When your relationship ends. - Page 11

I assume - having done zero research and possessing no legal knowledge or training - that  divorces have been made expensive and difficult for two reasons. First, in the name of "protecting the family" - giving people pause to end the marriage and possibly reconcile and patch things up. Second, because the courts and attorneys profit from it.

 

There's no workable way to do this in a free society, but my pipe dream is making being married more difficult (and expensive) and having kids even more so. Only people who really wanted to be married (and were able to endure red tape, premarital counseling, financial workshops, etc.) would do so. And suffice it to say that I find it a comic tragedy of cosmic proportions that you need a license to drive a moped, but any two idiots with working reproductive systems can have kids.

You don't need a license to drive a moped in SC; in fact they are the vehicle of choice for your DUI/suspended license types.

 

I am currently pushing over $3000 for a majority non-contested divorce that I didn't file for.  My ex and her attorney just don't show up to any court dates and it keeps getting pushed further and further back.  Apparently I have no say so in getting this thing ended.  I show up every single time and am the responsible party for the kids and everything else yet I keep getting the shaft on just having the paperwork approved.

Yeah, it does seem that people just would rather stay "estranged" and/or start up with someone else, rather than get the actual divorce due to the sizable cost. My brother in law is that way. Hates his wife, but neither has the money or the desire to fully go throughout with it. It's been several years now, and he's already been seeing someone else, and his estranged wife is alread working on baby #2 AFTER he left her. They've got one kid together, but I'm not championing him, as he had plenty of times to cut his losses beforehand, but he didn't. It is pretty funny hearing them argue over the phone when he's over. They argue like little kids it's hilarious.

On the more positive side, my brother's been married 4 times, divorced 3 times and he's still legally married to his 4th wife, but they've been separated for years, and he's been in a relationship with the nicest lady. He's even told me he wish he'd met her before. I think he's just waiting once his son turns 18 so he can finally get divorced, and that's not too long from now, but he's already told me he won't get married again. I told him that he's already been married four times. Nothing left to prove anymore. He's happy. That's what counts.

 

I agree so much.

 

Call me a fascist but there are about two dozen hoops missing from the process of getting married. And having children.

Hi, long time lurker (maybe 5 years) first time poster.

 

I've read this thread maybe 6 times through. Currently trying to understand what the fuck just happened to my relationship. My girlfriend of 3 years called me up a week ago and told me she just kissed a guy while drunk at a school thingy and that she wants to end it.

 

This is completely out of the blue. No warning, nothing. We just spent the few days before having fun together and she never let on that anything was wrong. 

 

She did not want to try to repair anything and didn't even give me a chance to try. We live together since 5 months ago and it has been (well I thought) going well.

 

I love her and my life just went out of the window. (it's a saying in my native language)

 

so.. not looking for advice, I'll be taking the good advice already posted here. I guess I just wanted to say thanks for the thread. It has kept me sane.

 

 

I don't know what hurts more, the betrayal or the fact she no longer wants to be my girlfriend. 

That is awful, Snerill. Must be heartbreaking. In the long run, though, sometimes a sudden, clean break is actually better than something long and drawn out. Not excusing her lack of talking to you - if you're sharing a home, she should have been willing to try and work on things. But maybe it being done will help you, rather than a long and drawn out break up phase.

 

Take care of yourself. Keep us posted.

thanks, yes I realize that a clean break is the best. I've been here before. What is different this time around is that it came so completely out of the blue. 

 

I'm afraid to fall into the whole "what did I do wrong" thinking pattern. And that scares me a little bit. 

 

anyways, thanks again to all the posters here. I feel I've come to know you alll a little bit and your stories have made me feel less alone. 

Best wishes to you, Sneril. What sucks is the fact that you're going to have to deal with one of you moving out...that'll draw this breakup out, unfortunately. Hope that works out for you.

today has been the first day that the breakup didn't occupy my mind the whole time. 

 

Maybe it has got to do with the fact that I got news today of a friend who is going through a much worse thing than I and it kind of put things in perspective and oddly enough I felt a little better. But still guttet for my friend. 

 

So, one day at a time, with a little help from my friends.

No specific break up to kvetch about, but this morning I'm just really down on relationships, love, and the prospects of ever finding someone that I can be genuinely crazy about, is available, and a decent, emotionally healthy person...ugh. "Astronomical" doesn't even begin to describe how big the odds feel to me.

 

Ugh.

Me too, man. The loneliness has been kinda bothersome lately. I mean, yeah, the occasional hook-up is nice, and otherwise I'm content being single and hanging out with my friends, but I'm starting to want someone to actually be around and do stuff with. That said, I don't want to fall into another relationship out of convenience or mild desperation like I did the last two times.

So hey, anybody else getting divorced tomorrow?  No?  Just me?  Okay.

Take care of yourself, Richard. I know it's not sneaking up on you, but having been through it, the actual moments in court can be brutal to your heart. Make sure you have some friends on call during the day, yes?

 

That sounds like some fuckery on her end and not yours.  She was looking for an out.  The fact that she didn't want a repair a drunken kiss situation speaks volumes.

 

Is this an event to be celebrated or mourned?

 

I've got the day off, and as it turns out, Maintenance is doing some work on my apartment, so I have an excuse to stay out of the house.

 

 

It's not what I wanted, but it's too far gone now to fix.  So regretful relief I guess is the operative word.

What a surreal experience.  Apparently "8:00am" means "whenever the judge feels like it."  It was strange watching the parade of other cases go in and out.  Then it was our turn, and I sat there as I listened to her pretty much fall on the sword, and I admit, part of me want to yell, "Stop!  This is stupid!"  But too much water under the bridge.  And then after, we went to breakfast and it was like nothing had happened.  Except everything had happened.  I feel okay, and feel kind of guilty for feeling okay, but really, this wasn't more than just an affirmation of what I've known for months.

Edited by Richard Dickson - 9/6/12 at 5:17pm

Well as little comfort as it probably is, at least it's done now, mate. Hang in there fella!

 

Holy shit... how long total?  I hit four years in July and She. Still. Refuses. To. Sign. The. Fucking. Papers.

We are about to get bumped off the docket and have to start at square one.

 

She moved out in January.  Filed in late July.  Really nothing to contest, so it was a quick process.

 

 

You can get a divorce without your spouse's consent.  Talk to your lawyer. 

 

Better yet, get a new lawyer.  

 

Once again: LISTEN TO HARLEY.

Yeah, out of the seven cases heard along with ours, only two had both spouses present.

 

The judges are the ones refusing to allow the paperwork to even come before the court.  She filed in January of 2011, we had a court date in March.  The day before her attorney rescheduled because he had to have emergency throat surgery for cancer he has had for years.  That bumped us to August.  They didn't show.  Judges gave him until November.  He didn't show.  Judges said give them another week.  They didn't answer the emails/phone calls/etc.  Finally signed the separation agreement in December.  Since then it has been a black hole of non-communication.  Several court dates have gone unattended and I keep getting told by the judges to allow them more time.

That sounds incredibly unfair, Tzu.  Surely your lawyer has some sort of legal recourse to get things done?  

 

At the bare minimum, I'd hope that all of this bullshit stonewalling on her part will strengthen your personal case when it finally does come up for resolution.

 

You're going to have to seek out options above your judges' heads.  If you want to light a fire under someone's ass, rat them out to their superiors.  Call your state's commission on judicial performance and DEMAND a meeting and an inquiry be made into this matter.  The word will get back to the judges and that should speed things along.

Just got off the phone with my paralegal.  They have hired a new attorney to take on the family court cases.  Friday they were in a meeting all day getting her up to speed on the cases they currently have.  When it came to mine she was shocked and recommended that we file a motion to allow me to move back to Atlanta based on several things.  One,  my ex having a live in boyfriend around the children in violation of the separation order.  My ex gets the kids ever other weekend and on her weekends they spend most of their time with her dad instead of her.  She barely sees them.  And the sheer amount of stalling that has gone on as some sort of indicator that she doesn't care about stabilizing things for the children.

 

I'm fucking spent.  My business is stalled and I am miserable not making any money and having to scrape by in this fucking town.  I was offered a job with a salary ten times what I am making here that I had to turn down because the courts probably wouldn't let me leave(paralegal says the last three cases they handled one was denied and the other two moved first and the courts gave them an option; move back or surrender custody) with my kids.

 

Apparently my ex's attorney isn't like this just with her the new attorney for my side says he has been treated this way by courts forever even before his throat cancer.

 

So, a meeting with my attorney and the new family court attorney is set for tomorrow and I have requested complaints be filed against my ex's attorney and if there is a 100% certainty that I would be able to leave and/or not suffer repercussions from requesting a move to Atlanta then I will be filing that motion.

 

NEVER AGAIN.  So sad that I will not be able to model a loving long term relationship in front of my kids.  I refuse to entertain the notion of ever marrying again and having to go through this bullshit once more.  And since my ex will parade men through their lives I have to have a clause that says no overnight guests of the opposite sex so I couldn't even settle down into a long term non-legally binding relationship.

Tzu: nothing but good wishes sent your way, man. Holy shit.

I have to share one humorous moment from my whole experience.  We were walking out of the court room, my ex in front of me trying to stifle tears, the deputy behind us showing us out.  The judge called to the deputy to send in the next case.  I'm sure it was a case as weighty in import to its participants as ours was to us, but hearing the judge say, "Send in the Trugotts!" is the last thing I expected to hear.  I damn near lost it.  All I could picture was this little gnome-like things called trugotts swarming into the court room to wreak general mischief.  Of course, I knew that if I walked out into the waiting area laughing, I'd have about a dozen strangers ready to help my ex toss me out the window, so I desperately turned it into this half-snort, half-cough thing that could have been interpreted as choking up, but boy was it a close thing.

 

I mentioned this to my ex once we were safely ensconced at breakfast and she thought it was hilarious.  Probably wouldn't have about half an hour prior, but timing is everything.

 

Seconded. I really hope your new legal team will get this shit cleared up for you.

 

 

Tragedy + time = comedy.

All this legal fuckery is why I will never, and I mean NEVER, get married.  Let's just fuck and be happy, okay honey?

Yup. I could find the absolute best woman in the world. Cartoon kritters could be showing up singing "Marry her, marry her!" Aint gonna happen.

Just found out that my friend's husband is leaving her after she just had their third child.  She didn't see it coming.  I'm really sad right now.

So.... too many irons in the fire I guess. 

 

Add on top of the divorce-that-will-never-be the current lass I have been seeing for the past year and a half.  I think I mentioned her in the dating thread.  Twelve years my junior with twin boys and a daughter of her own to my two boys.  Absolute blast to hang out with and many shared interests from a geek POV.  She has a housewife fetish thing which went very well with my general fuck-it-all laziness and blisteringly hot sex with a my-God-its-full-of-stars libido.

 

From day one she knew I was incapable of loving another person because of two past relationships.  She insisted that she didn't want more.  I let her fall in love, knew she was and continued on for more months than I should have.

 

We had a pregnancy scare which kinda brought a bunch into perspective for me(and her as well).  I cannot have another child at this point in my life.  She needs to finish college and absolutely cannot have one for that reason alone let alone others.

 

We agreed we cannot continue on and have decided in a not entirely mutual way to step back.  This was Friday night(I made her spend the night because I knew she wouldn't go home and would most likely "sleep" in her car crying all night) so obviously my weekend was shit.  We have continued to speak via text and chat all weekend and she is not doing well obviously.  She had been wanting a tattoo since we met two years ago and I had offered to pay for it the whole time.  Her sister was getting a new one and she decided to finally get hers so I sat with her while she got it Saturday night.

 

The scariest part for me is that I am sad off and on and miss her already but I feel so completely empty and black hearted as if to confirm my lost ability to feel for someone else in the way I felt for my ex wife and the rebound relationship that totally crushed my spirit.  I am scared that I truly cannot love again.  Maybe this is how it feels when you just aren't that into someone but I really do care for this young lady and want to remain friends with her.  But on the other hand I was promised forever twice and I don't believe anyone when they tell me they aren't my two exes.  I just "know" that something will bring them to the end of their rope with me years from now and I will be blindsided again with betrayal, desertion and loneliness. 

 

Several times in the last eight of these twenty months with her I have felt like letting my guard down with her; of giving her that part of me I promised never again to allow to be wounded.  I never quite could.  So many things swirled in my head, the age difference, my current unfit financial situation with respect to myself and two kids let alone three more and a college student, my current situation with hoping to persuade my ex-wife to allow me and our kids a move to Atlanta, etc.

 

So, fuck.

 

Also, Harley, I am saddened too for your friend.  It is never easy and even more so out of the blue.  Prayers and good thoughts her way.

Holy shit, this thread. Sympathies all around.

 

My family stuff this past week has only highlighted to me how happy I am to be an old divorced bastard. It can happen, people.

I wish I had better advice, and I wish I could say my experience was better. I will say this though, you have to be open to loving and being loved (I'm slightly ashamed I typed that), you just have to better prepared. After my split/divorce ensuing craziness, I did the same as you and figured I was better off not venturing into that territory again. After a while I worked out it's much better to be prepared, lay ground rules etc rather than be closed off and unreachable. You'll never have full filling relationships otherwise, long term or short term.
 

 

Serious question, is that different than what I said when I flat out told her I don't think I will ever love you back because I feel incapable of it?  And mind you this was before she decided to tell me she loved me several months in.

Doesn't sound like it to me.  You were honest about where you were emotionally and spelled it out in no uncertain terms.  That she chose to proceed indicated she understood that.

Yeah Tzu, what you did was infinitely better than bullshitting her. Don't beat yourself about it.

 

She's got a five-year-old boy, a three-year-old-boy, and a newborn girl to deal with on top of all of this.  She hasn't gotten into details with me, but I suspect that he wasn't happy playing family man anymore and decided to bolt.  Scares me because she says she's in actual physical pain over this, and I've never seen her this distraught.  We've all rallied around her, I've given her contacts to get into counseling, and a bunch of us have vowed to take the kids off her hands for a day of fun whenever she needs some alone time.  This just happened, so her head's still spinning, but I'm going to be there for her to support her and the kiddos. 

 

And to castrate this prick for abandoning his family.

 

There is too much cowardice in our world when it comes to the responsibility relationships put upon us.

 

I hope she never dealt with post-partum depression with her other two children.  If so, please keep the closest eye possible on her as another bout coupled with these developments could not be more dangerous.

 

I have seen situations like this, I also hope she wasn't a stay-at-home mom.  If she has been out of the workforce for 6+ years and is being left to fend for herself and her little ones then I wouldn't mind going all Fight Club on her husband with you.

 

My sympathies to everyone here. Nothing but the best wishes to you all.

 

This was my first thought when you mentioned physical pain.  Coming as close it seems to the birth of her third child, that's a gigantic emotional stew to be wading through.

She never had PPD, but we're still keeping eyes on her.  She's in a really bad place.

 

As a fellow man, I have to agree.

I cannot understand why a person would chose to leave their spouse at that exact moment at what happened with HQ's friend. Any person with any sense would recognize that a woman just given birth is going to be pretty sensitive. It's as if the spouse wanted to make sure his departure cut as deep as possible. Fucking heartless.

On behalf of my gender, Harley, I apologize for that guy being a fucking asshole. Bloody hell. How self-centered do you have to BE to pull shit like that?

 

Also, Jesus Christ, Tzu, Richard. All this divorce shit is making me wince in sympathy. And consider "You know what? Nice as having a girlfriend, and possibly a kid, would be, marriage is sounding like more of a hassle than anything else."

 

Though for our resident Jedi Master, it does sound like it went down in a more peaceful way than you imagined. Take care, Obi-Wan.

 

Now, I know good marriages exist. My parents have one; it is quite possibly the best I have ever seen. But for me? I just don't know.

 

Thank you for that. 

 

Now let me vent about this fucktard's latest move, shall I?  So, his father finally tracked him down.  Oh yes, that's right, HIS OWN FATHER hunted this asshole down and found him in a hotel because his own brother refused to let him stay with him after what's happened.  His father comes to my friend's house, so upset that he's shaking, but my friend was in no state to talk.  He talked to us instead.  This is a wonderful man who is absolutely heartbroken over what is happening, and barely stopped crying the entire time he was there.  He says that his son claims that he is tired of living for other people and taking care of other people, and that it's his time to take care of himself and do what he wants without answering to people.   

 

IT GETS EVEN BETTER 

 

Fucktard says he's made peace with the fact that he never wanted children, never should have had them, and no longer wants to deal with "the burden of them on his back anymore".  He wishes they weren't around so that it could be him and his wife, the way it used to be.  He wants to sign away his parental rights and thinks it's best for them if he no longer has contact with them.  It's best for his two sons, who seriously worship this man and look exactly like him, to be dropped like they are nothing.   It's best for his daughter to never get a shot at even knowing him.

 

I cannot believe this is happening.  To be honest, I had my misgivings about this marriage because they got hitched so young.  I never thought it would collapse like this, with children being crushed under the rubble.  Christ, Mini Mike asked me today when his dad was coming home.  I told him I didn't know, and he smiled, patted my head, said "Okay!", and ran off to play with his brother.  We have no clue how to tell these kids, or what to tell these kids.  I haven't talked to Jules yet about this, and I'm not sure if she knows what he said to his father.  I've gone from sad to enraged.  I don't want kids myself, so guess what?  I'm not having any.  It is beyond horrible to do this to her, to his children, and to everyone involved.  His family has vowed to stay involved and to help out in any way needed, but they shouldn't have to. These are HIS fucking children!!!!!

...my apology still stands. I seriously think the term "monster" applies to this man. I hope whatever divorce settlement Jules gets eats him alive financially.

He's not a monster. He's a weak, thin echo of a human being. 

 

What a horrible situation. The amount of damage he's doing is breathtaking and heartbreaking. 

 

Send in the Trugotts sounds like it could be my favorite Joe Meek song!

 

This thread makes me afraid to love. Even more so than all the fucked up things that have actually happened to me because of love (or what seemed like love at the time). Holy fuck. Sympathies to everyone.