I’ll start at the beginning. Me and my ex were together for almost 14 years… Have 2 kids. We’re both currently in our mid-30’s. In 2008, we bought a house together. Like all couples, we had our ups and downs. He had/has a long history of cheating. The relationship with me is the longest either of us have ever been in. And there were quite a few ’emotional’ affairs along the way and one full blown affair with another married coworker 3 or 4 years ago. I know. My fault for staying with him. Especially once I recently talked to a few of his other exes and found out he’d had the same patterns with them. When we first got together, he’d told me his last girlfriend left him broken hearted and cheated on him multiple times. I actually talked to her a few years back and found out it was he that cheated, and that she did leave him broken hearted because she was fed up with his lies and left him. Why did I stay with him this long? Why did I not leave him the first time it happened? I loved him. I believed his lies when he’d tell me it was the biggest mistake he’d ever made and it would never happen again and that he’d treat me the way I deserved and be the man he needed to be. I had so much invested in him… kids, a house, almost half of my entire life.
So it was easy for me to tell myself he really meant it this time. So, back to the present. He was working in a local hospital in radiology. It was a 2nd shift position. Rough on us, because I worked first shift. When an opening came up at a different site for first shift, we were thrilled. He took it. Eventually became manager of the department (and still is). Unbeknownst to me, there was another old married ***** that is the secretary in his department and he’d weaseled his way into. Non-stop texting for months before I even caught on. During that same exact time, I also found out he’d been in contact with the coworker he’d had affair with 3-4 years ago and begged her to leave her then fiancé for him. De she shot him down so he turned all of focus on the new *****. Of course, she fell for all of his lies. I know everything he was texting her was a lie because I read it. He wanted to paint this picture for her that showed poor, mistreated him trapped by horrible, psychotic me. And she bit, hook-line-and-sinker. While I still lived in my home, we got into a bad argument one night. The worst argument id ever had with him. And he was so hateful and mean. In front of his kids, which he’d NEVER done before. It made our youngest cry and it got so bad I had to lock me and my kids in a room to get away from him. That night I was so sick. Non-stop vomiting, could barely move, and so dehydrated. The next day I went to the ER. They thought I had severe food poisoning at first. But blood work had shown my sugar levels were sky high. I was admitted and left 3 days later with a brand new diagnosis of type 1 diabetes.
I was told by multiple doctors that the massive amounts of stress and how little I’d been eating and sleeping brought it on. I’d never in my life shown signs of diabetes and, as far as I knew, it doesn’t run in my family. I’m not even close to being overweight, probably underweight, if anything. Total life changer. I was devastated. While I was in the hospital, he was there by my side non stop and extremely supportive. I could tell it killed him to learn all of this. He made all these promises and swore to take care of me and help me adjust and be by my side the entire time. It all changed once I got back home. Once I got back home, it didn’t matter. I was having such a rough time. My sugar levels weren’t, and still aren’t, under control. They were still dangerously high and I was having such a hard time with everything. The doctor treating me after discharge told me the best thing I could do was eliminate as much stress as possible. De my ex went from saying he’d take care of me and crying and feeling like he’d been horrible to saying I did it all to myself and it was all my own fault. It was a kick to my gut when he told me that. But he finds a way to justify to himself anything and everything he’s done to me so he’s able to avoid feeling any guilt. And he absolutely believes whatever he tells himself to justify it all. I moved out the day (maybe a week after my hospital stay) that he withdrew $400 from our bill money in our joint bank acct in order to ‘treat’ the ***** to a night at the Hilton. Which was exactly what he’d done with the other coworker… same hotel, even. They couldn’t go to his house, because, duh, I was there with the kids. And they couldn’t go to her house because her husband and their 2 kids were there. Yes, she was and still is married.
So I packed as much as I could fit in my car, with my kids and our dog and moved in with my best friend and her family 2 hours away from everything we know. I want to mention that I have absolutely no family in Ohio. And my best and only friends house was the only place I had to go. After I left, he was ******, of course. He wanted to keep that whole ‘good man, perfect family’ image for his friends and family and wanted me to look the other way when it came to his extracurricular activities. For weeks, he played both sides. Telling her how absolutely psycho I was and not to contact me and feeding the same BS to me. You see, he knew if her and I did talk, his lies would come out in the open. And he didn’t want that to happen. He would text me and tell me what I wanted to hear and do the same thing with her. He’d find a way to reel me in and get me back to our house and say everything I wanted to hear and seem genuinely remorseful so that I’d sleep with him and stay under his control. And then he’d do the same with her. So that if one didn’t work out, he’d have another one to land on. It got old pretty quick. So I put up a wall between us and him. I took my kids there after a few weeks of none of us seeing him or having much contact with him. I do want my kids to have their dad in their lives. Immediately when I got there, he started in and reeled me right back in. He’s so good at manipulating and such a perfect liar. I slept with him again. Stupid, I know. A few days later, I brought my kids back to drop them off with him again. When I moved out, I only took the bare necessities… Clothes, paperwork, my kids laptops and game consoles. I still had a ton of clothes and jewelry and books etc etc etc in the house. I walked into the kitchen and saw my hair brush on the counter. I grabbed it up and went to use it when I noticed long blonde hair in it. I pulled out these nasty over-dyed, fried, crusty blonde hairs from MY brush. I went upstairs to my bedroom. Surprise surprise. Long blonde hair in MY bed on MY pillows. It’d be one thing if she didn’t know I’d just recently moved out or if all of my clothes and things were out of site but they weren’t. I have a stack of my girly sweaters on top of my dresser next to my bed! She knew. She knew it was my house… My bed… And my hair brush. He’s bald so he has no need for a brush. And she still used it. And slept in my bed in my house. What kind of person does that?? If it were me, even just the idea of it would make me feel gross and dirty.
Sleeping in another woman’s bed with her man and then using her things? I guess skanks just have no couth. I’d contacted her, too, telling her our history and what he’d been doing and how he’d been playing both sides. Everything. It didn’t make a difference. He just made up more lies and she believed him. Which was exactly what I told her would happen. A few weeks ago, I contacted her husband. He had absolutely no idea about any of this. He’d even asked her and she swore on her kids lives twice that there was no one else. All **** broke loose. And her husband told me she’s, to this day, trying to get him to reconcile with her and swearing up and down that everything that happened with my ex meant nothing and that she’d kicked him to the curb and that she’d even considered going to HR to file a complaint to get him to leave her alone. Probably all lies. They both lie so much that they’ve lost all grip on any type of reality. But in all honesty, they deserve each other. It might be all fun and exciting now, but once all that wears off, it’ll be nothing but distrust, lies, and accusations because they were both in committed relationships when it began.
And once a cheater, always a cheater. I hope they stay together for a long, long time. I was absolutely faithful to him for the entire relationship and it was still sheer ****. He made it so that I lost most of my friends, I never went out without him, and never even talked to other people aside from his friends and relatives. He wanted and got total control. And it’s what he’ll do with her. I just found excuse after excuse not to walk away. And it was the worst decision I’ve ever made. I can’t even imagine what it would have been like if I did have a history of cheating that he knew about. But I’ll get front row tickets to what it would have been like if I had because this ***** does. And, unfortunately, he’ll always be a part of my life at least a little because of our kids. I just wish I would’ve reached my limit years and years ago. Then maybe I wouldn’t be as destroyed as I am now.
