bethejoy

Our divorce is final. His girlfriend's divorce is still ongoing, however, so the repercussions are continuing. They hide their relationship for now, but when they're both legally free to move forward, I'm pretty sure I know who my kids' stepmom will be. ? My financial situation and emotional well-being have improved by leaps and bounds now that I am not being manipulated or taken advantage of by him anymore. I have primary custody, but with such young kids, we will be interacting for years to come. He makes co-parenting difficult and spreads lies about me. Life as a working, single mom of four is incredibly stressful and lonely. But I receive so many blessings for remaining faithful! I see God's hand in my daily life, buoying me up, teaching me, refining my testimony, helping me overcome my weaknesses. Though I have been utterly betrayed by the one who covenanted to love and support me, my heartache is lessened by hope in God's blessings. I have a long road ahead of me with heavy burdens to bear, but I know in Whom I have trusted.

That is so kind of you, @Jane_Doe. Right after my bishop informed me of the affair, I distinctly remember feeling strongly that I could not judge them because I didnt want to be guilty of unrighteous judgment myself. The gift of not completely falling apart through all this and having any kind of peace has come directly from God. He answers prayers and He has been teaching me every step of the way. I feel so blessed

Thanks for sharing your personal experience with this. It helps me think about this with a longer term perspective. Especially to think of the impact my actions now will have on my kids as they grow up and witness more of the consequences of their father's choices. If he turns around or starts making better choices, that will be great for my kids. And if he keeps going down this path, that's all the more reason they need me to be peaceful and healthy.

Again, these are great comments. Thanks for giving me good ideas for handling some of this. In terms of the suicidality, I have boundaries between us now. We only talk about the kids, so if he's verbalizing this threat still, it's with other people. I wouldn't know about it until after the fact. By the way, I think you were the first person who told me I needed to get a lawyer, Neurotypical, when I first posted at the beginning of this process. It took a few more months and five or six other people insisting I see a lawyer, including my bishop, before I finally realized the importance of it. Thank you for caring enough to start me thinking about that.

This is really good advice. Thank you for commenting. You're right, in the long term this will be much better for me and the kids. I can't invite the ex-in-laws over or anything. They live hundreds of miles away. I think I will just try to maintain friendly casual interactions. Someday they may ask, but until then it's probably a good idea to keep out of it.

Thanks for sharing your observations in a kind way. This seems very good advice. Now that we are no longer married I need to focus on my life and children and on moving on. While I honestly don't feel any anger toward her, I think your bigger point here is that this is not really any of my business any more. That's a freeing thought.

I have no intention of encouraging manipulation or force. Sometimes, I think if someone close to him that he respects can talk to him, it might help him open his eyes. No one that is close to him knows about this affair except my bishop and a few of my close friends. I can see how this really boils down to his agency, though, and you're probably right that I am being naive to think someone talking to him could make much of a difference at this point. My worries for the other woman being victimized in a similar fashion as I was, I guess, are misplaced. She's a grown woman making her own choices too. Thanks for your input.

I've posted my story here before but am in a new phase, facing new difficult decisions. I am divorced (it's only been final for two weeks). It took over eight months for the true reasons behind my ex-husband's insistence on the divorce to come out. I found out through my bishop that my ex is having an emotional affair that had, at least for a time, become physical. He also has a mood disorder and has determined that God told him to divorce me and that God wants his new love interest to divorce her husband as well (both affair partners have several children at home). I could do nothing to change his mind about divorcing me, but I took everyone's great advice and used an experienced lawyer to help me retain primary custody and I was awarded a minimal amount of child support (my income is greater than his). Now that I am divorced, I am trying to begin the healing process for myself, especially trying to work through the feelings of betrayal and rejection and the hurt of some of the nasty things he did and said during the divorce process. He continues to try to control and manipulate me, but I have a great bishop and a helpful therapist, so I am learning to set boundaries between us. So finally, on to my question. I have seen evidence of the manipulation and emotional abuse my ex is inflicting on the other woman (her husband found some emails between them and shared that with my bishop). Even though her family has tried to stage a couple of interventions to wake her up to the manipulation and control, she believes the "revelations from God" my ex is basing this whole affair on and for now at least is still pursuing a divorce from her husband, who sees her as tragically brainwashed and still wants to save the marriage. All of this seems fueled by my ex's mental illness, although in his day-to-day interactions at work and elsewhere he can play the part of a very friendly, generous and competent person. My ex's family knows he has a mood disorder, but they have believed his story that our divorce is just a result of me being very difficult to live with and emotionally abusive (wildly untrue). We have never been very close to his siblings (parents are not alive) as they are all very independent, so through this whole process I have not been in contact with any of them although one sister-in-law reached out briefly through text to say she knows how hard this must be and she hopes we can stay in touch. At this point, I am wondering if I should reach out to her and fill her in on the affair situation and the revelations he claims to have had. Her husband is a medical doctor and in a bishopric and they are a very active LDS family. My motivation would be to hopefully show them the truth behind what he's doing so they can try to help him see he needs to get professional help for the mental illness and encourage him to leave this other married woman alone. Should I reach out to my ex's family to at least try to help minimize the damage being done? My main reasons for not talking to his family before are 1) trying to make sure my own motives are pure and not fueled by vindictiveness or hurt and 2) I am concerned it could cause him to lash out more at me and further damage the co-parenting relationship I am trying to build with him. But he has been suicidal, too, and if her family succeeds in getting her to leave him, I believe it is a strong possibility he will hurt himself. I don't know what to do. This is my children's father and the repercussions of his choices and my decisions about how to respond to all of this will have lasting impact on everyone's lives.

Update: I finally received divorce papers this week. Also learned my husband has seduced the other woman and has convinced her she needs to get divorced (very sad because she also has several kids). I've got a good lawyer, but therapy and hindsight have helped me recognize I've been married to a controlling, manipulative narcissist and it has turned to a custody battle, I believe mainly because he doesn't want to pay me any child support. He cut me off financially. Luckily I have a job, but I've had to get help from the ward for food and bills and borrowed money from my parents to pay the lawyer. This is very difficult as I have to allow him to spend time with my kids but he is manipulating them as well. It will be months before we even see a judge and get some resolution.

I should clarify what I mean by emotional affair. He has been emailing this other woman and telling her he thinks they should be together sometime in the future, he talks to her about his philosophies on life and love, and he has gone to see her on at least one occasion (she lives an hour away). I do not have any evidence of them getting physical or even talking about those kinds of things. But he gave her chocolates on Valentine's Day and is secretive about their "friendship" (changed his passcode on his phone and closes his laptop whenever I come anywhere near).

Well, I just found out that he is having an emotional affair with a married woman. He doesn't know I know, but it's obvious he is justifying things and doesn't think he's done anything wrong. Thinks there's something sacred about their friendship, etc. More than my personal hurt at his willingness to transfer his emotional intimacy from me to her while still married, I am worried about his soul and where this kind of justification will lead him down that slippery slope. Confronting him about his actions would be very contentious I know, and I'm pretty certain since he already considers our marriage over, it's not likely he will care about the hurt it has caused or admit wrong-doing. So now, I'm just trying to decide if I should do anything with this information I have.

All our conversations about the divorce have included our mutual desire to remain connected as respectful co-parents. We have talked about custody and child support. I don't have any expectations that he will disappear completely. He's proven to be a very responsible adult all the years I have known him. He doesn't want to hash out anything connected with what went wrong in the marriage or how we might possibly fix it.

I am not sure if I am fully understanding your comment, letmeoff, but I'm certainly not trying to prove my spirituality to anyone, much less my husband. But I know that if we had focused more on spiritual things together, it would have definitely strengthened our love for one another. A hard learned lesson for me. I still love him, but he is choosing not to love me anymore. If we ultimately end up divorced, I have begun to recognize that I can eventually work toward a new marital relationship with someone else.

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who responded, both for your advice and the caring you have shown me. You have all given me good things to consider and I feel this is a safe place to work out some of my concerns. I am getting past the shock and grief of my husband's decision and am now functioning a little better. I am working hard on being a better wife and more in tune with the Spirit. And realizing that whether or not he goes through with the divorce, Christ can still make me whole and I will be the better for staying true to my covenants and trying to be loving and as Christlike as possible. This is the most trying and painful experience I have ever imagined I would have to go through, but as President Hinckley said, everything will work out. This week I have been trying to find ways to serve my husband and show him love, and I have been blessed with more peace and at least some positive interactions with my husband. Many, many times this week I have had to stop myself from desperately begging him to change his mind and take me back. I know that is not the way to fix this. I am working on being more emotionally strong and relying on the Lord instead of on my husband. We are supposed to have a talk tonight. I know he just wants to talk about logistics of getting the house ready to sell and preparing for the divorce (we're doing this on a weekly basis). Whenever I bring up that this is not what I want, he shuts down. I'm struggling with what to say to him in my very limited time I still have a chance to talk to him.

First, thank you for your kindness and your thoughtful advice. I have wanted to try marriage counseling at various times during our marriage, but he is against it. His dad was a marriage counselor and he doesn't have a lot of respect for him, so it's not something he believes could help. I don't see how I can "fight" him on this. He is very aware that I do not believe divorce is the answer, but this is a decision he has made and is determined to see through. When I bring up anything to do with staying together and working on the marriage, he shuts down. It is not healthy or productive. I love him and am working on showing him my love and commitment in other ways, but I feel that letting him go is part of that.