I'm not sure if anyone remembers me, but I was separated for a year this month. My ExWW filed for divorce finally this past month and I signed off on them, as I am tired of fighting.

Anyway, the divorce is final and I feel a sense of freedom mixed with sadness. It�s kind of like putting down Old Yeller, I don�t want to but I know I HAVE to. She started seeing another guy while we were separated and I�m pretty sure that�s what pushed her to finally divorce. She has been basically living with him since before I even found out they were a "thing". He is basically the exact opposite of me, but I won�t go into too much detail. He has a little girl from his previous marriage and my Ex uses this as an excuse to have my son around him. She says he is playing with the OPs daughter. I know that she will pretty much NOT do anything I ask simply to spite me and I've learned not to get angry when she does, but I still don�t like it.

Regardless of all of that, I had a few questions that I was hoping the community could help me with.

1. I asked my Ex if she would be interested in co-parenting counseling. Her reply was "No, I don�t want to see you unless I have to." Now, while I can understand not wanting to see me I don�t understand the hatred. I've given her the divorce that she wanted so much and have stopped contacting her unless it�s about our son, or to answer a question she asked. I don�t bother her anymore, even when I know she is with her boyfriend. When we do talk I am very polite and I don�t try to move the conversation in a direction that I want. I really don�t like to talk to/see her anymore. She is the reason for the failure of our marriage and every time I interact with her it�s never a good experience. I just try to avoid it now.

I guess my question is: Where is all of the hatred coming from? This new life is all her choice. I�ve given her everything she has asked for, but she still thinks that I am up to something. Why can she not be in my presence even for my son�s sake (parental counseling)?

2. My son has recently been telling me things like "I want to stay with you forever" "I�m sad with mommy" etc.... What am I supposed to say to this? To this point I�ve been telling him that while I would like him and me to be together all the time, it�s not up to me it�s up to his mother. He asks "why" and I tell him to ask her. I don�t say ANYTHING bad about her, but I�m not going to lie and say that it�s my fault along with his mothers. She is the one who chose all of this, not me and not our son. I try to protect him (and her to an extent), but I refuse to take blame for our current situation. Am I doing the right thing? Should I be telling him that I don�t want to be with him?

3. My Ex has been calling me a lot lately. Usually it is when she has our son and when (I assume) the boyfriend isn�t around. While I understand there are things that need to be discussed regarding our son and certain legal matters, I don�t understand why she feels the need to call me and just "talk". I've asked her not to do that and have told her that I don�t want to be her friend. I don�t hate her, but after all she has done I defiantly don�t like her either. I don�t jump to answer her calls anymore and I almost never call her. When I do have to contact her I usually try to keep it to a text message or an email, but I never get a reply. Is there any way to improve communication, or at least move it in a more neutral direction? Again, I can�t get her to respond to me about this or any other issue so I�m kind of at a loss here.

4. She gets angry with me for no reason at all. Just yesterday she called and told me she would be going to our son�s school Halloween party and that she would be taking off of work until 1pm. All I did was ask her if she would be taking him from school early and she flipped. She accused me of trying to make her feel guilty because she couldn�t spend time with him. I got a little upset because I didn�t mean it like that in any way. I just thought that since her and I both wanted to spend more time with him that this would be a good opportunity for her to spend some extra time with him. If I bring up that our lack of time with him is due to HER choices she always acts as though what we are going through now and the cheating/divorce are two separate issues.

I guess I�m just looking for advice on how to handle this. All of this is still relatively new to me and while I feel like I�m done with the anger stage, I still have no idea how to approach anything with her without her getting upset or thinking I have some ulterior motive.


Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to get everything out before I forgot.

Sorry to hear the update Broken. I remember you. I can tell you what I did and what worked and didn't.

First of all, the anger is very typical for a wayward ex. Mine's exactly like that and so is his OW to her xBH. I have 2 related theories on this. (1) Waywards rely on drama to feed their affair and the only thing their affair-relationship is based on is their common hatred of their ex-spouses. The old, "it's us against the world" syndrome. (2) As they integrate their affair into the real world from fantasy-land, problems obviously show up. But since they are so "perfect" for each other, it can't possibly be their fault so it must be yours. As an ex-BS, you are to blame for every single thing that goes wrong. Heck, if they run out of toilet paper, it's because of you some how.

What has protected me a lot was to borrow the concepts of Plan B. I didn't write him a letter (though in retrospect I probably should have). I just minimized contact to the absolute essentials. It wasn't too hard for me as DS was grown, but we did have his wedding and graduation to contend with. What happened was WXH and OW turned their rage onto OWH. OWH and OW have an 8-yo DD so they had to see each other and deal with each other for visitations. Skipping the gory details, it escalated to the point that OW ran over OWH with her truck and was charged with assault. The court imposed a restraining order against her as well as an intermediary for communications and visitation drop-off/pickups. OWH has never been happier since this happened as he no longer has to deal with her anger.

After taht happened, the happy couple refocused their rage back on me. Having had 2 years of plan B practice, I was better prepared to deflect them, though I ended up suing WXH in small claims court. He countersued but the detailed process we have to follow does not lend itself well to fits of rage, so my contact with him, when necessary, is now almost pleasant. I'm not sure when our court date will be as I've had to postpone the first one.

To bring it back around, OW has filed another custody suit against OWH saying that the assault charges were frivilous. I'm sure she did this simply because they've run out of ways to actively hate us (OWH and I). Her lawsuit could very easily result in her losing the level of custody she currently has, plus a variety of priviledges she has "taken" along the way.

Moral of the story: Your ex is angry and regardless of the details, it's all your fault. The only way to avoid this fault is to get out of range. It will still be your fault but you won't hear about it and eventually it will be too rediculous even for them.

I'm not sure what to do about your son. OWH in my sitch has the same issues with his DD8. She has confided in him that she sneaks out of the house (OW & WXH's) and does things she knows she's not supposed to there. So far she hasn't been caught but it's a matter of time. I actually worry about taht little girl as she has been witness to some of the uglier events that happened between her parents (including her mother running over her father with the truck).

Sorry you're in this predicament. All I can say is keep taking the high road no matter what.

However, have you had THE talk with your son? As in, let me know if you ever feel uncomfortable around mommy's boyfriend, if anything ever doesn't make sense? Or he seems too friendly? etc.?

No I haven't had that talk yet, but I'm not even sure how to go about doing it. She hasn't told him that its mommy's new boyfriend, so I don't know if I should be the one to even bring it up. I have told him that he can talk to me about anything but being 4.5 years old, I don't think he really understood. I have a personal appointment with a counselor this Friday and I'm going to ask for any advice on how to proceed with all of this. What I should say to my son, how I can communicate with my Ex and maybe even how to forgive her. Its hard to forgive someone who doesn't think that anything that they have done is wrong though, and that you're wrong for everything in their lives.

Dang man..no words really..sorry you had to experience this. My wife and I are separated (she cheated) and I get the anger too. She is always pissed. I pray for your peace in this situation.

Similar boat and I'm years out of the marriage with my XWW, and she's still angry.

I was trying to coordinate parenting time for Halloween and Thanksgiving. Our child is a fan of Halloween, but me, not so much. So she wanted to spend this weekend with her mother.

I wasn't against that, but the only time I had to trade for the weekend was the weekend before Thanksgiving and since I had her on Thanksgiving break this year, she wouldn't have DD for three weekends.

So I asked DD to have her mother call me, to get her out of the middle and to make sure my XWW knew what DD was asking.

So I asked her if she knew what DD was talking about, and made the clarifying statement that the only weekend I could trade was the weekend of 11/19, that I had plans for the weekend of 11/5 and that we were going to be gone the entire Thanksgiving holiday, so was she OK with doing something with DD and her family on the weekend of 11/19.

She unloaded on me in a snarky fashion that she didn't need all the detail.

Good grief, it's call co-parenting and while she may still treat what her family is doing as a state secret, I have nothing to hide and would rather give too much information than not enough.

So she's still angry, just like the OP's wife, and yet she got exactly what she wanted. She wanted a divorce and got it. She wanted shared parenting instead of keeping the marriage together and got it.

So why is she still so angry when she got everything she wanted?

I don't care, other than it impacts DD.

He doesn't have to know that a man is mommy's boyfriend to be told that if he ever feels uncomfortable in what a grownup does around him, he should tell someone. You know what I'm talking about, right? Some men choose women who have young kids, just so they can have access to the kids. There are some great books out there for a kid's level about this. I'm not saying there's something wrong with this guy, but if my child had to be around a strange man, I'd be sure this was covered. The Number One action kids take in such instances is to not talk about it.

As for your wife's anger...just be a bigger person than her. Feel sorry for her. Turn the other cheek. You are the one who'll be able to look themselves in the mirror without regret. It's just anger, and it's all about herself, not you. Why get uptight over it?

Thank you everyone for the advice. I have recently set up an appointment with a VA counselor for some advice on how to handle my Ex. The most recent development with her is that she is taking our son to her boyfriends house and they are both spending the night. Ive made her aware that I dont like this, but she doesn't care. She lied to me last night and told me that they werent spending the night at her boyfriends house. Of course, I found out otherwise. It almost seems like she doesnt know how to do anything but lie to me.

Also, the games are getting more and more annoying. I dont bother to call her anymore unless its important, but even then she will generally not answer. She usually calls back with a bad attitude or sends a snide text message. I guess it upsets me that she doesn't even respect my wishes as my sons father. It also stings that there is another father type figure being forced into my sons life. I feel already that I dont get to spend enough time with him, and now there is someone else around when Im not.

This is basically just me complaining I guess, as I feel helpless in not only my own life but my sons life as well. She doesn't know the pain that she has cause. She doesn't know what it feels like and I dont think she can empathize with how I feel because she has blocked herself off from me. She actually takes any idea I have and makes it out to be awful simply because its my idea. It doesnt matter if its the right thing to do, it only matters that its something I want and she cant have that.

Lastly, its infuriating that I cannot have an adult conversation with her. She refuses to actually try to work anything out. She always acts as if she is owed something simply for existing and that I should give it to her. She cheated, she broke up our family and she was the one that was unwilling to give us a second chance, but I have to pay for it....literally and figuratively. Wheres the Karma bus I hear so much about when I need it?

Thats all for now. I'll try to write more as there is more to write about. Until then though, thank you for listening to my complaining.

Have you been to your lawyer lately with the comments from your son, about being sad with mommy? I would, if I were you, to see what steps you could take to at least legally monitor how her boyfriend is affecting your boys, as in counseling, if not something stronger. Just in case there is something you can do.