Roger fell out badly with his sisters when he moved us to the last farm.
It was awful. I loved his family so much. But I was loyal to him, and felt we lost them. It utterly broke my heart. I am sure it was a big part of my grief about the whole thing. His lack of communication about how he felt about the farm our kids were fourth generation on. His lack of care about my attachment and love of that property. His anger at my grief.
However, they’re all matey again now. And they love Trinket.
When his affair with her became an open thing, the younger of the two sisters and her husband were very sympathetic to me. They stayed at my/our house for Christmas, while Roger was Christmassing with his whore and the granny bras and knickers he bought for her.
At their mother’s funeral, just weeks before our physical separation, they insisted I sit with them with our kids in the family section. There were warm hugs and lots of banter.
I thought they were my family and I loved them very deeply.
It didn’t last.
Losing them, and knowing they accepted Trinket so very, very quickly, despite knowing she was a cheating whore, is another layer of deep grief I had to endure.
It shouldn’t have surprised me. His eldest sister was an affair partner who broke up a marriage. Her husband was a serial cheater with a young son when they started their affair. Their relationship/marriage didn’t last long. She was pregnant at their wedding, and their two kids are less than two years apart in age. He was kicked out (for cheating on her) before their youngest was even a year old.
The family had accepted him and turned a blind eye to the fact that their daughter has zero morals.
I don’t operate that way.
But I did love them, even through that awful, grief filled period where we were estranged. I missed my nieces and nephew very badly.
Knowing that for thirty-one years, I meant nothing to them has taken a lot to recover from. I get it. They are not my people, despite everything I did for them, all the love I felt for them.
I’ve got caught up in a cycle of toxic positivity lately.
Led by that whole, My Husband’s Affair Became the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me, discourse.
Ugh.
No.
No. It wasn’t. It was actually the worst thing.
And I’ve had a few other pretty bad things happen. I could list them for you, but that’s boring.
I have survived. I have rebuilt a new life.
But there’s deep, deep grief. An almost unbearable weight of loss. And I’m under enormous financial pressure because he halved our assets and halted our earning power at the highest earning part of life. Trying to clamber towards a comfortable-ish retirement eventually. I’ve bitten off a bit more than I can chew right now…
On Friday night, I had a stupid dream. Didn’t sleep much.
It was Trinket snuggling into my Normie saying, “oh Snookie Bear, you’ve lost a lot and your house and property getting buried in flood silt, is all my fault. If you hadn’t moved down here, chasing my sparkly pussy, you wouldn’t have had this awfulness happen. I’m so sorry.”
To which he replied, “No. Not at all. You’re the Best Thing That’s Ever Happened to Me. You saved me from the Evil Bitch Paula.”
I woke in agony. My broken heart was in so much pain.
And I recently – four days ago – stupidly, reached out to my oldest friend in the world. I wanted to ask a small favour. One that would benefit her immensely, too.
We can share memes, Snapchat bullshit, tag each other in light hearted crap.
But will she read or respond to a “serious” message from me when I always do for her?
Nope.
I know that she isn’t capable of being the friend I hoped she was. I accepted that a long, long time ago. And have been surprised at my hurt. Because I know who she is. So why expect her to be someone else???
I have had a very heartbreaking time with her and our “couple friends.” They just dumped me. Thirty and forty plus year friendships that I treasured, but they didn’t, have been, if not ended, severely disrupted. I really loved Rog’s best mate. But his understandable loyalty to his friend has meant that relationship is no longer. I miss him. But I get it. It’s disappointing. He was betrayed by his first wife, who I liked, but never spoke to for well over twenty years after she cheated on him and left him for her business partner and supposed friend’s husband. I was fiercely loyal to him.
None of these people were loyal to me. I put them to one side.
The author, Jen Hatmaker, has a close circle of longtime friends. They’re all coupled. She was lucky enough to “keep the friends” after her divorce in 2020. The only divorced person in her group. I loved this post.
And yearn for that.
Losing so many does make you appreciate the wonderful, loyal few, even more than ever. I am eternally grateful for a small handful of true friends who get it. Who were there for me after my cancer treatment. Who are fun, supportive, adventurous, and true.
But there isn’t one single couple pair that we spent time with as couples, bringing up kids, etc, who is still in my life. How fucked up is that? He cheats, abuses me, and lies for at least a decade, and it must have been my fault? It’s so weird.
But, that is the charm of Rog. I see that now. I see how I was lured in by his charm. How our friends are attracted to him.
How Trinket is blinded to who he is, what he has done.
I woke from a hyper real dream that I am just recovering from.
Do you ever have those dreams where you wake thinking it was all real? All facts?
Mine were bizarre.
One involved one of my former BFF’s brothers dying, us holding his funeral, then him coming back to life!
In another, I was stacking hay, and Roger was also there. (That wouldn’t happen at the moment. I have a subacromial bursitis of the shoulder. Bloody sore.)
As he was about to leave, he smiled and said to me, “Number three is on its way.”
We were getting along just fine. Laughing and joking. He told me I looked really good and had found my sparkle again.
And off he went.
Then, talking to Switzerland friends there, I realised his AP was pregnant.
And thought what??? We have three kids. How is this number three?
Turned out that his AP was a dark, Latin looking 29 year old. With a toddler.
Still no idea what number three meant! Can’t he count?
Weird.
Anyway, it took ten awake minutes for me to remember that his AP is actually a plain little late 50s redhead…(does he have a type???)
And the whole way our friends have treated this heartbreaking exit affair was highlighted. My longest and deepest friendship has been decimated.
She thinks Rog and Trinky-poo are just lovely. 🤢🤮
So I had to detach.
It has been utterly hellish. I lost my BFF as well as him and my whole life.
J was the person I drove to the morning after DDay. To talk. To find support as the worst night of my life had just smashed me to pieces. She knew how much I loved him. How utterly devastated and bereft I was. She was floored. Not Norm. Noooooo. Oh, Paula, WTAF. Shit!
Anyway, she is team NormandTrinky these days. Completely unaware, or uncaring, or whatthefuckever about what his actions did to me.
To find that your pain means nothing to people who you loved is just rubbing salt deeply into the very, very raw and painful wounds.
At the funeral I attended the other day, J was asking me all about Roger’s awful losses in the flood.
Like I would really know???
Clueless.
Why are we not all just jolly friends, where I sit and drink wine with the delightful Trinket???
Because, J, I HAD NO FUCKING IDEA WE WERE APPARENTLY SEPARATED when that cunt whore came and stole my fucking life. I pick me polkaed my little heart out those next seven months. We made the most insanely intense love. He told me he’d never have with her what we had. He fucking told me that one day we’d find our way back to each other. He knocked me unconscious over me calling him out about lying and bringing that whore into my home to fuck. He gave me diseases that caused cancer. That I faced surgery and radiotherapy alone, just weeks after he left me.
People have no idea of what he did to me.
Of course, that was just my inner monologue.
Instead, I sat there saying, “Yes, it’s truly terrible what has happened to him (hey it REALLY IS truly horrific. I have enormous empathy for what he has been through and is still facing.) Losing bloody everything.
But my lifetime bestie has lovely times with NormandTrinky. They’ve built a maimai on her farm. They’ve gone on tramping holidays together. They’re great buddies. She friended her on social media…so unbelievably fucking hurtful.
This experience of Switzerland friends was so unexpected. I’m the most loyal fucker you will ever meet. I assume that’s how people are.
They aren’t.
Even Rog used to say, “J, she’s pretty flaky about friendship.”
I knew. I just expected more of her. No idea why! She showed me who she is several times over the almost five decades I’ve known and loved her.
And this is sadly common in the chump experience. As one chump described,
“I actually confronted one of those people, a woman I considered a friend (I still do), and she cried. She said she didn’t know what to do. I will say that this friend has been one of the few that has actually been there for me since D-Day. Others who know treat me like I have the plague.”
Conversely, the odd person understands. One of Roger’s old schoolmates, C, who has remained friendly with me, asked if H (Roger’s best mate, whom I loved far better than a brother) talked to me at the funeral. I said, nah. And she shook her head. “That’s terrible, Paula. I’m so sorry.” I just replied, “He’s just loyal to his mate. I get it.” Mind you, C’s husband cheated on her over a decade ago. She gets it…
If it hadn’t happened to me, over and over, by “friends” being so disloyal and outright cruel, I wouldn’t have believed it was a thing.
And when I was reeling from Rog cheating again – this time with the cuntfaced whore, the trinket off the dating apps – she put the knife in deeper, and twisted it hard.
She and I had a difficult relationship. She first rubbed me up the wrong way when she and Rog had a moment, early on in her relationship with his mate.
She had lived with his brother for several years. When he discarded her, she set her sights on his brother. He was still married to his first cheating wife then. He didn’t know she was cheating yet.
But, this bitch gave him a BJ one night, in his kitchen. He was obviously in the wrong, but also pretty mortified at what they did.
Not long afterwards, he discovered his wife was cheating. They divorced. A clusterfuck all ’round. Ms Cheaterpants moved on in. I mean, literally. He never had a minute to heal or breathe. She was all over him.
He’s a lovely guy. But weak as all hell. There have been several times over their marriage when he admitted to Rog he would have divorced her, but 2 kids with wife #1 and 2 more with this bitch, and he just couldn’t face a second divorce.
Anyway. She butted heads with Rog at a function one night about a stupid thing. Something that she didn’t have her way. He didn’t want more children, and had been vasectomised. She tried to paint vasectomy as The Big Terrible Thing. And should be banned. And therefore was declaring (loudly and drunkenly, her default setting) that this should be illegal. FFS.
Rog had enough. And called her on it. “He doesn’t want more kids. He made a grown-up decision. You knew this about him when you pursued him. STFU.”
Anyway, I had Roger’s back. Many, many more such incidents occurred over the next 17 or so years. She’s pretty awful. Her close-knit in-laws, who tolerate her in public, call her Mrs Repeater (‘cos she drunkenly tells the same stories over and over) and roll their eyes about her. Her stepdaughter (my goddaughter) often confides in me about how inappropriate she is.
This bitch – who I know has a slow sex life – accused me of not being enough. Not sexy enough. Not enough sex. Not anything enough. That was why Roger kept cheating on me. Lift your game, Paula.
She was jealous of me for any success. So petty. Did not acknowledge anything I did well. But tried to tear me down in public. I learned to avoid and evade. I had a “policy” about her. I didn’t drink in her company (hence me being sober driver the night Leanne texted me about her affair with Rog – it was this bitch’s birthday.) I limited the time I engaged in conversation with her.
I’ve never done that with anyone else.
Ever.
At first, Rog thought I was baiting her. Doing something that caused her to react.
Then one night, he witnessed her in action. I was sober at some friends. She was drinking (lots. As usual.) And I used my tactics. Engage in pleasantries. Nod and smile. Move on.
She spent the night chasing me around our friends’ kitchen island. Trying to provoke me. It was weird! Eventually, after he warned her to cut it out several times (me not reacting), her husband physically restrained her and took her home. Rog was flabbergasted as I drove home. He saw it all play out. He saw how she targeted me. So weird.
Anyway. She blamed me when he cheated again.
She never offered any support, or even understanding, when he was caught cheating with Leanne. My downfall created such glee in her.
Pretty terrible person really.
And the first (only, I think) I deleted from my social media after he left me to run to his beige mouse.
Weirdly, she cornered BG at that party and told him she behaved very badly to me.
I had smiled and been polite when I saw her, but she has never apologised to me. So she knows. It isn’t ignorance that caused her behaviour. It was intentional and she acted with malice.
I’m good without her in my life anymore. One bonus of being discarded.
She remains close with my former BFF. Who knew what she did to me. Witnessed some terrible behaviour. Been on the receiving end of some of it at times. And is still her friend.
I spent years and oodles of emotional energy on this. The couples’ counsellor I eventually – years later – managed to finally drag Roger to, kept drilling into me that I am enough.
That my brain’s constant message, that none of me was enough (not thin enough, not clever enough, not rich enough, not pretty enough, not sexy enough…ad nauseum) was delivered by Roger’s actions. And were not the truth.
They can impress them by being nice to their kids. (Love bombing them. Cheering them on. Seeming invested in their futures – less so their own kids, or at least the ones who have seen the truth of who they really are.) Seeming to be thoughtful. Passionate. Kind. Generous. Etc. They can whisper sweet nothings, touch the new love in all the right places (both figuratively, and literally.)
We betrayed, have seen behind the curtain. The facade. The mask.
The new supply doesn’t have all the facts. And will never dig deep. Probably doesn’t care about what he did to someone else. How does that affect them?
After all, they won the prize.
Easy.
Walk away.
Start again.
With someone who is willing to engage with an already partnered person. So has the same low morals.
That’s a helpful place to start. They’ll never try to hold them accountable. They’ve already set the bar low.
Honest, loyal, faithful partners, who are working through previous betrayals, working on themselves, are just too much hard work. Better to cut and run.
And this time, don’t pick one with integrity, a brain, a heart.
Just pick the first one who is easy, and believes the bullshit.
Including the woe is me stories, and fake remorse.
I’ve just had something very painful happen. I may never share the details. Just that I am in a world of pain right now, and this is my safe space to acknowledge it.
I used to believe this, below
But, the reality is, he doesn’t care. Never did. It hurts so much. I loved SO HARD.
Life doesn’t work that way. No one cares that you gave it your all.
And that is me bleeding out the latest pain, in my safe space. Keeping my dignity and trying to rebuild my self worth.
She finished up our conversation (about some travel plans, when we can travel again, where will we go, etc) with a strange, leftfield parting comment. We hadn’t spoken about my relationship, etc at all.
“Paula, don’t worry. You’re doing great. I know you still love him. And you hurt. So much. But it will bite her on the bum. Her choosing a partnered man. His children tolerating her, but having zero respect for her – or bugger all for him, too. It will be playing on her mind. I guarantee it. I think she’s weak and lonely. You know Norm. He’s literally charmed the pants off her with his lies. Whisked in to rescue her. What a hero. She was just his exit plan. It’s sad.”
WTF?
Firstly, I corrected her. I don’t love this man. I do love the man I was with for thirty years, but he died. Is gone. You can’t find him anywhere in Trinket’s physical clone of him.
The man I loved cheated on me. Knew how badly he broke me.
Then the new one (or more likely, the unmasked one) did it again, after he witnessed my agony in healing myself from his stab wounds.
I just quietly said, “thanks hun. That is a really sweet thought. But I don’t believe that. He’s told her such a convincing story about me being an unloving bitch, that apparently cheating with her – and the dozens of other online women – was his only option. Having an honest discussion, leaving without having a new vagina lined up was just not possible, right?”
It does still hurt. She’s right there. But I accept that hurt will always play a part in my life. Acceptance starts to help you bear the almost unbearable weight of that pain.
I know it affects me still, yeah. I had my first … disagreement? …not even sure what to call it – with BG last night. And I know it just pushed all of my buttons. Made me feel unwanted. But I was aware what was running the operating system. My shit. I know I give “too much” so I immediately backed off. Radio silence. Just needed to think and not respond. Sadly, he took it as a slight. That he’d done something wrong. I woke at 3.30am to several messages. I was so exhausted from the pneumonia and two days at work, I fell asleep early. Now I do feel a bit sad he panicked. Distance is hard.
Anyway, we’ll iron out the kinks, I’m sure.
My friend was definitely buying into the fairytale that all cheaters and their APs have regrets. Or are doomed to fail, because of guilt.
Not so. I think some have regrets. But that doesn’t really affect them. Cool, bummer, wow, of sorts.
I can think of one long term married couple I know, 20ish years, started as an affair. He was married with two kids. I’ve heard him express his regrets. That it was a totally shit thing to do, to his wife who was living on the other side of the world from her family. Who’d followed him down here from Europe, their two tiny humans in tow. His current wife (who had been married, but was divorced when she met someone else’s husband, after having apparently been cheated on in her first marriage???) has confessed to me how she regrets the way they acted.
But hey, twenty years, another kid. 🤷♀️ Regrets don’t mean much.
I really don’t understand people who were cheated on by their husbands – this woman, Trinket – can do this to faithful, loving partners.
Chump Lady says it well, replying to a letter writer who confesses she made a play for a married man, after she was cheated on,
“Any consideration of his chump wife here? In our first paragraph, you want me to understand that you’ve been chumped by a cheater. And then you dish it out to someone else? This is where you lost me.”
My baby girl (22) messaged to ask if I was home. I told her I was at a staff do. She said no worries, was gonna come sleep with you. I just need cuddles.
We were nearly done, so I made my excuses, drove the 40 minutes home, let my doggos out of the house, fed them and popped them back in bed. I drove over to her city for cuddles.
This poor kid. She’s been struggling for a long time. We talked quietly until 1.30am.
I know it isn’t all about what Roger did to our family. I lived through the same stuff. It does fuck with your emotions, as a young adult, watching your apparently ‘so in love’ parents fall apart.
Well, the relationship and I did.
Roger was happier than a pig in mud.
Lord, that aches. Stabbing pains in my chest, remembering that utter agony.
There is other stuff that contributes to her poor mental health right now, too. But I am really very, very saddened that I don’t have anyone to share this with. Our baby girl is hurting, and at times, it scares me. She has admitted to the darkness causing suicidal thoughts. I can’t team up with her father. He isn’t great about poor mental health, really, anyway. This is a very, very worrying occurrence that I have to try to navigate alone. We used to be an unbeatable, unbreakable team 😭
As I drove over to her city, around 10.45pm, I wept gently. The times I fled our home to go sleep with her, in floods of tears on the way, pulling myself together as I hit the city’s outer boundary, after he knocked me out. D was scared for me. Scared her father was going to hurt me again/some more. She wanted me to move in with her, into her student flat. Sweet kid. I told her I was okay, not to worry. It was a one off. Ugh.
I wasn’t worried about physical pain. My emotional agony was far worse.
I can’t tell you how agonising it is to watch the man you have loved your whole life, with everything you have, loving someone else. It’s sheer torture.
I haven’t slept much. I drove home at 5am, and have spent the past two hours feeding stock, cleaning out the chicken coop, stacking silage bales, rearranging electric fences to try to capitalise on the drought breaking rain we’ve just received. All in the dark.
And as I work, I think. How can I help my girl better? I’m already paying for therapy. Which she says is helping. But her therapist is a bit overworked, and getting appointments seems to be a bit problematic. She still refuses to consider meds. She has taken a few steps back from some of the more harmful behaviours in the binge drinking culture that so many young people here normalise. I’m glad. We have talked about that. She agreed and seems to be trying to help herself.
We talked about getting away. She’s going camping with friends in a few weeks. She needs a little break from work (and study, she’s doing a graduate diploma while working, and the perfectionist she is, puts a lot of pressure on herself.) She said she’d love to go visit the friend I took out for breakfastin the southern city I was just in. I offered to shout her airfares to go visit. She feels guilty. I reiterated that I am happy to do that, that mental health is important.
I miss my mate. My partner. My other half. The person I made this human with. I miss feeling like he had my back.
Little did I know he was just searching for the perfect placement for the knife.
About loyalty. How those who can’t be arsed making a stand, turning up for friends when they’ve been severely betrayed, are apparently just clueless.
Nope.
They are actually just lazy. And curious.
Rubber neckers. Oooo. What did he trade her in for?
They don’t ever go, oh shit, that must be terrible. Imagine if my husband did that? Long term affair with a friend, in my children’s and my bed! Then pretended he loved me, while internet dating, and eventually throwing me away because he broke me. That must feel shitty. I can’t even imagine the utter heartbreak and unending disappointment. The feeling of failure.
I know! I’ll just make friends with the homewrecker! Woohoo! What a fun time all of this is!
I’m down south with my favourite barman. His organisation’s national conference.
I’m his plus one. Which worked out great. All expenses paid four day weekend here. My baby brother’s birthday was yesterday. He lives in this city. I (we) took him and his kids out for dinner. We worked out that this was the first birthday, his 49th, we had spent together since he was 12! WTF?
I bought him a wee cake to take to dinner
He’s been having a hell of a time, divorcing a narcissist. No cheating. But she had a new partner within a couple of months.
She’s an only child, brought up by a strong wāhine – her nana, who bullied her koro (grandfather) into submission.
She is a chip off the old block. Was always telling my brother what to do. And how to do it. I liked her, but saw this dynamic from the start.
He’s finding things a bit tough. His ex is uber manipulative, and pushes his buttons something awful. He vents to me regularly, to avoid reacting poorly. Yesterday he found out that his ex has cut his lunch. On learning he was planning on signing up to a martial arts class with their almost 11 year old, she has already signed him up.
With her new partner.
My bro is devastated. He can’t say anything to her, even gently. She twists it as him being uncooperative and the bad guy. Hey, I was just signing our kid up to a sport, what’s your problem?
I talked with BG. His cousin is the CEO of a national organisation that supports fathers who are struggling with coparenting well with mothers who are combative. He immediately sent Brendon, his cousin, a message. Asking him for some advice.
I’m blown away by this. BG immediately wanted to help my little brother. His cousin replied immediately, asking if he could call C. And sending information about support groups in this city.
What lovely men. They responded quickly, and with empathy.
C is touched. I asked him if we were interferring. Was this okay? He said it was awesome, and he’d love to talk to some loving dads who have dealt with this.
I’m kinda swooning.
Twice today, at this conference, old friends/colleagues of BG’s asked me if we were engaged. Then went on to sell him to me. Super great guy. Never understood why he’s been single forever, etc. You’re the first he’s brought to this. You’ve obviously managed to get through his armour. Can see he thinks the world of you.
Jesus! What?
I can certainly see the regard he is held in in this industry. Yesterday, he had three mentoring sessions with individual managers. He’s been constantly asked about innovative software packages, technologies he’s adopted, etc. I have been told before by others that he is considered at the top of this field. I could see that, in the size and scope of the operation he heads. But this is his native environment. His brain is on fire here. I listened yesterday as he mentored a team from near my previous home. It was pretty impressive, TBH.
But this chat about marriage. WTAF?
I don’t get it. It’s quite embarrassing! I haven’t told him about it. I feel quite cringey about it actually. I’ve never come across people who are so desperate to marry me off!
Then, at the Expo, hilariously, some food compliance IT system providers, one of them turned out to be women who previously worked with my brother, in another city! They both knew him, and spoke really highly of him. They asked after my bro once they worked out my relationship with him, knowing he was going through a very contentious divorce. Jen said she would call him, that they needed to catch up, that they had connected really well at their previous employment. A nicer guy she hadn’t met. Told me about some of their chats in cars, driving to jobs. And he knows his stuff, but is always keen to listen and learn. He sometimes still calls her for advice, etc.
He’s been very isolated here. His ex has turned mutual friends against him. And his best friends live up north. They’re great. They call him often, etc. But no mates to just hang out with when he’s feeling low.
I get that. Roger and I had a gang of mutual friends. Some were truly awful to me. And he had been the one to keep cheating on ME! I was totally gutted by that. But know it’s best not to be friends with people with such completely different value systems to my own. Lord it hurt so much, though! Still does.
Others are Switzerland friends. And I’ve learned to keep my distance, to not be around them too much, and to keep my mouth firmly closed. I don’t want disloyal people close in my life. I had a lying, cheating, disease infested partner for too damn long. That level of disloyalty and disregard for me did a number on me that I’ll never really fully recover from. It’s all pretty bad. But him snuggling me, calling me by all his pet names, swearing he had learned from his 18 month long affair with Leanne to never keep secrets again from me. Then me discovering the tens of thousands of text messages to other women for those two years prior to hitting the jackpot with the winning Trinket. He was just keeping me on the bench, in case he couldn’t find my replacement.
That does something to you. You never want to stand next to betrayal ever again. Not sure how you go from being the only person who gets him, the love of his life, his soul mate, his other half who completes him, to yesterday’s trash? In the blink of an eye. I was pushed off that pedestal.
I’m wagging conference duty today. A day of seminars. I’m gonna take my brother, niece and nephew exploring.
My heart is hurting today. I had terrible dreams again of Roger and myself. Happy and madly in love. Fucking stupid brain. I hate waking up to the reality. That he used, abuse, lied, cheated and discarded me. After thirty years of giving myself to him. That trauma bond. It’s a MOFO.
Tears are here again. Time to get up and wash that heartache away for another day.
Tearing at the Fabric 