Hello fellow DBers! It's been ages since I've posted, or even lurked. I see a few old friends here and many new ones. I've been D since 2006, and am doing really well in many ways. However, I thought I would dip in here and vent a little bit about something that came up recently with my ex and my adult children.
I managed to not have to deal w/ my ex very much in the intervening years since the D. I find that if we need to communicate, email or texting is best. Things just devolve when I see him in person and I have a hard time remaining calm and detached. This is all manageable when I have little contact with him, but with the arrival of grandchild number one we have had way more contact and intersection. The conflict between us has been hard on my daughter, and she has indicated to me that she wished we could "just communicate". This came up when he remarried and she felt like she was in the middle. OK that's great. I see her point and I would never want to cause either of my children stress.
Sidebar about finances. When we divorced, ex was making approximately double what I was. Fifteen years later, that is still the case, even though I have greatly increased my income, it is still no where near what his is. He is a public employee in California, and his new wife is also. Salary and compensation information is part of the public record, so I looked them up. Their combined income is close to $300K.
Occasionally ex will send me a random check. I'm sure some amount of guilt plays into this, and I'm always happy to accept. He usually includes a hand written note with some sort of rambling diatribe against one or both of the kids. This last note was railing against our son, who recently graduated with a MFA in painting. Graduating with an art degree in the time of Covid is challenging. Yet, S has managed to get good press, has pieces in shows, and he coordinated an international on-line show. S is not a slacker and has a very impressive resume which includes working at the MOMA in NYC. This latest letter was a diatribe against S who apparently hasn't sent ex a painting that ex paid for. My response was that basically cut S some slack, he has lived in 3 different countries in the past 18 months and is basically homeless and unemployed. (Tho making do, as I said)
H responded with a vitriolic text about S. I was with D at the time and she said, Yeah he's been complaining about that for a while. He even is threatening to SUE S for the money.
I'm still shaking with anger 3 days later. I really don't want to hurt D's feelings when I get so angry about the ex, and I don't want to drag my kids into the myriad of reasons why I don't trust him or like him.
He's always been mean to our S. This was always a source of conflict in our marriage. He has always been sweet to our D.
Thanks for listening, DBers
SG
Survival Goddess "The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any." -Alice Walker
Wow girl - that’s awful. And it makes me feel like he only sends you money so he can hold onto that thread of connection to you and vent to you.
Is the money enough to make it worth listening to him? Or should you just become the gray rock, say thanks for the check and respond to nothing else?
I find that as my kids have gotten older, for two of them, understanding their father in the context of narcissism has helped them. This is stressing you in part because it’s making you feel like you have to get in the middle and defend S, but really, maybe the best answer to your ex (and D) would be something along the lines of “well, that’s between you and S”.
Weirdly, I had a dream last night (I never remember my dreams) that had something to do with middle son asking his dad to help repair his computer and him refusing . S’s computer, which he needs for work, IS having a problem with the screen and needs to be fixed but it turns out it should only cost $100 to replace the screen with his AppleCare . The main point of the dream was the pain it causes S when ex selfishly won’t help.
