Take hope in that after you’ve gone through this, you’ll be a better person than you would have been. But only if you let the experience rid you of the traits that brought you to this point.
What are they? As you’re probably aware, that’s your job to discover.
I’ve never read here a happy ending if the tale has the words “my GF is Bi-Polar” in it.
And this woman that you’re currently breaking up with – the one in love with the married pseduo-pedophile – which Girl was she? A, B, or C?
I decided it’s not really relevant, but now I’m curious.
Tristan, do yourself and your kids a favor and get some counseling for yourself. You may be able to find free or low-cost services through your local government or some local college or medical school.
You’re drawn to drama and chaos. Open marriage, abandoned marriage, bi-polar partner, moving cross-country, drinking, leaving, phone fights, etc.
You devalue yourself in order to try to please others. Marrying a woman who says she doesn’t love you that much, “growing up” to please her, moving, taking jobs, leaving jobs.
I’m not saying you’re doing any of this deliberately, and none of it makes you weak or pathetic. I’m guessing that someone in your early life probably modeled or inculcated these self-destructive behaviors for you, so they are ingrained and feel natural. But now you’re modeling them for your kids, and you owe it to them (and yourself) to try to break the cycle.
Set all these relationships aside (the women, I mean, not your kids), and work on yourself. I don’t think you like yourself much right now, and changing that – becoming a person for whom you can have self-respect – should be your first priority.
Counseling is something I have been looking into to… difficult, with my schedule, but it may be worth it. I think a big step was admitting to myself that I clearly have some co-dependency issues, and those are pretty tightly tied to my own disasterous upbringing. More on this, as it develops.
Dogzilla my current wife is Girl A, the one who is breaking up with me.
Co-dependency is also something that can be addressed through Al-Anon. It’s not just for family members of alcoholics. It can help you with management of any sort of toxic relationships.
I think the real moral here is that Facebook sucks. Closure is a wonderful, natural thing that humans crave. Fond memories are wonderful things to have. Sometimes people just weren’t meant to get a second chance.
Here’s hoping you and your kids pull through. (And, I have to say it, that she really was just like a kid sister when you were 16 and she was 13. Because if it went any further and she was being abused during that time or shortly after, it adds a whole new layer of fuck upedness to this whole thing.)
She was cute, but just a friend. At 16, I viewed here mere 13 as practically a child. Nothing happened until she was about 2 weeks shy of 16.
I see there’s a whole thread about finding ex-flames via Facebook.
I’ll second this, although I don’t have much patience to offer the rest of the kind words and advice, for the reason mentioned above: you’ve created a life of total chaos and dragged a bunch of kids into it who didn’t ask to be born into any of this.
Grow the fuck up, settle down with NO relationships until every single child is 18, and establish a stable life in which you can be an adequate father. If that takes counselling, whatever, do it; just keep the kids out of your constant crises.
IME, people like this don’t really want counseling. They’re addicted to the drama, to the endorphin rushes, and/or to the crazy sex. Counseling leads to healthy decisions, which leads to a boring, sedate life- not something that a man that invites another woman into his home with his wife is likely to want. It’s highly unlikely that the OP will actually seek help, in my opinion. Although I do hope that he does, and things settle down for him.
The OP should make a “Lifetime TV for Women” movie over his life.
I really could.
I am well aware that in the past I persued drama. All my life was based around unhealthy decisions
Leaving my first wife to be with Girl C was what I thought was the first step towards getting my life together. My first marriage was bad… I got 2 amazing children out of it, but neither of us were really happy in the marriage, and were using “open marriage” as a bandage to try to address that.
With my current wife, I grew a lot… but my own chaotic upbringing gave me no idea how to be in a grown-up relationship. So I failed, in that regard. I admit that 100%, but when I was finally shown how serious things were, I did a lot of soul searching, and research, and figured out (I hope) what I was doing wrong and took steps to fix it.
Those steps were hard. Really hard, in some regards. Being responsible isn’t easy, but the rewards I have discovered are very much worth it.
I thought that my wife was past her own dysfunctional upbringing, but I was really really wrong. She craves that chaos even more than I did, in the past. She woudln’t be persuing a virtual relationship with an abusive ex if she wasn’t.
I am committed to change, at this point. I am dedicated to making my life the life I want it to be, not for her, or anyone else.
I want my children to grow up with good memories of their dad, and respect for him, not pity or sadness like I often feel for my own father.
I assure you, this is real. I am changing. I am tired of giving my heart to someone only to have it stepped on over and over and over again. If I spend the rest of my life single and celibate, so be it. I will live. No relationship is worth the feeling I carry around with me now, the rage and anger and frustration.
Tristan, have you ever been screened for clinical depression or bi-polar yourself?
You are so aghast that your wife would pursue someone who brutalized her, yet you’re doing the exact same thing. She’s screwed you over again and again, and yet you remain steadfastly and irrationally devoted to her. That’s not love, dude, that’s good, old-fashioned obsession.
FTR, there are few qualities less appealing than blind devotion. Personally, I want a man who’d toss me out on my ear and not take me back if I were to cheat on him.
Hell with that. Be *very *hard on yourself. Because if you don’t figure out what you keep fucking up and why, you’re just going to keep doing it over and over again.
Sorry there’s no pill for this pain. Avoid self medicating, it will make your thinking hazy, and you need your wits about you. You’ll need your wits to keep from repeating these painful life lessons. We all know people who just keep repeating the same mistakes again and again, it’s painful to watch. There is always a draw toward the familiar, which humans find comforting. For persons raised in chaos and dysfunction, this presents real problems. We live in a culture that constantly reminds us to follow our hearts, but sometimes, for some people, what we’re drawn to, is the problem.
Concentrate on learning the lesson to take away from this experience. Own your part. Almost always, those people who are repeaters of life lessons, it’s because they can’t own their part.
It is instinctive to withdraw and shutdown when our hearts and souls have been brutalized. The challenge of every life is to choose to have an open heart even though you’ve been hurt, an open mind though you think you’re certain. Never forget that life is all about ‘open’.
I also feel to remind you to have some compassion for yourself. At least the measure you’d gift a friend who came to you in similar circumstances. Maybe spend a quiet moment generating compassion for all the other souls on earth, at right this very moment, who are also reeling from painful and tragic loss of love. If you can find it, in yourself, to manifest compassion for them you’ll find a way to forgive yourself your shortcomings. When you can do that, you’ll be ready to choose an open heart, and maybe just find happiness.
I wish you good luck my friend.
You are an idiot. I wish the best for the kids.
WHY IS THIS BULLSHIT IN THE PIT? (Shouting intended)
Sweet fucking Og!
You’re reaping what you’ve sown. That said, this must be pretty awful, and I feel pretty awful for you.
Yeah, dude you were a total prick to Girl C and for the record, if my wife let me have another woman move in with us so we could build a “happy triangle”, and the new girl:
(A) made an ultimatum after my current wife generously decided to share her home and her husband with this girl who was down on her luck; and
(B) demanded monogamy,
I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t pick the selfish bitch “because I was in love”
You’re a dad several times over and you act like a teenager its kind of irresponsible and frankly if Girl C didn’t sound like such a psycho I would say you should probably leave the kid with her but as things stand, I’m not sure he wouldn’t be better off in foster care (perhaps with extended family) because you need some time to be alone and grow up. Think about the decisions you make in your life and what drives them because you have been making some fucking doozies.