From finding a crumbled up paper about her feelings towards their marriage, to losing in a board game, divorced people share the ‘final straw’ of their marriage.
[Source can be found at the end of the article]
My husband was out of town on a business trip. I had a surgery scheduled for the same time. Had the surgery and there were complications. It was supposed to be a day surgery and I should have been home that evening. Ended up in the ICU for two days and the hospital for four more. My friend called my now ex husband and told him that I almost died and was in ICU and he needed to come home. His reply, ‘Well, she didn’t die so I’ll be home when my business trip is over.’ After he got home and I got home from the hospital, he was nice enough to leave the hotel invoice on our dresser. A room with two occupants.
komakozic
She didn’t want to be married or a mom anymore. She also wanted to see other people. I showed her the door and she ran like a bat out of hell. Left me and the kids. All I had to do to get custody was keep paying her cell phone bill and car payment. This was pretty much all she cared about, too damn bad that was not part of the divorce agreement. I stopped paying the day after the divorce was final.
4z4z4z4z
Finding plane tickets and hotel reservations to go meet some guy she had been chatting with online.
Turns out the guy wasn’t the fishing-boat owning Alaskan adventurer he claimed. He turned out to be a part-time theater ticket-taker for a movie theater, living in his mom’s basement.
TheGarp
I was going to get yelled at no matter what I did: Did the laundry, get yelled at for not folding the towels correctly. Let her do the laundry, get yelled at for not doing the laundry.
The final straw was I was sent to the grocery store for French Cut green beans. They had French Style green beans and Cut Style green beans. I spent more time than I care to admit scrutinizing the green bean isle. I finally realized that green beans are 40 cents and I’m not taking an argument over 40 cents. I bought both.
tohones82
She decided she loved her girlfriend (who was also married) more than she loved me and our new baby. She left for the girlfriend, who subsequently left her husband and kids too.
Both families ended up divorced. Both women lost the kids. They broke up a few months later.
PrintError
He got blind drunk at his birthday party and was trying to start fights, etc. So I got him home. Had the presence of mind to hide the car keys in the drier. He wanted to go back out, so tore the whole house apart looking for them. Threatened me with a kitchen knife when I wouldn’t give up their location.
MyHomeOnWhoreIsland
There were two things that stuck in my mind I just couldn’t get past. But it was a lot of different things. I guess these two were the nails in the coffin.
Birthday dinner for my father in law. 5 minutes before we are leaving for dinner, my ex tells me, “oh, dinner is just for our immediate family.” I thought I was his family. It was very heartbreaking.
I spent a month caring for my dying Grandmother. One of the most treasured people in my life. I was exhausted and devastated by the time she passed. I don’t even remember the conversation but only his response of, “I really need your support right now, your Grandma’s death really messed me up.”
I realized I was alone in my marriage and that it wasn’t ever going to change. I had to walk away for my own health and sanity.
harboringgrace
She threw my laptop on the floor, which caused the screen to break. I took the laptop into the bedroom to inspect it. I brought it back out to show it to her. She accused me of breaking the screen. It wasn’t the first thing of mine she broke, nor the first time she made a ridiculous accusation.
Wdeflect
She got debt free, mostly thanks to my income. She literally wrote the check to pay off her last debt while I read the five page letter telling me everything she had hated about me from the moment we met. 8 years, 3 kids, but the second our savings account matched her student loan balance, I got one week to pack my stuff and get out. As a bonus, it was also my birthday.
PM_ME_A_JOKE_PLS
I decided to go to college and get my degree. He refused to get a job to help. Fine, but at least keep the house up.
Nope.
Turns out I was expected to work 8 hours, then go to school for 8 more, then come home and cook, clean, do his laundry, run him around town, and give him sexy time. I realized at that moment he didn’t really give a damn about me the way a husband should.
RockPrincess01
Finding a video of her with the guy she was having an affair with. Love how it’s never their fault and cheaters always refuse to take responsibility.
(She left her email logged in on my laptop and we both used Gmail.)
He was also married and he and his wife had a kid. I never said anything to her since my ex is incredibly vindictive and didn’t feel like dealing with the blow back as I had enough going on with the divorce.
Can only imagine if that bomb shell was dropped now…
Looking back now, she did me a favor, I have a great life now.
gjones9038
For about 3 months already he would only be home for 10 minutes after I got home from work. Just long enough to say hi to me and our infant son before taking off to party with friends until God knows when.
The final straw when when he thought it was acceptable to disappear for the entire weekend and get mad at me when I went looking for him. He had a seizure disorder and mental health issues so when he went missing in the past (happened multiple times) I had to go looking for him to ensure he was safe.
Otterz4Luv
When one of my husbands MANY girlfriends actually came up to me, apologized and said, He told me that you knew about me, and that you had an open marriage. I was already planning on leaving him, because of the infidelities. She just made me move all that much faster.
Heemsah
She spent a week away with some guy from work, and it was something I should have questioned more if I genuinely loved her. When she returned, she basically said that she was in love with this guy and that she would move to the spare room. It was perfectly amicable, we’d just exceeded our shelf life, so to speak. We both met someone else, and never looked back.
SoapyRibnaut
When he told me that we were too young when we met (21) and that he never got to live a bachelor lifestyle. He wanted to take a break so that he could date around and get it out of his system then we would get back together. This happened about a month after we got married. Lived together 9 years, married for 6 months. Marriage only lasted so long because he realized that he wasnt attracting the dime pieces he thought he would and dragged his feet signing paperwork.
whatisevenleft
My wife and I both had very difficult upbringings. I suffered a lot of physical abuse and she suffered a lot of emotional abuse.
What split us was the fact that I wanted to move on and she didn’t (we were together throughout our 20s). I addressed my issues, but she never did. Her past resulted in unchecked depression, mistrust, and low self-esteem. We loved each other very much but our life together was very difficult.
One day during one of our many fights, I punched a hole in the wall and it scared me. I wouldn’t ever hit her, but I also couldn’t ignore that I couldn’t move on to who I wanted to be if I was with her.
wearethat
The final straw for me was during an argument one night over something insignificant. My wife looked at me and said “Our relationship works because I lie to you.” I was livid, I stood there my jaw wide open, after I regained my composure I asked her what she said. She repeated it and at that moment after 4 years I knew there was no hope for it. Our relationship was dead..
Now she is trying to come back and tell me she loves me and how things will be better if I just give her a chance. I told her it’s never going to happen I will not change my mind and will never take her back.
nousferous
She didnt want to have to worry about coming home. She would sleep all day. We pulled up next to a truck one day and the guy was just glaring at me, then he peeled out and ran the red light. I asked her You know that guy? she replied yeah, we work together. I found out she was sleeping with this guy. I left soon after. She told me to take the kids because HE (her new man) didnt want kids. I left with a 9-month-old a 1-year-old and a 5-year-old. That was 10 years ago. She killed her self last weekend. My oldest is so angry. My boy is heartbroken he will never get to talk to her anymore and my youngest, my precious little girl, is devastated. Its so hard to understand how someone can do anything that she has done and I am completely lost.
xIIBIGPACEIIx
My divorce was death by a thousand paper cuts. The final straw was something a little different.
I wanted to go to my local micro center and browse the afternoon away. She decided to go with me and sit in the car. As Im wandering at the glory that is tech, Im in the BYOPC department looking at a motherboard. This couple in their 20s walks up to the CPU case and the guy lays down this nerd stream about the latest AMD processor. Shes listening, lets him finish his overview of thread counts and proceeds to bust his balls about it. But it was so sweet. So caring. It was the cutest thing Id ever seen. She didnt understand but she loved him. And loved what a giant dork he was.
It was in that moment I realized that I would never have that with the person Im with and even if I could find a way to get there with her I dont want it. I had struggled for a few years with all the excuses of not getting out. Oddly enough that exchange between strangers was what did it for me.
gli_liphon
When my (apartment) neighbor asked me how I was ok “with all of that.”
Me: Ok, with what?
Him: Oh, with being in an open marriage…
Me: I’m sorry, what now? Come again?
Him: Yeah, she told us you guys were in an open marriage when we saw her bringing guys home to your house while you were working.
Me: I’m sorry, what now? Come again?
AWK-WARD SILENCE!!!
Thanks for letting me know, or I’d still be in the dark about this “whole open marriage thing.
TheNotSoFunPolice
I didn’t even know I was getting a divorce. I received the divorce papers in the mail. My, ex was in the Navy at the time about to retire. Her last duty station was in Michigan. We had been in the DC area for about 12 years before the last transfer came. So I stayed in DC as our home was almost paid off and after 3 years she would be back to settle here for good.
We had been together for about 10 years before we got married. About 3 months before her retirement I get the papers from the State of Michigan, in 30 days you’re divorced. Apparently she talked to a JAG officer about her retirement and he suggested she divorce me so she wouldn’t have to split her retirement check with me. I paid all the bills at the DC house and most of the ones at the Michigan house. I didn’t want to fight so we got a divorce. I did keep all of my stuff, house, car, motorcycle. And she didn’t ask for any of my business.
About 4 months later, I get a call from her, saying how she doesn’t have enough money to pay her bills. I told her that’s not my problem, and you know what, it felt really good. 4 years now and I get a call every now and then of her telling me she misses me, and loves me and she can’t pay her bills.
manilapat
It wasn’t the final straw, but it was the first time divorce was mentioned, and it was the first time we admitted openly that we both wanted out.
We were playing a board game and his character walked into a trap I’d set and took a massive amount of damage. He tried to institute his own version of “take backsies,” and when I refused because we were adults and he was cheating, he knocked the game board over and yelled, “That’s it! THAT’S the straw that broke the camel’s back! I want a DIVORCE!”
Sadly, we worked things out and continued on through more miserable years until I eventually called it quits due to his online dating and his controlling behavior.
That game still has a special place in my heart, though.
Kurkey_Tooker
When it finally hit me that the impact of killing myself would be the push needed for my mother to die too. That my cat would get sent back to a shelter, my 14 year old dog would never have another forever family, and my mother’s two cats would probably eat her body and be put down for it.
Up until that point I was willing to put up with being cheated on (to this date I’ve learned of 5 different women), the emotional manipulation, not being allowed to have friends, and developing a particularly rough eating disorder. But that was all happening to me. I wasn’t all that important in my own head, but nobody gets to hurt my mom.
I’ve since recovered from the self harm and eating disorder, cut all contact and got a divorce and am in an amazing relationship with my childhood boyfriend. Plus now I have a happy little family of three cats and my dog will be 17 soon.
captian-dickachu
I saw a crumpled up piece of paper on the floor. It was a letter to “me” she never intended to give me – a therapy tool – pouring out all our problems and a few I didn’t know about.
The upside is once we talked about it and realized neither of us wanted to be married anymore, the only feeling was a massive sense of relief all around. It was pretty amicable as far as divorces go.
plastickhero
Two things happened at once. My daughter came up for adoption. We knew about it because she is my son’s biological sister. My ex-husband had angered social services so much that he was banned from adopting again. I asked if I would be allowed to adopt her on my own, and they said yes. My ex-husband was never violent and any verbal abuse he spewed was so blatantly impotent that I never felt threatened or afraid, but he had closed one too many doors with his horrible behavior. At the same time, he screwed up another financial decision. His inability with money had become a problem, especially when connected with his defensive and angry attitude regarding being wrong about anything.
estrogyn
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