Who are these woman that want to be with men who treat their exs and children poorly?

[Glitterbug21]

This is a question that had been pondering me for a while. My ex abused me and caused all kinds of problems and as a result his daughter who is 13 refuses to see him. His son who is 9 is barely interested either. The new gf was an affair partner who he moved into our home weeks after kicking me and the kids out. this was quite a while ago but I still get agro and my kids still feel the effects of these events.

now obviously the first person to blame here is the man, but my situation is not rare, and these men are often not short of girlfriends.

as a woman it baffles me how any one could see that behaviour and find that person attractive! I could never be with someone who could cause harm to their own children, yet it’s very common, but we never here from these woman?

literally just random thoughts on my behalf and I’m interes To hear what others think.

They will have been fed lies. In the story they've received you are the bad one. That's how they can live with themselves

I imagine many of them will be vulnerable to manipulation and believe the narrative a man feeds them, despite it often being obvious the man is full of shit.

This! It's hardly like they meet someone new and go "I must tell you, I'm an abusive lying cheat".

They act the exact same way they did with you at the start and as @MorrisZapp and others have said, you obviously saw something in him to have a home and children with him??

I think some are hoodwinked through inexperience or naivety of being spun a very good line but there are plenty who just don't care, like @LittleSeasideCottage said. Not acknowledging that is strange to me.

Sometimes they don't know, they've been strung a line, or they don't understand the scale of nastiness.

There are always two sides to a story, and it doesn't take much to mislead.

I think this is where love bombing comes in. These men likely treat the women very well initially, and with an abundance of women who still buy the his crazy wife / ex story over the two sides to everything approach.
So they find themselves with this faultless guy, who has a horrendous ex partner. And he’s different (he told her so), and she’s been treated bad in the past so she can see (thanks to love bombing) that he IS different to the others. Then, ultimately over time I’m sure they see things change but often not before he’s trapped her with a kid.

Cynical - yes. But honestly the theme I pick up on from these threads.

I agree. One of my relatives just got married to a man with DC. Apparently his ex is crazy, he left her and she’s bitter about it etc. etc. All this my relative told me, not him.

He love bombed my rellie and she thought he was great. They got married and at the wedding one of his friends wives told me that his ex was her friend and that he made her really unhappy and she was much happier with new partner and well rid of him.

1 year in and my relative is unhappy and I’ve witnessed him openly belittling her in front of everyone and reneging on any plans they had made.

Whilst many will be, there are those who aren't and seem just "blind" to all a bloke's failings and seem to fall for them warts n all, in the vane hope that they will "cure" them and turn them into a wonderful partner and parent.

I've known professional/successful women who certainly weren't "broken damaged women easily coercible and manipulable" who have fallen for a succession of "wrong uns".

For some women, it must be the thrill of the "bad boy" that they never grow out of, even in adult life.

It's not a case of not thinking for themselves, they are deceived by very clever manipulative liars. OP was in a relationship with him and had children with him, presumably she was taken in by him at the beginning? Men who abuse don't generally start out that way, they conceal their true nature until they have reeled in their latest victim.

I think many of these blokes actually believe it themselves when they always trot out the same lines blaming their previous wives, partners, mothers of their (often many) children, etc. They're so blinded to the reality that it's THEM who have the problem, attitude, etc., and not their various past women.

Like the bad drivers who give the "innocent" driver the abuse, two fingers, etc - they're so convinced in their own mind that they're right and the other person is wrong. They just have an inability too see it from any other point of view.

The fact that you may be successful in business does not immediately translate into being being intelligent from an emotional perspective. Those women that you are referring to belong to the same category I explained before: easily manipulable and gullible when it comes to relationships.

I think many of these blokes actually believe it themselves when they always trot out the same lines blaming their previous wives, partners, mothers of their (often many) children, etc. They're so blinded to the reality that it's THEM who have the problem, attitude, etc., and not their various past women.

This is definitely accurate with some men. My ex firmly believes he's very very hard done by.

He feels betrayed by his last ex fling. He misjudged her and bragged that he hadn't told CMS about his new job. He was made redundant in Covid so his payments went way down. He then never said a word when he got a new, very well paid, job. She was horrified and sent the two mums he was underpaying the details of his new job. They contacted CMS and his payments doubled.
He genuinely believes he was the one betrayed and let down in that scenario.

That’s so sad for the relative.

I think it’s a societal issue though. Women and young girls are objectified from such a young age, they are taught that the male gaze is the ultimate prize. And I think this makes them more vulnerable to the love bombing. You see women on here all the time saying they’ve met an otherwise perfect guy but he’s done [something wildly inappropriate and dump worthy] and they want to know what they should do. It’s sad that we aren’t raising women with the confidence to take a no shit attitude.

I always say you can tell a lot about a man by the way he talks about his ex.

I started a thread like this not too long ago in sheer frustration at my exBIL. @Resilience came on there as well and made some extremely useful points. Starting with:

Many of these women will not be under the impression that the man has deliberately chosen not to see his children and won't pay for them. They'll have fallen hook, line and sinker for the lies about crazy, manipulative exes. They'll believe that the costs and biases in the court system means the poor man will never win so there's no point trying. They'll believe that he does pay maintenance (if he lies outright) and that the ex is lying or that he wouldpay maintenance but she'd only spend it on handbags and nails so he doesn't... etc. It's often naive or wilfully ignorant, but IME it's rarely callous.

It's so true.

If you think back to the beginning of your relationship withyour ex, I bet he told you about his crazy/toxic/abusive/manipulative/controlling ex? And perhaps (this one does seem to happen more as they get older and does depend on type of abuse), he had more issues with work and it was always because of terrible colleagues/out to get him etc?

They are master manipulators. They are liars. And they often target people who are vulnerable to believing their shit.

I agree with this 100%. It's often true that it is "strong" woman who land up in these situations. In part because I think these same women can be very empathetic, they also often believe evry much in compromise but don't realise they're the ones doing all the compromising, they're competent and independent so they're USED to takeing on eeryone else's shit.

This is true, however the stark truth is that there are many, many women who are batshit and controlling and use their DC as pawns in a fight for control.

However obviously on MN this never happened, all men are evil and all no woman would of course ever do this.

I think these men will hide their true behaviour and abusive traits from any new partner. The women will realise it after they are in love or have children most of the time. I think that there are red flags but they refuse to see them though.

I have a single friend whose new "guy friend", potentially new date, is divorced from a "crazy manipulative woman" as he says. I told her to beware of any man to just label their ex in that way, most likely is a lie. He appears to be handsome and charming as per her words.

He will be telling them you are crazy. His mask will slip in time. They lie, that's what they do, and by the time the truth is out that poor next woman is too attached/impregnated/terrified to leave.

They have heard his version of events, not yours.

And DSC can be hard work. There are women who would not get involved with a man if he was actively involved with his DC. Some don’t want that.

Him not wanting to see his DC makes life easier for them.

The men who have genuinely batshit and controlling ex's are actually very easy to spot....

They're the ones where the man is telling his new GF how unhappy it makes him, she can see he's not lying becuase

• he's talking to solicitors and has gone through (or is going throughh) a court process
• he's contacting his children as much as he can,
• He's engaging with the school so that at least he can attend school plays and parent evenings etc.
• When he DOES have the DC, he's actively parenting them and not palming them off on her/ his parents etc. He knows what they like to eat, doesn't rely on McDonalds, makes sure they have clean clothes at his house etc.
• ALso when he DOES have the DC, he's not refusing to take them to their activities or school events or playdates.
• He's paying child maintenance, on time, every time. And, as necessary, also for the extras that children need.

The reason so many of us judge woman who fall for abusers' lies (I'm trying not to) is because it SHOULD be so easy to see through the lies.

I imagine what's going on in their head is something like 'he left them for me'. Not everyone is a nice person, and some people see others as a resource or a source of supply. You have trouble imagining that because you aren't like them.

Fuck knows. My ex is on wife number 6 now.
I am gobsmacked that women keep marrying him. Wife number 2 I could sort of understand, but what in the world was 4,5 and 6 thinking, going by his previous record.
Hes got 7 kid's at the last count, none that speak to him.
I'm sure all his ex wives are 'crazy and unstable ' which I get might work for wife number 2.
But surely wife number 6 can't believe that he has 5 ' crazy ' exes.

Friend married a man who hadn’t seen his kids for years. He contributed nothing to their lives. Nothing. Didn’t even attempt to see them. Didn’t bother her. He had a house.

For some (of the new) women there also seems to be a “laying claim” to the man by getting pregnant. By having his baby they feel more secure in the relationship. Even though he may well have just left his old family for them…….

OP- let me share my story. My biological father was a physical and psychological abuser. He left us when I was 8 months old and my sister 5 yo. We are not from the UK. My mother recalls walking down the street after they separated and he would walk on the other side of the road with his new gf, both of them making fun of mother, laughing at her that she's a single mother with 2 kids (that was late 70ies, in a more conservative country. They all lived in a big village, but everyone knew pretty much everyone). 6 months later this gf dumped him. Then he'd find another one, again this one would dump him after a while.

These were young women and he was a love bomber. Yet, they never stayed long with him as they saw the truth very quickly. He eventually married another single mum who, after a couple of years, kicked him out if her house.

He died at the age of 37 of a heart attack, as he had a very poor lifestyle, drinking and smoking. He was sad and alone and was found dead by the lake in our village. I do wonder if he had undiagnosed ND and needed help, not an excuse for his behaviour though. My sister has ASD.

These men are dysfunctional and I guess always blame the women for whatever happens in their relationship. They tend to be love bombers. I could never even contemplate dating someone who I knew treated their ex wife and children poorly.