How to move past a dark betrayal - 07/01/21 07:04 AM
New to this forum and I hope I’m in the right place. I attempted to post this on Reddit, but frankly I’m too “old school.” This may be very long as it’s covering a lot of backstory and content.
My wife and I have been married 35 years and have two adult children. Daughter (33) and Son (30). Wife and I are both in our early 60’s. I’m an attorney, wife has expertly managed our household, raised our children and is involved in multiple charities/non profits/volunteer programs etc. We’ve had rough patches over the years and there were a few points when divorce was discussed, but we worked through it and pressed onward.
However, something has come to light recently and I’m so shaken by it that I don’t fully trust myself to respond in the right way. I’ve made tiny adjustments to some irrelevant details to protect my family’s anonymity.
My daughter has 3 young children. About 6 years ago, after a divorce and custody battle, she and her older two children (3rd grandchild wasn’t born yet) came to live with us. At the time, my practice was expanding to another city and I was away from home most of the time. I assumed that my daughter moving in with the grandkids would be good for my wife as well. Our home is on the large side, with bedrooms for everyone, plus guests if desired.
Unfortunately, I was wrong and the situation between my wife and daughter grew hostile very quickly. My wife claimed that my daughter was unstable and trying to live a “party girl” lifestyle. My daughter didn’t deny this, but she begged me to believe that she was trying her best. She admitted to being depressed and unhappy and reassured me she was medicating her ADHD as required by her mom and trying her hardest to attend therapy when she could.
I admit that I should have tried harder to intervene here, but I assumed they would work through their differences. They did not and my wife threw her out. I ended up renting her a little apartment and she’s now working, remarried and thriving. Im very proud of her.
Last weekend, a conversation with an old family friend landed on the subject of my daughter. This person said “I’ve always wondered, how did you guys get her THIS stabilized? Was it just detoxing from the drugs or is she on medications for mood?”
This statement shocked me. My daughter has never done drugs. Nor does she have a mood disorder. But this old friend went on, talking about how hard it must have been to make the decision to send my daughter to a facility.
My wife has lied to friends before in a relatively harmless way. Exaggerating things or skewing a story a little to give herself a bigger role. But something about what this friend said made me wonder. So I started digging. I’ve never gone through my wife’s phone or computer, but I went through everything and what I found is horrifying.
She’s living a fantasy life online. Ironically, in another marriage help forum. Her main source of martyrdom in posts, private messages and emails is my daughter. When I looked at things from that time period, I saw that she was telling people my daughter was a drug addict with multiple arrests. She claims my daughter neglected her children and didn’t feed them during the day. She said she partied every night and snuck strange men into our home. She said my daughter violently attacked her, had bouts of mental insanity and attempted suicide.
She also had a plan to have my daughter committed to a mental facility. This plan included tricking my daughter into signing over parental rights to her children. She was going to use a document from my practice to do this and lied to my secretary for a copy.
I’m disgusted and ashamed. I feel terrible for my daughter who was trying so hard to please her mother. She needed support from both of us at that time and instead, she got an absent father and a mother hell bent on destroying her. I don’t understand why she would do this.
All of it is a lie. My daughter has no arrest record. There are security cameras in the home, no men were at our house. My grandchildren were always healthy, happy and adored their mother. My son was around often and he said that while his sister was struggling with depression, she mostly kept that to herself. She did get more angry and erratic toward the time that she moved out, but now I completely understand why. She wasn’t partying, she was cocktail waitressing. My wife wouldn’t watch the kids for her to work during the day OR go to therapy. I found this out through their emails back and forth. My wife went as far as taking the keys to my daughter’s car to keep her from going to therapy.
I had a very emotional conversation about this with my daughter. She was relieved that I knew and had more things to tell me. But she also reminded me that this was a long time ago, she’s been steadily healing from it through therapy and she doesn’t want me to blow up my life over it. She encouraged me to try and move past it.
I want to do that. But I’m just so sick about this. I deserve to know why my wife did this to our child. Our child deserves to know why.
What happens now? I haven’t confronted her. I have compiled the proof and organized it to correspond with a relevant timeline of events. There will be no gaslighting or excuses. But how do I present this? I have stipulations she will need to meet to continue our marriage. How do I give her those without attacking her or making angry ultimatums?
I thank you in advance if you’ve made it this far and can offer some support. I am reeling.
My wife and I have been married 35 years and have two adult children. Daughter (33) and Son (30). Wife and I are both in our early 60’s. I’m an attorney, wife has expertly managed our household, raised our children and is involved in multiple charities/non profits/volunteer programs etc. We’ve had rough patches over the years and there were a few points when divorce was discussed, but we worked through it and pressed onward.
However, something has come to light recently and I’m so shaken by it that I don’t fully trust myself to respond in the right way. I’ve made tiny adjustments to some irrelevant details to protect my family’s anonymity.
My daughter has 3 young children. About 6 years ago, after a divorce and custody battle, she and her older two children (3rd grandchild wasn’t born yet) came to live with us. At the time, my practice was expanding to another city and I was away from home most of the time. I assumed that my daughter moving in with the grandkids would be good for my wife as well. Our home is on the large side, with bedrooms for everyone, plus guests if desired.
Unfortunately, I was wrong and the situation between my wife and daughter grew hostile very quickly. My wife claimed that my daughter was unstable and trying to live a “party girl” lifestyle. My daughter didn’t deny this, but she begged me to believe that she was trying her best. She admitted to being depressed and unhappy and reassured me she was medicating her ADHD as required by her mom and trying her hardest to attend therapy when she could.
I admit that I should have tried harder to intervene here, but I assumed they would work through their differences. They did not and my wife threw her out. I ended up renting her a little apartment and she’s now working, remarried and thriving. Im very proud of her.
Last weekend, a conversation with an old family friend landed on the subject of my daughter. This person said “I’ve always wondered, how did you guys get her THIS stabilized? Was it just detoxing from the drugs or is she on medications for mood?”
This statement shocked me. My daughter has never done drugs. Nor does she have a mood disorder. But this old friend went on, talking about how hard it must have been to make the decision to send my daughter to a facility.
My wife has lied to friends before in a relatively harmless way. Exaggerating things or skewing a story a little to give herself a bigger role. But something about what this friend said made me wonder. So I started digging. I’ve never gone through my wife’s phone or computer, but I went through everything and what I found is horrifying.
She’s living a fantasy life online. Ironically, in another marriage help forum. Her main source of martyrdom in posts, private messages and emails is my daughter. When I looked at things from that time period, I saw that she was telling people my daughter was a drug addict with multiple arrests. She claims my daughter neglected her children and didn’t feed them during the day. She said she partied every night and snuck strange men into our home. She said my daughter violently attacked her, had bouts of mental insanity and attempted suicide.
She also had a plan to have my daughter committed to a mental facility. This plan included tricking my daughter into signing over parental rights to her children. She was going to use a document from my practice to do this and lied to my secretary for a copy.
I’m disgusted and ashamed. I feel terrible for my daughter who was trying so hard to please her mother. She needed support from both of us at that time and instead, she got an absent father and a mother hell bent on destroying her. I don’t understand why she would do this.
All of it is a lie. My daughter has no arrest record. There are security cameras in the home, no men were at our house. My grandchildren were always healthy, happy and adored their mother. My son was around often and he said that while his sister was struggling with depression, she mostly kept that to herself. She did get more angry and erratic toward the time that she moved out, but now I completely understand why. She wasn’t partying, she was cocktail waitressing. My wife wouldn’t watch the kids for her to work during the day OR go to therapy. I found this out through their emails back and forth. My wife went as far as taking the keys to my daughter’s car to keep her from going to therapy.
I had a very emotional conversation about this with my daughter. She was relieved that I knew and had more things to tell me. But she also reminded me that this was a long time ago, she’s been steadily healing from it through therapy and she doesn’t want me to blow up my life over it. She encouraged me to try and move past it.
I want to do that. But I’m just so sick about this. I deserve to know why my wife did this to our child. Our child deserves to know why.
What happens now? I haven’t confronted her. I have compiled the proof and organized it to correspond with a relevant timeline of events. There will be no gaslighting or excuses. But how do I present this? I have stipulations she will need to meet to continue our marriage. How do I give her those without attacking her or making angry ultimatums?
I thank you in advance if you’ve made it this far and can offer some support. I am reeling.