If you've been divorced, how did you live through the time you decided to divorce until it was finalized?

It sounds like she is being either unfair or naive or both. It was very painful for me when my husband announced he was moving out and even though my life is much better now, I am still hurt and angry. We didn’t yell and scream or anything – we were very civilized throughout – but we are not an intact family anymore nor did we have sex after we split. He moved out about three weeks after he told me he wanted to at my prompting that “the sooner the better” once he was planning to move. We have been more and less cordial over the years as things have happened but we’re not one big happy family.

I agree with @janbb

When I knew things were over in my marriage I just wanted it to BE over. No way would I have had any desire to still hang out with my ex, have sex with him on a casual basis or anything beyond the necessity of functional co-parenting. This women sounds manipulative and extremely insensitive to what her spouse may be feeling. It’s one thing to split on good terms but those terms don’t include still remaining sexually involved or hanging out like you’re still a couple.

She’s not one for sensitivity and empathy, I’ll give you that. She’s divorcing him because according to her, he’s insanely jealous and controlling. He did it one time too many and finally said that she was too close to one of her male friends. A therapist agreed and said she had to end the friendship to save her marriage. She refused. She said there was nothing to be jealous of.

What she doesn’t know is that I took my dad out to lunch and I saw her with this exact guy she’s talking about. We were at the very next table. If my dad had leaned his head back, he would have smacked into the back of her head. I have no idea how she didn’t notice us, but I stayed hidden because I was shocked at what I saw. I thought they were on a date together. They were very flirty with each other. Maybe her husband was insanely jealous for no reason in the past, but I thought he had good reason to be jealous of this guy. It’s been driving me crazy the last few weeks knowing this about her and then hearing her say that her husband is being unreasonable because he’s not being warm and affectionate to her while she’s still in the house.

I don’t think he’d be a guy I’d want to be married to. He’s not the perfect husband by a long shot. But I feel really sorry for him. Even when I hear her side of things, I just feel bad for the guy.

Your details say that the wife is wanting more family outings, hugs, and sex.

Your post says, “She’s not one for sensitivity and empathy”.

Reconcile the couple or the posts?

@ibstubro she didn’t want the divorce because she wanted those things and wasn’t getting them. She had plenty of all that before she asked for a divorce.

She still wants all of the stuff she had before she stated that she wants a divorce and she doesn’t have any understanding that people get angry and resentful when you divorce them. They don’t want to go to the movies and hang out or have sex with someone whose just dumped them. You can’t just tell your husband “hey, I want a divorce…so can we go out for pizza tonight?”

It’s not bad to want those things, but if you initiate a divorce, I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect the other person to be totally casual about it and for the two of you to continue everything you did while you were married.

This is what she wants and it tells me she lacks empathy for her husband, because she says she has no idea why he doesn’t want to still do everything they used to do before she said that she wanted to leave. How could you not get that? Why would someone want to go do fun stuff and be snuggly with someone who has dumped them?

Did she say why she wants the divorce?

I don’t think anyone is going to contradict you here… her expectations are completely bizarre.

Edit: Sorry, @keobooks, I only just read your post about her reasons. It sounds to me as if she thought asking for a divorce would make her husband change her behaviour, maybe “fight for her” or something. If so, it’s an incredibly childish, unrealistic move. Or one pulled from the script of a romantic comedy.

Amazing she chose her friendship with the other guy over her marriage.

She said her husband was too jealous of all her friends and wanted her to end a friendship with one particular guy because their friendship made him uncomfortable. She refused. I know it’s tough to be in a relationship with someone who is always jealous. I would have sympathy except that I saw her with him, and I thought she was on a date because they were very flirty with each other.

The reason she said that she wants a divorce is because he’s always jealous and she doesn’t get to see her friends very often. That’s it.

They went to a councillor for years (not because of trouble. She says it was preventative medicine) and her councillor said the relationship with the friend was going to destroy the marriage and told her that she needed to end it. She said she was shocked because the councillor gave such excellent advice for all these years and suddenly turned on her for no good reason. She shrugged off the councillor’s reaction as being a personal religious hang up. I’m sure if I told her what I saw in the diner, she’d shrug it off somehow too.

She’s always been extremely stubborn and prides herself at never ever backing down. She will not back down on this. I’ve seen her in action and she will do anything to be right and get her way. I’ve many many stories I could tell about her going to extreme lengths to prove herself right—and even when there is glaring evidence against her, she’s still right. It’s just the way she is, there no way she’d even consider not seeing this guy, because that would mean that she was wrong about something.

Obviously she is ego driven, insecure deep down and grossly immature. He’s better off without her anyway. Gah…nothing worse than stubborn pride, many a relationship fails over this, when “winning” and being “right” takes precedence over relationships.

She sounds like a faux cliff hanger to me. She is clinging to life with one hand, and grabs for a branch with the other. The branch is no good and gives way. The woman still claws at the same spot like crazy, even though her friends are right there shouting at her that she is only three feet from solid ground, and to just let go. She thinks she needs that branch to save her life, but what she needs to do is just let go.

That chick be crazy.

She doesn’t want a divorce. I’m not sure what it is she is after… perhaps her cake and eat it too. If she wants to do this, then he needs to walk and not fall into her trap of ‘ex with benefits’.

She wants to have an affair (if she isn’t already) with the ‘friend’ their marriage counselor told her to break it off with. I hope the husband has enough self respect to walk away unless she wakes the hell up.

We were separated, and living in different places when the final decision was made. Ours was an amicable divorce, so that made things easier.

You know what I’m thinking of? There are times on here when some people (not this thread, not these people necessarily) will adamantly defend a married person’s friendship and hanging out with someone of the opposite sex. They seem to find it highly offensive, just the thought that it might be inappropriate or cause for dissension. I will try to find links later.

Is anyone being a friend to the husband? Often men don’t have good support and it looks like he could use some. I hope he is at least getting some help from the counselor. Wifey should be made to move out soon.

My Ex and I did some family get togethers when the kids were in town and it was weird but ok but since he has been with and married his current wife in a very public wedding and has step-children, I am much more inclined to keep separate. My kids are adult children who live at a distance though. We have gotten together at times and talked but I am less inclined to do that since he has a new family.

Under no circumstances should the husband move out of the house. Neither should he date or do anything that could throw the onus on him. ASAP he needs to secretly take one day off from work and do what needs to be done to every credit card, bank account, 401k, life insurance policy, passwords, etc. This needs to be done swiftly and decisively with absolutely no warning or tipping of the hand.
That evening he can offer to let her sleep somewhere else – perhaps with her boyfriend.
(Note: If she does the bills she might have already done it.)

He does not want the divorce but clearly the approach he is taking is not working. Taking back control of his own life might. Either way he will feel much better about himself .

@LuckyGuy Divorce is generally “no fault” these days and they will probably be sharing finances in some way until the divorce is final. Some of your advice seems a little draconian if there isn’t a suggestion of malice. What he should do is consult a divorce lawyer about what he should be doing now.

I’m not a lawyer (and I never played one in high school) but I think protecting one’s finances is never bad advice. The couple may be on friendly terms now but that could change in a heartbeat. Then it’s each man for himself and that may result in each taking money and justifying it (“I make more,” “I put the down payment on the house from my dad’s wedding gift,”“I supported him through medical school,” He wouldn’t have that job if my cousin’s husband didn’t hire him.”). Not that those things are definitely going to happen, but better safe than sorry.

@jca I think it is best to get advice from a lawyer before doing anything is what I am saying. Thier finances will be joined in some way until the divorce is settled and assets such as 401Ks are split according to a formula so it makes sense not to jump the gun before getting advice.

@janbb I had a friend who was cleaned out by his wife. That ws the maneuver she used. The guy was totally blindsided. His wife had a boyfriend she met in the church choir (Really!). They had been dating and having sex for about a year. Since she was the stay-at-home parent , and the courts try to rule in favor of the children, he was forced to leave their home.
Eventually the finances were somewhat corrected by the courts but that took years and was one more indignity he suffered through no fault of his own.
For his own self respect he needs to do something rather than be pushed around by his (ex)wife.

I agree that he does need to start taking action. Each case is different of course but he does need to protect himself.

In CA. it is all no fault and affairs have zero bearing on the outcome of a divorce. Everything is split 50/50 and any spousal support is based on a formula taking both parties incomes into account.

@jca “There are times on here when some people (not this thread, not these people necessarily) will adamantly defend a married person’s friendship and hanging out with someone of the opposite sex.”

I’m one of those people, and I’ve been thinking about that in connection to this question, too. However, the question isn’t about whether or not she should have a friend outside of the marriage – it’s about whether her expectations of intimacy after demanding divorce are appropriate. Whatever the reason for her wanting a divorce, I think her expectations are ridiculous.

If you want my opinion about the friendship, I think she has every right to have a male friend while married, and every right to expect her husband to not be controlling. I don’t know whether @keobooks is correct that she was flirting with the friend. Sometimes friendliness can look like flirting; I’ve had people make the wrong observation about me in this respect, before. Only the woman and her friend know whether the friendship is appropriate or not. I don’t think anyone else should judge.

I’m all for everyone having friends of whatever gender they choose, and those who know me in real life know I’m not a prude by any standard of the imagination. Only the married people in question know the extent of the wife’s involvement with the male friend in this case, and what their parameters were about the friendship, but I trust @keobooks’ judgement when she says they were flirty with each other.

I don’t think there is anything wrong with being married and having male friends. Almost all my friends are male. Some of them are even old boyfriends. All of them are married, and that might make a difference. I’m also the least flirty person I know. Even when I flirt, nobody can tell.

I do think it’s significant that she’s had this therapist for years who defended her having male friendships and took exception to this particular one. She seemed to have no issue in the past with the other male friends. But this time she took notice. That combined with what I saw, it’s just something I think she needs to take more seriously.

Anyway, I only mentioned it because people wanted to know why she wanted a divorce. I do, however have several non related examples I could give of her being very unreasonable and demanding things that the other person had no obligation whatsoever to give. This is just one.

Once she bought something at Amazon and returned it. She got her money back for the item, but not for the shipping. Amazon refused to give her the money back, so she wrote to the postmaster. She wrote once a week every week for FIVE years. Every week she was told the post office had no responsibility to give ther the four dollars in shipping back. Finally, the postmaster cut her a personal check from his own personal checking account for four dollars and asked her to never contact him again. Five years of harassing this guy who had nothing to do with Amazon or its return policy—for four dollars. She was very proud of that moment.
——-

I just asked because when I was growing out, adults would move out of the house as soon as divorce was mentioned. I know that economics are tough these days and people have to live together during and sometimes even after the divorce because they can’t afford to physically separate. I thought maybe that caused people to be more civil during the transition. I had the feeling that sex was too much to ask for, but maybe people did go to movies and do family things in the meantime. I guess not, though.

I don’t know if anyone was interested in an update, but I found out she’s now living with her “friend” full time. I also found out she was texting him for months and the real reason the therapist asked her to stop seeing him was because at least once she called in sick for work but spent the day with the guy at the house. Her husband found out when he called her up to ask a question at work and they said she was sick. He went home to see what was going on and he was there. Hmmmmm.

I know there are two sides to every story, but even when I hear her side from her own mouth, she sounds awful. Her idea of “controlling” and “abusive” seems to be that she can’t do whatever she wants, whenever she wants.

She’s also all but abandoned her son, only seeing him once or twice a week for a few hours, and complaining when she’s “forced” to do it. (She happens to be the woman I mentioned in another question long ago, who used to constantly say that she never wanted kids at all and that she wished that she got an abortion. She didn’t mind saying this right in front of her son, either.) Anyway, out of the blue, she’s now demanding full custody and thinks her husband should have monitored visits. I hope to god this doesn’t happen. I’ve ALWAYS thought her words were cruel and demeaning to her son. I don’t think she wants him at all, except to be mean to her husband.

He’s not blameless. His biggest mistake was going into that marriage, most likely lying that he never wanted kids and hoping she changed her mind later on. The only reason she didn’t get an abortion was because he begged and cried when she made the appointment. I think if he’d been honest about wanting kids in the first place, none of this garbage ever would have happened.

She’s also the woman who shaves her cat that I mentioned in another question… Sorry to rant, but I am just fed up with this woman.

She souds like a nutjob. I would stay away from her and support the husband if you want to and are able.

She’s nuts. She wrote to me and justified her actions by saying God spoke to her through Tarot cards and told her to divorce her husband and run off with this guy. Considering she’s Christian and two of God’s least favorite things are divination and infidelity, I question her sanity.

Well when mumbo jumbo walks in the door, sense and reason fly out the window.

This is what I want to post on Facebook, but never will.

You may get a message from Tarot cards telling you to sin, but it’s not the voice of God. Who is it?

(I’m not Christian. I just am irked this super Christian lady claims God spoke to her through Tarot cards and told her to leave her husband for another guy. )

God told me to celebrate Labor Day weekend with some ice cream.