I have had no contact with my stbxh in five months. Separation papers have been signed and FJ should be signed any day. Everything was amicably resolved through our attorneys. There was never any fighting over anything.

All of a sudden in the past couple of weeks, my stbxh starts getting hateful towards me. I get three vile e-mails from him at work accusing me of untrue things; he disburses a joint bank account that was to stay intact until tax return filed; he lies to me in an e-mail about us getting a tax refund; he revokes my shopping club card which was out of shear meaness as it was not a charge card and had no affect on him whatsoever; I pass him driving on the road and he glares at me.

Why all of a sudden is he lobbing grenades at me? I have gone out of my way to stay away from him and out of contact.

A friend told me it sounds like he is a very unhappy person and is trying to take his anger out on me for some reason. I know he is having severe health problems, financial problems and problems with the OW. But why am I suddenly being attacked? I am trying so hard to get on with my life and get past the nightmare of his cheating on me and abandoning me and then he pulls this stuff. I am so confused.

Hi Fingers,
Sounds to me like he possibly regrets the outcome of everything that has happened.
Of course it's all your fault that he went out and had an "A", j/k.
So he is going to take it out on you for all of his antics.
He's angry and he is venting his frustrations out on you.
Don't allow yourself to get caught up in it.
Also if he is breaking any legal agreements, be sure to let your attorney know.
Stay Strong!
Wallace

Anger is one of the five stages of divorce, and I know I've gone through it.

Fingers-

I have been through this. I came out really good in the divorce and my ex wife was pretty much screwed. This was all my fault. She would lash at me in e-mail and leave nasty messages on my VM. She kept on begging me to change some of the terms of the divorce. When I would refuse I would be verbally assulted. After the anger stage passes then they try to guilt you and make you feel sorry for them. My ex wife would call up crying saying she could not afford to pay her share of the daycare expenses. I would get these sob stories and I would let a lot of her fiancial obligations to our children slide. What do I get for my kindness.....she went on a 14 day cruise with her MM. After that I was done playing the sucker. My point is when he is done being a pissy baby he will try and guilt you. DON'T fall for it!!

T1

T1: I think you hit the nail on the head. I am coming out real good in the divorce. I got the house with no mortgage; 1/2 of a healthy bank account; I have a great job; I kept all our friends and family (no one sided with him), etc. What can I expect when he tries to make me feel guilty? He did get word to me through my boss that he had to go in for surgery soon. I'm just ignoring that information.

Wallace: I am sure he has a lot of regrets. He now has to deal with her two kids; his teenager and living in a small home. The OW is on permanent disability and in bankruptcy so he is now supporting her and her kids. Our passion was traveling and now he can't do that at all.

newly: Is anger one of the five stages of divorce even for the WS; the one that actually cheated and left and is supposedly happily living with the OW? I can understand anger on the part of the BS but I thought everything was supposed to be perfect for the WS - just as they planned it!!!!

So does all this add up to my stbxh taking his frustrations out on me? Why? It's hard to believe he still actually cares about me, but we did really have a good life prior to this mess. I think he is starting to miss that; I know I do. But he has mucked things up so much I don't think he knows what to do except get angry at me.

<small>[ July 08, 2002, 12:26 PM: Message edited by: Fingers1258 ]</small>

Fingers,
Sounds to me like he got the booby prize.
Your situation sounds a lot like mine to a degree.
These WWS's just don't realize when they have crossed the line of no return.
They keep pushing it, until they have destroyed it, and then they wonder why there is nothing left to come back to. When they ralize they got the booby prize... they get get Pi$$ed off.
Like you, we had a nice life, or so I thought... maybe it was too good. So what do they do... I'm bored, or I need more attention... and they go out and destroy one of the most important things in life... your family... go figure.
Stay Strong!
Wallace

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Separation papers have been signed and FJ should be signed any day. Everything was amicably resolved through our attorneys. There was never any fighting over anything.
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Fingers,

Well, reading this thread made me realize that mine isn't so UNUSUAL!!

My ex went through the same thing!! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" /> I couldn't say or do anything right for about the last couple of months.

Everything pi$$ed him off! Even if it didn't have anything to do with ME!!!

I've been trying to figure him out, cause he's not usually this way -- at least not to people he "likes." <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" /> (Oh, I guess that wouldn't necessarily include me, these days, would it!?)

I think Wallace is "onto something." I think it really has something to do with "going for the gold," and finding out it's gold-plated instead!

In counseling today, I talked about the anger, the blaming me for everything, I am not cooperating with him, I am wasting money on the lawyer, etc. It is the control and they are losing control. So the only way they can act out is to lash out at the one they loved, or now hate <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> . SNL has done it over and over, and seems like it never stops. He tells me one thing and then another and is opposite of what he said earlier. I see him nervous at times, I see him in a loss of paper work. I have seen his place, it is a mess, papers all over the place, and no organizational pattern.

He wanted it, the judge ruled that he take over paying the bills, needless to say, bills were not all taken care of. Now things are a mess, bills overdue, his credit ruined more, and he charged my mastercard, and over charged it. I asked how that happened, and someone made a mistake. SNL can't have his own credit card, cause he has such bad credit. I canceled all my cards, and paid the one he used to the max and over. I will have to start over, but that is part of the betrayed spouse.

SNL bashes me with words, money, controlling issues, etc. It is a way of getting back at me for disturbing his relationship with the wonderful, sexual, Mrs. Perfect X. Only she is married and still married, but makes no difference to SNL.

According to counseling, the bashing will end when I am in control of my life. Twenty years down the road? Fifteen years down the road? Maybe I will die in a car accident tomorrow? SNL will be <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" /> . Try to move on, I am saying this with all that has been said to me, but it is so hard, and I find myself daily, wishing for a end.

Isn't it totally bizarre how the ones who hurt you are the ones first in line to bash you? I haven't figured it out yet (and it's been almost 2 yrs). In my view, they who bash when they should be loving or at least show some form of humility, are either: totally self-absorbed and convinced that it was YOU who caused all of this or totally egotistical and self-serving that they care NOTHING aboout what you are feeling.

My personal view is it is a combination of both of the above. Let's face it, if they had any respect for you, they wouldn't have gone this far and also, if they totally think it is YOU who caused their "actions", then it makes them free of dealing with the reality of their actions and it's a temporary "fix" for their emotional state.

As you and I know, we could not live with our conscience by being so deceptive. And, as they know, they can live with their conscience of going the deceptive route by blaming someone else.

It's so classic, as I've learned. I am not someone who is high and mighty and thinks I am better, but I know one thing, I DO NOT ever want to be a person on this Earth who slam-dunks people who are hurting from the pain I might've caused them. Enough said. Amen.

There are other possible explanations for this kind of behavior...

Sometimes when a person is struggling with feelings (such as self-hatred or shame) that he finds difficult to "own", he projects those feelings onto someone else. So, for example, if he projects those feelings onto you, then he believes that rather than hating himself, you are the one who hates him. A spouse is the most typical receptacle for this kind of projection, since boundaries already tend to be a bit enmeshed in a marriage.

Once your spouse has displaced his unwanted feelings onto you, he believes that all he needs to do to free himself from those feelings is to free himself from you. He quite literally can no longer see you as a real person; you become nothing more to him than the portion of himself that he is trying to disown.

At first, after you have been jettisoned he feels a tremendous sense of relief. The less interaction he has with you, the more relief he feels. His problems are gone!

But his relief is (relatively) short-lived. His problems are not gone, and neither are those feelings he had hoped to escape. They're still persecuting him. Ergo, you are still persecuting him, since you are the personification of his rejected feelings.

If you are basically out of his life by the time his initial relief begins to fade, things start to get interesting. Without a connection between the two of you, it is difficult for him to sustain the illusion that you are the source of his pain. Does this make him start to think that maybe he was wrong about his source of pain? Unfortunately, that's not the way it usually seems to work. Instead, he seeks to re-establish his connection with you, so that he can renew his illusion. And of course, this connection must be antagonistic, since its whole purpose is to give him a way to displace his own inescapable internal conflict.

Fingers, I don't know enough about your situation to know whether this explanation really "fits", but it sounds like it might.

Gnome,

As usual that was an exceptional way of stating it.

Stay Strong!

Wallace