The Lovefraud reader who posts as “Winifred” has written about dealing with her husband’s sociopathic ex-wife. Read “The Other Prey loving someone previously married to a sociopath” and “Survival tips when the ex is a sociopath.”
My husband’s ex sociopath wife and their 2 (now adult) children have been the focus of many of my writings to you and this site. I title this article “The Aftermath” because his youngest of the 2 children with her has just been emancipated at 19 by the state of Indiana, Thank God!
We are still facing 3 more years of college dealings with his ex, but the difficult, emotionally, mentally and physically tolling part is over ”¦ we hope!
My husband and I are now finding ourselves like 2 deer in the headlights, not quite knowing how to act or what to do with ourselves or our lives, as bizarre as that sounds!
Retreat and fight
We have spent the past 12 years in two modes his mode has been retreat, mine has been survival without both this would have been virtually impossible! When we are involved with a sociopath(his ex), we are in survival mode, emotions that we never knew we had kicked in, kinda like a mother removing a car off of her child.
We have spent our entire relationship staying one step ahead of his ex, merely to protect ourselves from being eaten alive, and now, all of the ammunition she used all of these years has come to a legal end.
Yes, his two children with her are now 19 and 24 and don’t speak to their father. She has brainwashed them and alienated them from him their entire lives, and now that they are adults, the damage is done and they see him as she has lived to portray him … a weak, non caring father.
Her lies to the court, her infidelities, her defrauding of churches, her fake terminal illness (I could go on for ever) have now become null and void; she cannot bankrupt us financially or emotionally anymore.
Backfire
The irony of the situation, if there is any, is that some of her actions backfired and actually benefited us. For example, she claims to be disabled and collects disability (yes she can even fool the govt.), but her disability was part of the reason my husband’s daughter can go to a private college paid in full.
His ex would have loved to nail us for 41K a year for college, but because she is “disabled,”their daughter gets a financial college tuition break, which is a catch 22 for the ex. She had to choose between continuing to get free govt. monies (SSI), or her daughter going the college of her choice. If the ex wanted to continue the disability lie, then her daughter got to attend a private college with govt assistance also.
The ex also has to keep taking certain meds for her disability, which disfigure her and blow her up like a balloon, but she’d sacrifice her looks to play the part of the VICTIM so people will feel sorry for her!
90% over
Now, it’s 90% over and we can sit back and take a breather. We went to court June 8th and only have to pay $174 monthly towards college ”¦ for “essential like tp and toothpaste etc ”¦ for 3 more years. But the money does not go to his ex ”¦ she now gets nothing from us financially, which has been her driving force.
She realized long ago that she couldn’t split us up, and that she was dealing with someone smarter and stronger than her when she had to deal with me, but now I am finding it difficult to switch mindsets, as I am sure my husband is also!
We have to retrain ourselves to live again, be happy again, and let go. I have spent 12 years in a defensive stance and now I have to relearn what it is like to live without constant drama and worry. Yes, the ex will still throw a punch now and then, but now that she cannot legally extract every dime we have, she has no other choice than to retreat and find others to victimize, lie to and take advantage of, God help them!
It is surreal, and new to us, this new found freedom ”¦.
Focus on us
As we take a huge breath, we now can focus on us, our lives. She is limited to the damage she can do for once, we can begin to live!
The road has taken its toll on us in different ways. My husband just sat back and let me fight the fight. His way of thinking was that the more drama you give his ex , the more she thrives, which is somewhat true. My way of thinking was that someone had to hold her at bay, and keep what dignity we had left. I refused to let her destroy us and it has taken its toll on me physically and mentally at times, but i came back stronger ”¦
It wasn’t easy! At first I went at her with all barrels, but quickly learned to choose my battles because there were so many, it was impossible to fight them all. I had to be clever, yet prompt.
Now, I am 53 and my husband is 65, and whatever life we have left on this earth will be lived without her, without her evilness. Learning to live without a sociopath to deal with 24/7 is an adjustment, I will say that, but we will heal slowly, we will smile again and enjoy what we have fought for ”¦ our love for one another and peace ”¦ something we haven’t had for over 12 years.
We will have many moments without the ex now, and our attention will be focused on each other and the people we love that are not evil liars and master manipulators ”¦ it will be on one another.
To all that fight this fight, there is an end, it just doesn’t ever come soon enough!
God Bless and thank you for you years of help.
Winifred
Winifred – thank you so much for sharing. I imagine that it will almost be a shock to your system – not having to be on total red alert all the time (only some of the time). I hope you and your husband are able to enjoy your new life.
Thank you Donna for removing that.
Winifred Thank you for sharing your experiences with us. It’s an exhausting journey. I want to apologize to you for me not stepping up to support you back a few months back. I hoped someone else would step in who was of the non evil gender. Of course I’m being rediculous here but I’m sure you get my point. What’s really amazing to me is how many women who seem to have pretty decent insight into this stuff as long as the subject is a male completely go off track when the abuser is a female. Hey most of the spathy people that I have dealt with are males. Yes. There are plenty out there. Having a spathy female beside me putting out her scent drew in several of the males that I then had to deal with. Most of them I already knew but had not been exploited by yet. It’s really the same with females. They don’t scowl and drule or wave a flag saying ” hey, did you know I’m really a social predator !? ” They play their character. They wear their mask. Females are generally much better at the social nuances than males. Female spaths are a whole different animal than males, just like the criminal sub type presents very differently than the corporate CEO or false front religious leader. If we choose to focus on the gender and not the behaviors and underlying motivations we can leave ourselves wide open to invite a world of trouble into our lives. I hope you and your husband can have some peace now. Please come back and visit and share your comments. Your perspective is valuable and can help open some eyes.
4Light2Shine
Female spaths use their children as pawns…..most of them cannot hold a job for very long and depend on their exes income for total support, if she gives up the children, the income goes out the door. My husband’s ex told him at 1st that “he could have the kids”, until she figured out she would have to pay him support and would have to pay house and car payments, then her story changed drastically! A lot of divorced people with “normal exes”, always say, “oh the kids will come around and see the truth someday”, all this does is give false hope, that is NOT always the case….this mother will never let up even tho their kids are now adults, she keeps up the alienation process! My dream is that all of the sociopaths out their find each other and battle out those relationships…minus the children! It takes a lot of love, patience and character to forgive someone when the knife they are holding is still stabbing you in the back? I am learning to heal from this 12 year life of hell she has dealt us…..but I still have far to go…God Bless Winifred
Winifred
Everthing that you have written was almost exactly what my husband and I have been through over the past 12 years with his ex with the exception of a couple of things. My husband’s ex promptly filed for bancruptcy 2 months after child support stopped. Her daughter moved out just before graduation although she is not in college, the problems have continued in a different way. We have a child togehter that his ex did not know about. She found out by getting into our insurance information online. WE went to police. called a lawyer went to get a restraiing order and she slipped up in court, to make a long story short, she is stalking my son and started when he was 5 years old. we are working on an injunction. WE thought it was over too. Just be aware that she can and will exploit anything that is innocuous. Be happy and move on with your life but be aware that a predator knows exactly who and where you are.
Yes Winifred I too have witnessed some bizarre excuses for parents who orchestrate and perpetuate conflict. It gives them a charge from their empty souls. And yes some were females. Forgiveness as you mention is a beautiful thing. There is a spiritual element to it. It holds the promise of resolution. Without both parties participating in the process there really never is true resolution. That is a large part of what makes these pathologicals so toxic to us so called normal people. Disengaging, minimizing contact, or even better to go no contact is often times the best that we can hope for.
Katt, Lord help you, u sure your husband wasn’t married to my husbands ex? LOL! She filed for bankruptcy twice with him, once 2 weeks after they married and once to get a divorce cuz she couldn’t stop spending money! She has threatened to kill me, defrauded a church she joined of $24,000.00 (they paid her bills monthly cuz her and the kids lied and told them my husband was a “deadbeat dad”, and was paying nothing while they were getting $4400.00 a month paid for them? She tried to get me fired and my husband fired from our jobs, faked a terminal illness and lied to their kids when they were 9 and 13, along with her family….the kids have forgiven her…not their dad? She filed many false police reports on us, we NEVER got to enjoy our time with his kids cuz she spent 24/7 calling them, and interrupting our visits, when I unplugged the phone, she got them cell phones! Her last married boyfriend turned up shot to death…it was either suicide cuz he realized what he gave up for a psycho, or she killed him…we will never know cuz she threatened his wife at the time by saying she was going to attend his services so his wife hurried and had him cremated and didn’t have a service! This goes on forever…. the saying ,”if it doesn’t kill you it makes you stronger applies here to the max, unfortunately for her, I got stronger! When she walks in court it is with a cane, she cries and lies! I wish you well, don’t let her bully your child! God Bless, Winifred!
It’s not clear to me why the amount that the father chooses to pay for college for his children is not solely between him and his child, if he is unable to work cooperatively with the mother of the college student child. Why did this issue end up being litigated? Many parents want to help their children with higher education expenses to the extent they are able, and negotiate with the college student child as to how much they can help and how that affects the choice of school, and other choices such as instate vs. out of state, private vs. public, community college vs. 4 year institution.