Please learn from my mistakes

I’m in the process of divorcing. My husband of 9 years dipped out on our child and me in the middle of this pandemic to be with his college ex-girlfriend. Over the past couple of years he has dialed up the gaslighting, emotional abuse, and most importantly the financial abuse. Because he left almost every piece of paperwork in the house, while I’ve been boxing up his shit, I’ve come across some of his secret diaries. He lovebombed me like crazy for the first couple of years. I ignored some early gut intuitions that his actions weren’t matching up with his words, because he was so obviously devoted to me. If I told him that I had a flat, he would leave work early and drive an hour and fourty five minutes to help me fix it. My car had a mystery no-start issue. He helped me search the internet for solutions and drove me to the computer tech (that I paid) that fixed the issue by correcting some poorly done solders. And many other small things that I would have done for a good friend, but at the time made me feel “special“.

Imagine my surprise, ten years and a kid later, when I come across his handwritten outline to handle the objections that I had made to slow things down. He had tallied every single instance where he did the slightest thing to help me out and formulated it into a debate team style argument to keep me in the relationship with him. Every single thing that you or I would probably do just because for a friend, he had calculated and lined out as reasons that I owed him. He held these sorts of crazy accounts for our entire relationship and I had no clue why he was so begrudging and felt so justified in doing the shitty things to me that he did. Maybe more horrifying is his diary enteries about the younger girl that he had dated a couple of years before we got together. He goes into detail about how he would specifically answer then not answer her texts, change plans, press her boundaries, say I love you to keep her off balance and control her. Direct quote about suddenly ghosting, “I used to be better at that-answer with no answer, but of course it has it‘s trade-offs. What was she thinking? It makes me laugh after my “no answer”. All I know is I’ll be more of my other self more. I’ve been letting her know too much of one-side. Now maybe she needs to see the other.”

Yes ladies, they know exactly what their doing and why when they lovebomb and breadcrumb you! Don’t assume because you are aboveboard and honest that men aren’t working from a position of entitlement and gameplaying because he seems so “nice” and “cares so much”.