Wife just filed for divorce...furious and hates me

[2ndtimearoundCA]

Hey Majic: nobody is going to ever totally understand our situations,.. especially from what we write here. When people comment on your post, they are trying to provide help. Remember that whatever tone that persone uses they are trying to Help you. When you feel that someone's comments are not justified, try and clarify without being defensive. To me, you sound very defensive, which feeds right back into your anger issues that you have already admitted are a problem. Even if the anger isssues are not the reason for you marriage problems, this is good life advice. I think your situation has a lot of promise if you want to have your M work out. Good luck!!

[MagicJack]

I don't plan on being a WAS, but I don't want to get my hopes up too much if she is really leaving; that and I'm trying to detach and GAL.

I think that the only thing that will bring her back will be her missing me and having the space to reflect on things and realize there were a lot of good points in our relationship and the grass is not greener on the other side.

One thing that seems odd is that I have not yet received D paperwork even though she went to her lawyer 10 days ago to put her "final signature" on it and it was supposed to be sent to me this past week. I am beginning to consider the outside possibility that she held off on sending it to see how things go, although I don't want to get my hopes up and then get D papers in the mail on Monday lol.

However, I have also realized that if she does want to stay with me, that I need to have boundaries in place to protect myself. This means not staying with her if she is going to continue to be "friends" with these guys who are in love with her, or if she is going to be dishonest with me. After I found out about her EA initially, one thing I think I did wrong was go overboard with setting boundaries and rules (I came up with a list of 10 rules for her to follow in the short-term to keep her from contacting these guys). She initially said she would, but then after a few weeks she said she felt like a prisoner and that was when she really pushed to get away and I found out she had still been communicating with the one guy. I also made the mistake early on of reaching out to her friends and family to see what was going on, etc.

At this point all I am doing is going to counseling on my own, staying busy, reading these forums, and not initiating contact with her. I would like to think she thinks about me a lot and misses me at least a little, but who knows?

[25yearsmlc]

My wife used to be overweight and I would get controlling with her diet. I saw her as not making an effort here. She eventually lost weight, about the time she started hanging out with her ex-boyfriend last December lol.


Why the "LOL"? I never get that. It's sarcastic and you were incredibly insensitive/hurtful to EVER mention her diet or eating or her weight. You need to know this about women NOW.

With anger I don't scream or yell a lot but I break things or hit walls when I'm pissed. This is kind of rare, but it's something I still shouldn't do.

No you should NOT.

It is scary and immature. Plus it is intimidating to her. Maybe intentionally. That's how it feels to women who are smaller and NOT "good fighters".

Sorry man, but you sound like a bully.


For example a few years ago she kept hounding me about not having my phone on me and being available to answer it.

Because she likes to be able to reach you? That was LOVING OF HER.


I got mad and said "ok" and threw my phone out the window. I did that with two separate phones, both cheap.

Gee. Good thing they were cheap...do you see what I See?

I hope so. You need to do some MAJOR WORK ON YOU

When I found out about her EA I kicked her out of the house and ripped up a few of her paintings. When I found out a few weeks later she had talked to one of these guys again after she said she wouldn't, I threw her phone in the sink and turned on the water.

WOW, I cannot believe she is an open to a recon with you as she seems.



I've never hit her though, and there was a period of several years where I broke nothing.

Please do not boast about "never" hitting her like it's an achievement....I don't know what else to say about that.

I have also sworn at her a few times during arguments, usually when I get scared and panic. A week ago when she demanded I return her car keys I shouted "F you B" and hung up the phone on her. It felt good in the moment, but anger always hurts you in the end.

IF it felt good at all, you have deeper work to do.

Get some tools for learning how mature men handle stress.

I've a woman veteran and served in war time. So has my h. Neither of us has hit anyone or destroyed property or thrown things in decades, outside of combat. Plenty of stress in our lives.

NO excuse for losing your head. Period.

It's attractive when a man is in control of HIS own emotions and supportive (not controlling or neglectful of other's...)

Make sense?

You may turn this around but it's all about YOUR CHANGES.

FROM other veterans

I will give you the advice Michele gave to me......every person is a package deal. He is a whole package....his emotional baggage, his situation, his character, his physical status, everything. And so are you. So decide if you really want this whole package.


Then......

TAke care of yourself and your self esteem. Only do that...do nothing otherwise. Watch his actions (not his words). Be loving, kind, gentle...

[MrBond]

""Remember that everything that you know about me is based on what I've told you."

Yes and you've explained very clearly about the things you've done. You seem to have forgotten your own stories. Look at 25yrsmlc's post above. She outlines it very well.

"The only time I have ever broken anything of hers was after I discovered her affair,"

Really? So what about her phone and I believe you said this..."With anger I don't scream or yell a lot but I break things or hit walls when I'm pissed. This is kind of rare, but it's something I still shouldn't do. "

"She is very conveniently now using the excuse that she is "afraid of me" and that this justifies all of her decisions to be unfaithful prior to me finding out about her affair and going ballistic. And yes, for the final time I am aware that my reaction to that was not appropriate and am working on this in counseling."

I don't know what you mean by "conveniently". I mean you documented pretty clearly the things you did and honestly you were lucky she stayed that long. I don't know any woman who wouldn't be afraid of you if you did those things.

"I would appreciate comments going forward that are constructive and helpful and not blaming.""

Now this part was laughable. No one "blamed" you. You detailed it all yourself. You're shifting into the area where you don't understand your W's POV. If you did, you'd show a little more humility.

But that's just my 2 cents.

[MagicJack]

I wasn't controlling of her, and I really don't think I was a jealous person beyond the obvious stuff of I don't want her associating with her ex-boyfriends. Is that too much to ask? I never told her she couldn't go do something, including all of the times where she said she was going to the city to visit her sister when really she was doing other stuff, and even when she would go to bars or clubs with her female friends/relatives. When she would travel out of town for work, I never needed to follow up on her.

I was also supportive of her career and her academics. I was the only one working while she got her Masters, and I even helped her write papers. When she started actually working I would talk to her about how to deal with people at her job who she was having conflicts with. Her problem over time was that she had serious anxiety in social situations and could not adjust to dealing with these people over the course of several years. We were having the same hours-long conversation every night about the same two people who she couldn't deal with. At one point she was determined to quit her job completely and "take three months off work" so she could "relax" and not work at all. Because she owed over 100k in student loan debt that we were paying interest on I told her that if she quit her job it would be financial suicide and I wouldn't stay with her since she would be torpedoing us. She never forgave me for saying that.

Her calling me all the time went way beyond normal phone needs. She could not respect any limits on my availability especially when I was at work. If I didn't answer my cell at work, she would call my desk. If I didn't pick that up, she would actually call my co-workers or the main switchboard. These were not calls that couldn't wait until I got home, either. They would be over things like her wanting to talk about why the electric bill was so high, etc. When I would try to tell her to please not call me at work unless it was an emergency, and to definitely not call the main switchboard/co-workers, she could not respect that and would keep calling those numbers. When we got married it was a lot worse and out of frustration I literally threw out my phone twice so she would just stop calling me so damn much. I felt it was controlling on her part to expect me to be "always-on" no matter what I was doing or where I was.

I was also supportive of her while she dealt with numerous health problems including a brain tumor and collitis. I took her to the hospital more times than I can count, including lots of times in the middle of the night. But the only thing she remembers is the 2 times when I didn't take her to the hospital (I was out of town both times), and the time where I was pissed off about taking her because I thought she was a hypochondriac (she would have phantom "stomach pain attacks" which conveniently became emergencies whenever I would go out of town). She would go to the hospital almost monthly with these issues.

I did get on her case about her unhealthy lifestyle. She would horde junk food and binge eat little debbies and not exercise. I don't want to live my life like that. I tried encouraging her to exercise with me, bought her a gym membership, even cooked some healthy meals for her, and of course any reasonable person is going to get the hint that their spouse wants them to change. I never told her she was "fat" or that I wasn't attracted to her. I just wanted her to try to be healthier, just to try. And she basically refused to do anything until after she made up her mind to leave.

And on the topic of anger, again. I state that I didn't hit her not because I think that is some kind of accomplishment, but because I didn't hit her (and I don't want people getting the idea that I was physically abusive). And I never damaged her property until I found out she was cheating on me, and I realize now that was wrong. Mr. Bond, what more do you want from me? How long are you going to keep bringing that up as if that is the only thing going on here? I realize it was wrong, and I am taking steps to work on it. Yet the only advice you can reply is to keep repeating "damn right she left you, etc". She was planning to leave me before that, and she was cheating on me before that, so I have a hard time believing she was some kind of long-suffering victim. And for the record, she never once said she was afraid of me until after she had moved out of the apartment and needed to come up with a reason to give to people about why she left. She is a deeply fundamentalist Christian and she needs to be able to justify what she is doing to her family and the community. The truth is I could justify being afraid of her more than she is of me. She would throw things at me, not let me leave (even to another room) when I wanted to get space when we were fighting, and motioned like she was going to stab me with scissors on three separate occasions when she got frustrated with arguments we were having. She would also make statements regarding how she would cut off my balls if I ever cheated on her, etc. You can say whatever you want but she was in no way "in fear" for her safety. The typical "she's a woman/the weaker sex" argument doesn't always apply when the woman is nuts. Yes, I said nuts, and I still loved her.

I do have sympathy for her. Mostly it's pity. I feel like she is not happy with any area of her life. She was not happy in her job, and I used to spend hours listening and consoling her and giving advice. When we started dating she was not happy with her family and fought them all the time (she would get in screaming matches with her mom), and I supported her in her problems with them and tried to calm things down between her and her parents. Now she's not happy with me, and who is there to convince her to stay with me and work on problems? Not me anymore, and probably not any of her friends since almost all of them are divorced or serial cheaters/undateable to begin with. I'm not perfect, but I do try to improve myself and be a better man. She thinks she will find someone who is going to baby her and give her everything she ever wanted. She's popping Lorazepam to deal with her anxiety disorder, but I read that the stuff has a side effect of making depression worse. So my guess is she's pretty lost right now.

[labug]

Because she owed over 100k in student loan debt that we were paying interest on I told her that if she quit her job it would be financial suicide and I wouldn't stay with her since she would be torpedoing us. She never forgave me for saying that.

How might you have handled this differently?

And another question, do you equate work with only those things that produce income in realtime?

[MagicJack]

Also, as a catch-all, I can't help my sense of humor. If someone was going to kill me and there was any amount of humor/irony in the situation I would probably start laughing.

[MagicJack]

Hi labug, we were having an argument where she was screaming and crying about how much she hated her job, and nobody understood how awful it was. I tried to talk to her about it for a long time before she kept insisting she was going to walk in and quit, and in the heat of the moment I said "if you quit your job I will divorce you" since I did not want her to quit her job while she was so emotional.

I apologized later and told her I said it out of desperation, but I really don't know what else I could have done. If there is a better way I would like to learn.

[MagicJack]

As for work, we don't have kids and we split housework evenly. Her free time is spent mostly going out with friends or doing volunteer projects. On average she worked under 40 hours a week at her job (high hourly rate but they don't want to pay benefits).

[labug]

Have you read DR or anything about validating? I know you're new at this but this is a basic. She was having a tough time, you probably wanted to fix it, it couldn't be fixed so you were exasperated and went straight to catastrophe-If you do that we're ruined!!!!!!

Read up on validating and then come back to this.

I might have said "Honey, I see you're having a really hard time at work. That must be difficult. If I was being treated that way I would also be (insert emotion she's expressed)"

It's a skill and it takes caring for the person you're interacting with. Would you say you love your W?

Most women process things by talking about the event, we don't want you fix it or negate the importance of it, we want you to listen and hear them. Even if you don't really understand, you're showing respect to the feelings of someone going through a difficult time, not saying "you shouldn't feel that way because I wouldn't feel that way."

On the work question, I wasn't clear, I was referring to this quote:

I was the only one working while she got her Masters, and I even helped her write papers. When she started actually working

You're now sharing in the fruits of her labors, right?