Leaving Castle Caladan

[Zues126]

Just got an email from XW. I am in a bit of shock at the moment. She made several significant accusations that just blow me away and talked about how much pain this all caused her. I will write them out, then get my feelings off my chest. Maybe then I can start to process what type of response is appropriate.

1. She told me it hurt that I wasn't supportive of our children's events. Thursday night my son had a violin concert and I didn't attend.

2. She told me I burner her with the tax returns. She found out she has to pay in $2,000 in taxes this year while I received a refund.

3. She told me that she found out I was a drug addict for 10 years during our marriage. She told me she felt my addiction to uppers was responsible for the failure of our marriage and probably for the death of our miscarried child. She said she learned this through a mutual friend and cited specifics of events that either never happened or were patched together from different situations that occurred years before I met her.

Now to get this off my chest.

1. I am a tremendous dad. I have been reading to my children every night. We are eating healthier than ever. My D6 and D9 played the chess tournament yesterday, D6 took first place, D9 took 4th, this was exactly a year after their first tournament and after me telling them if we worked hard at it they could get trophies in a year. During this tournament I took S12 with me and I had him write an English paper. It wasn't homework, I was actually dissatisfied with how little writing they were having him do in school so this was my own assignment. He wrote a persuasive paper and I taught him how to brainstorm points, organize them, create an outline, create a rough draft, and write a paper. We went to lunch together and he typed it up last night. He learned a ton, in a subject (English) that XW thinks he struggles in. This is on top of our daily reading. I spend time with all of them together, 1:1, and still give them time to do their own thing. Bottom line, my son hates violin and is counting days until the end of the school year when he never has to play again. Missing this event doesn't warrant an accusation of poor parenting.

2. Our finances are legally separated now. I got a refund because I worked, I paid in taxes, and due to deductions I was entitled to a refund. She had to pay in because she didn't work so had no taxes paid in, and because the maintenance was taxable income. Everything has been executed according to the divorce decree. She made the decision to separate from me and this includes financially. She made the decision not to go back to work. Through it all I have always paid my unfair share in a timely way, even when it has impacted my quality of life and forced me to move in with relatives. The only deception with finances was her theft of $12,000 in my income (as those that follow this thread are aware of) and the only inequity is that which was inflicted on me by the courts. This suggestion that I am being financially unfair is absurd.

3. Here's where my jaw hit the floor. I literally don't have words. From the day we met in 2003 I avoided any uppers like the plague, with only one exception. That was in 2012 when I played a major one on one challenge pool match that lasted 3 1/2 days nearly straight through. This was a unique event in my life and I knew when I signed up for it that was the price of admission. I wouldn't do it again, but it truly was a one time event. It happened years after our last child was born and at no other point during our 10 year marriage. The suggestion that I murdered our unborn child is staggering.

Through this all she talked about how much I hurt her, how even though we're divorced it still hurt to find out I deceived her for 10 years, that I continue to hurt her by not supporting our children and taking them from her half the time. When I, too, am without the children half the time from a decision that was clearly not mine.


OK, thank you for letting me type all of that. I had to get my reaction out of my system. Now I will take some deep breaths.

This demands a reply, but honestly I'm shocked and tired and have to go to work in the morning and fight to hit my sales goals in a tough month. I need to give some thought to how I reply, or should I say I need to find my calm place. I don't feel like going on the defensive, being whiny and weak and debating these points. I do feel the need to state clearly and one time that she has received some misinformation, but whether she believes that or not is outside of my lane.

I have been solid through all of this and I'm not going to get derailed now. I think of the example that one poster used to give, that if you were standing on a street corner and a crazy person came up and started screaming at you, you wouldn't get upset. You'd just enforce your boundary. It's a little trickier because I do need to co-parent with this person, but I certainly don't need to react emotionally or defensively or argumentatively.

I'm still getting this out of my system so I'll just say that to me this is simply insanity. I'm all about validation, but I don't know how you validate some of this crap, "It must be tough to believe your ex hid a drug addiction for 10 years causing the death of your marriage and unborn child, I can understand that...???" Pass. And I'm all about understanding there is a grain of truth in everything and that it's not black and white, and I'm not perfect. I get it. But as I look at this again and again, while I am open minded to my own humanity, I am totally confident that I've done everything I can for the last 3 years to be the best man and leader of my family I can be. She is free to disagree. Heck, she got her divorce. But I'm going to keep moving forward.

Part of me wonders if she is really crazy, or if she is just in a really dark place and dealing with the consequences of medicating the pain of the loss of our marriage instead of going dead through the middle of it dealing with it. Maybe her and her boyfriend had a fight, maybe she's drunk, I don't know. This is all mind-reading on my part so I'll stop right there. There is no way I could understand what is going through her mind anyway. I just have to shrug and accept that it's not my game. I'm sure she has her reasons and I wish her the best in navigating through them. In the meantime I just need to be on alert to protect myself and my children if she starts acting as illogically and unpredictably as she is talking.

I know I'll calm down and the right reply will be revealed when I'm feeling centered. I'll certainly read and consider any suggestions you all have to offer. Jelly, given your background I'd be really curious what you recommend as well if you have any thoughts to share.

Thanks gang.