My grandparents got married and divorced twice. The only reason I ever remember my grandfather is because he was living in my grandmother’s house when he died.
I’ve been married twice, there’s no way I’d go back to my second even though she’s the mother of my children. I have no idea what I would do if I ever even saw my first wife again.
I dated my ex five years after the divorce. It was mostly… comfortable. And in the end a disaster. I hadn’t really changed. And she hadn’t really changed. For us, that was a deal killer. Still miss seeing my kids as often as I did, but it still isn’t enough to put up with her.
My great-grandparents married and divorced twice. This was around the turn of the century in BFE, AK. Even more oddly, my great-grandfather raised all the kids. After the second divorce, the wife hung around long enough to wean the youngest and then (according to family legend) ran off and joined the Mormons.
My best friend’s parent got divorced and remarried before I met him over 20 years ago. They’re still together and are, as best I can tell, perfectly happy together.
This ^
I would never consider it. When I make a decision, I stick to it. I have a good relationship with my ex-husband/father of our 2 kids. There were good and bad times in the 17 years that we were together. In the end, we are much better apart, as are the kids.
my ex went back to her ex…problem was, she had restraining orders on him (he never knew why)…I knew why. She had two reasons - both fabricated… She went back to him, counting on him remarrying her. So I sent him the reasons for the RO’s, that my ex spelled out in an email, when she wanted me to “save” her.
I IM’d the oldest girl, who is now in college. She said when he read that, he went ballistic…the household was a living hell ever since.
What I find amazing is, as I understand, two judges were involved and both approved it ASAP…It was sealed (no one but the legal staff and my ex, knew the reasons). I actually felt sorry for him, when I found out later it was a lie.
So they are together for the best of the 2 girls, still at home.
I would nominate theirs as the poster child for never going back to an ex.
“They” just just their first house ever…A $38k repo cracker box. I looked it up on the county tax web site…in his name only. All the tea in China says she will be kicked to the curb when the last girl (14) moves out.
I can not speak for her, but I can’t see how it worked out well for her.
This, combined with your other thread about wanting to tell a neighbor’s kids about their estranged father having cancer after stalking them through the interwebs, is pretty damn creepy.
I’ve heard that this isn’t all that uncommon. People get back together with their ex because the things that attracted them together in the first place are still there. Then they split again because the things that caused them to split the first time are still there too.
I’ve seen this happen a couple of times in real life and that’s exactly the pattern it followed.
Relax. Don’t get your panties in a knot.
The Ipad event with the neighbor was not my idea…I walked over one day just to show him my ipad, as well as googles Earth zoom in of his house from space…I showed him my FB account. He asked if I could look up his kids. I did, found the daughter. Asked me if I could email her. I said I could FB PM her. I sent one message to her. EVER…Just said I was her dads next door neighbor, he just wanted to say hello and asked how they were doing.
Went to her FB friends list to find her brother. Thats when I noticed she had many friends that worked at the same hospital.
Try it. Look up any person on FB, then look at their friends list. Without even going further, you see the friends place of employment (if they filled that out as public info)
Again, she never replied, so I never again attempted to contact either offspring.
THIS IS NOT STALKING.
The guy got to see what his grandkids looked like. That brought tears to his eyes. That made it worthwhile alone. At this point for all I knew, she might have
Any 5 yr old with FB could do this in less than 5 seconds..
Regarding my IM’ing the now 20 yr old girl that I raised. Her dad kicked her out of the house when she was a teen, no job, no income. I heard about this (small town, and my sisters were still friends with ex’s twin) so I IM’d her for the first time ever. She replied with the possibly the nicest and most cherished msg I have ever received. I sent her an unsolicited sizable check to hold her over ( to an address she gave me). She sent one more thank you reply. I replied to contact me if she ever needed help again.
I also directed my atty to divert the $$$ that my ex owed me in monthly payments, to the 19 yr old, with the stipulation that it go to her college fund. It helped get her into college.
Nothing more in 2 yrs.
NOT STALKING.
My sisters told me about ex buying a house. So yes, I looked up its value on the county tax web site. Again any 5 yr old could do this in 5 seconds.
Ex’s twin told me that she drove my ex past my house when I moved. I never drove past their house they just moved into, nor do I desire to. I moved 4 hrs away to get away from her. She rode in a car 4 hrs to see my house. She also came to visit me after the divorce once…wanting to negotiate the settlement she owed me. I declined and politely sent her on her way.
I only last month had a series of nice emails with my ex, concerning the middle girls education. I had a plan that she agreed would greatly benefit the girl, who is very gifted. As agreed, the girl will not know of my involvement. No one will.
My ex emailed me a detailed report of how the girl was doing academically as well as otherwise.
She ended the email by thanking me for helping the daughter.
No further contact. None needed.
Keep in mind, she never filed a RO on me…just the sorry bastard she went back to. I have never had a RO on me. EVER.
But thanks for your concern, and please be reminded of the SD rules on character attacks on other Dopers.
also, I should note, my ex step, in her replies, told me she worked at a Hilton on campus , when I said I would love to see her again.
I never visited…can’t explain why…maybe a guy thing about not wanting to show emotions. The neighbor guy said a girl came to my house a few months ago…described her to a t…said she was in a young guys car, he stayed in car (she doesn’t drive). Very possibly she tried to visit, but I am always on the road.
How “creepy”, huh?
Pretty damn creepy???
I think not, but who knows.
So what was the reason for the restraining order? I won’t tell anyone I promise. No one will know that you told.
last, if you are referring to, or including my post about sending my ex’s ex, the email she sent me about the details of her RO against him:
I was a long time member of a forum similar to this. My wife was aware of this, and knew my pen name…when she went back to him, he joined the same forum, under a pen name. It didn’t take me long to recognize his personal attacks on me that followed me from topic to topic, were of the same very unique writing skills from emails he sent her during our 5 year marriage…very bizarre - keep in mind he was a self confessed bipolar.
At some point, he began absolute threats directed not just at me, but even of then candidate Obama, who happened to stop in our town that year…always referencing his AR-15 Bushmaster.
I noticed all of his rantings, had time stamps on them, like they do here. It occurred to me, that he was doing this on company time, and therefore on company computers. So I contacted both their local IT security, as well as their Detroit world HQ, that one of their engineers was doing the above. They monitored his activities, then walked him out, with armed escort.
So, who was the creepy stalker? He came after me, I responded by letting the authorities handle it.
True, i sent him her email to me, about the RO 5yrs prior, but emails are considered public domain, unlike my PC when she let him in my house while I was on trips, and he tried, unsuccessfully, to find any dirt on me.
I sent you a PM…PS, I don’t care if you tell anyone here; the details were gross, and might have got me kicked off.
PS someone stated when I joined in OCT, that I would not be here long. They win. I am leaving.
A sincere Thanks to most of you, for some good advice.
Sorry, one last post…and true to form, I am posting to the wrong OP…but only because I can not find the OP… It was someone asking about how an Escalade SUV compares to a Chevy Tahoe…I promised I would pass along the reply I got from a lady at GM who works in quality and owns both:
So please pass this along:
Both trucks are off the GMT 900 platform. The Tahoe has a truck suspension system and the Escalade has a smoother suspension duie to the gas charged system. Both are great. Just happened to own both due to them being my pep vehicles anbds needed to participate in program purchase program. Love them both. Use the Tahoe as Mom’s taxi and the Escalade as family vehicle.
Escalade carries a hefty price tag…much more than I would pay should I not have had a drive and buy.
(my apologies for cross posting, but your search engine didn’t find this recent OP)
I’m sure the poster will find this helpful advice, if he ever finds this helpful advice.
Lemme help steer this back on topic…
I’ve seen this happen twice. The first instance is a friend of my parents. She married a guy and then divorced him a few years later. Don’t know why, but they decided to get back together and eventually get remarried. This was probably 20 years ago and they’re still married. Not sure how happy they are, I’ve only met them once, when I was in middle school.
My wife’s parents divorced and remarried. He was a wannabe career army grunt and in the early 80’s was stationed to Korea. They had been married 13 or 14 years at this point. While in Korea he fell for one of the local hookers and informed his wife – in a letter – that he wanted a divorce and was marrying this girl he met on the street. He simply walked away from his family. I don’t know the details of the divorce, but somehow they managed to get it finalized without him ever having to return stateside to deal with it. However, his now fiance decided she didn’t want to quit turning tricks, so when he came back to the states he re-proposed to his now ex-wife, and they remarried. They were divorced for 8 months IIRC.
Since then he’s found Jesus and makes a big stink about the importance of family, but there seems to be little affection between the two of them. They like each other ok, but they really seem like good friends and not a loving couple. My wife’s mom does not drive and they live in little podunk town, so she’s dependent on her husband for literally everything. She hasn’t worked since before they got divorced – something like 35 years now. I suspect their marriage is one of convenience/necessity, at least for her. Hell, they originally got married because she got pregnant. She’s a British citizen, was here on some sort of work permit and got knocked up by a local GI. I suspect staying here and getting married rather than returning to her Pentecostal family in Glasgow was simply the easier choice.
Interestingly, he talks about his time in Korea as sort of the highlight of his military “career”. Even more shockingly (to me), he has a picture of the Korean hooker buried in a photo album. It’s not particularly hidden, the album sits on the shelf in plain view and the pic is a big professional photo. I never understood that one. He refers to his Korean fiance fairly regularly when discussing Korean culture, customs, food, dress, etc. ‘Insensitive’ is putting it mildly. Again, they seem like friends and not a happily married couple that love each other.
Superficially he’s a nice guy – hell, he bought my wife and I a car some years ago, no strings attached. He’s done similar things for other people. But he’s also caused a tremendous amount of pain to a lot of people, and the whole family sorta acts like that whole chapter doesn’t exist, even though to an outsider it’s pretty obvious there isn’t much love between the two of them.
Not counting the 8 month divorce (and they don’t when someone asks them how long they’ve been married despite using the date of their second wedding as their anniversary), they’ve been married 44 years.
Cougar58, I merely commented on what IMHO was your behaviour (something that at least one other person also commented on in your other thread), there was no personal or character attack there. Quite common per SDMB culture.
I certainly hope my comment wasn’t the catalyst that made you do a flounce. Was not my intention at all and I apologise if that was the case. I got nothing against you personally, honest!
And if you are still reading this - you can also go to your profile (User CP) and look up all your posts on other threads, if you’re having trouble with the search function.
OK, sorry for continuing the hijack.
Exes suck. Or, they don’t necessarily suck but there’s almost always a good reason they’re exes. People don’t typically make a casual decision to waltz out of a marriage - having done it (twice!) I’d say it was extremely difficult and sad, carefully considered, but in my cases at least, really better for everyone involved.
I’m pretty sure that my friend who successfully remarried her ex-husband is an exception to the rule.
I’m sort of in this position right now. My SO and I split up around 18 months ago (at her instigation) after 10 pretty good years together. We were both on our second long term relationship after failed marriages and looked like we were heading for a compatible old age together. I should say that there was no one else involved on either side and we still see each other 4 or 5 times a week and get on fine.
Now we both live alone. I’m not happy with it and nor is she. I saw her today and we talked about how Christmas went and it was fairly crappy for both of us. I came away thinking maybe we should try again but I feel that the issues that broke us up are still there and if we got together again they would be likely to turn into the elephant in the room and we’d wind up fighting about the same old shit and going through the whole sorry situation again.
It’s a bitch because a large part of me wants to get back together, a smaller part of me likes my freedom and at the same time I’m worried about how she’s coping on her own.
God, I’m confused. Any shrinks out there?
I get it. Before the breakup, there was attraction, love, shared experiences…
Unless one the participants turned out to be a lying asshole, those are still possibilities.