Feeling bad about feeling good

[keiji]

You know that phrase, "If you wait by the river long enough, the bodies of your enemies will float by". Well, I waited, and it happened.

 

Here's a breakdown of my story. I've posted bits and pieces here and there, but never had my own thread. It will be long considering how eventful the whole thing has been for six years.

 

-In a relationship for nine years. Married for two. We buy a very, very expensive flat. Everything's going great both on a personal and professional level. We try to have kids but she has some fertility issues, so she starts treatment. Her character begins to change for the worse and we have our first arguments in almost nine years. I'm puzzled, to say the least, but I put it down to hormonal changes and the realization that having kids will not be an easy task. I even secretly call her doctor one day, but he says it's quite normal given the circumstances.

 

-She seems more and more distant. One day she's in a bar with a bunch of our friends (my friends, actually) and she doesn't even say hello when I arrive. I sense something is very wrong and on the way back home I decide to confront her about it. We sit in the kitchen and she says she doesn't know what's going on with her but she feels the urge to get away from everything. I tell her I understand, offer any help I can provide and accept that it's the end. I look at her and I see someone completely different. It's almost like I don't know her and it feels a bit scary even, like her face has changed to the point of being barely recognizable. She's started a diet months before, has changed her haircut and dyed her hair dark too. All of this makes a lot of sense if you keep reading.

 

-The next morning she wakes up crying and I ask her if she wants to move with her parents, sister or some friends. She says no. Changes her mind after lunch, packs up a little bag and leaves.

 

-I close the door, totally in shock considering how sudden and absolutely weird the situation is. I go out to the terrace, open a beer, light up a cigarette and try to make sense of it all. Then I get this weird feeling in my stomach. Something doesn't quite fit, so I log in her Gmail account, the chat window opens immediately and there she is having a conversation with some guy 30 minutes after leaving our place. Nine years of absolute trust down the drain.

 

-I call her to let her know and I leave the flat to meet a couple of friends. We spend a few hours together and they warn me she'll probably be at home when I get back. I disagree, but she proves them right. When I go into the living room I see her lying on the couch besides a few sleeping pill blisters. I call an ambulance and five minutes later two police officers are in my living room asking questions. We go to the hospital, I call her parents and the doctors tell me she's ok (of course she is; it's how emotional blackmailing works), but we need to go to a mental hospital for a check. It's the law. We go back home at 7 in the morning after the most shocking and sad night of my life. She leaves at noon and never comes back.

 

-Four or five days later she withdraws the money from our bank account, comes home while I'm not there and grabs two TVs, my laptop (I worked from home then and that was my backup computer) and a motorcycle that she still has to this day. Not bad considering I hadn't even started mourning and I couldn't for the life of me understand what the hell was going on. She seems to have gone from angel to demon overnight, but that is just the beginning and it was not overnight.

 

-Fast forward three months of intense pain, utter bewilderment and general despair. One evening I'm theorizing about her behaviour and what may have happened when a common friend can't stand it anymore and tells me the truth: she has a new boyfriend, a workmate she's been chasing for quite a few months. It's not the same guy I saw her talking to on the Gmail chat. I can't even speak.

 

-During those months she's been trying to kick me out of OUR flat, part of which my parents helped us pay, because she wants to rent it. She says she has nowhere to go, she's living with her parents and needs money. Needless to say, she does have somewhere to go. Her parents are rich. What's more, the previous Christmas, three months before the breakup, we go to her aunt's apartment for the family lunch. Her aunt has an empty flat on the upper floor, and my then-wife asks her if she can see it. Just out of curiosity, you know. In a perverse gesture, she asks me if I'd like to see it too. That's the apartment she moved in immediately after leaving in order to be nearer the new guy. Saying I felt like an idiot when I realized this is a huge understatement. Let's not forget the fertility treatment she was undergoing while she planned a life with her new guy.

 

-Around the 4th or 5th month mark, I'm at a traffic light on my motorbike and I heard, "look, that's Keiji". I turn around and see her and her new boyfriend making fun of me. How cruel is that, considering that I haven't done anything to her nor interfered with her relationship. I get the hell out of there without saying a word.

 

-At that point, many people have started turning their back on me. She's started a propaganda campaign against me to justify her own deeds and it's working. I don't do anything about it. I have this friend who's a model, and my ex-wife tells people we've had an affair for a long time before the breakup, which is false (we ended up sleeping together a few times and our friendship remains intact, so eat that, b****). She even said I was sexually useless. I'm quite active, unlike her, but she's so "sweet" that some people believe her. Not the best publicity when you're back on the market.

 

-After fighting for two years, I can't take it anymore. I give up on my flat, get back 10% of what me and my family invested in it, grab my cats and my records and try to start from scratch and never hear from her again (the latter, quite unsuccessfully I must say). I heal, meet new people, have a great professional career and I'm the happiest I've been in years now, but it's been hell, so I need three different therapists to get here.

 

I could go on and on forever. My problems with her last to this day. She's been the cruelest, meanest person I've ever met. I've never, ever taken revenge or spread false rumors about her. I've basically dodged the blows for six years and tried to carry on with my life while she devotes her time to investigate what I'm up to by any means possible.

 

So last week I get the news: her boyfriend has broken up with her, the first guy who's ever left her in 38 years, and she's so devastated that her parents have forced her to move in with them lest she tries to kill herself. In light of this, I almost throw a party and I can't erase a smile from my face. But now I feel quite bad about being so satisfied. On the one hand I think that life has compensated me for all she's done to me and my family, specially my family (I left that out). On the other, I feel guilty and mean for being happy about someone else's misery.

 

I don't know if I'm just venting because I feel somewhat relieved, like the last chapter finally came and I think the universe has administered justice at last or of I'm expecting some words of encouragement, a "you're entitled to be happy about this, you're not a bad guy". I'm not a revengeful person, that's for sure, but I can't deny I'm resentful, and I don't like it.

 

Again, I guess I'm just venting, but this is also a corroboration of that famous Chinese saying I mentioned above.

Edited February 17, 2017 by keiji

[Ieris]

I must admit I was smiling by the end of your post. I think you did good in not retaliating over the 2 years because karma has slapped her in the face

[mikeylo]

Maybe you found closure and validation that it wasn't you. It's another step towards healing

[AT15]

Wow, Big ups to you for healing. I hope you meet your new wife soon.

 

What goes around comes around. I'm sorry you had to endure so much pain.

[Popsicle]

That is a very sad story all around and for all around.

[LitTunnel]

Sorry to hear about this man. Hope you move on now in peace.

[Ronni_W]

In light of this, I almost throw a party and I can't erase a smile from my face. <snip> I'm not a revengeful person, that's for sure, but I can't deny I'm resentful, and I don't like it.

keiji,

The reason that you don't like it is because you recognize, at deeper levels, that your reaction is the reaction of a person who was, in fact, wanting/needing/hoping for vengeance. (Just because you were, albeit unconsciously, waiting for Karma to do the 'dirty work' - or for the Universe to deliver your 'justice' for you - doesn't change

what was in your own heart, about it.)

[keiji]

keiji,

The reason that you don't like it is because you recognize, at deeper levels, that your reaction is the reaction of a person who was, in fact, wanting/needing/hoping for vengeance. (Just because you were, albeit unconsciously, waiting for Karma to do the 'dirty work' - or for the Universe to deliver your 'justice' for you - doesn't change

what was in your own heart, about it.)

 

You have a point here, as I generally want kind people to do well in life and mean people –who fortunately I can count with the fingers of one hand– to do not so well. But I had a few chances to take revenge on her and I didn't. Turns out that our bank agent was a childhood friend of my ex-wife's. I must say she's not a very good professional, so both plotted to improve my ex's financial situation in my back. Her friend is so unskilled that I ended up being the co-owner of the flat but was exempt from the mortgage. Genius.

 

When I learnt this after a phone call to the bank to check some mortgage information, I could have easily said, "Ok, now I'm going to enjoy a wonderful flat with swimming pool while you keep paying the full monthly fees for twenty-five years". Instead of that, I e-mailed my ex to let her know that, despite everything she'd done to me, I couldn't sleep at night if I kept a cent that was not mine, so I'd spare her the burden and wouldn't take advantage of her stupidity and her clumsy dirty tricks. I also e-mailed her friend at the bank to tell her that I wouldn't have her bosses kick her out because she had a little daughter and I'm way more decent than her. I don't think I can consider myself a vengeful person in light of this. And I had quite a few motives to boost my finances after all she stole from me.

 

Also, I don't believe in the universe solving our problems, of course. It's more of a "you rip what you sow" situation, and someone who's caused a lot of harm to many people is just ripping.