(A Somewhat Lengthy Read)
This is my second marriage. I(currently)(59) married a woman(55) who had represented herself to be somewhat financially well-off, as I had left my job with the Fed in order to marry and move away with her. Her mantra was that she was so well-off financially(est. @low to mid seven figures) that it would not really require me to work full-time, although I do have a flourishing avocational occupation. We had dated about a year before deciding to tie the knot, and have subsequently been married for some 7+ years. A pre-nuptial agreement had been drawn up and signed prior to the wedding.
She had kids from her previous marriage as did I. Mine, I am proud to say, are very studious, ambitious, and educationally inclined, as they both are honor students; one at a major university and the other at a private school. Her's have always been lazy, being nothing more than problem students and dropouts, choosing to leave school in favor of embracing the drug culture, tattoo emporiums, law enforcement, and ultimately the judicial system. All have records for drug possession with one having actually done time in county incarceration.
She had never given me any notable information or explanation about her finances, nor did I ever make that request as I came to trust her implicitly. I felt that it was not really any of my business. Without hesitation she was always gracious enough upon insisting that she pay for my kids educational expenses to keep them from incurring any student loans.
In December of 2010, a local girl who was in her early 20's, who my STBXW knew as a contractor that she had employed from time to time, moved into our house at her insistence and my relationship with my STBXW was headed South ever since. My STBXW said that she had invited this girl to move in because she really had nowhere else to live. And from that point in time, my STBXW had little to no time for me, staying on the road.
So in early March, 2011, my STBXW came into my study to annonce to me that she wanted a "trial separation" coinciding with my kids getting out of school for the Spring semester. She intoned that she was now greatly concerned about her finances and could no longer afford to pay the tuition of my secondary school child. However, she said that she would steadfastly continue to financially support my college child with tuition, since she was an alumnus of the college that he attends as a student. She said that this "trial separation" in effect, would allow us to communicate from afar and that we could get together occasionally for a family meal at a local restaurant allowing us to try to work things out between us. She thought that it would be best that I move to a locale about a half-hour away, to the city where my sons college and high school are located, supposedly to cut down on drive time and gasoline expenses.
Now I really do not know if this separation actually stemmed from the stock market heading South, in essence taking a lot of her wealth from her, but she made it abundantly clear that my spending habits, which were primarily for joint household living expenses, and mostly for food, gasoline, liquor for her, bills, pets, and livestock, were not what she wanted. By the same token, it was not uncommon for her to continue to lavish money on her own kids for cars, a separate residence of their own, insurance, tattoos, and to just be there for them whenever they needed to be bailed out of jail or needed money for any legal representation. She highly resented my informing her of whenever I happened to run across overt evidence of drugs, residue, or alcohol in the house that these minors of hers were bringing in both with and without her knowledge. I haven't even mentioned the shady druggies that frequently came by to keep her kids company and to obviously ply their wares.
She wanted my college-aged child to be told of the impending separation almost straight away, but absolutely did not want my secondary school child to have any knowledge of it until such time that he returned from his out-of-state class trip. This was done under the guise that she did not want to jeopardize his good grades, final exams, and class trip to cause him any worry and anxiety. She then physically helped to move the vast majority of our belongings out of the main house into our rent home some 30 miles away in another county where the kids and I now reside. The youngest child actually returned from his class trip and was taken to our "new residence" with little more than an awkward explanation from me.
My STBXW initially did not want any of her family members to have any knowledge of the separation. I honored that, but later discovered that her family had ultimately learned about the separation from her. Since then, I have had virtually no contact with them as well. To date, there has not been as much as a telephone call from my STBXW in these nearly 9 months of separation, much less any of her extended family members. My kids both still think the world of her and have driven over to see her and her extended family members on several occasions and she and my kids stay in touch via telephone and Facebook. But since she had us moved out, she will rarely send a text message or an email to me and then it will only be geared toward business matters, i. e. a bill or some pressing business matter. She randomly shows up at our residence without the slightest notice whenever she is in town, usually with boxes of our clothing or other belongings in tow. She is ultra-cordial and talkative to my sons, but verbally will not give me the time of day. She is truly a physically beautiful woman, and when I see her, it can occasionally make me begin to long for her. But in my heart I know all too well that there is absolutely nothing there but coldness anymore.
Whenever I go back over to our old home to try to retrieve personal items, she gets quite defensive about my presence there without providing her with prior knowledge of my coming. My entire rationale is that if I did inform her of such, she would simply find a reason to either not be there or to answer the door. I still have a lot of my own family's furniture and antiques all acquired through inheritance still there, along with stored clothing and personal effects in the house and also in her warehouse. All too often, when I do show up, there is no one home, newspapers collecting on the front lawn, and the house is securely locked up. Upon my leaving, she took the liberty of removing the house key off of my key ring, but strangely enough, she let my sons retain theirs. I absolutely refuse to even try to enter the house when she is not there for fear of any possible legal ramifications.
She travels both internationally and domestically rather frequently on trips designed to help her monitor her investments in the cities that she has them in. Trips to Asia, Europe, the Carribean and Hawaii are not uncommon. In my marriage years, I never once was asked to accompany her on any of them as she usually went with other friends and business associates of hers. I got to stay home and take care of things while she travelled. And since moving out, I am never informed of any of these trips by her, usually finding out about them from one of my kids.
In early November, she came by late one night shortly after I had gone to bed. She brought over some boxes that the boys helped her bring into our house. Sometime the next afternoon, I also discovered a typed sheet of paper that she had discretely placed listing some minor inventory items with attached monetary values of the goods that she had brought over that evening. Inside that folded paper was a sealed envelope with my name written in her handwriting on the front. After opening it up, I saw that it was a copy of a filed petition for divorce from our original home county where she resides. Although she left the copy of the petition for divorce, according to my attorney, that is still not deemed to be legal service in my state. So until I legally receive proper service, my attorney advises doing nothing for the time being. My STBXW sent out an email in January asking if I had seen the "legal letter" that she left here. Upon advice of counsel, I was told to tell her that I had indeed seen it and was contemplating what steps that I might possibly take. But according to my attorney, that in no way implies legal service in Texas.
It was not uncommon for her to call and invite the boys to her family gatherings such as Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve. The boys asked me if they could go, and I agreed that they might enrage her if they didn't since she still throws money their way if they need it. My eldest is still having his college tuition and expenses largely subsidized by her, as well as supplying him with one of her vehicles to drive. He's fearful that if he doesn't stay in lockstep with her requests, that she could ultimately cut them both off. That hurts me nearly as much as my separation and impending divorce from her.
On a very recent trip over to see her, she told the boys that she was leaving to take a Mardi Gras vacation in NO, from Feb. 11 through the 22nd. She told them that a friend was picking her up and driving them to NO. I'm thinking that she is on a cruise out of NO up until the final days of Mardi Gras. I can't help but believe that during this entire episode since my moving out, that she has been busy seeing someone. She has changed her name on FB back to her name when I first met her. I've often thought that she might leak certain details on FB about her lifestyle that I could possibly put in my lawyers hands, but since I do not do FB, that's really not an option. And even if I did, I think she'd restrict me in some way.
The pain from all of this has caused me to greatly lose sleep as I have only managed to average some 4 to 5 hours a night at best while trying to manage the living activities for my sons and me.
I am primarily living off of my Fed retirement as it most difficult these days for a man in his late 50's to get the opportunity to reenter the work force, more especially in this downturned economy of ours. She has even intoned that I could live off of federal assistance. But I was quick to assert that that since I was not yet even eligible for Social Security benefits, that that wasn't even a remote possibilty since we are still deemed to be married in a community property state. Given all of this, I really can see no discernible hope for this marriage. My eldest child feels like he and his brother have been squarely placed between a rock and a hard place, in that if they truly vent their frustrations about the current state of affairs, that the proverbial money and tuition card would be pulled from them. So they both try to empathize with me, but must remain quiet in the whole process of things. I still am having to foot the bill for my youngest son's private school tuition which I don't mind doing at all.
I have tried to immerse myself by becoming busy in joining a local church, but at times, the lonliness seems to get the better part of me. I'm also in the process of selecting a family counselor to have to bounce things off of, as I already have done with my pastor. I just wanted to share my rather lengthy story with you, and see if any of you had any similar circumstances or ideas. And I thank you from the bottom of my heart if you've taken your time to read this far. Best of luck to you all and may our Lord and Saviour richly bless all of you!
This is my second marriage. I(currently)(59) married a woman(55) who had represented herself to be somewhat financially well-off, as I had left my job with the Fed in order to marry and move away with her. Her mantra was that she was so well-off financially(est. @low to mid seven figures) that it would not really require me to work full-time, although I do have a flourishing avocational occupation. We had dated about a year before deciding to tie the knot, and have subsequently been married for some 7+ years. A pre-nuptial agreement had been drawn up and signed prior to the wedding.
She had kids from her previous marriage as did I. Mine, I am proud to say, are very studious, ambitious, and educationally inclined, as they both are honor students; one at a major university and the other at a private school. Her's have always been lazy, being nothing more than problem students and dropouts, choosing to leave school in favor of embracing the drug culture, tattoo emporiums, law enforcement, and ultimately the judicial system. All have records for drug possession with one having actually done time in county incarceration.
She had never given me any notable information or explanation about her finances, nor did I ever make that request as I came to trust her implicitly. I felt that it was not really any of my business. Without hesitation she was always gracious enough upon insisting that she pay for my kids educational expenses to keep them from incurring any student loans.
In December of 2010, a local girl who was in her early 20's, who my STBXW knew as a contractor that she had employed from time to time, moved into our house at her insistence and my relationship with my STBXW was headed South ever since. My STBXW said that she had invited this girl to move in because she really had nowhere else to live. And from that point in time, my STBXW had little to no time for me, staying on the road.
So in early March, 2011, my STBXW came into my study to annonce to me that she wanted a "trial separation" coinciding with my kids getting out of school for the Spring semester. She intoned that she was now greatly concerned about her finances and could no longer afford to pay the tuition of my secondary school child. However, she said that she would steadfastly continue to financially support my college child with tuition, since she was an alumnus of the college that he attends as a student. She said that this "trial separation" in effect, would allow us to communicate from afar and that we could get together occasionally for a family meal at a local restaurant allowing us to try to work things out between us. She thought that it would be best that I move to a locale about a half-hour away, to the city where my sons college and high school are located, supposedly to cut down on drive time and gasoline expenses.
Now I really do not know if this separation actually stemmed from the stock market heading South, in essence taking a lot of her wealth from her, but she made it abundantly clear that my spending habits, which were primarily for joint household living expenses, and mostly for food, gasoline, liquor for her, bills, pets, and livestock, were not what she wanted. By the same token, it was not uncommon for her to continue to lavish money on her own kids for cars, a separate residence of their own, insurance, tattoos, and to just be there for them whenever they needed to be bailed out of jail or needed money for any legal representation. She highly resented my informing her of whenever I happened to run across overt evidence of drugs, residue, or alcohol in the house that these minors of hers were bringing in both with and without her knowledge. I haven't even mentioned the shady druggies that frequently came by to keep her kids company and to obviously ply their wares.
She wanted my college-aged child to be told of the impending separation almost straight away, but absolutely did not want my secondary school child to have any knowledge of it until such time that he returned from his out-of-state class trip. This was done under the guise that she did not want to jeopardize his good grades, final exams, and class trip to cause him any worry and anxiety. She then physically helped to move the vast majority of our belongings out of the main house into our rent home some 30 miles away in another county where the kids and I now reside. The youngest child actually returned from his class trip and was taken to our "new residence" with little more than an awkward explanation from me.
My STBXW initially did not want any of her family members to have any knowledge of the separation. I honored that, but later discovered that her family had ultimately learned about the separation from her. Since then, I have had virtually no contact with them as well. To date, there has not been as much as a telephone call from my STBXW in these nearly 9 months of separation, much less any of her extended family members. My kids both still think the world of her and have driven over to see her and her extended family members on several occasions and she and my kids stay in touch via telephone and Facebook. But since she had us moved out, she will rarely send a text message or an email to me and then it will only be geared toward business matters, i. e. a bill or some pressing business matter. She randomly shows up at our residence without the slightest notice whenever she is in town, usually with boxes of our clothing or other belongings in tow. She is ultra-cordial and talkative to my sons, but verbally will not give me the time of day. She is truly a physically beautiful woman, and when I see her, it can occasionally make me begin to long for her. But in my heart I know all too well that there is absolutely nothing there but coldness anymore.
Whenever I go back over to our old home to try to retrieve personal items, she gets quite defensive about my presence there without providing her with prior knowledge of my coming. My entire rationale is that if I did inform her of such, she would simply find a reason to either not be there or to answer the door. I still have a lot of my own family's furniture and antiques all acquired through inheritance still there, along with stored clothing and personal effects in the house and also in her warehouse. All too often, when I do show up, there is no one home, newspapers collecting on the front lawn, and the house is securely locked up. Upon my leaving, she took the liberty of removing the house key off of my key ring, but strangely enough, she let my sons retain theirs. I absolutely refuse to even try to enter the house when she is not there for fear of any possible legal ramifications.
She travels both internationally and domestically rather frequently on trips designed to help her monitor her investments in the cities that she has them in. Trips to Asia, Europe, the Carribean and Hawaii are not uncommon. In my marriage years, I never once was asked to accompany her on any of them as she usually went with other friends and business associates of hers. I got to stay home and take care of things while she travelled. And since moving out, I am never informed of any of these trips by her, usually finding out about them from one of my kids.
In early November, she came by late one night shortly after I had gone to bed. She brought over some boxes that the boys helped her bring into our house. Sometime the next afternoon, I also discovered a typed sheet of paper that she had discretely placed listing some minor inventory items with attached monetary values of the goods that she had brought over that evening. Inside that folded paper was a sealed envelope with my name written in her handwriting on the front. After opening it up, I saw that it was a copy of a filed petition for divorce from our original home county where she resides. Although she left the copy of the petition for divorce, according to my attorney, that is still not deemed to be legal service in my state. So until I legally receive proper service, my attorney advises doing nothing for the time being. My STBXW sent out an email in January asking if I had seen the "legal letter" that she left here. Upon advice of counsel, I was told to tell her that I had indeed seen it and was contemplating what steps that I might possibly take. But according to my attorney, that in no way implies legal service in Texas.
It was not uncommon for her to call and invite the boys to her family gatherings such as Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve. The boys asked me if they could go, and I agreed that they might enrage her if they didn't since she still throws money their way if they need it. My eldest is still having his college tuition and expenses largely subsidized by her, as well as supplying him with one of her vehicles to drive. He's fearful that if he doesn't stay in lockstep with her requests, that she could ultimately cut them both off. That hurts me nearly as much as my separation and impending divorce from her.
On a very recent trip over to see her, she told the boys that she was leaving to take a Mardi Gras vacation in NO, from Feb. 11 through the 22nd. She told them that a friend was picking her up and driving them to NO. I'm thinking that she is on a cruise out of NO up until the final days of Mardi Gras. I can't help but believe that during this entire episode since my moving out, that she has been busy seeing someone. She has changed her name on FB back to her name when I first met her. I've often thought that she might leak certain details on FB about her lifestyle that I could possibly put in my lawyers hands, but since I do not do FB, that's really not an option. And even if I did, I think she'd restrict me in some way.
The pain from all of this has caused me to greatly lose sleep as I have only managed to average some 4 to 5 hours a night at best while trying to manage the living activities for my sons and me.
I am primarily living off of my Fed retirement as it most difficult these days for a man in his late 50's to get the opportunity to reenter the work force, more especially in this downturned economy of ours. She has even intoned that I could live off of federal assistance. But I was quick to assert that that since I was not yet even eligible for Social Security benefits, that that wasn't even a remote possibilty since we are still deemed to be married in a community property state. Given all of this, I really can see no discernible hope for this marriage. My eldest child feels like he and his brother have been squarely placed between a rock and a hard place, in that if they truly vent their frustrations about the current state of affairs, that the proverbial money and tuition card would be pulled from them. So they both try to empathize with me, but must remain quiet in the whole process of things. I still am having to foot the bill for my youngest son's private school tuition which I don't mind doing at all.
I have tried to immerse myself by becoming busy in joining a local church, but at times, the lonliness seems to get the better part of me. I'm also in the process of selecting a family counselor to have to bounce things off of, as I already have done with my pastor. I just wanted to share my rather lengthy story with you, and see if any of you had any similar circumstances or ideas. And I thank you from the bottom of my heart if you've taken your time to read this far. Best of luck to you all and may our Lord and Saviour richly bless all of you!
