EX has told so many lies about me!

[Rainbowlights]

Hi this is my first post so I hope it’s okay to post this, just looking for a place to vent.

Ex and I split up last year after 35 years of marriage, he was having an affair.

He obviously told me he was trying to convince himself he was happy and could make it work! Although did ask me if there was anyway if we could make it work? I obviously told him no!

Ive found out he has been telling lies about me. He has said I got him into debt, I didn’t, he has said I have told the kids lies about him, I didn’t (thankfully kids are older and realise he is lying), I am a foster carer and the young persons who are with us have been with us for 10 years, they called him dad, he has told people I’ve prevented him from seeing them…..I didn’t, he told social work he didn’t want to be responsible for them, didn’t want to be classed as a foster carer anymore, and makes no effort whatsoever to have any contact with them, doesn’t get them anything for Christmas or birthdays.

I told his family he wasn’t paying enough maintenance for our youngest (he is self employed and pays way below what he should be paying as he earns in excess of 100k per year but takes it as dividends and pays himself the minimum wage to prevent paying tax), so now it’s “that fucking cow is trying to get more money out of me”.

I’m seething. I know I shouldn’t be but I’m seething.

Anyway, just on here to vent!!

Honestly, just let it go. While you are bothered, he has power over you.
Don’t let him.

It sucks. You just have to make your peace knowing people who know you well will know he is talking rubbish. Those that believe him are not your concern. He is just trying to make himself feel better. It won't work. He still has to live with his decisions.

Thanks I know your right, I would love to tell him that but what would be the point, he will just laugh.

Im still trying to get over him, so that might be why there is still a reaction.

He is a fucking prick!! Am I allowed to say that on here?

Oh yes. You can use all the swear words you like. I had a few this week for my ex. Although it's been 5 years since we separated. He still manages to royally piss me off by yet again job hopping as soon as deductions are made by cms. I had hoped that him having had a new family now he would settle in a job.

It’s infuriating. I don’t know many men who actually pay what they should for their children. My ex earns a good wage, I have done everything for the kids for the last 7yrs whilst he’s worked overseas to further his career and make a lot of money in the process. He can’t bring himself to pay me regular maintenance. Why? Does he think I’m going to be going off having a great old time with his money? I told him enough was enough recently, he was helping me pay for the kids. So pay day he put £1000 in my account with ‘winter fuel’ written. It made me realise it’s all about control. Non committal, I don’t know if he will pay anymore. It made me furious, I wish he hadn’t given me any. Anyway needless to say I can pay for my own bloody winter fuel, I’ll spend it on what I want. Men, make me so angry. This is someone I’d have put my life on would always support his kids

I think letting go of difficult things we can’t change is important. But, I also think we can be too quick to tell each other to let something go, especially when it’s so fresh. Be angry! Be offended! Rage!

But, also know that he probably wants a reaction and also that he is a real coward - imagine hurting someone so badly, your own wife of so long no less, and then adding insult to injury by making up bullshit stories about them. It’s the actions of a coward and someone who can’t bear to be thought of badly - weak and pathetic.

One day you’ll see him that way and feel maybe mild pity. When you’re healed. Right now it’s a very active wound so it’s fine not to immediately let it go, you’re human and you are healing.

The man is a weak liar with no integrity. Remind yourself of that often. You’ll rise and be happy. Him, not so much.

It’s a pain in the arse when they act like this and there is nothing you can do. You eventually become immune to it.
My Ex doesn’t bother with maintenance at all. He doesn’t want his money spend on fancy takeaway coffees is what he has told me in the past. Obviously children cost nothing to raise and it’s just us women being money grabbing witches when we look for maintenance. 🙄

Absolutely INFURIATING.

My x executed a smear campaign about me after I left him so I know it's incredibly hard to just ''let it go''.

To try and manage the extent of your feelings I'd divide people in to two categories.

Lies told to people you couldn't care less if you never saw again.
Lies told to people whose good opinion you would like. So instantly that kind of halves the damage. I'd do nothing immediately but in time, see what the people you do care about think.

When people split up and their x delivers a character assassination, most people would read between the lines and think 'umm bits of this may be fiction''.

xx

My ex husband did exactly this, had an affair and left. Told everyone I'd got him into debt, I didn't even have a credit card at the time, never came to see the DCs and told everyone I was preventing him. I remember feeling really upset about it at the time, but then I realised the only people he was telling it too were people who didn't know me and had never met me, so what did I care what they thought. It really changed my feelings and perspective. His behaviour was so terrible that anyone who knew us both as a couple stepped away from him so he had to create a new identity with his new partner. Time passes so quickly and in time this will be just another story in your I was married to an arsehole story. Best of luck things do get easer and better

How are these ridiculous men always earning over 100k a year, what do they DO that they can hold down such an impressive job while clearly being horrible human beings...

There needs to be some sort of succinct leaflet handed out to fathers who grudge maintenance, to walk their tiny minds through what is fair.

The cost of raising children ought to be divided. But so many fathers think that if you have a bean left over at the end of the week then they do not need to give you money to treat yourself. This to me shows a really core belief that the cost of raising kids is women's.

How can men be allowed to delude themselves with this thinking, ie, if you're not absolutely starving and crawling along barefoot hoping that the electricity isn't going to be cut off that they are absolved of responsibility. Anything in your household that isn't bread, milk and teabags was extorted from him and he was fleeced. It is such a delusional mindset.

The issue for many is that the cost isn’t seen as something to be divided but to be borne entirely by men.

When does that happen

Sorry - but all the time. Women feel entitled over and above a “fair contribution” and don’t acknowledge they ought to be making a financial contribution at all. I know several mothers who married with the intent of being a SAHM and rather than accept that might have to change when the separate be hell bent on maintaining it. When the kids are at the other parents it’s seen as a well earned break, to indulge in whatever it is they like, whereas other parents have to work when they don’t have their kids.

I know some unsupported, single Mums who are amazing but I also know some total letches who think the world owes them something because they’ve given birth.

Works both ways.

My ExH is doing the same thing, he's telling people that I'm denying him access to his children and that I stole money from him. The kids are adults and the money is some savings that were always in my name.
It is upsetting and frustrating, but I don't think anyone who knows me would believe him.
Bizarrely, my ex is much better off financially than me but because I was a SAHM for a while when my kids were small he thinks that he'll get most of our assets in a divorce, including my savings, which are worth about 5% of his assets.

Thanks everyone, nice to come here to vent.

He has even told people I'm lazy and there is no reason why I shouldn't be out working when the kids are at school...I'm a foster carer and I'm not allowed to work until the foster children are 16, and he knows this.

I'm still waiting for the time when I no longer care, it's been 18 months and I still cry, not as much as in the beginning, but certainly every couple of weeks. This time of year is very hard.

My husband is trying to paint me as lazy too, even though we agreed that I'd be a SAHM for a while as he worked crazy hours. Then I worked part time until my youngest went to secondary school and I went back full time. I was also the main earner when we met first and supported us while he did the course that got him his well paying job.
It's very bizarre to have somebody try to re-write a huge chunk of your life. I think I can see why he's trying to persuade other people that he's really the victim but I can't fathom why he thinks he can gaslight me.

My ex left me for a 14 year old girl (he was 32)

he tells everyone I stopped him seeing his kids (I didn’t)

I got myself pregnant so he didn’t have to pay for them (um,ok)

he dragged me through the courts-after all legal aid is ‘free’ and put us through hell for two years-just because he could-he didn’t show up for contact but by dragging me through the courts showed he cared about ‘my’ children

I left him in debt (he left me with 8k of debts but ran up loads more,which of course was my fault)

it was all my fault he was sent to prison (I wasn’t the one drug dealing)

the girl got herself pregnant-nothing to do with him at all

I had another baby a 18 months after he left-I was the biggest slag ever

i moved house twice,it was to stop him having access to ‘my’ children-he never once knocked on my door to see them,all that mattered was keeping tabs on me

my son as a teenager wanted to buy a hat-he sold them-ds asked how much this hat was,and was spat at and told to ‘fuck off,I’m not buying it for you’ (at no point had ds even thought that-he just wanted to spend his pocket money)

he went on endless holidays but tried to tell the passport office not to issue us with passports so we couldn’t go away ourselves (failed on that one-they laughed at him,so he tried to take me back to court-he’d got wind that we where going away on a cheap holiday in the uk-he didn’t get far based on the fact he hadn’t bothered with them for 11 years)

he found out ‘my’ adult son has going to Spain on a lads holiday so rang the airport to tell them he had covid-he hadn’t-shame he got the wrong weeks and my son was back long before his phone call

he popped up at times,to tell me I was bringing ‘my’ children up wrong but he was dad of the year if you listened to him-even though I ‘stopped’ him seeing them and he didn’t pay a penny as ‘that bitch will spend it all on herself’

i moved away from my home town a few years ago (which kills him as he doesn’t know where I am) and the day I left,I saw him-he was screaming at me that I’d spent all ‘his money’ on myself-he’s never paid a penny but it made his point that strangers heard him and judged me

sod the fact that he’s never paid a penny-I have always ignored him-he has no hold over me and he knows it

oh and he wonders why they don’t want to know him-I’ve turned ‘his’ kids against him-his family peddle that to anyone who will listen

I have never thought about it like this before, but I think your right many men think anything to do with kids is the woman’s responsibility. They are so brazen about it too.
How many times on MN do you see threads where it’s expected childcare comes out of woman’s salary and not paid by both.