Hypothetical question for the men and ladies...

[Lois]

You know what they say, "hell hath no fury ... "

[Els]

I don't understand what your gripe is about now, to be honest. Earlier in this thread you said you were willing to 'pay her more than most people would find fair' (and that is a lot!) because you wanted to at least make up for the fact that you changed your mind about this marriage through no fault of hers. Now it turns into a fight over the money and you're attempting to throw a blanket accusation at all divorce courts?

 

I don't know about whether your court's settlement was 'fair', but really, what else have you to offer to attempt to remedy what you have put this woman through? By your own admission, she was the 'perfect wife' to you, gave 100% to your relationship, did everything she could to make it work. You wishy-washied your way throughout the entire marriage, to the extent of cheating on her, then finally decided to call it quits after causing her years of heartbreak. Yes, it was your right to do so, and we all make mistakes, but any decent person would have offered the other person anything they could possibly do to make things right, IMO, for wasting all those years of their life and love. This wasn't a great relationship gone bad, where both parties had put in 100% and finally realized it just wasn't working. This was one-sided from the start and she had put in her 100% in exchange for nothing.

 

As for 'It's ironic how, when faced with the imminent prospects of divorce, everything revolves entirely around money and how much you can get from the other person.' - I think that your ex-wife finally moved into the Anger stage of dealing with things, after spending so much time in Grief. Not saying the way she expressed it was right, but I don't think anyone can blame her after reading your posts about your one-sided relationship.

 

If you had to do it all over again, I would suggest that you stay away from marriage, to be honest. Some people just aren't cut out for selfless commitment (which is perfectly okay as long as you are honest to yourself and anyone you get involved with about it), and I think you are one of them.

[Kelemvor]

I don't understand what your gripe is about now, to be honest. Earlier in this thread you said you were willing to 'pay her more than most people would find fair' (and that is a lot!) because you wanted to at least make up for the fact that you changed your mind about this marriage through no fault of hers. Now it turns into a fight over the money and you're attempting to throw a blanket accusation at all divorce courts?

 

I don't know about whether your court's settlement was 'fair', but really, what else have you to offer to attempt to remedy what you have put this woman through? By your own admission, she was the 'perfect wife' to you, gave 100% to your relationship, did everything she could to make it work. You wishy-washied your way throughout the entire marriage, to the extent of cheating on her, then finally decided to call it quits after causing her years of heartbreak. Yes, it was your right to do so, and we all make mistakes, but any decent person would have offered the other person anything they could possibly do to make things right, IMO, for wasting all those years of their life and love. This wasn't a great relationship gone bad, where both parties had put in 100% and finally realized it just wasn't working. This was one-sided from the start and she had put in her 100% in exchange for nothing.

 

As for 'It's ironic how, when faced with the imminent prospects of divorce, everything revolves entirely around money and how much you can get from the other person.' - I think that your ex-wife finally moved into the Anger stage of dealing with things, after spending so much time in Grief. Not saying the way she expressed it was right, but I don't think anyone can blame her after reading your posts about your one-sided relationship.

 

If you had to do it all over again, I would suggest that you stay away from marriage, to be honest. Some people just aren't cut out for selfless commitment (which is perfectly okay as long as you are honest to yourself and anyone you get involved with about it), and I think you are one of them.

 

Hehe, I should have known that would bring Elswyth leaping from the ring corner to save the poor, abused and battered ex-wife from the horrible ex-husband intent on destroying her. God forbid there are actually two people at fault in a failed marriage, right? IN SPITE of an affair! <gasp>

 

Elswyth, do you even work? How on earth you find the time to post so much on here, while attempting to maintain any semblance of relationship (assuming that you even have one...), while remaining productive within a career (please tell me you work?)... is a mystery to me. I'd recommend that you go back to the online video games that you seem to play all the time judging from your past posts. I'm sure they give you plenty of insight into real world relationships.

 

However, since we're on the topic... Please don't try to imply that divorce court is gender biased. Really? Divorce laws were put in place to protect women 50+ years ago from being destitute as they were not able to generate the income of a man and many times were with children and no skill set as they had been stay at home wives. You don't think many of those laws carry over from the past? When I have one of the top lawyers in the region telling me that the type of alimony is from a law from the 1800s when women were treated as cattle, and is a valid form of legal extortion... are you implying to know more about his trade than he does?

 

Yes, rehabilitative alimony for a fully able bodied woman to take care of herself financially is ridiculous. Also, two people's lives were wasted here for 2 years. Anyone that knew us, knew we were miserable from the start.

 

I'm happy to finally put it behind me and heal emotionally and spiritually from the horrible experience.

 

However, if you're the stay at home girlfriend/wife/mistress who is playing online video games all day long, addicted to relationship forums and posting well into the wee hours of the night/morning, then I'm entirely certain that you would find it extremely easy to sympathize with my dear ex wife.

[pinkie]

Sounds like a simple case of Karma to me

[Els]

Hehe, I should have known that would bring Elswyth leaping from the ring corner to save the poor, abused and battered ex-wife from the horrible ex-husband intent on destroying her. God forbid there are actually two people at fault in a failed marriage, right? IN SPITE of an affair! <gasp>

 

Elswyth, do you even work? How on earth you find the time to post so much on here, while attempting to maintain any semblance of relationship (assuming that you even have one...), while remaining productive within a career (please tell me you work?)... is a mystery to me. I'd recommend that you go back to the online video games that you seem to play all the time judging from your past posts. I'm sure they give you plenty of insight into real world relationships.

 

However, since we're on the topic... Please don't try to imply that divorce court is gender biased. Really? Divorce laws were put in place to protect women 50+ years ago from being destitute as they were not able to generate the income of a man and many times were with children and no skill set as they had been stay at home wives. You don't think many of those laws carry over from the past? When I have one of the top lawyers in the region telling me that the type of alimony is from a law from the 1800s when women were treated as cattle, and is a valid form of legal extortion... are you implying to know more about his trade than he does?

 

Yes, rehabilitative alimony for a fully able bodied woman to take care of herself financially is ridiculous. Also, two people's lives were wasted here for 2 years. Anyone that knew us, knew we were miserable from the start.

 

I'm happy to finally put it behind me and heal emotionally and spiritually from the horrible experience.

 

However, if you're the stay at home girlfriend/wife/mistress who is playing online video games all day long, addicted to relationship forums and posting well into the wee hours of the night/morning, then I'm entirely certain that you would find it extremely easy to sympathize with my dear ex wife.

 

Whoa, I gotta hand it to you, it isn't common for a thread-starter to derail his own thread with a post 90% filled with strawmen. Usually it's other people that do that. If our productivity or love lives are to be judged inversely by the amount of posts we have on LS, then why are you here at all? Surely you'd be more, ah, productive with 0 posts than with 90?

 

Regardless, if you are incapable of making an average of 4-5 posts a day on an online forum while maintaining a healthy career and relationship, don't pin it on me or attempt to use it to discredit my points. You know full well that I speak the truth, and it's reflected all over your OP. All your previous threads have started the same way: Talking about how into your relationship your wife is and how you aren't, then talking about her 'failings' in an attempt to justify that (which, so far as I have seen, include not being career-driven enough despite working and having 2 degrees, and not wanting to take your last name), then talking about your affair, and asking what people thought about you divorcing her. You generally get some responses that don't fall within the realm of what you're expecting, you pull a strawman on them, rinse and repeat.

 

The fact of the matter is that all your posts reek of narcissistic disregard for your wife and her investment in your relationship, and your lack of reciprocal love for her. You even managed to turn your wife's episodes of 'sobbing in a corner with tissues all around her' into a manipulative scheme designed to inconvenience you because 'you get frustrated and unhappy when you see tears'. Good lord, man, very few people can cry on cue if they're not trained actors, especially not like THAT.

 

So, frankly, I don't see why you're getting your panties in a bunch when people call it as it is: You treated her poorly because you led her on for years despite not being even half as invested in the relationship as she was. You were wrong to cheat on her, despite your constant defending of it. And now she's finally decided to turn the tables on the one-sided relationship that she was in, and to take you for what you're worth in parting. Was she right to abuse the divorce courts to do so? Probably not. Did you deserve it? Yes.

[Kelemvor]

Whoa, I gotta hand it to you, it isn't common for a thread-starter to derail his own thread with a post 90% filled with strawmen. Usually it's other people that do that. If our productivity or love lives are to be judged inversely by the amount of posts we have on LS, then why are you here at all? Surely you'd be more, ah, productive with 0 posts than with 90?

 

Regardless, if you are incapable of making an average of 4-5 posts a day on an online forum while maintaining a healthy career and relationship, don't pin it on me or attempt to use it to discredit my points. You know full well that I speak the truth, and it's reflected all over your OP. All your previous threads have started the same way: Talking about how into your relationship your wife is and how you aren't, then talking about her 'failings' in an attempt to justify that (which, so far as I have seen, include not being career-driven enough despite working and having 2 degrees, and not wanting to take your last name), then talking about your affair, and asking what people thought about you divorcing her. You generally get some responses that don't fall within the realm of what you're expecting, you pull a strawman on them, rinse and repeat.

 

The fact of the matter is that all your posts reek of narcissistic disregard for your wife and her investment in your relationship, and your lack of reciprocal love for her. You even managed to turn your wife's episodes of 'sobbing in a corner with tissues all around her' into a manipulative scheme designed to inconvenience you because 'you get frustrated and unhappy when you see tears'. Good lord, man, very few people can cry on cue if they're not trained actors, especially not like THAT.

 

So, frankly, I don't see why you're getting your panties in a bunch when people call it as it is: You treated her poorly because you led her on for years despite not being even half as invested in the relationship as she was. You were wrong to cheat on her, despite your constant defending of it. And now she's finally decided to turn the tables on the one-sided relationship that she was in, and to take you for what you're worth in parting. Was she right to abuse the divorce courts to do so? Probably not. Did you deserve it? Yes.

 

Elswyth, get a life, a job, or both. Anybody who has time yesterday to make 21 posts all day long and into the evening, needs some help. Also, quit posting your advice on marriages and divorces unless you've experienced one. You only have a boyfriend from your recent posts and I can see no indication that you have ever been married. If so, then go ahead and tell otherwise on here. Otherwise, you're providing your opinion on a subject matter of which you are woefully ignorant.

 

No, I can't post 4-5 posts on a relationship forum on a daily basis and be successful in my career. Then again, my career took 12 years of higher education.

[Els]

Elswyth, get a life, a job, or both. Anybody who has time yesterday to make 21 posts all day long and into the evening, needs some help. Also, quit posting your advice on marriages and divorces unless you've experienced one. You only have a boyfriend from your recent posts and I can see no indication that you have ever been married. If so, then go ahead and tell otherwise on here. Otherwise, you're providing your opinion on a subject matter of which you are woefully ignorant.

 

No, I can't post 4-5 posts on a relationship forum on a daily basis and be successful in my career. Then again, my career took 12 years of higher education.

 

Ouch, 21 posts (really? I should go and check that) during Christmas break takes so much time, I was virtually forced to eat in front of my computer. Perhaps that time would have been better spent cheating on my SO instead, or stalking the posts of someone who just posted on a thread that I started while making huge assumptions about them?

 

The only person on here who gives a **** about your career or your higher education is yourself, and perhaps the ex-wife whom you had no qualms about prioritizing it over. Even your strawman posts towards me tell us plenty about yourself: Someone who is unable to find any balance in his life between work, relationships, and personal hobbies, who defines himself by his career and expects everyone else to do the same. Someone who only knows, in response to having his faults and mistakes laid down in front of him, to blame-shift, accept no accountability, and make a pathetic attempt to make someone else look bad. I'm not the only person you've done it to in your stint here, and plenty of the others who have shared my viewpoint towards you have been *gasp!* married for far longer than you have.

 

But you're right on one point, my posts on this thread really have been a complete waste of time. Time to stop doing that. Good luck with your delusions of grandeur, my friend.

[Kelemvor]

Heh. Apparently, I hit a nerve. Truth can do that. Yes, your opinion is worthless on here so I'm glad you finally came to that realization. Perhaps you'll move along now. Maybe if you spend less time on here and more with your SO, he'll pop the big one and you can head to the altar for I'm guessing...the first time?

[Mr. Lucky]

Kelemvor, I do agree with some of the points you've made regarding divorce court and the need to put this behind both of you. But the defensive attack mode you've adopted with several LS members that have responded to your threads make me think that you're surprised that there's those that take issue with what you've done. Did you think that you were going to receive universal approbation for marrying a woman you weren't in love with and then cheating on her in the process? Because those are the facts, everything else you've posted here is just spin...

 

Mr. Lucky

[Kelemvor]

Kelemvor, I do agree with some of the points you've made regarding divorce court and the need to put this behind both of you. But the defensive attack mode you've adopted with several LS members that have responded to your threads make me think that you're surprised that there's those that take issue with what you've done. Did you think that you were going to receive universal approbation for marrying a woman you weren't in love with and then cheating on her in the process? Because those are the facts, everything else you've posted here is just spin...

 

Mr. Lucky

 

Several? I've posted 93 times since 2011.

 

I only have an issue with people being overtly critical on a marriage/divorce situation when they have never experienced either themselves. Do you routinely offer advice on how to handle situations of which you have no experience? I don't.

[Mr. Lucky]

Several? I've posted 93 times since 2011.

sev·er·al

 

/ˈsev(ə)rəl/

Adjective

More than two but not many

 

From you to Elswyth:

Heh. Apparently, I hit a nerve. Truth can do that. Yes, your opinion is worthless on here so I'm glad you finally came to that realization.

 

From you to Tojaz:

Some of you guys just seem to have nothing better to do than try to start an ongoing argument. I got a few replies on here that were valuable (and appreciate those), and now I'm done with it. Just drop the thread. Don't you all have something better to do today?

 

If there's a mod on here, just lock the thread already. Good grief.

 

From you to trippi1432:

lol.. I guess these posts cannot be avoided... Look, you don't know anything about me. Most people make defamatory and accusatory posts by projecting their own experiences or insight onto the other person.

 

So yes, several...

 

Mr. Lucky

[Kelemvor]

Wow, you have some free time don't you?

 

So, I disagreed with 3 people out of 93 posts? Is that what you're trying to say? I suppose you can construe that as "defense attack mode". I call it a disagreement. You're allowed a few of those in life, last time I checked.

 

Don't you have something better to do?

[trippi1432]

meg·a·lo·ma·nia noun \ˌme-gə-lō-ˈmā-nē-ə, -nyə\

Definition of MEGALOMANIA

 

1: a mania for great or grandiose performance

2: a delusional mental disorder that is marked by feelings of personal omnipotence and grandeur

 

It's not a simple disagreement when you disagree with anyone who's opinion is not your own and then go for a jugular vein in an effort to prove your point by pointing out the other person has more flaws than you to gain the upper hand. Pretty much, that is what you have been doing since you came back to this thread.

 

Simple, you were never into the marriage to begin with, she was. She found you out to not be the person she thought you were, yes, she was hurt. I would venture to say that the same coldness you present here is probably one you presented her with as well. It's not scorn, you got what you deserved when you set out to deceive in the first place. So take the lumps and quit blaming her, the courts and posters here who are pointing out the obvious.

 

You do have me on one thing Kelemvor, 2 years.....I only have 10 years post secondary education, but even I have the common sense not to argue with every opposing view. Something I do have, experience with someone very much like you for 15 years, and breath easier being divorced from it. If you don't understand that, go back and read the first sentence after the definition of Megolamania then wash, rinse, repeat.

[Kelemvor]

Trippi, I hope your personal and health issues improve.

 

This thread can die as far as I'm concerned.

[dreamingoftigers]

Too bad I missed this one... I feel for the wife.

 

I went through similar with my own husband. He was full-on right up until the wedding. Then that month he was weird about things.

 

3 years into the marriage was cheating.

 

Then disappearing etc etc etc.

 

Until it came time to end things, then it was all about saving our marriage/family and he started working out his attachment issues.

 

I hope OP starts working out his.

 

It should be a pretty big red flag to a person that they can live with someone as man and wife and within two years see nothing but division when the other person is expressing emotion. Plus, seeing them as having been 'economically compensated' as though that is a fair trade in any sense.

 

It should be a red flag to the individual themselves that they are not attaching normally to their mate and that maybe they have underlying issues.

[tojaz]

 

This thread can die as far as I'm concerned.

 

Yeah you've said that a number of times, its a shame someone resurrected it after lying dormant for 4 months..... Oh wait, that was you wasn't it?

 

TOJAZ