Was she afraid that if she talked to me, she would lose the will to move ahead with the divorce?
After finding the strength to stay until the kids were in college and then leave--I doubt she views herself as weak in any way, shape, or form. BD1 was when the sex ended. She said she didn't enjoy being talked over, not helping out in the home, and general grumpiness. (You have a list of complaints, too. Most failed marriages are a two-person job!) She stayed another 10yrs. That doesn't sound weak. She's probably not trying to hurt you, she's probably not evil, she's probably just trying to find her happy.
CWarrior, thanks for this. But then perhaps the rest of you can help me get a perspective on her based on the other actions she took within the first month.
I was not working when BD day came, because I had been fighting off some lawsuits (this was part of the household stress, no income combined with lawyer bills). And when she walked out she took the best car, transferred nearly all of the working cash we had in the bank, and had secretly filed taxes on her own so she got the full tax refund within the month. I was in the house, but couldn't write a check for more than a few dollars!
One month to the day after she served me, I received a nasty letter from her attorney threatening me with a restraining order because of my "violent" tendencies. This was a flat-out lie, but the context was she wanted me to move out and then we would proceed with an immediate sale of the house (the only one my kids had ever known, by the way). She knew I had no money to get a lawyer and fight her. My STBXW was always the sweetest woman ever, but somehow in this process the coaching she got, from other divorcees and her attorney, convinced her to do this because now it was war.
The letter almost put me in the ER. I had chest tightness, night sweats, insomnia (couldn't sleep more than an hour at a time) and other related physical reactions to it. I had never raised my voice once to her in 30 years! I had never called her a name or raised a hand in anger, either. In fact, she had done more violence to me, during that final year (when all she could think about was ending the marriage) she had twice thrown the TV remote at me, once hitting me in the cheek and once missing me entirely.
I succeeded at thwarting her wishes by borrowing some assets, getting an attorney, and finally getting some backbone back. But the echoes of what she tried still hurt to this day.
