It has been a rough week. My W returned from a 2 week vacation with her "Friend" on Monday and things have gone steadily downhill. Here is a rather long-winded summary:
Tuesday night: I get home from a trip to Cedar Pointe @ 11:00pm, wife gets home around 1:00am. I ask her how her tip was, she says “great”. I go to bed.
Wednesday night: I come home from work, and W is showing my 6 yr old pictures of her Haiti trip. I tell my wife that the pictures are inappropriate (She is vacationing with another man while we are still married) and that I do not want her sharing them with the kids. She ignores me.
She goes inside the house, and calls someone. She is telling them how wonderful her trip was and starting to plan her next trip. I ask her to stop making these type of calls from the house. She ignores me.
I pick up the 2nd extension, introduce myself as my W’s H, and ask that they not call and talk to my W from our home phone. My wife has a fit, screams at me and grabs the phone from my hand. She re-calls the person and begins the conversation again. I ask her to leave the house if she wants to make these types of calls. She flips me off. I go downstairs and unplug the phone router, ending the call. More hysterics, name calling, hitting. I ignore her.
She settles down and takes a shower. I go on the computer downstairs. She comes down, and takes the power chord from the router so I cannot use the internet. I ignore her and go to bed.
Thursday morning: I send my W the following message – “The tension in our house is unbearable. I understand that you are not willing to move out. I also understand that nothing I say will convince you to stop pursuing your new life. But, that doesn’t mean it is appropriate to openly flaunt your new life in front of me and the kids. I am simply asking you to show some discretion. I have the right to be in my home without having to listen to you talk to these men, or hear your phone beeping every time you get a text. What you are doing is incredibly hurtful and disrespectful to me. When you show my kids pictures of you in Haiti with other men, it humiliates me. Please don’t show the kids your pictures, or talk with them about your trip. Please don’t let them skype and text XXXXX and or XXXXX. Please don’t talk with them about going on these trips with you in the future. And, please don’t openly text and talk to other men in front of me or our kids. This is a very reasonable request. Please let me know if you can honor it. If you cannot honor it, then we need to move forward with a divorce immediately. We can discuss tonight, but I do need you to make a decision. I am not dealing with this anymore.” - I didn’t get a response.
Thursday Night: I come home late from my soccer game, and go right to bed. I do not talk to my W. I had been thinking all day about this and decided that it is pointless to discuss with my W. I decide to file for D ASAP.
Friday: I sign the retainer agreement and mail the contract/retainer to the lawyer. We schedule a meeting for Wed. to sign the complaint and serve my W.
My W comes home with the kids around 8pm. They decide to go to the fireworks. When they get home, D14 informs me that watched the fireworks with another man and his 2 kids. I tell my wife how inappropriate it is and how upset I am about her doing this. I tell my kids not to participate in any activities with another man and to call me to pick them up if this happens again.
Sunday: W is gone all day. I drop D12 and D14 off at summer camp for the week. I spend the day with D6 and my family. I get home @ 9pm. Wife is on phone w/OM from Haiti. I ask her to leave the house if she is going to talk to him. She ignores me.
Again, I pick up the extension, introduce myself as her husband and ask that he not call or use my house phone to talk to my W. My W again gets hysterical, yelling at me, calling me names, grabbing the phone. The man hangs up. My W grabs the wireless extension, unplugs the handset from the wired phone, goes downstairs and calls OM again. I go and unplug the phone router.
My wife screams at me, tells me how much she hates me, tells me that I am ruining her life, and starts hitting me. I ignore her and go upstairs to bed. As I am going upstairs, she grabs my car keys and work laptop and runs out of the house saying “Good luck getting to work tomorrow”.
I give D6 a bath, put her in bed, and go to my bed to read. My W comes into my room and takes all the remote controls out of the room so I can’t watch TV. She then goes and takes a shower. I go downstairs to check my email.
My W comes downstairs naked with a towel wrapped around her. She asks to see the keyboard. I hand it to her and she changes all the computer passwords so I don’t have access. There was something very comical and sad about watching her stand there and do this; with the towel falling off and being put back on, exposing her naked body while she fumbled with the keyboard. My W went and finished her shower.
While she was in the shower, I called a friend on my cell phone. W finished her shower, came downstairs and tried to grab my cellphone. I just looked at her and said fine, I am not going to fight with you and handed it to her. She ran off to another room. I went upstairs and went to bed.
She comes into my room and turns off the in-room air conditioner. As she leaves, she says she is “going to make my life miserable”. I think I am truly detached now, because I don’t feel anything. No anger, just a sadness that the woman I loved and married has changed into this person. I turn the air conditioner back on and go back to bed. 5 minutes later, I lose power to my room. She had turned off the breaker. I go back to bed.
I wake up and get ready for work. I go downstairs and wake up my wife (she now sleeps on the couch). I ask for my keys and laptop, she ignores me and goes back to sleep. My cellphone is sitting on the table. I go outside and call the police. They show up, walk into the house and talk to her. The policeman walks out with my keys, and my wife’s keys. He opens up her car and hands me my briefcase.
I ask if he is going to file a police report regarding the theft. He said that since we are married, all our possessions are community property. I explained that the laptop is not mine, but owned by my work. He took down the information and indicated that he would file the report.
My wallet is missing, but my W insists that she didn’t take it. I go to work without my wallet.
How did my life ever get here? What happened to the woman I married?
Why can’t she see that not talking to her OM in my home, in front of me and my kids is not appropriate and that I have the right to enforce this boundary?
This is an intelligent 37 yr old woman. Why can’t she see how immature and hurtful her behavior is?
I don’t think I will ever get answers to these questions. I just need to move forward with a D, show her love, compassion and patience, continue to enforce my boundaries and rebuild my life.
You sound like you stood your ground with some boundries, didn't let it escalate too much considering the circumstances.
Maybe its time to just get the phone number to the house changed? And have it listed as private, so it wont show up on caller ID. Have the phone billing put in just your name if its in both now?
If she's hitting you, im sorry but i'd call the police for battery. Not to be vindicitive, but to get some issues documented in advance of divorce. To cover yourself, in case she tries to come back and say you hit her. You don't have to file charges, just get something on paper that shows a history. If your going for custody in the divorce it can help.
I know it must be tough, but you have to protect yourself and your kids too. Maybe the vets will disagree with me, but this lack of respect cant be healthy for anyone involved.
The decision to end the marriage is yours, only you can decide when YOUVE put in enough to say that you did your best. Prayers coming your way for you and the kids, even your wife that she'll "wake up" some day and realize the damage she's doing.
