Has anyone been left by their (Ex)H, to bring up their DCs alone, and actually years later realised they are glad that he went?

[LineRunner]

That's it really.

After a couple of years on MN, I am realising that he might have done me a favour.

He was different towards me after we got married. (DD was just a few months old.) He encouraged me to drop my career. He had at least two affairs, one when I was 7 months pregnant with DS who was born prematurely. ExH is a fucking knob.

He told me he was leaving me as he was sitting on the sofa, and I said 'Pack a bag and go.' He did and has behaved ever since like I threw him out. (He went to OW #2.)

Yet he hates me.

I was meant to beg him to stay, right?

Otherwise I cannot make sense of the ten years of utter hatred he has expressed towards me, through at least five girlfriends/partners, that frankly I am now sick of, as the DCs have turned 15 and 17.

Nice wording there. - I feel terribly sad you won't agree with me... I bet he does.

"kofi " enough ??

REALLY Important day for ds

Stbxh has known since jan.

Said he wouldnt miss it for the world a week ago.

I haven't had ANY contact for a month

When I tried to raise subject of ds day and he RAN AWAY!!!

Dear catfourfeet (FULL name lol)

Please inform ds it is with regret that I will not be attending his (VERY special) celebration this coming week. I am truly sorry about the upset this may cause him but I feel that it would be inappropriate to attend this ( religious) celebration given our current circumstances: namely, that I am presently filing for a divorce and (given our last exchange) that my close proximity to yourself will only cause distress. I therefore cannot foresee any way in which my presence at the celebration could be a positive influence on his day.

I truly hope that his special day goes well. He will be in my thoughts.

Yours sincerely,

Stbxh

............

Catfourfeet - unbloodybelievable!

Similar received recently - DD was playing piano in front of whole school & parents assembly & desperately wanted him to come seeing as it was his day off anyway.

Text the night before, I have texted DD regarding her piano performance & she agrees that in view of the fact that she is only playing for 5 minutes it is not worth me attending. Charming!

fengirl1 I think my DCs are only recently realising 'how horrible he is' [my ExH obvs, not yours] and finally 'getting' that this is what I have had to put up with for 12 long years.

You should put a plaque up at that railway station. Possibly Kofi-based.

Sadly typical and reinforces what my friend was saying about 'service to self'. All they can do is think of cost benefit analysis in terms of themselves - its only five mins of piano to them but a much needed validation for their child. Tossers.

Exactly - just looking out into the crowd & seeing your parent's face is what matters to the child. That they are worth it & important to you. GRRR

May I add a couple of comments from one of the many ranty letters my Ex sent me?

"I will be unable to give DS a birthday present this year (DS was 5), as YOU have reported me to CSA and they are draining my bank account".

I was getting £4.50 a week at the time.

Or another classic - "I'm not "doing" Christmas presents this year as you have not invited me to lunch on the 25th".

I didn't invite him as he had left us for OW. But in his head that wasn't a reason not to come over and eat our food!

Another one - our DS was in a school play. Ex couldn't make the performance because he had a darts match.

Entitled narcissist springs to mind!

themidwife - you are spot on! I didn't know they existed until I joined MN!

I think the sum total of my ExH's birthday and Christmas presents to our DCs over 12 years probably amounts to less than he spends on his completely unnecessary motorbike in annual insurance.

Ex would spend vast amounts of our joint income on himself. On one occasion, he spent all the money I had saved to pay for nursery fees (so that I could work full-time) on a new cd/radio for HIS car!

He was unemployed for a time, but I couldn't trust him with DS. Just before my maternity leaved ended, I went into work for an afternoon for a catchup. Ex had left DS upstairs in our bedroom for the entire time. No bottles or a change of nappy. Looking back, I should have left him then.

The phrase "if you didn't laugh you'd cry" springs to mind here.

My XP is a slightly different brand of awful to a lot of the specimens described on here. He actually can't do enough for DS and turns up to all parents evenings, gets him lovely presents, takes him to activities and so forth. At this point I'm thinking you will all be rolling your eyes at me thinking I'm a complete fraud posting on here but bear with me.

I believe with XP that this a form of narciccism (sp?) I've always believed that he sees DS as an extension of himself, and me (you know, his actual mother) as an irritation that he has to put up with as I very inconveniently refused to go away and let him and OW bring up DS..I actually had to go to court to get residence of DS. The court reporter who dealt with him had him sussed and recommended that I had care of DS as he couldn't be trusted to put his (DS) welfare above his own needs.

By the way, despite his extravagant gifts to DS and constant activities, he pays a grand total of £55 per month maintenance and I had to fight to get even that. He is self employed (enough said).

*leave

:( OldRich - what a selfish bastard.

My ex wouldn't buy me an engagement ring because he said they were a waste of money (I know I know - I've grown since then!) but he spent £400 on ONE cymbal for himself.

My ExH has bought a very expensive drum kit.

The biggest red flag I now recognise in hindsight was when I was 26 weeks pregnant with our 1st child. I was coming home from work on the train, and barely made it home. I had started to become very unwell - visual disturbance, couldn't speak. I thought I was having a stroke. I made him take me to the GP, who said I was having a migraine and told my husband to take me home and give me 'plenty of TLC'.

I just knew - absolutely knew - that he (my ExH) would give me no TLC whatsoever and find the concept alien. I felt sad and a bit ashamed if I'm honest, looking back. That was 17 years ago.

ive only just found this thread, it made me laugh and cry!
my ex had an ow, i asked him to leave. he's not with her since ow informed me of the affair, he tried to overdose and was found in time, sent me threatening texts and emails, threatened numerous times to try suicide again.. refused to see dc, threatened to have my dad "beat up" to sort me out. at times he was lovely and i loved him so much and then others he was very nasty. i brought the lundy book and recognise so much in it..
anyway.. now tonight (4yrs on) weve had a disagreement as he text ti say hes on a course next week and cant collect ds from school and i have to sort it. i cant at short notice anf after a banter it transpired hes not on a course hes going away with his new ten years younger than him gf. i sent an angry message back and hes now refusing to see the dc ever again and i will have to get a childminder again. why do they do this!! its so frustrating. i still have to either do what he wants or i have no childcare to work. he pays no maintenace as he claims he cant afford to..and doesnt have them weekends.
he knows i cant get a childminder as ive gone through three in a year. (ds has adhd and the cm doesnt seem to be able to cope with him)
EX'S!!!! arghhhhhh

It is horrible when they play games over agreements to have time with their own children in order the bugger up your ability to hold down a job.

I have had this. He once turned up an hour late knowing I had a key meeting to attend for work. I asked him to at least drop me off near the office as it was on his way home, as clearly I couldn't call a cab until he had turned up to collect the DCs, and I was now very late. He and OW refused.

But his OW had recently rung me to say she thought I should 'earn more' so he could stop paying child support.

Surreal.

O god yes, massive red flag if they can't be nice to you when you are ill. Again, nothing in it for them, so why bother. I looked after my ex for three solid days when he had laser eye surgery. He sent me a card to say our relationship 'had passed its first test'. I can't remember a single nice thing he ever did when I was ill, just got grumpy about it.

Aaaaarrrrrgg. Why do we accept so little? Why does it tke so long to get wise? My mum never talked to me about stuff like this, is that part of the problem?

I am going to do a list for my daughter and MAKE her memorise it.

Things to watch out for
Is your partner kind to you?
Does your partner listen to you?
Does your partner make you feel safe?
Does your partner apologise when he/she makes a mistake?
Does your partner cook and clean?
Do you feel like your partner supports you?

It was a big fat 'no' to all of the above with my ex but the tragedy is, I knew that right from the start and didn't do anything about it for years.

Yes ashamed feelings here too. I knew but accepted it too.

Mine left me & I feel better off without him.

It has been really tough. I had to go back to work full time because he was so tight about maintenance and sometimes he has been so awkward about not sticking to contact arrangements I could cheerfully have dug his heart out with a spoon - but I am glad he left.

I am stronger, happier & know that the DCs have grown up in a much less stressful environment than they would have had if we'd stayed together.

themidwife there are worse things I feel ashamed about and while I know they were not my fault, they do hurt. I am so glad I am starting to face up to these things. For instance, I think it was vile of him, utterly vile, to have sex with me (I thought we were making love IYSWIM) the day before he left. Would I have consented if he'd told me the truth - 'I'm shagging someone else and leaving you and the DCs tomorrow'? Would I hell.

Things like that can really mess with your head if you think you are the only one. Thank god for all the lovely women who have come onto the thread.

linerunner I have the same thoughts over and over again about the 'last day' sex
sometimes I think I feel a bit ptsd about it -it's years ago now. Also I can totally relate to the not caring/not looking after you when you're ill, pregnant etc. I can remember my exh being really cross with me when I was quite ill, had an accident and hurt myself and several occasions like this I think I was too 'far in' at that stage and didn't know any better.

PostBellum I completely get where you are coming from. We have many happy times in our home that ExH would have prevented happening. There would have been no lie-ins, no clutter, no spontaneity allowed.

All of which makes me think his awkwardness over contact arrangements was very carefully orchestrated to cause me maximum disruption, despite the fact that my working was to keep a roof over our DC's heads not just mine.