I'm doing 16 things
The story of how my whole world cam crashing down on me. And why I feel so foolish.
Meet 2 years ago. She was living with her x-husband at the time we meet. Her bedroom was downstairs, his was upstairs.
How we meet. I was having a beer with a friend at a restaurant. She came in with some friends and co-workers. She started up a conversation with me and asked me to call her.
We finally had our first date about 3 weeks later. She told me within the 1st week that she loved me and wanted to marry me.
She was a waitress at a restaurant. She only worked a couple of days a week.
A month after we meet her x-husband moved out and into his own home. He quit making payments on the house. A year later it went into foreclosure. The foreclosure took place in January of 2008.
She was an Alcoholic, although I didn’t realize it until she got a DUI, 8 months after we meet. Substance abuse does not run in my family. I had no experience, spotting or dealing with a alcoholic.
We agreed that she needed to quit drinking and she wanted to quit drinking. She first tried to quit drinking on her own. This lasted for about 4 months. By then she was a closet drinker. Never drank around me. She moved in with me in January of 2008. At that time I knew that she had started to drink again.
We married in late February, with the plan that she needed Alcohol Addiction treatment so we married in February so she could go on my health insurance. We had planned on having an official wedding ceremony in mid summer.
By mid to late march she went on a bender. Which put her into Detox, I drove her to Detox. This is 5 day treatment at a hospital and then off to a 28 day in-house treatment.
I told her that if she left treatment that she would have to move out. She left the 28 day treatment facility 10 day into treatment. She moved out, into a apartment complex about 1 block away from me.
She moved in with me in January of 2008. I have a large 3-bedroom condo. I have two kids of my own, whom I have shared custody with my x-wife. They are now ages 12 year old boy and 16 year old girl. She has a 11 year old son whom she spilt custody with her x-husband.
We officially stayed married though out the summer of 2008. we slowly got closer to each other. Things were great up until a couple of weeks ago.
She was working a lot of hours and finally taking care of herself for the 1st time in a long time.
Since March of 2008 I have been going to Al-anon meetings and researching how alcohol effects the alcoholic and loved ones.
In early September the GOP convention was in town. She meet a 78 year old (I’m 46 and she is 48) delegate from Hawaii. She told me that he was interested in buying art in the twin cities and needed somebody who knew art and could find some art work for him.
He would make this a free lance job and provide her with a car.
This was starting to sound fishy. Just didn’t smell right. I asked her about it and she said she was going to use to make some money and not to worry.
About a week later, which September 29th. We went to a movie and stayed at her place. At around midnight I heard her cell phone ring. The next morning I saw her cell phone. I opened it up and saw that she got a call from the 801 area code.
That night I asked her what that was all about, why is this old guy calling her at midnight.
She got all upset and accused me of going though her e-mails and checking her cell phone messages. I knew then that something was really wrong.
She confessed that he wanted more from her then just a job as an art dealer. But she assured me that she didn’t think it would go that far…
I told her then that she had to chose me of this old guy from Hawaii. This was Wednesday, October 1st. I talked to her on Friday, October 3rd. At this point she told me that she loved me but needed the money and was choseing the money over me. So I told her we were going to get a divorce.
Needless to say I was devastated. But thought this was more funny then anything else. We agreed to meet Sunday morning. I was going to give her one more chance. She flat out refused. I was further devastated.
Today is Wednesday, October 08, 2008. Monday was really rough for me. She refused to talk with me. I tried calling her and e-mailing her. I even went over to her apartment. She again refused to talk to me and threatened to call the cops, just because I wanted to talk to her. I was breaking down emotionally.
I talked to a few people; my mother, my Jewish work mom and my Al-anon sponsor. They were all very helpful and supportive. I also went to a Al-anon meeting on Monday night.
Yesterday I meet with an attorney and filled out the divorce papers. Actually I did the paper work Sunday and Monday night. The attorney just spent 5 minutes checking it over and said it all looked good and was going to be an easy divorce.
Tuesday night I dropped the papers off at her apartment. She said that she would fill in her information and give them back to me.
After I dropped the divorce papers off at her place, I felt like 1,000 pounds had been lifted off of my shoulders.
I felt really good until I went out to lunch with a co-worker today. I told him about it and the sadness has come back…
This is pass time, I’m sure but it still sucks big time.
