Hi New to Boards but not divorce

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-30-2006
Hi New to Boards but not divorce
20
Mon, 10-30-2006 - 6:06am

Hi my name is Maria and I just found this board this am. I am at work and into my last hour thankfully. I am a 911 operator for the past 5 years and Sunday nights can be not so busy for us. I dont want to say the "Q" word.

I have been married for 5 years to what I thought was my soul mate. This is my 2nd marriage. I was happy up until Aug when my dh decided to have a midlife crisis and take it out on me and my 2 girls from previous marriage and our son.

I am not quite sure where it has all gone wrong but trying to talk to him has been of no use. Everytime I tell him how I feel he turns it around and tells me I am at fault. He doesnt want to get help.

I have always supported him in what he wants to do with his life from each job change 9 in 5 years to times when he doesnt even work. We have some serious debt issues which I am trying so hard to work us out of but he has been of no help. DH is a truck driver gone M-F home weekends. I work mostly weekends 16 hour shifts overnight. Not a lot of time for us but when there has been time for us he does not want us.

I feel he does not respect me or my girls and we are there to serve him. I hear my girls get excited when I say that he wont make home for a weekend and it has made a huge light bulb turn on.

I have started a few steps towards a seperation, my own checking account, switching bills to my name like car and insurance. I wanted to try to get through the holiday season and then req for a seperation but I am not sure how much more I can take.

DH told me just yesterday that I love my officers more than I do my family since I work all the extra hours. This he also told my children. I was furious that he looks at it this way.

My first divorce was due to him cheating on me. I think what hurts me the most is I have to put my kids through yet another one.

There are days I have myself believing that I must be the one who has the problem with marriage.

Sorry for the long version of my first hello..... I look forward to meeting you all and glad I was able to find a place with support.
Maria

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 10-30-2006 - 6:41am

Hi Maria!

Welcome to the board!

Pianoguy knows firsthand (after a long marriage and a very short one) that DIVORCE isn't a piece of cake! But...when you come home to a household in fear of your partner's words or how he'll react to his children...there's sometimes NO OTHER OPTION EXCEPT TO END THINGS!

I can understand that you wish to keep your family life intact...at least through the holidays. But eventually, you and your husband are going to have to sit down and discuss what's right for EACH OF YOU as well as your son...and your daughters.

Because you're a mostly 'stay at home Mom'---I think I can understand why your husband feels the way he does? But if your source of income is the only consistant source of money in the family, it appears that you have very little choice when it comes to WORKING or NOT WORKING?

Since you've already begun to take steps to get your own checking account and are attempting to eliminate some of the 'previously acquired debt'---you might want to talk with a trusted friend and/or legal advisor? Perhaps one (or both) can offer some suggestions as to how you should proceed after the holidays are over?

Good Luck!

Pianoguy

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-25-2006
Mon, 10-30-2006 - 11:11am

Divorceagain,


Hi and welcome to our board. Hugs to you and your kids as you find yourself in this situation. It's very difficult to know what to think when you discover your spouse is a different person than you thought!


My first question is this: Has anything really significant happened in your DH's life in the past six months? Did he lose a job, get demoted, get promoted, have a parent or significant friend die or suffer a life threatening injury? Was he in a serious accident with his rig? Have a friend who was? Did he have a "Big-O" birthday, i.e. turn 40, 50, etc. Does he have any friends in trucking who were recently divorced because their spouse cheated while they were on the road? His "accusation" you like your coworkers better than him makes me suspect something like that is going on. I also find it interesting that he's gone five days a week and yet you're the one he accuses of "not being there" for the family.

CL-Wisdomtooth2020

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-03-2006
Mon, 10-30-2006 - 12:47pm

Hi Maria- Funny thing....my xhusband is a truck driver too and I think he has had a mid-life crisis too. That along with an affair that he probably took stock in before he signed the divorce papers. I think that truck driving gives the drivers a lot of time to analyze their lives and when their lives aren't just what they think they should be back home than it's time to start pointing fingers. My girls and I sat at home and waited for my xh to show up. Never really knew when that would be...just stayed home waiting. In his eyes, I didn't try hard enough. I expected some help with the finances and the kids, at times, but he accused me of treating him like a paycheck. Ya know, sometimes you wonder what the heck....I stay home with the kids, work 40hrs a week, don't go anywhere, handle all the household chores and all the kids' activities and homework but yet I'm the one with the problem. Too much thinking time! I always worried about my xh physical health but never really gave his mental health much thought. Wished I would of. Well, he's got his 20yr old gf to deal with now (mind you he's 44) so I hope the life he thought he was going to have after divorce is a happy one. Mine sucks and probably will until the gf gets fed up or finds someone else to leech off of. It's not easy knowing your kids are having dinner at dad's and seeing or hearing who knows what....My xh told me that he thought life after divorce would be doable. Guess what....the grass isn't greener on the other side of the fence. Had he given me a chance I would of taken it.

Hang in there. You have been through it before so you know what the ride is like...maybe you can get your husband to sit with you and talk about it. Anything is better than heading to the courtroom without a fair chance to make things better.

Robin

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-21-2004
Tue, 10-31-2006 - 4:17am
Oh my gosh, reading your post - especially the last response by Robin sounds so much like me and what I'm going through now. My husband is 45 and we have been married for 21 years and dated for 4 and he has totally walked out on us. He is a truck driver (well he got fired a couple of weeks ago) left us before then. But pull up my name on this website and just read my posts that have been put on there for the last couple of weeks. It will amaze you.
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-03-2006
Tue, 10-31-2006 - 9:18am

Hi gal_jasper..I tried to find your posts but I am not real familiar with this site and couldn't pull them up. I will continue to look for them. I would like to read more of your story. Sounds like it may read out kind of like mine. I don't know where you stand with your xh but with mine it's just a mess. We were married for 25yrs. I have know him since I was in high school. He was my best friend. I still have strong feels for him, but he's mixed up with this other girl. I honestly feel like he doesn't want to be there. Our kids are in the middle of that mess. This girl is a bad influence and is only 5 yrs. older than our oldest daughter so you can imagine what is happening there. I just want this girl to go away. I had the first face to face with her yesterday to let her know that she had no rights when it came to my girls. She is so imature! Wanted to hit me. She would of if my xh hadn't grabbed her. She is the reason we couldn't begin to work on our "communication" issue. This is what my xh says was our problem. Yeah, it's hard to fit a weeks worth of events into a one day visit. But we had been down this road for 15yrs when he decided he just couldn't take it anymore. What is really was is that he had found this girl or she him and knew just what to say and how to stroke him. It's very hurtful to know that I have been replaced with some like her. She has no education, no money, no family and no morals. I hate her being around my kids and my xh won't drop her off because he says she has no where to go. Like he should put that before the his kids. The whole situation sucks...I would give anything for it all to go away and for life to be livable again. Tell me your story.

Robin

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-21-2004
Mon, 11-27-2006 - 6:05am
I just read this message that you have typed if you go to the find messages and type in gal_jasper it will pull up the posts by me. Your story and mine sound so much alike. It makes me sick to think that my husband has replaced me and our two children with a 22 year old...but at least I don't have the problem of having to worry about them being around her because he doesn't even contact them - much less want them to come over. From what I understand they are living in an unfurnished trailer. It just all makes me physically & mentally sick - and after a while - nobody wants to hear about it - it is sort of like "he is a part of your past" well he isn't - our divorce won't be final until January 8th. He won't even have to sign papers because I did it by publication in the paper for four weeks. I couldn't afford a lawyer - so I'm just praying that things go smoothly....he knows I have filed for divorce, but I think he has forgotten. I was really hoping he would come back home...but it doesn't look like it is going to happen. He never even came and picked up his clothes - so now I have all his winter clothes and everything else in storage...isn't that strange?
iVillage Member
Registered: 12-21-2004
Mon, 11-27-2006 - 6:11am
Oct-22 10:45 am - I just looked back and my original posts was under the I Will Survive Column on October 22 at 10:45 a.m. When I typed in gal_jasper int he find message block for some reason it only brought up a few of them - I guess maybe it only goes back so far.
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-03-2006
Mon, 11-27-2006 - 9:44am
I don't know if having your kids exposed to him and the relationship he has now would be a good thing or not. I told my ex that I would never stop him from seeing the girls. The only thing that I wouldn't allow was her being around them. She has no morals and cannot even begin to understand what she and my ex have done to the thinking of my kids. My oldest who is 15 is counseling and I know that a lot of the issues that she is having stems to the relationship that my ex has with this girl who is only 5yrs older than his daughter. It is sickening! Now the ex tells me that she is no longer riding with him on the truck and I say whatever....heard it before. I can't believe that someone can change as much as he has. I used to think how great it would be to have him back in our lives, but I know that I could never put behind me the things that he has done to the girls and I to show us that at times he just doesn't give a flip about us. That hurts horribly and I hate that my girls, who are the entire world to me, are going through this and he just doesn't care about anyone but himself and what he's getting out of his choices. He asked me if I wanted him out of the picture completely. What does he think?? There is no way I am going to go there. I just wonder if in his mind that that isn't what he wants and it would be an excuse for him to use me saying yeah leave.
iVillage Member
Registered: 12-21-2004
Mon, 11-27-2006 - 5:43pm
Maybe that is the reason my husband isn't coming around - maybe he doesn't want them exposed...but our daughter saw him at the local convenience store talking on the pay phone while the girl was pumping gas. My daughter is 17 the girl is 22...so I know exactly how you feel. My son is the one that I'm really worried about he is 13 and he use to play for hours and hours with his daddy and for him to just walk out - has got to be traumatic for him...but he never mentions his daddy - and when I do he said he tries to block him out of his mind. His best friend told me that my son told him the same thing. I know this isn't healthy - I've talked to the school counselors and to all of his teachers. I just don't know what else to do. I worry sometimes that what if that girl stops by here....I mean my husband isn't taking her on the truck - who knows why - because I sure don't -- so I don't know what in the @#%^ that she is doing other than riding out gas. But I do know that she comes right by here. But I called the courthouse today and my divorce will go to court on the 13th of December instead of the 8th of January. It is so bittersweet...I guess deep down I really wanted him to straighten up and come home....but that obviously isn't going to happen. He went to his neices house Saturday and she said he NEVER mentioned either one of our children at all....that is the oddest thing to me. That is the reason I think he has snapped in the head (seriously) how else do you just FORGET your children....gosh I would just die at the thought of being without mine. Three years ago I was hospitalized for a brain hemorrhage for 23 days and I was going INSANE telling the doctors every single day what I was missing in their lives...like my daughters 1st day of high school..my son's 1st day of his last year at elementary school...it was the little things like open house, and school shopping that was driving me crazy...I found out then that life goes on without you...that was a very sad experience to me and it was also humbling to realize that life will go on whether you are there or not....so I can't even begin to IMAGINE what my husband is thinking...or if he is thinking at all...I don't even know if he remembers that we are getting a divorce since he won't have to sign any papers at all. I would much rather know that the woman was riding with him than driving his personal vehicle around -- and I can tell you that is the strangest thing also - because honestly I bet nobody has ever driven his vehicle but him...he is SO PICKY ABOUT IT. Something other than drugs has happened to him. And just like all of these other middle aged men that find these younger women...the women aren't getting prizes at all...and the women aren't going to stay with them. My husband swears he isn't having a relationship with this woman. I'm like you whatever...... Is your divorce already final? I am assuming that mine will be final the day I go to court is that correct? I can't even imagine being single. I keep listening to an old song by Alabama "She's A Lady Down On Love" it describes my relationship perfectly.
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-03-2006
Tue, 11-28-2006 - 9:54am
I think too that my ex has snapped. I don't know if it could be a midlife crisis or if there is something deeper. I do know by looking at him that he is in depression. This is nothing like what he thought it was going to be. He thought he was going to get a divorce, see his girls without incident, have me live close enough to let him do so and for us to be best of friends. WRONG! He hasn't been honest with me or the girls for months. He keeps that trashy girl in his truck with him. He is never in a hurry to get home to see his girls. He is a huge mess right now. I feel badly for him but as everyone has told me there isn't a thing I can do help him if he doesn't want to help himself. He is totally self-absorbed. I know he is realizing that the life we had wasn't as bad as he thought it was. Handling the responsibilities of life all on your own is huge when you have never done it before. He says how messy the house is, how far behind he is on the laundry, how paying the bills is never ending, yadayadayada....that's all the things I did and take care of the girls along with working 40 hrs a week. But he couldn't live with me so he left. Now it seems that leaving wasn't the better choice. I just wish he would of given me a heads up so I could of asked him to work on us. I know now that that girl was already in the picture and I am sure he thought life with her was going to be just grand. Well, you want grand? It isn't happening with a teenager and a 44 yr old. It won't be happening with your husband and his "girlfriend" for long either. That you can bet. I will always love my exhusband. I just will never like the things he has said, done and has become. I pray for him that he will get the help he needs. He's the only one in the family who hasn't been or isn't in counseling. But than he is certain that he doesn't have any issues. For your kids I would highly recommend some counseling. We know how bad our situation is what it is doing to our minds. The kids aren't able to make sense out any of this stuff and it will turn on them and they will act out and it probably won't be a good acting out. My 15yr old has already been there.

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