and said that she didn’t like what she was seeing. She was surprised at how large the mark was and said that it was too big for her to remove without leaving terrible scarring. She was going on holidays at the end of the week but wanted it biopsied before she left. She asked her nurse to book time for me, even if it meant she had to stay late one night because we needed to see what we were dealing with as quickly as possible.

She cut out an elliptical cross-section of the mark. She sewed the skin back up with dissolving stitches in the under layers and nylon stitches on top. I returned 2 weeks later to have the top stitches removed but the pathology report still wasn’t in. She said she was going to follow up directly with the lab to get the report.

Tonight I received a call from the specialist from her home after hours. The pathology report confirms that I have the aggressive and most dangerous skin cancer, melanoma. I have to call her office tomorrow to make an appointment to go back in next week to determine the next steps.

Melanoma is the least common of skin cancers but it causes the most deaths. If it is not treated early enough it can spread through the blood stream to other parts of the body making it difficult to treat. I feel like close to 4 years of this growth on my body is not early intervention.

I am disappointed with myself for not following my gut that this was something that needed to be removed when I first found it. I am also being compassionate with myself though. It is very fresh in my mind the last 3 years of hell that have been my reality. Especially because many aspects of that daily battle still exist. When I reflect back on what I was dealing with emotionally and the tasks that I had to perform physically and mentally, all by myself, just surviving each day was a victory in itself. The worry and stress I carried for me and my children and the responsibilities that were now solely dumped on me along with the impact of the consequences of my husband bailing on his family buried me. It is no wonder that my own physical well-being fell so low on the priority list.

So as I read an email that Dave just sent addressed to “Robo McBlobo” I am reminded that I have strength of character, perseverance, faith, hope and trust in a greater purpose that will allow me to deal with whatever this cancer has in store for me.

adultery, affair, breach of contract, cheating, child support, children, control, court, divorce, Family Law, infidelity, lawyer, legal process, marriage, separatiion, spousal support

Back to Business

We were supposed to go to court on December 17, 2015 but Dave’s lawyer pushed it into the new year. We are scheduled to appear on January 20, 2016.

Dave owes me more than $11,000 from July 1 – December 31, 2015 for spousal and child support as well as pet expenses. The amount is based on a formula as per our income tax figures and the amount agreed upon as per our mediation agreement but he chooses not to pay. I need the court order to enforce payment.

My name is on our older daughter’s school account that Dave was responsible to pay from September 2014 to June 2015. The bill is for incidentals, not tuition. She was living with him at that time. He hasn’t paid a dime. When she lived with me for the 2 years she incurred these expenses I paid them 100% with no child support. That amount is now $1229.88.

There are a few other things we are requesting.

There isn’t a whole lot more you can do when you have an agreement with someone who has zero integrity. I wish I had never wasted time, energy, and money with the Collaborative process or mediation. You have to know who you are fighting against and a court decision is the only hope that I have in putting an end to my ex’s game playing with my finances and putting an end to our marriage officially.

adultery, affair, Betrayal, cheating, children, divorce, Florida, marriage, other woman, travel

My Nosy Ex

My girls and I were at our last stop in Calgary, Alberta before catching our final flight back to Victoria. It was a long travel day and we were enjoying an excellent dinner at the Calgary airport. My daughter was legal drinking age in Alberta, 18 years old, so I was able to buy her a pomegranate mango passion fruit sangria (her choice) in a giant mason jar glass as her first legal drink.

My phone buzzed during our dinner and it was a text from my ex. He said, “btw… say hi to (friend’s name) for me.” Some how he found out who I was staying with in Florida during our trip. It is a guy that grew up on the same street as me in London, Ontario. He is 5 years older but my sister went to school with his sister, he knew my parents and me, we went to some of the same parties in high school and we reconnected in Toronto after university as we both worked in the insurance industry.

He was always very kind to me treating me to dinners, concerts and golf tournaments as his client when he was a marketing rep for a company that I used often for business purposes. When Dave and I were travelling on a road trip down to Baltimore and then up the east coast he generously gave us restaurant gift certificates and baseball tickets at stops along the way. He did the same thing after I won a trip to Las Vegas during a golf tournament he took me to as his guest. Dave and I went to Vegas and then stayed an extra week renting a car to travel around California.

My older daughter had lunch with her dad today before I drove her to the ferry to head back to school. Her dad mentioned my friend and said that he knew him and didn’t know why we kept it a secret that we were staying with him. It wasn’t a secret. Why would my ex think that me or my children should share any details of my life with him? My children didn’t find out about the trip until Christmas Day and we left at 3:45 a.m. the next day to go to the airport. Their dad chose to see the girls for lunch on Christmas Eve so they didn’t even see him after finding out about the trip. I told Dave in advance that we were going away and for how long so he was aware I was taking our daughters out of the country. He was fine with that, wrote me a letter for customs just in case, and didn’t ask where I was going let alone if I was going with anyone.

My older daughter asked him 3 times at lunch today how he knew that we were staying with my friend in Florida. She said that each time she asked he changed the subject and never responded to her question.

Hmm, I wonder if he knows who slept over at my house the night before we left on our trip and who drove us to the airport and then picked us up the night we returned. 🙂

abuse of power, adultery, affair, Betrayal, cheating, Christianity, deceit, divorce, Frank Elsner, God, infidelity, lying, Police, shame, sin, Spirituality, unfaithfulness

Victoria Police Chief Steps Aside

The police union demanded the resignation of Victoria Police Chief, Frank Elsner, two weeks ago as a result of his admission that he was exchanging inappropriate Twitter messages with the wife of a subordinate police officer.

Now, as reported by CHEK news tonight, Frank Elsner has voluntarily stepped aside, with pay, now that the Office of Police Complaints Commissioner has ordered two different public trust investigations into the police chief.

He is being investigated by RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) and two retired judges. Not only is there an issue with his exchange of flirtatious social media messages but he also allegedly misled investigators, lied to the officer in question about the messages he sent to his wife so that the officer would not file a complaint against him, talked to witnesses after being told not to talk to witnesses, and four employees have made workplace harassment complaints against him since 2014.

The investigation is expected to take six months.

Based on my conversation with people who work for Victoria Police, all of their emails and the Police Department social media accounts are internally monitored. How could the police chief be so stupid to not only do what every cheater does and risk his marriage, reputation, relationship with his children and family, ruin his finances, ruin his dreams but also do something that could destroy his career? Did he just think he wouldn’t be caught? Is it spiritual blindness because of his sinful thinking? Maybe when Romans 6:23 talks about the wages of sin being death it is talking about everything good in your life is now dead and gone.

I think of people like Bill Cosby who spent a lifetime building an image that is respected and admired only to have it crumble apart and turn to ash because of his apparent repeated abuse of women for his own sexual pleasure and whatever other gain he received from that behaviour. Now that will be his legacy. I think of scripture like “your sin will find you out” (Numbers 32:23) and “What good is it for a man to gain the whole world just to forfeit his own soul?”(Matthew 16:26) It makes me feel like I felt with my own husband that he was a fraud, liar and that everything he pretended that he stood for was false.

I suspect that there will be a new Victoria Police Chief in 2016.

adultery, affair, Betrayal, cheating, divorce, infidelity, other woman, psychology, relationships

Negative Consequences of an Affair

Thank you, TheClip, for providing this link from “About Relationships”. It describes my cheating spouse’s behavior and treatment of me to the dime. It helps explain and confirm that healing from the side of the faithful spouse is a longer, harder journey especially when the cheating spouse continues to try to force me to pay for his bad behaviour.

Mutual Agreements Mean Happy Endings:

There are differing types of divorce and each one has it’s own emotional and psychological intensity. There is the bilateral agreement divorce where both spouses are unhappy and conclude that they will be happier being apart. In a divorce like this, the couple is often able to come to a mutual agreement, settle their affairs amicably, and stay connected as friends with little emotional upset.

Then there is the unilateral divorce where one spouse makes the decision to divorce to the utter shock of the other spouse. This type of divorce means more emotional and psychological intensity for the spouse who was unaware of the problems in the marriage.

The one choosing to leave has had time to think about, reflect upon and weigh the options and to emotionally divorce themselves from the marriage. The other spouse, who is caught by surprise, is normally mistreated and left to feel abandoned. There is a huge imbalance of power with the one leaving being the one in control of most aspects of whether or not the marriage will continue.

Enter The Third Party:

Add to this a third party and the issue of an affair and the emotional intensity is compounded. Not only will the left behind spouse feel abandoned but he/she will also feel replaced by someone better, younger, more attractive. The pain in this type of divorce comes from losing a position of importance in the life of your spouse, from beliefs about immorality, betrayal and feelings of failure as a spouse.

Normally a spouse who falls prey to an affair is a decent person that is aware of their behavior and how it is frowned upon by society. Even though they are aware of the immorality of their actions, they continue with the relationship, which means dealing with feelings of guilt.

The Blame Game:

Feelings of guilt motivates them to demonize the faithful spouse in an attempt to justify their affair.

They will accuse their spouse of many negative and unforgivable traits and behaviors. The faithful spouse is portrayed as an inadequate partner, which left the cheating spouse no choice but to find an adequate replacement.

Not only will the faithful spouse be demonized, history is rewritten to make it appear that he/she has been inadequate for the entire duration of the marriage. The cheating spouse will recreate the marriage and what happened during the marriage to make it appear that they have suffered much pain and unhappiness throughout the entire marriage.

They may say things such as, “I was forced into marrying you” or, “You’ve never loved me the way I needed to be loved” or, “I have lived in hell for 20 years.” He/She will say anything as long as it will enable him/her to appear to have been the victim of the marriage and fully justified in abandoning their spouse by blaming the wronged spouse.

You Pay for Their Bad Behavior:

The cheating spouse will tell their story often and to anyone who will listen, to the point that they will finally begin to truly believe that the left behind spouse deserves punishment. The faithful spouse is the offender and the persecutor and needs to be dealt with harshly.

Punishment will come in the way of financial withholding or worse, fighting over custody for any children of the marriage. They may begin to believe that the faithful, demonized spouse is not entitled to receive any future benefits from them, sometimes not even those allowed by law.

Shocked and Awed:

The faithful spouse will question their own sanity and replay their marriage in their mind trying to find some hint of all the unhappiness they are told of by the unfaithful spouse. They will question how their spouse, someone they have loved and trusted could betray them in such a way. First to have an affair and then to rewrite the history of their marriage in such a way as to try and lay blame at their feet.

The faithful spouse will wonder how their spouse could blame them for having to have an affair and how they could defame their character after many years of being given love, respect and trust. They will wonder how their spouse cannot see how their words and blaming does damage to the children by depicting their mother/father in a bad light.

The faithful spouse will question his/her own memory of what they thought was a happy marriage. He/She will wonder if the marriage was never anything but a sham and a figment of their imagination. They will wonder why the unfaithful spouse never complained if they were unhappy or why they never made a request for changes in the relationship.

Being punished for your spouse’s cheating is an overwhelming state in which to find yourself. Recovery from the stress of such a profound emotional trauma is slow. If you have found yourself in such a situation, remember, with time comes healing and understanding. You will laugh again, love again and the sun will shine again. All you have to do is trust your memories, never forget that the insanity caused by an affair is not your fault and that you are not alone because in today’s society cheating is the number one reason for divorce.

scornedwifeblog

A wife's personal experience of infidelity

Category Archives: cheating