I recently divorced my husband of 10 months after learning that he had married me only for what he could get from me. Two weeks before the wedding he came to me and asked if I would be open to his 15 year old son living with us after marriage as his ex-wife was abusive. I am a loving and nurturing person and I agreed. I had been exposed to some of her behavior, but nothing to what it would become. Fast forward, once we were married, my husband and I never came together. He had a secret life that I learned about later. I found MB 5 months into the marriage, was encouraged to separate and did. He never came back even though he agreed to POJA and attempted to get back together briefly.
I later learned after the divorce that he had been unfaithful during the marriage, had lied and cheated no only me, but many others, and that his behavior in our marriage was his normal behavior. I am working on forgiving. I forgive and then I get angry again and want to expose his behavior-even after divorce. It doesn't make sense, the relationship is over. I have to keep letting it go and completely move on. I am trying to get my head around it all.
My concern is that I want to put into place healthy behaviors so that I am not attracted to men that are deceptive, manipulative, and cunning. They of course don't come across that way in the beginning. I have asked my group of girlfriends in accountability to be strong and question me on all my friendships/work relationships. I know that I have to give myself time to heal and get him out of my head. It's as if I walked thru what I had to do to end the relationship to get away from toxic behavior that refused to change, however, my heart is anxious for protection so that I don't end up in this same situation. I have been married 4 times, different types of men, commonalities are lying, deceptive, and prideful. They present completely different in the beginning and then after marriage become the other person.

Welcome to MB. Did you post before? Who gave you the advice to separate?

What was his SSL? Was the OW married?

Have you read Dr. Harley's advice on dating?

Have you read this? Buyers, Renters and Freeloaders

The first thing you should do is Plan B your ex husband (all of them). Contact with him is just going to keep you in the funk. Have no contact with him ever again. You won't care what he is doing after divorce because you won't know. You will forget about forcing yourself to forgive him. Your anger and focus will fade.

Here How to Plan B Correctly

Thank you for your advice. I have made a decision to let go and not look back, but look forward. Dr. Harley advised me to separate which I am thankful for, it was drastic, but it showed me who he was. Then everything started to come out. I couldn't put it together until then. People came out and told me things that I would never have known. I guess one of the things that I need to do is do more research on who I choose to spend time with, look at their friends, family, ex spouse, co workers,etc. I didn't spend enough time discovering his background. My divorce attorney was kind and said that if I chose to marry again he would do the background search and review the man's divorce to see how he treated his soon to be former spouse! I also will be reading the books that you suggested and do plan B correctly! Many thanks!

Did you write Dr. Harley on the radio show? Is that where he gave you the advice to separate?

Yes. I had sent an email and Joyce called me and they talked with me.

Do you remember the day of your show?

Yes. I had sent an email and Joyce called me and they talked with me.