Gordie #18: still not divorced

[AndrewP]

I was neither happy nor unhappy. TBH, this feeling of just going through the motions was a cause in my de-emphasis on her and the M. I had my own resentments.

Check

She would never say she was sorry. If we got into a fight, she’d go cold and give me the silent treatment until I broke the ice. Somehow, the only way to do that was to say I was sorry...no matter who did what to whom.

Check

She withheld sex from me. This built up resentment on both sides. Neither was happy.

Check

She was a spender and I was a saver. If I made $50k, she wanted more. If I made $100k, she wanted more. If I made $200k, she wanted more. No matter how much I made, it was never enough. She felt I was stingy and I felt like she was reckless.

Check - although in the last few years she became quite frugal as we recovered from a financial mess and my income steadily increased. She was quite proud of her frugality but also kept wanting nicer and nicer things.

She is full of gratitude towards friends and strangers. But to me at home? There was no gratitude.

Check

Same song, different singers.

I think one key difference in our situations was that for my ex her OM was a moderate step up in financial capability so that gave her more incentive to "complete the transaction". I heard from friends that she was bragging about the life they would have together and the large amount of money he got from his wife's insurance policy after she died. Yep - low class gold-digger.

This conflicted with her need to appear to be a fabulous person to the world. Hence her interactions with others - who she would talk down about behind their backs and her volunteer work - which she would rage and complain about in private.

I recall her fear after her affair going on for a year on the night before she finally moved out that it would become public that she cheated on me if I filed for divorce on the grounds of adultery. There was true horror in her and rage at me for even considering it since "but people would know" as she said. I'm not sure how many people believe her lies but most people in our circle know. She does have a separate non-overlapping much smaller circle of friends these days I believe.

Perhaps if your W had landed a well-off widower with a large insurance settlement and an active business your situation would have gone more like mine.

Writing this reminds me of my ex's brother. A few years ago he was caught having an EA (there was probably other cheating and PAs over time). When going through mediation he found out that his wife controlled all the money and that he would be scr3w3d in any settlement. They reconciled. Seeing him is like seeing a prisoner under guard. A very nervous man who is superficially trying to make his wife happy but doesn't seem happy about it. His wife has a long list of excuses and reasons for his cheating like "he was tired and the kids made too much noise in the house" and "we didn't involve him in things but he wasn't home anyway" etc. I figure that he's probably either been cheating all along or will as soon as he figures he can get away with it and keep the money. In talking to him when I was trying to get him to tell my W of the time that reconciliation was a good idea he was contemptuous of me and my attempts, believed that cheating was normal and that great relationships come from it, and that the only reason his EA wasn't a PA was that he was too lazy to drive up to see his AP.

I'm so glad that family is no longer in my life.