Count of Monte Cristo

Background:

We've known each other since we were fourteen and dated in high school sophomore and junior year.

Dated again at the end of freshman year in college before she broke up with me for an old boyfriend.

Reunited at 10-year class reunion and lived together for two years before getting married. We would've been married nineteen years this summer.

We have two wonderful kids (D16 and S14) and lived a comfortable lifestyle, which included countless trips and a beautiful home.

She was contacted on Facebook by an old boyfriend almost three years ago and began an EA that went PA (he lives over 1000 miles away and is (was?) married with three children.)

In the middle of the EA, I took a severance package from my old company and a year later opened my own business.

D-day was 12/3/11 and she moved out a month and a half later because she 'could not be the kind of wife that I wanted her to be.'

She also had a ONS with another Ex-boyfriend while visiting her mom in another state. Over the last year and a half, she grew increasingly distant, which I attributed to the fact that I was starting a risky venture and she might possibly be going through a mid-life crisis. Looking back, I should've paid more attention to the signs but I attributed it all to the usual ebb and flow of married life.

After D-day, I made all of the mistakes the betrayed spouses make. I pleaded and cried and did everything to try and keep my family intact. But it was too late. She had probably been checked out of the marriage for at least a year.

Her attorney filed for divorce on 2/14/12 -- Happy Freaking Valentine's Day.

The past five months have been a whirlwind of emotional and lifestyle changes. I've been as low as one can be in this life and I've cried more than I've every cried.

But it has also been an awakening and learning experience for me. I learned that everything that I'm going through is part of a process and that everything will be fine in due time.

I learned that I'm much stronger than I realized and that I should never again put my partner on a pedestal.

I started lurking on TAM in late January after my ex had moved out. This place has been a godsend. I realized that unfortunately I was not alone in my despair. I only wished that I had discovered this site a year ago. Things might've worked out differently.

I chose not to contest the divorce because I wanted this to be over with and I also didn't want to enrich a bunch of lawyers in the process. Financially, she made out like a bandit -- to the tune of almost $150,000.

However, she lost out on so many things that money just can't buy. The kids live with me and I see them when they wake up and before they go to sleep. I haven't badmouthed their mother but eventually they'll realize on their own that she was the one who abandoned her family. She's also disconnected from her circle of friends in the neighborhood.

This is a bittersweet day for me. I don't know any of you personally but I've come to value your advice and 'friendship'. Thank you all.

keko

This should be a mandatory reading for every BS.

Did she gave up child custody or is she still local?

Either way Congrats!!

Count of Monte Cristo

Keko, we share custody but I'm the custodial parent. She moved to an apartment about four miles away and is still an integral part of the kids lives.

In fact, on Mondays and Wednesdays, she goes over to the house and cooks dinner for them.

We're by no means friends but we both have the kid's best interest.

Complexity

Congratulation Count! Hope everything works out for you and your kids. Who knows, you might meet your own Mercedes one day

StayingStrong

Let me speak a word of truth over you. You will not just survive this, you will overcome this. One day you will look back on this and your eyebrow will come down a little but you will be smiling.

YOU are unique, she did not make you that way, you were born that way.

You never had to be perfect, you did your best, you deserve better, now look at your new found freedom and go start living again.

Finally. This has been symbolic for me. Take your hands and pretend you are holding a book. Slam them together as hard as you can. Now set the book down.

Open your hands up before you again and begin writing a new story.

Jellybeans

Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life. May you be happy.

You should try something new this weekend (hobby, food, etc).

keko

Not that it matters much but is she with OM or lonely with 150k to waste?

Count of Monte Cristo

Complexity, thanks. I know there are a lot of great women out there and one day I'll find love again. Alas, I don't think I'll get married again but you never know -- I might become a dopamine addict and can't help myself.

Count of Monte Cristo

She's not with the OM. I think he broke up with her about six months before dday, which is when our relationship really started to go downhill.

He's got his own problems. When I found out about the affair, I went nuclear and sent over 200 pages of explicit communications between him and my ex to his wife, everyone at his workplace, and the PTA at his daughter's school.

He had a lawyer send me a letter requesting that I stop all such communications or else he would take legal action. Which is fine with me because I had already made my point.

But one day, while I'm sunning in the South of France, I'll fire off another salvo just to keep him honest.

TBT

Perfectly understandable that you're feeling a little blue as you witness the final end of your relationship,especially since it extends so far back in your lives.Personally,I still feel a very little touch of melancholy from time to time,because no matter what my ex did wrong,there were also times in our marriage that she helped me grow as a person.There were many good times and that I can't deny.

It's good to see you don't bad mouth your wife to your kids and like you said they do come to understand the circumstances with time.My son deals with this now and he has stayed out of contact with her in the last few years,though I know she continually reaches out to him.In my heart of hearts I hope they can heal this rift between them as I know how much she has and always will love him.

Anyway,I just thought I'd post because it got me to remembering
and I certainly wish you well in the next chapter of your life.Take care.

__________________
"Truth is like the sun,you can shut it out for a time,but it ain't going away"-Elvis

SprucHub

Congratulations on being freed from the Chateau d'If. You'll find your Haydee soon enough.

Godspeed!

happyman64

Count,

You have so much to offer to so many people:

-Great advice to us lost souls on TAM.

-A great man looking for a great woman with the same core values!

-A ready made family for a woman that loves children!

-A kick butt house that will be your new woman's castle!

-A wise man that has not only survived one of the worst betrayal's by a long time friend but has come out of the other side realizing what a great father he is with beautiful children he has as his true treasures!

You will find love, happiness and family again!

After all, you are the Count!!!!

Keep moving forward my man.

HM64

PS
The karma bus is out looking for your XWW as I write this.

Count of Monte Cristo

TBT, thank you for sharing your insight.

There were definitely more good times than bad ones. However, the bad times are ginormous in comparison, which might lessen over time. If I had to come up with a mathematical equation for this, it would look like:

BAD>GOOD GOOD GOOD GOOD GOOD GOOD GOOD GOOD

Lifescript

Congratulations. Feel good that you got to keep the kids. I've heard of men whose wife cheated and they still got to keep the kids and get away with a lot more then $150,000 although that's a lot too. It's normal to feel this way but it will pass.

bandit.45

Count,

Your ex-wife is a coward of the lowest class...

My mom walked out on my dad and my little sister and I when I was 6. She left my dad for another man. I never saw her again, and today, 39 years later, she has passed completely beyond my ken.

As a kid I blamed myself wondering what I had done wrong to make her want to leave. My dad had no idea how to deal with it, since he was an old-school cowboy who kept everything bottled up inside himself. My sister and I never had a chance to talk about the abandonement and process our grief.

Then as I got older, that self blame turned outwards and I became a mean, angry juvenile delinquent. I stole, fought, vandalised and when I was fifteen the Juvenile judge was getting ready to send me to juvenile DOC if I didn't straighten up my act. My dad intervened and threatened to send me to military school, and that woke me up and put me back on the straight and narrow.

But I never did deal with the abandonment, and now today it has taken an enormous toll on my psyche and my health.

If you do anything, please get your kids into grief counseling. They take blame onto themselves than you know, and I guarantee you they are hurting more than you realize.

Congratulations on your divorce by the way.