February 19, 2025 • 63 mins
Day of Events: February 12 and 19, 2024
after my journal entry for the day, this is actually the telling of one of the ways he subversively dominated me- a way of sneaking in a sort of underhanded like and making himself look better by putting me down because I didn't fit into or believe in his definition of something or process...
I liked to cook but he always put me and my cooking down, nothing was ever good enough so why should I try? I have lots more things to do, buddy!!
Scarlett Davis
Facebook: Future Single Lady
email: FutureSingleLady@gmail.com
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:05):
What did I promise you?
I promised you the ups, thedowns, and the all arounds and
some of it might be triggering.
So if you're triggered easily,stop listening here because this
is not the place for you.
I use wordy dirds.
I say things that are foul.
I'm very blunt.
(00:26):
Sometimes I'm nice about how Isay things, but not always.
I say what I feel because it'sthe real deal.
I'm telling my story of how Iforced my way through a divorce
with someone who I found outafterwards was a narcissist.
(00:47):
I spent almost 20 years, well,almost 20 years married, over 20
years actually with this man.
We have two children togetherand there was another child that
he had before I met him.
There's a lot of stuff going onhere, a lot of variables, a lot
of irons in the fire.
(01:08):
This is me asserting myindependence, my story, my
version of what happened.
I'm not giving any advice or ifI am just know that I'm not
qualified to give it because I'mnot any kind of psychological
professional.
I am not qualified in any way togive any advice or legal advice
or mental advice or anythingelse.
(01:30):
All I am is a woman telling herstory and being very emphatic
about it sometimes, sometimesbeing very sad.
Sometimes being angry, all kindsof emotions here.
So if you're interested in that,then keep on.
But if you're triggered easily,you might want to reconsider
(01:53):
what you're doing here.
I'm Scarlett Davis and I am thefuture single lady.
Special delivery! It's finallyarrived.
I'm going through my journalfilling in the gaps between me
insisting upon my independenceand when I actually started
(02:13):
recording this.
So I'm going through my journalentries and it turns out for
this date, February 19th, therewasn't a really long entry.
So you know what?
I figured that was the perfectspace to actually tell the story
of how things went down.
Of the day and the time when Isaid, Hey, let's have a chat and
(02:37):
tried to, I did approach thingsnicely and as eloquently as
possible and nicely as possibleexpress that I didn't want to be
married to this man anymore.
Still be a family.
Yes, just not married.
And I thought I was addressingthe elephant in the room.
(02:59):
What do you, what happens when.
When you tell a narcissist thatyou don't want them, when you
reject someone who dares tothink that there's no way
anybody could reject thembecause they're so awesome.
Well, this is the beginning ofthat story.
All right, so here we go.
(03:21):
It is February the, I don't knowwhat it's today, the, I gotta
look at the date on my journalto keep up with this.
February the 19th, and quitehonestly, there is very little
to really say about this.
I'm going to go through this,some of this really quickly, or
at least there's, there's a lotto say about it.
Two pages of stuff here, but alot of it is not stuff that will
(03:47):
make any sense to you, so I'mjust going to get started and
then go through it.
5 a.
m.
on a Monday.
Why?
Speaking engagement on, at alocal high school.
Mathis.
I want the best of everything,all for the greatest good.
I believe this will help me getthere.
(04:07):
After all, uh, okay, sobasically I go into to some
stuff.
I have this idea and If youhappen to be the person to make
t shirts and websites and stuffthat's really inspirational,
contact me, futuresinglelady.
at gmail.
com.
(04:29):
I have some stuff that I justfeel like could be attitudinally
revolutionary.
It's, it's good to me anyway,but anyway.
There's some stuff that it's,it's a visual thing, it's not
It's not a verbal thing.
It's not an audible thing.
(04:49):
So I'm just going to gloss overthat because it doesn't make any
any sense to you.
The traits of the day for mybest future self are strength
and success.
I said, yes.
That basically I I just absorband and affirm all of that.
Um, basically I had this wholeidea this realization About yin
(05:15):
and yang about masculine andfeminine and so one well, I
don't have to get into that itdoesn't matter right now, but it
was I just had a kind of alittle epiphany there about yin
and yang and the whole Idea ofmasculine is the idea of
something and feminine is thecreation of something.
(05:37):
So it's like masculine So if youwere to actually Transition that
or translate that into actualsexuality sperm would be the
idea of a baby But it's Thewoman with the egg in the womb
that creates the baby thefeminine does that So that's
(05:59):
just it's about an energy thing.
And so it was just a littleepiphany for me.
Oh uh speaking engagement thatwas this wonderful person Who
does a lot of things she's amassage therapist here locally
and she does a lot of networkingstuff She has taken basically
her the skills from her previouscareer and applied it to this
(06:24):
one You And she helps a lot ofpeople network together.
And so she and I went and wewere representing massage
therapists in the coastal bendand it was a careers thing.
So we weren't actually aspeaking thing.
It was just, we were there beingpresence introducing to high
schoolers that this was aprofession and it's a legit
(06:45):
thing and we can help people andit helps with sports.
It helps with recovery.
It's therapeutic, focusing onthe therapy.
Anyway, it was a, it was awonderful day.
And then afterwards we had the,our chapter meeting for the
local.
Continuing on.
(07:07):
Basically, I have some otherideas.
Thoughts.
That afternoon I had anotherentry.
So in Corpus Christi I was, orbasically I was summing up the
day that I was in Corpus Christiat this lady's house by 8 a.
m.
With coffee and drinks for, forthree people because her
(07:29):
daughter came with us too, Ithink.
Was that it?
Something like that.
The thing of the, the MathisHigh School was cool.
We listened to Zoom on the wayback, or I listened to the Zoom
meeting on my way back and Whilewaiting for a meeting and it was
a good meeting.
Uh, oh, so it was a good meetingand I look forward to basically
(07:56):
I had asked my husband to teachme his way of making hamburgers
and I actually put the list ofingredients in here and so
basically that, that's all but Ijust put the recipe in here and
so one of the things I thinkthat this might have actually
been a turning point in howthings went with us as far as
(08:20):
the taking apart of ourmarriage.
He realized I actually had anenthusiasm for cooking.
He had always dominated me inthe kitchen.
In truth, in a very subversivemanner, he always sought to
dominate me.
And some of it I recognized andsome of it I didn't.
(08:45):
And he had my family convincedthat he was the only one who
could cook.
The truth is, because he wassuch an asshole about it, That I
was just, I was just like, fine.
You want to do the cooking?
Fine.
You want it done your way?
Fine.
Now, mind you, this is a manwhose taste buds were so
sensitive that he could go to arib cook off competition, taste
(09:06):
someone's ribs and name offevery ingredient that they used,
including blends of seasonings.
He, he, he actually did that.
Try cooking for someone likethat.
Now my thing was in thebeginning, early on in our
(09:27):
marriage, for one thing, um, I,I considered cooking, cooking.
You, if you are putting stuff inpots and pans and you're mixing
it together and you're cookingit on the stove, that's cooking.
Well, that was not hisdefinition of cooking.
So right from the get go, ourdefinition of cooking was not
the same.
His definition of cooking was,oh no, you gotta have a recipe
(09:48):
and then you gotta tweak it.
You make it a few times and youperfect it.
You try this and you do that andwhatever.
That's cooking.
Okay, um, that's a style ofcooking.
It doesn't mean that my stuffwasn't cooking.
So, just because I opened upsomething from, from a box, And
(10:11):
I followed the directions and Icooked it on the stove.
No, that was, that was notcooking according to him.
Yeah.
I sense your reactions fromhere.
Yeah.
So him forcing his, his impacton me, which, okay.
I'm, I'm always willing tolearn.
(10:31):
I'm always looking to improvemyself and trying to see things
from someone else's perspective.
And I think sometimes this getsme into trouble because I feel
like.
In, like in Runaway Bride, whenJulia Roberts, um, basically
she, she conformed to what allof these men wanted to be,
basically be the ideal.
(10:52):
And I'm not saying that I wasexactly like that, but because I
guess I would just thought thatsupporting whoever I was with in
whatever way that I could, thatthat was being a good partner.
What I didn't realize is thatthe more I support the other
(11:13):
person, the more I lost my ownidentity.
I wasn't supporting my ownidentity.
So even though, literally on ourvery first date, this man and I
agreed that you can't, thatyou're an individual before
you're part of a couple, andyou're a couple before you're
(11:34):
parents, and You have to havetime for all of those
relationships, a relationshipwith yourself, a relationship
with your partner, as well as arelationship with your family,
the kids that you, your familythat you create, your children,
that it can't be all about thechildren.
(11:55):
It can't be all about the familybecause that's not balanced.
If you're not nourishing thecouple relationship, then you're
not really being a good exampleto your children.
And if you don't nourishyourself.
You're not being a good exampleto your children and you're not
(12:16):
being the person that you'repart of a couple with, that
makes up the couple, part of acouple.
So we literally agreed to thatin the, on the very first date
that that was, we both thoughtthat way.
We had some very in depthconversations on that or just
(12:39):
about life in general.
So I was being supportive of himand I, I guess I thought it was
unique to one relationship.
And I definitely didn't want togo through it again.
I was in a relationship for sixyears where I definitely lost my
identity because I was sowrapped up in this guy.
(13:02):
And it was, it was a very long,hard struggle to get back to me,
to find myself again, who I am.
And I, so I, I was trying tostand strong in this one and I
was, I thought it was so coolthat I had a guy who supported
that.
I will tell you in the verybeginning, I My kids will tell
(13:25):
you, and especially mystepdaughter at the time, would
tell you that I was Cinderella.
It's not that I just lovedCinderella, it's that I loved
that I was Cinderella.
And her daddy was my PrinceCharming.
I even looked into having,having our wedding at Disney.
Uh, it started at 10, 000.
And that was 20 years ago, canyou imagine what it is now?
(13:45):
But, I wanted, I wanted to, toshow up, arrive, whatever, in
Disney.
Cinderella's carriage.
That would have been justmagical to me.
Turns out that I did have aCinderella themed wedding.
It just was not in the same way.
It's kind of like be carefulwhat you wish for.
(14:06):
My Cinderella themed wedding wasleftover birthday cake from my
stepdaughter's birthday becauseher birthday was in November and
she wanted, because truly asoften happens, This little girl
looked up to me and adored me somuch and she knew that I loved
Cinderella so much So she wantedto be Cinderella for Halloween
(14:28):
and her mom was was all game forthat until she found out That
the reason her little girlwanted to be Cinderella was
because I believe that I amCinderella.
So, nope, needle scratch off therecord.
You want to know what her mommade her dress up as?
(14:49):
A little witch.
She went from being Cinderellato a witch.
So, so you could say, was thatthe mother trying to project on
me?
Or was it, no, you can't be likeher.
(15:09):
You have to be like me.
And she identified as a witch!Anyway, well, so Since that was
the the case and we didn't haveher for Halloween then her her
dad said fine You didn't get tobe Cinderella like you wanted to
(15:30):
for Christmas.
We'll give you a Cinderellathemed birthday party two weeks
later so we did it was two and ahalf weeks later and So we just
had a justice of the peace.
We didn't tell anybody We had ajustice of the peace show up to
our backyard on, on the daythat, that we decided, and we
(15:51):
thought we had to havewitnesses.
So there was one couple that,um, basically it was my
husband's work wife, uh, youknow, his, his best buddy there
at work and that guy's wife, Ireally, really enjoyed her.
Um, and so they were going to beour witnesses.
Turns out we didn't need anywitnesses and they invited
(16:13):
another couple.
Okay.
Also, they were supposed to beour photographers.
This was so laid back and supercasual.
I mean, we were literally inshorts and t shirts right before
the ceremony.
And I was following his lead.
If he was going to be in shortsand a t shirt, so was I.
(16:35):
And then he ran in to go take ashower and put on some better
clothes.
And so I did too.
I was already clean.
Mind you, well Gosh, I'm gonnahave to back up again, aren't I?
Well, no, I will just have totell the story of leading up to
the wedding later.
(16:57):
Right now, we're talking abouthow I said I didn't want to be
married anymore.
So, trying to get back on track.
Cinderella.
Okay, so I had Cinderella themedcake.
It was actually leftoverbirthday cake.
Fast forward to asking for adivorce.
(17:21):
I had been being nudged andencouraged from something that
was greater than myself, fromsomething that I believed to be
divinity, pushing me andinsisting upon claiming this
divorce.
I couldn't bear the thought ofgoing into Valentine's Day
pretending to be in love withsomeone who I absolutely was
(17:42):
not.
And I could not bear the thoughtof him putting his hands on me
or me having to submit my Mybody to him and just like I
could not Did not just did nothave the energy for that Um, oh
(18:09):
I got off on the um the cookingthing All over the place here.
Apologize.
That's welcome to the mind ofscarlet I told you that this was
gonna be an authentic podcastand this is this is me.
This is real So here it isAnyway, so the cooking thing,
cooking was not good enough, butI, I opened my mind.
(18:32):
I, um, always willing to learnsomething new, fair and
reasonable, and be a goodsupportive partner for my
partner, trying, treating himthe way I want to be treated,
right?
Because that's what we'resupposed to do.
Um, well, anything that I cookedwas never good enough, and the
(18:52):
question I would ask is, Howdoes it taste?
And he would start telling mehow it could be improved upon.
And this offended me.
And after enough times of this,I finally looked at him and
said, Thank you, but I didn'task how it could be improved
upon.
The question that I asked was,How does it taste?
(19:12):
Or, How do you like it?
He did not like his authoritynot being received.
Basically, he My perception isthat he always wanted to be
viewed as the king and theauthority on all and his, his
(19:35):
appreciation to be sought, hisstamp of approval as the, the
goal.
And that wasn't me.
And it came to a point, and hewould, he would take my things.
So, one of the things that didhappen, that he did give
approval of, is there was oneday I was making spaghetti.
And I did what I saw my fatherdo, which it was a jar of sauce,
(20:01):
and, but then adding in, Myfamily loves garlic.
I just realized kind of a littlefunny thing there.
My mom and my uncle, peoplealways called me garlic.
So, yeah, my family lovedgarlic.
Loves garlic.
Some people don't love meanymore.
I guess, I don't know.
It doesn't matter.
Doesn't stop me from shining mylight.
(20:22):
So, there you go.
Anyway, spaghetti sauce, addingmore garlic, garlic, whatever,
whatever additional seasoningyou want to just kind of kicking
it up a notch.
Well that just blew him away andhe was like, you know.
That's a really good idea.
Well, then suddenly he has gotto, you know, competition comes
in and he has got to be betterthan, than this.
(20:44):
He's got to do things his way.
And so suddenly he becomesmaster and commander of the
kitchen.
And anytime spaghetti sauce ismade, it's got, he's got to be
the one doing this because, ohno, it needs a little, let me
taste this.
No, it needs a little, yeah, itneeds this and maybe this other
thing over here.
(21:06):
For me, crickets are chirpingand it's like, uh, okay, thought
you liked the way I did it, butevidently that wasn't good
enough.
Okay, fine, whatever.
Somewhere in there he comes upwith this four hour recipe for,
for homemade from scratch sauce,and it's really good.
(21:27):
I'm not gonna lie, it's reallygood.
And great that I inspired him.
He even gave me credit for theinspiring of that.
And it gave him, honestly, histhing was that he was always
trying to grow up to be his dad.
And his dad worked shift workwhere he would have sometimes up
to a week off in a row.
(21:48):
And his dad used his timewisely.
And one of the things that hewould do is find a recipe or
create a recipe or whatever.
He would do some, some reallygood cooking.
And that's great because I gotthe benefit of that too.
So, but the point is from thenon, spaghetti sauce was his
domain.
(22:09):
So it was something that Istarted, but he had to take it
over.
And this was a repeatingpattern.
And it was a point, it became apoint of a contention at, at
some point that, and even ourfriends, he encouraged our
friends to mock me.
And I said, it's so frustratingthat I do something, but then he
has to copy it, but he has tomake it better.
(22:31):
And then everybody laughed andthey were like, well, what's
wrong with making it better?
And I was like, the making itbetter is not the point.
The thing is.
That it was my thing and it wasgood to start with.
But he had to turn it into acompetition and take it over.
So that my thing isn't goodenough anymore.
So why should I cook?
(22:55):
Why the fuck should I put forththe effort to do a damn thing?
If that's the way it's going tobe treated.
He even said at one point, Hesaid, well, I'm, I'm like the
cook and you, you're the baker.
You're a really good baker.
Well, no, that wasn't goodenough either.
(23:17):
He had to start being the bakertoo.
He had to start coming up withcobblers and, oh, you know, I'm
such a chef and so creative at,at all these things.
And everybody likes whenever Imake this or whenever I make
that.
And I, oh, you know, I got thisrecipe from someone and you
know, well, okay.
Okay.
Just grandiose bullshit.
(23:38):
So sick of it.
So what it encouraged me to dois stay the fuck out of the
kitchen.
You want all the glory and honorfor yours?
Fine.
Keep it because I am notcompeting.
I have plenty of other stuff todo.
(23:58):
So that was a thing in ourmarriage and I say all of that
to get to this point.
Um, he made really goodhamburgers and some of it was
inspired by my father and someof it was inspired by my
grandfather.
Actually, the steaks were moremy grandfather.
Um, but I expressed, you know,my thing was, if we were going
(24:21):
to be separating, then our kidswould be spending time
eventually at his house, myhouse.
Doesn't mean that the kidsshould go without some of the
things that they are used towhen they are at my house And it
doesn't mean that that theyshould be exposed to only new
things So basically I wasdeferring to him and his his
(24:44):
experience and I asked him toteach me I said I want to make
the burgers, but I want to makeit the way you make it Can can
you teach me?
So of course that stroked hisego.
So of course Well, the thing isI did it really well, and it was
good You And I enjoyed it andeverybody saw that.
It wasn't like putting on a showor anything, but the point was
(25:10):
made that I've always enjoyedcooking.
I just don't like you telling mewhat to do.
But in this case I have askedyou to tell me to do things your
way.
I just don't like when you comein and take over my things.
Well, basically everybody sawit.
(25:31):
And I think that that wasprobably a turning point.
for things not going as nicelyas they were, because there was
another incident where herealized that he had been
ignoring me all along.
He was nice enough to, uh, andwe'll probably get into this
later, but it'll come up in oneof the journal entries.
(25:51):
But I wanted to, uh, to cook aham and I wanted it my way.
I wanted it the way that My mommade it whenever I was a little
girl.
We were living in governmenthousing and there was this
beautiful ham.
And it had these pineapplerings, and these bright red
cherries on it, and pineapplesand cherries were things that,
(26:12):
that was such exotic stuff forme in this small, itty bitty,
teeny tiny town in what we callWest Texas.
It's just about as far west asyou want to go, but it's really
north central Texas.
And it was gorgeous, and wecouldn't touch it.
We couldn't, we couldn't drinkor eat any more of the other
stuff because it had to go onthe ham.
And the ham, I don't even knowwhat it was for.
(26:34):
I want to say maybe like aneastern star thing or something.
I don't know.
But it was this beautiful,shiny, glossy ham with this
super yummy, delicious stuff onit.
And I couldn't have any more.
But my mommy had made thisdelicious goodness.
And that was, that was, I guessa core memory for me.
(26:57):
And I wanted to make that.
Now mind you, he was reallyexcellent at smoking a ham.
Um, um.
Every chance I got, I got him tosmoke me a ham, and we'd have,
we'd keep the ham bones to putin a pot of beans later.
Are you getting hungry yet?
But I loved the, the smoked ham,and like I said, he was, he was
(27:18):
really phenomenal.
He was really very skilled, andthen that was a great benefit.
It's just there was no roomoutside of his grandioseness,
but when he realized that I hadskill, and I had desire to cook,
well anyway, so I was gonna makethis ham.
And he and our daughter went tothe grocery store and he had her
(27:39):
call me saying, dad wants your,your, your shopping list.
Okay.
So he was going to be buying thefood.
Okay, great.
You know, this is a really goodsign.
This is cooperation andeverything.
So I just screenshotted therecipe list and I said, but
don't, I said, nope, not cloves.
(28:01):
I can't stand cloves, just thepineapple rings and maraschino
cherries.
They come in through the frontdoor carrying the bags of
groceries and he's halfwaythrough the living room, we had
an open floor plan, halfwaythrough the living room almost
to the bar where he's settingthings down and he said, I am so
sorry.
(28:21):
I said, for what?
He said, if you ever told me, hegoes, I don't think you ever
told me, but if you ever did, hegoes, he goes, I didn't hear you
that, that you don't likecloves.
And he said, I've been makingthem all these years with
cloves.
And I just, I smiled and I said,I told you several times.
(28:42):
I said, I just, I am so sorry.
And I said, it's okay.
I said, I just didn't eat thatpart.
Well, I think that was, thosethings were beginnings.
They, they cracked his eyes opento how much he had suppressed
and oppressed me.
That I actually enjoyed cooking.
And I was actually good at it.
(29:03):
When he wasn't, in effect, beingan asshole about it.
Anyway, so that was, um, thatwas, uh, yeah, I got the, I got
the hamburger recipe here.
So that's, that's great becausehonestly, I've been, I've been
wanting it and there's nomeasurements here.
It's just a little of this and alittle of that.
(29:25):
And that's the process.
So back to, since that's, we'vekind of got you on a daily thing
here.
So I figured I'd go into thiswhole thing about, I've been
promising.
That I needed to say how measking for a divorce came about,
the details of that, and I'll behonest, it was, it was a year
(29:47):
ago and it was about an hour and15 minutes of conversation and
I'm just going to give you the,the parts that I remember as, as
best I can.
So this is February the 12th.
I couldn't stand the thought ofgoing into Valentine's with.
(30:08):
For all of that.
So my plan was to go about thisin the nicest possible way And
I've covered some of this withyou already.
So I'm just gonna kind of glossthrough some of it That I wanted
to start off with a show offaith So I gave him the
Valentine's card that says I'ddo it all over again because I
would As much as I'm happy to beout of it, that marriage
(30:31):
fulfilled a lot of dreams forme.
I told him repeatedly that hemade all the best dreams come
true.
I got my babies out of it.
Those are, those are probablythe best dreams, but I really
would do it all over again.
So there was 100 in there, andthat was to go towards the
(30:53):
concert tickets.
We wanted to go see Styx andForeigner, and we wanted these
good seats like we had hadbefore.
Um, so I put 100 in there, and,so he was, he was like, Okay, he
said, Why are you giving, givingme this early?
It's still, Valentine's is stilltwo days away.
(31:13):
Why, why are you doing thisearly?
I don't know.
And so I told him that I knowthat he loves me, or I know that
I love him, and I know that heloves me.
And I said, but can you honestlysay that you're still in love
with me?
Not gonna lie, it shocked thehell out of me when he
immediately said yes.
(31:37):
I'm pretty sure my mouth hit thefloor.
And I told him, I kind of noddeddown the hall.
So he was sitting in his seat onthe couch and I was sitting on
the corner of the coffee tablefacing him.
So in between him and the, thehuge ass TV.
(31:59):
And mind you, he was on his, hisiPad all the time playing his
game.
Because you know, I can't, Ican't be given his, his full
undivided attention.
Our son was months away fromgraduation and which meant that
our daughter was a couple ofmore months away from starting
her senior year of high school.
(32:19):
I nodded down the hall to wherethe kids rooms were and I said,
I said, he's about to graduate.
And then next year, uh, he'sabout to graduate.
I said, but even whenever heleaves this house, he'll still,
still be a member of our family,right?
He said, yeah.
And I said, and next year.
(32:41):
Our daughter will be graduatingand when she leaves our house,
she'll still be a member of ourfamily, right?
He said, yeah.
I was like, that's just it.
We don't have to be in the samehouse or married in order to be
family.
(33:04):
And he said, so what you'resaying is you want a divorce.
And honestly, I could not saythat word.
It was just, I, it's such anugly word being a child of
divorce and my parents beingchildren of divorce.
Just such an ugly word, at leastwhenever I was growing up and I
just, I couldn't, I couldn'tsqueeze that word out of, out of
(33:27):
my throat.
It just wasn't happening.
And I told him that I wanted apeaceful parting of ways, that
we could still be a family unitand we could work together and
finish raising these kids and,and go our separate ways.
But we didn't have to be marriedto do that.
(33:48):
I also told him, we got intothis without attorneys.
We should be able to get out ofit with attorneys.
And he said, no, I said, no, Isaid, we can hire a mediator,
which is basically a third partywho knows more than we do, who
makes sure that everything isfair and equitable.
(34:09):
And he said, no, he said, hesaid, I guarantee you it's going
to get ugly.
And I said, no, I said, whateveryou look for, that's what you
will find.
And I am not looking for that.
He said, I guarantee you it'sgoing to get ugly.
He told me that I didn't haveany right to the house.
(34:29):
And I said, yes, I do.
And he said, no, you don't.
I said, yes, I do.
My name is on the deed.
We bought this house together.
You have this house because ofme.
I'm entitled.
No, you're not, especially notat its current value.
Yes, I am.
And I had a small smile on myface, peaceful and calm,
(34:52):
speaking to him about the sameway that I'm speaking to you,
except heartbeat racing like athousand beats a minute, but
calm and peaceful and just likepaddling a boat, slowly
paddling, paddling slowly.
(35:12):
Um, I made myself some notes sothat I wouldn't get totally
sidetracked.
So he.
Somewhere in here, I forget someof the order of these things.
He gave me an opportunity totake it back because he promised
me that it would get ugly.
And, and somewhere in there hehad said that he still had hope.
(35:36):
I, I said, I said, honestly, Ican't believe that you're still
in love with me.
And he said, yeah.
He goes, you know, there aretimes he goes, I still have
hope.
Okay, shocker.
Because.
In my mind, I'm sitting therethinking, how can you call
somebody a fucking cunt andstill think that you're in love
(36:01):
with them?
But I didn't say that.
I just, okay, go, go along withit.
Finally, he's, he's giving me anopportunity to take it back, to
change my mind.
And for a millisecond, like halfa millisecond, I was like, Oh,
erase, do over what?
(36:22):
Cause he's saying he's not goingto be nice about this.
And he actually is in love withme.
What?
And then I think, no, no, Ididn't come this far for
nothing.
No, I've been thinking aboutthis for a long time.
No going back now.
And I said, how can you say thatyou still have hope?
(36:43):
I said, I don't, I don't see howthat's possible.
How, how can you say that youstill have hope?
And he goes, well, there aresigns.
And I said, well, like what?
And he said, well, there aresome times that I'm sitting here
on the couch and you come, comefrom the bedroom, which is
basically bedrooms at the backof the house and down, down a
long hallway.
And he goes, and you walk intothe room and your nipples get
(37:04):
hard.
Needle scratch off the record,crickets chirp.
What?
My mind, what the fuck?
In a nutshell, what, what'shappening, and I've told him
this repeatedly, but does helisten?
(37:26):
Obviously not.
So I tend to run a little hot.
I have very large breasts, verylarge, and they're real.
Um, it's a physiologicalresponse.
I'm warm natured.
I walk into a room where thesurrounding area is colder,
(37:49):
which he always had a fan.
Okay, the fan that we had in ourliving room, it was a big ass
fan.
Not the brand, big ass, but itwas, it was like, I think had
eight or ten blades on it.
And he always had it at a veryhigh speed.
I cannot stand the wind blowingon me.
(38:10):
Or the air blowing on me.
Near me and circulating whateverbut, and being out at the beach
or having the actual wind blowon me is one thing.
But having artificial air blowon me, Ah, there's, there's only
very specific circumstanceswhere, where I like that.
Well, of course, I walk intothat room where it's like a
hurricane in there.
(38:31):
It's not really, I'mexaggerating, but close enough.
I will just say that anywhere,any room where, where he was,
had any control over the air, Ihad a blanket in there.
Okay.
So basically I would walk intothe room and my nipples would
get hard because the, the airwas blowing on them.
(38:54):
So basically he thought that hewas.
going to get to have some funwith those nipples and therefore
the rest of my body?
Basically, he had hope that hecould still fuck me.
That's what he defined as beingin love with me.
That's what that came out to.
(39:15):
That was why he still had hope,was that he could stick his dick
inside me.
No.
Oh, and he did make it a pointto tell me that the last time
that we were togetherphysically, which.
was after a concert.
We were out of the ranch and itwas post concert.
(39:37):
I'm going to tell you right now.
It was date rape.
I don't care if I was married tohim or not.
The fact is I had kind ofdeveloped a bit of a routine
that anytime that we would goout, I would definitely drink
some cocktails.
And then by the time that wewould get home, I was almost
asleep and he knew it and itleft me alone.
(40:01):
In this instance, he wasdetermined to get some.
I was actually asleep when hestarted touching me and moving
my body and insisting on havinghis way with me.
I didn't actually fight him off.
I remember waking up saying,what, what?
(40:21):
And he's like, come on, youknow.
And when I realized that it wasgoing to happen, I I figured, if
I'm going to have to endurethis, then I may as well at
least try to get something outof it for myself.
He had a twinkle in his eye ashe thoroughly enjoyed telling me
(40:45):
that the last time we weretogether, the last time we had
sex, that was the worst sexever.
And I just kept looking,maintaining eye contact, and
with my little smile and saying,uh huh, uh huh, uh huh.
I was not disagreeing.
I got date raped by the man Iwas married to.
(41:07):
Yeah, just that alone ought totell you that it was really bad
sex.
Uh, he was doing really whateverhe could to start, you know,
with the jabs.
And he told me, you know, thekids have already decided where
(41:27):
they want to live.
Really?
Okay.
Okay.
Endeavoring not to show anysurprise because I know his
subtle and manipulativebehavior.
It was a shocker that he had hada conversation that deep with
the children.
(41:48):
Uh, he also, I think around thetime that we were talking about
sex, that, uh, he had asked meif I had been with someone else
that, that why was I wantingthis?
And I told him I hadn't beenhappy for a long time and I know
he hadn't either.
And I really thought I was justaddressing the elephant in the
room.
(42:08):
And thinking that we would, wewould all be happier because of
this.
And he said, we know if you'vebeen someone else, it's, it's
okay.
And he was giving me this, the,his tone and the look in his
eyes was, there was almost kindof a gleam as he was telling me
that it was okay that when hewas kind of looking me out of
(42:30):
kind of like the corner of hiseye, like, it's okay.
Like I have been.
So at first it was, At one, Iwas, I was shocked by it because
I haven't, I always have madesure that it was never called
into question whether or not Iwas, I was faithful.
(42:50):
Very old fashioned beliefs atthe time and I embodied those.
I tried to be the model motherand wife for my children.
So him telling me, you know, sois there someone else?
And I said, no.
(43:10):
You know, because it's okay ifyou have.
And this, this kind ofinference, this look in his eye
that tells me, oh yeah, he'sbeen with other people.
At first I thought maybe he wasjust trying to catch me in
saying something so that hecould hurl it against me, you
know, about maybe that I've beenjust um, a crazy fucking whore
or something, which I hadn'tbeen.
(43:31):
Always the picture of propriety.
Um, covered the rest of that.
He insisted on telling thechildren.
He said, he said, well, youknow, we gotta tell the kids.
And I was like, no, let's justkeep this between us for now.
And he was like, oh no.
Kids, come in here.
(43:53):
Now mind you, this man couldnot.
It's funny, I want to say thathe could not keep a secret to
save his soul.
But he turns out kept a lot ofsecrets.
Some of which are still comingto light.
So he called the kids in there.
(44:14):
Okay, so, um, I'm just going togive you an example of how he
could not keep a secret.
I was pregnant, and whenever wefound out that it was a boy, we
left the doctor's office at thehospital, and I said, Can we
just keep this to ourselves fora little bit?
I liked the idea of having asecret.
So, um, with my husband,something that was just mine and
(44:35):
his thing that only he and Iknew.
He and I made the baby.
We should, you know, he waslike, Oh yeah, sure.
He immediately gets on the phoneand calls his mother.
My jaw drops.
He gets off the phone and I waslike, so what happened to us
just keeping it to ourselves?
(44:57):
He was like, well, yeah, that'sfine.
He goes, I had to tell myparents.
Uh, that's not ourselves.
And honestly, that right thereshould give you a clue to, or a
lot of insight to the rest ofour marriage.
There were a lot of times thathis mother knew things before I
did.
And that by the time he gotaround to telling me, he, I
(45:20):
wasn't getting as much detailsor enthusiasm because he had
already told the story.
So much for the man who taughtme that, well, one, he was
celebrating himself for beingright.
Because.
One of his co workers was goingthrough a, whatever class it is
(45:41):
that, whatever church it does,before people get married, you
go through and you learn thesethings together.
And the guy comes, comes out andhe goes, man, I can't believe,
you know, the, the pastor,priest, whoever it was, asked,
asked this question and he gotit wrong.
And the question basically was,it's the future.
(46:02):
You and your wife, you havechildren.
Your wife and your child are inan accident and you can save
only one of them.
No matter what you can do, youcan only save one of them.
Who do you choose?
Well, he said the child becausethey're young and they haven't
started their life yet.
They're you're young andinnocent.
That was not the right answer.
Well, the man I wound upmarrying had the right answer.
(46:26):
And the answer was you save thespouse because theoretically you
can create more Children.
But your spouse.
Is the one person that you havespent your entire life looking
for and that you've committedthe rest of your life to.
(46:47):
Even if no one's lives werethreatened, your children will
eventually grow up and leaveyou.
And it is your spouse thatyou're supposed to keep, that
you're supposed to be with, thatyou're supposed to grow old and
die with.
So this is what the man who Imarried taught me.
(47:10):
But he ran into his mama everychance he got.
Moving on.
So he called the kids in andbasically I'm sitting there and
I'm, I'm really not, I, I'mcrying at this point because I'm
really not wanting to say thisto my kids.
(47:34):
But, basically I told him that Ifelt like I was addressing the
elephant in the room.
And that none of us had beenhappy for, for a while.
And that I was looking for apeaceful parting of ways and
that we can still be a family,but we don't have to be married
(47:55):
for that to be the case.
My daughter's jaw drops and shegoes, well I didn't expect this
to happen until after Igraduated.
So she was already expecting it.
My son was like, are youserious?
Like he, he literally had.
(48:17):
Difficulty believing that he,basically it felt surreal to him
because we were so calm andpeaceful about it.
Just like I'm speaking to youright now.
And let me tell you, this littleIrish English redhead, when I
get angry, mmm, yeah, the crazycomes out.
(48:42):
I am, I'm a very passionateperson is really what it boils
down to.
And whatever, whatever has myfocus and my attention, I'm very
passionate about.
And if it means, if it'sstanding up for myself or
standing up for my children orjust standing up and insisting
on being heard, I will be heard.
And historically that means nothesitating to use my outside
(49:06):
voice.
I've learned.
Other ways to express myselfthen.
But if I have to yell and screamand I will, which is crazy
because I never wanted to havethat kind of household.
But if I have to raise my voice,I will.
Because yeah, he, he often didnot like me speaking up and
(49:28):
speaking my truth.
And so he often tried to silenceme, which meant that I spoke up
even louder.
As I was telling my childrenthis, for one, I apologized to
them for the timing.
And expressed that I didn't wantanything to impact my son's
(49:54):
celebrations.
His birthday, him enlisting inthe Navy, his graduation, his
shipping off, all of it.
And assuring them that we canstill be a family.
We just don't have to be marriedto do it.
And we can still be an effectiveteam and get things done.
(50:15):
Be a winning team.
Um, I lost my train of thoughtthere.
Oh, the thing, and I said, Itried to, I said, nobody's been
happy for years.
And I really tried to try towait, to suck it up and wait
(50:35):
until after our daughter hadgraduated.
But then I realized, and thisis, this is, this is really
where it got me.
This is where I started bawlingand, you know, sinus is all
swollen up and you know, can'tbreathe through the nose, but
suddenly the water, the nosebecomes really watery and just
draining like a sieve.
And, but then I realized whatkind of example I was setting
(50:58):
for you children.
And I didn't want you to thinkthat it was okay to live that
way.
continue on in a relationshipwhere you weren't happy To force
a smiley face on when reallyyou're sad inside and I mean
(51:22):
that just that was that wasreally my big thing that was Um
So that was that was really thethe big things and So it turns
out that the whole kids havealready decided where they want
to live You Because I broughtthis up to the kids and I said,
(51:43):
so evidently y'all have alreadydiscussed this and you've
already decided where you wantto live.
And my son was like, what areyou talking?
He's like, I have no idea whatyou're talking about.
He goes, I haven't.
And my daughter was like, well,so what had, what it had come
down to is that on one of thesemany trips where they had gone
(52:04):
to the ranch.
So this is, Two hours and fortyfive minutes away.
We call it the ranch, but it wasreally just a little under ten
acres, and it was a propertythat his mother had inherited
after her brother had died.
Well, it was, it was my husbandand children who went and worked
like slaves to maintain thatproperty.
(52:26):
Excuse me.
And, but they would go up there,they would leave on a Friday
night or a Saturday morning.
Well, I worked on Saturdays.
So I couldn't join them,especially if this was not
planned ahead.
And a lot of my clients werebooked six months and a year
ahead.
So it's, it had definitely hadto be pre planned.
(52:50):
And that's my paycheck.
That's, God, you see my voice isnot one that wanted to speak
these things out.
But the point is that I couldn'tgo.
And it was a double edged swordfor me.
Either, A, I make money, or Idon't and that's a whole other
thing with that as far as thefamily or I take time off work
(53:15):
and go do these things.
Well, I enjoyed that property upthere and at the same time I
hated it.
When there were changes made tothe property, I had zero input.
The man I was married to wasknown for for yelling and
(53:37):
screaming.
All the while and saying allthese things about his mother
and sister who did make thedecisions for the property based
on whatever he said.
And then he and my childrenworked like little slaves to
enact their visions of what theywanted.
And he would always tell my kidsas they're busting their butts
(53:58):
and he's yelling and screamingat them for not doing things
good enough, that Yep, that theywere busting their asses on this
place and that his sister wasprobably going to inherit it.
And that they weren't ever goingto see shit out of it.
And the kids, especially my son,are like, Why the hell am I
(54:18):
busting my ass for a place thatI don't own, and that I'm not
ever going to own in the future?
Why am I having to spend myweekends doing this?
I would rather be playing gameswith my friends.
I'd rather be at my own house,in my own bed, doing my own
thing.
Why the heck do I have to be uphere busting my ass, with you
yelling and screaming at me,telling me I'm not doing it good
(54:39):
enough?
So in the end, they did have,they did of course have some
good times and everything.
It wasn't, it wasn't all bad,but I think you're probably
beginning to see the dynamic atplay here.
That there was constant yellingand screaming and you're not
(55:01):
good enough, you're not goodenough, you're not good enough
and let me take you away fromyour, from your mom and I'm
going to take you out in thecountry and we're going to do
stuff that I know you don't wantto do but you've got to do it
anyway because I tell you to andyou've got to be my little
slaves at it.
Well, on these three hour drivesback and forth then he had a
captive audience.
My son would be in the back seatbasically trying to go to sleep.
(55:25):
Daughter would be up front.
She's more daddy's little girl.
And she would be up front.
And so he would have a way ofmanipulating a conversation and
say things without sayingthings.
And one of his things that hewas known for saying is, Oh, you
(55:46):
know, I just, I try to be, youknow, it's, it's good to be
prepared for all situations.
You know, you think about thingsbefore they happen so that when
they do happen, you're preparedfor it and you're okay with it
and you can handle it.
You know, so I just, I testmyself all the time, you know,
like when my dad died, I was Um,yeah, it was a shock and
everything, but, you know, Ihandled my shit, I handled my
(56:08):
business, I was able to dealwith what I had to, but look at
my sister, she was completelylost, because she was so
completely and totally dependenton our father, and she couldn't
handle her day to day lifewithout him, because he was her
little bitch, and whatever, sohe would say these kinds of
things.
And then, so then that wouldmake it easy to lead into
(56:28):
something else.
Like, so what would I do in asituation if, you know, my mom
died or you're, or you know,what if your mom died and, you
know, or this or that, or, youknow, one of you kids, I never
want that, but it's like, youthink about these things so that
if they happen, then it's, it,you know, it doesn't have as
much hurt.
(56:50):
So he works into one of theseconversations and in one of
these hypotheticalconversations.
He's talking to the kids, toboth of the kids, primarily my
daughter.
And, you know, he's thinking,you know, like if, if something
like that were to happen, youknow, like if, if your mom
decided that she wanted todivorce me or whatever, you
(57:11):
know, whatever, the hypotheticalhypothetical hypothetical,
right.
Well, my son who is about tograduate high school and has
lived in the same house since hewas five years old says.
Well, I know one thing I'm notmoving Okay, so there were two
(57:35):
assumptions being made herenumber one the assumption from
their dad Was that he would havethe house?
that I had no right to it andWhen we had actually split up
before he had told me that Icouldn't afford the house and I
said it doesn't matter you'releaving I'm not That's a whole
(57:59):
other story.
And, the kids just automaticallyassumed that I would shoot up to
Abilene, to where my family isup there.
No, that was not my plan at all.
So, everything is inferred that,hypothetically, if we should get
(58:25):
a divorce, the kids aren'tleaving the house.
That's And he's assuming that hehas the house.
Ergo, the children choose him.
Well, that's not what was said.
At all.
At.
All.
But that's what he was saying.
(58:45):
So, that was basically howeverything went down.
And, you've listened to meenough to know that I see signs
everywhere and That I startedthis conversation at 616 p.
m.
And I was back in my chair inthe master bedroom at 838 p.
(59:06):
m.
Both of which were good signs.
And I thought it comical that hesaid that he had to get a new
hairstyle.
I was so grateful whenever hesaid that he was not sleeping in
that room again.
And that he was sleeping in thespare room.
Thank you Lord Jesus, Amen!Prayer answered, but I thought
(59:28):
it comical that he said he hadto get a new hairstylist.
Okay, whatever.
And I told him I was like I'mnot gonna jack your hair up.
I still have to look at you.
You're the father of my childrenOh, so this was speaking of the
kids This was one of the thingsthat I had said said when I was
saying this stuff about we gotinto this without attorneys we
can get out of it withoutattorneys and Of course he was
(59:53):
saying no and I said even if Wedon't have respect for the 20
years that we've been together.
So we should respect ourchildren by honoring the fact
that they are not only each apart of us, but that we are a
part of them.
(01:00:14):
We each are in our children andif we honor and respect our
children, we will honor andrespect each other.
Well, obviously he didn't agreewith that.
So, things got ugly.
By the way, we did have to get amediator because that's part of
(01:00:36):
the court process.
And, well, uh, I already kind ofoutlined what happened in the
next couple of days, but I hadfound a process where we could
get a mediator that it wouldcost us 75.
Fast forward, what did we windup doing?
We had a mediator that, I, Idon't recall if it was 5.
(01:00:58):
50 each or 5.
75 each or something.
It was, it was 500 somethingdollars each.
That we had to pay to themediator and honestly, we didn't
even get our full time worth.
That's a whole other story themediator called off the rest of
mediation when he saw That theman I was married to was
(01:01:20):
skirting around a bunch ofbullshit and hiding a hundred
thousand dollars But that's astory for another day.
Also I still have paid twentythree thousand dollars in
attorney's fees and my attorneyYou Is still wanting over$2,000
more.
$2,002 and 40 cents was the lasttally I saw.
(01:01:43):
And I straight up told her Ican't get what, give you what I
don't have.
So good luck with that.
Uh, lots more to that story.
So I know I've dropped a lot oflittle nuggets there, but
there's a lot more to come.
So now you have a lot more juicytidbits, not only of actually
(01:02:03):
how everything went down, butalso a little bit more insight
into what life was like withthis man.
And of course, it's easy to zoomout and to look at the
overarching things and to seewhat twists and turns affected
things in the past and what kindof ripple effect they created in
(01:02:24):
the future because you're zoomedout looking at things.
But.
When you're in the moment,you're just dealing with it as,
as life goes on, right?
If if, well, I guess if we'regonna keep using water analogies
and we're talking about rippleeffects, well I guess when
you're in the moment, you'rejust treading water or just keep
swimming.
Just keep swimming.
Just keep swimming.
(01:02:45):
So this is my story.
I hope you're enjoying it andlet me know what you think.
Please reach out to me, futuresingle lady@gmail.com or go to
my Facebook page, future SingleLady.
I'd love to hear from you andwhen you hear back.
It's gonna be from me.
Nobody else.
Just me.
So bring it.
Tell me what's going on in yourlife.
(01:03:06):
Tell me how this is affectingyou.
Alright?
I'd love to hear from you.
So I hope you stick around andyou listen to the rest.
I wanna be like Paul Harvey, therest of the story.
What did I promise you?
I promised you the ups, thedowns, and the all arounds and
some of it might be triggering.
So if you're triggered easily,stop listening here because this
is not the place for you.
I use wordy dirds.
I say things that are foul.
I'm very blunt.
(00:26):
Sometimes I'm nice about how Isay things, but not always.
I say what I feel because it'sthe real deal.
I'm telling my story of how Iforced my way through a divorce
with someone who I found outafterwards was a narcissist.
(00:47):
I spent almost 20 years, well,almost 20 years married, over 20
years actually with this man.
We have two children togetherand there was another child that
he had before I met him.
There's a lot of stuff going onhere, a lot of variables, a lot
of irons in the fire.
(01:08):
This is me asserting myindependence, my story, my
version of what happened.
I'm not giving any advice or ifI am just know that I'm not
qualified to give it because I'mnot any kind of psychological
professional.
I am not qualified in any way togive any advice or legal advice
or mental advice or anythingelse.
(01:30):
All I am is a woman telling herstory and being very emphatic
about it sometimes, sometimesbeing very sad.
Sometimes being angry, all kindsof emotions here.
So if you're interested in that,then keep on.
But if you're triggered easily,you might want to reconsider
(01:53):
what you're doing here.
I'm Scarlett Davis and I am thefuture single lady.
Special delivery! It's finallyarrived.
I'm going through my journalfilling in the gaps between me
insisting upon my independenceand when I actually started
(02:13):
recording this.
So I'm going through my journalentries and it turns out for
this date, February 19th, therewasn't a really long entry.
So you know what?
I figured that was the perfectspace to actually tell the story
of how things went down.
Of the day and the time when Isaid, Hey, let's have a chat and
(02:37):
tried to, I did approach thingsnicely and as eloquently as
possible and nicely as possibleexpress that I didn't want to be
married to this man anymore.
Still be a family.
Yes, just not married.
And I thought I was addressingthe elephant in the room.
(02:59):
What do you, what happens when.
When you tell a narcissist thatyou don't want them, when you
reject someone who dares tothink that there's no way
anybody could reject thembecause they're so awesome.
Well, this is the beginning ofthat story.
All right, so here we go.
(03:21):
It is February the, I don't knowwhat it's today, the, I gotta
look at the date on my journalto keep up with this.
February the 19th, and quitehonestly, there is very little
to really say about this.
I'm going to go through this,some of this really quickly, or
at least there's, there's a lotto say about it.
Two pages of stuff here, but alot of it is not stuff that will
(03:47):
make any sense to you, so I'mjust going to get started and
then go through it.
5 a.
m.
on a Monday.
Why?
Speaking engagement on, at alocal high school.
Mathis.
I want the best of everything,all for the greatest good.
I believe this will help me getthere.
(04:07):
After all, uh, okay, sobasically I go into to some
stuff.
I have this idea and If youhappen to be the person to make
t shirts and websites and stuffthat's really inspirational,
contact me, futuresinglelady.
at gmail.
com.
(04:29):
I have some stuff that I justfeel like could be attitudinally
revolutionary.
It's, it's good to me anyway,but anyway.
There's some stuff that it's,it's a visual thing, it's not
It's not a verbal thing.
It's not an audible thing.
(04:49):
So I'm just going to gloss overthat because it doesn't make any
any sense to you.
The traits of the day for mybest future self are strength
and success.
I said, yes.
That basically I I just absorband and affirm all of that.
Um, basically I had this wholeidea this realization About yin
(05:15):
and yang about masculine andfeminine and so one well, I
don't have to get into that itdoesn't matter right now, but it
was I just had a kind of alittle epiphany there about yin
and yang and the whole Idea ofmasculine is the idea of
something and feminine is thecreation of something.
(05:37):
So it's like masculine So if youwere to actually Transition that
or translate that into actualsexuality sperm would be the
idea of a baby But it's Thewoman with the egg in the womb
that creates the baby thefeminine does that So that's
(05:59):
just it's about an energy thing.
And so it was just a littleepiphany for me.
Oh uh speaking engagement thatwas this wonderful person Who
does a lot of things she's amassage therapist here locally
and she does a lot of networkingstuff She has taken basically
her the skills from her previouscareer and applied it to this
(06:24):
one You And she helps a lot ofpeople network together.
And so she and I went and wewere representing massage
therapists in the coastal bendand it was a careers thing.
So we weren't actually aspeaking thing.
It was just, we were there beingpresence introducing to high
schoolers that this was aprofession and it's a legit
(06:45):
thing and we can help people andit helps with sports.
It helps with recovery.
It's therapeutic, focusing onthe therapy.
Anyway, it was a, it was awonderful day.
And then afterwards we had the,our chapter meeting for the
local.
Continuing on.
(07:07):
Basically, I have some otherideas.
Thoughts.
That afternoon I had anotherentry.
So in Corpus Christi I was, orbasically I was summing up the
day that I was in Corpus Christiat this lady's house by 8 a.
m.
With coffee and drinks for, forthree people because her
(07:29):
daughter came with us too, Ithink.
Was that it?
Something like that.
The thing of the, the MathisHigh School was cool.
We listened to Zoom on the wayback, or I listened to the Zoom
meeting on my way back and Whilewaiting for a meeting and it was
a good meeting.
Uh, oh, so it was a good meetingand I look forward to basically
(07:56):
I had asked my husband to teachme his way of making hamburgers
and I actually put the list ofingredients in here and so
basically that, that's all but Ijust put the recipe in here and
so one of the things I thinkthat this might have actually
been a turning point in howthings went with us as far as
(08:20):
the taking apart of ourmarriage.
He realized I actually had anenthusiasm for cooking.
He had always dominated me inthe kitchen.
In truth, in a very subversivemanner, he always sought to
dominate me.
And some of it I recognized andsome of it I didn't.
(08:45):
And he had my family convincedthat he was the only one who
could cook.
The truth is, because he wassuch an asshole about it, That I
was just, I was just like, fine.
You want to do the cooking?
Fine.
You want it done your way?
Fine.
Now, mind you, this is a manwhose taste buds were so
sensitive that he could go to arib cook off competition, taste
(09:06):
someone's ribs and name offevery ingredient that they used,
including blends of seasonings.
He, he, he actually did that.
Try cooking for someone likethat.
Now my thing was in thebeginning, early on in our
(09:27):
marriage, for one thing, um, I,I considered cooking, cooking.
You, if you are putting stuff inpots and pans and you're mixing
it together and you're cookingit on the stove, that's cooking.
Well, that was not hisdefinition of cooking.
So right from the get go, ourdefinition of cooking was not
the same.
His definition of cooking was,oh no, you gotta have a recipe
(09:48):
and then you gotta tweak it.
You make it a few times and youperfect it.
You try this and you do that andwhatever.
That's cooking.
Okay, um, that's a style ofcooking.
It doesn't mean that my stuffwasn't cooking.
So, just because I opened upsomething from, from a box, And
(10:11):
I followed the directions and Icooked it on the stove.
No, that was, that was notcooking according to him.
Yeah.
I sense your reactions fromhere.
Yeah.
So him forcing his, his impacton me, which, okay.
I'm, I'm always willing tolearn.
(10:31):
I'm always looking to improvemyself and trying to see things
from someone else's perspective.
And I think sometimes this getsme into trouble because I feel
like.
In, like in Runaway Bride, whenJulia Roberts, um, basically
she, she conformed to what allof these men wanted to be,
basically be the ideal.
(10:52):
And I'm not saying that I wasexactly like that, but because I
guess I would just thought thatsupporting whoever I was with in
whatever way that I could, thatthat was being a good partner.
What I didn't realize is thatthe more I support the other
(11:13):
person, the more I lost my ownidentity.
I wasn't supporting my ownidentity.
So even though, literally on ourvery first date, this man and I
agreed that you can't, thatyou're an individual before
you're part of a couple, andyou're a couple before you're
(11:34):
parents, and You have to havetime for all of those
relationships, a relationshipwith yourself, a relationship
with your partner, as well as arelationship with your family,
the kids that you, your familythat you create, your children,
that it can't be all about thechildren.
(11:55):
It can't be all about the familybecause that's not balanced.
If you're not nourishing thecouple relationship, then you're
not really being a good exampleto your children.
And if you don't nourishyourself.
You're not being a good exampleto your children and you're not
(12:16):
being the person that you'repart of a couple with, that
makes up the couple, part of acouple.
So we literally agreed to thatin the, on the very first date
that that was, we both thoughtthat way.
We had some very in depthconversations on that or just
(12:39):
about life in general.
So I was being supportive of himand I, I guess I thought it was
unique to one relationship.
And I definitely didn't want togo through it again.
I was in a relationship for sixyears where I definitely lost my
identity because I was sowrapped up in this guy.
(13:02):
And it was, it was a very long,hard struggle to get back to me,
to find myself again, who I am.
And I, so I, I was trying tostand strong in this one and I
was, I thought it was so coolthat I had a guy who supported
that.
I will tell you in the verybeginning, I My kids will tell
(13:25):
you, and especially mystepdaughter at the time, would
tell you that I was Cinderella.
It's not that I just lovedCinderella, it's that I loved
that I was Cinderella.
And her daddy was my PrinceCharming.
I even looked into having,having our wedding at Disney.
Uh, it started at 10, 000.
And that was 20 years ago, canyou imagine what it is now?
(13:45):
But, I wanted, I wanted to, toshow up, arrive, whatever, in
Disney.
Cinderella's carriage.
That would have been justmagical to me.
Turns out that I did have aCinderella themed wedding.
It just was not in the same way.
It's kind of like be carefulwhat you wish for.
(14:06):
My Cinderella themed wedding wasleftover birthday cake from my
stepdaughter's birthday becauseher birthday was in November and
she wanted, because truly asoften happens, This little girl
looked up to me and adored me somuch and she knew that I loved
Cinderella so much So she wantedto be Cinderella for Halloween
(14:28):
and her mom was was all game forthat until she found out That
the reason her little girlwanted to be Cinderella was
because I believe that I amCinderella.
So, nope, needle scratch off therecord.
You want to know what her mommade her dress up as?
(14:49):
A little witch.
She went from being Cinderellato a witch.
So, so you could say, was thatthe mother trying to project on
me?
Or was it, no, you can't be likeher.
(15:09):
You have to be like me.
And she identified as a witch!Anyway, well, so Since that was
the the case and we didn't haveher for Halloween then her her
dad said fine You didn't get tobe Cinderella like you wanted to
(15:30):
for Christmas.
We'll give you a Cinderellathemed birthday party two weeks
later so we did it was two and ahalf weeks later and So we just
had a justice of the peace.
We didn't tell anybody We had ajustice of the peace show up to
our backyard on, on the daythat, that we decided, and we
(15:51):
thought we had to havewitnesses.
So there was one couple that,um, basically it was my
husband's work wife, uh, youknow, his, his best buddy there
at work and that guy's wife, Ireally, really enjoyed her.
Um, and so they were going to beour witnesses.
Turns out we didn't need anywitnesses and they invited
(16:13):
another couple.
Okay.
Also, they were supposed to beour photographers.
This was so laid back and supercasual.
I mean, we were literally inshorts and t shirts right before
the ceremony.
And I was following his lead.
If he was going to be in shortsand a t shirt, so was I.
(16:35):
And then he ran in to go take ashower and put on some better
clothes.
And so I did too.
I was already clean.
Mind you, well Gosh, I'm gonnahave to back up again, aren't I?
Well, no, I will just have totell the story of leading up to
the wedding later.
(16:57):
Right now, we're talking abouthow I said I didn't want to be
married anymore.
So, trying to get back on track.
Cinderella.
Okay, so I had Cinderella themedcake.
It was actually leftoverbirthday cake.
Fast forward to asking for adivorce.
(17:21):
I had been being nudged andencouraged from something that
was greater than myself, fromsomething that I believed to be
divinity, pushing me andinsisting upon claiming this
divorce.
I couldn't bear the thought ofgoing into Valentine's Day
pretending to be in love withsomeone who I absolutely was
(17:42):
not.
And I could not bear the thoughtof him putting his hands on me
or me having to submit my Mybody to him and just like I
could not Did not just did nothave the energy for that Um, oh
(18:09):
I got off on the um the cookingthing All over the place here.
Apologize.
That's welcome to the mind ofscarlet I told you that this was
gonna be an authentic podcastand this is this is me.
This is real So here it isAnyway, so the cooking thing,
cooking was not good enough, butI, I opened my mind.
(18:32):
I, um, always willing to learnsomething new, fair and
reasonable, and be a goodsupportive partner for my
partner, trying, treating himthe way I want to be treated,
right?
Because that's what we'resupposed to do.
Um, well, anything that I cookedwas never good enough, and the
(18:52):
question I would ask is, Howdoes it taste?
And he would start telling mehow it could be improved upon.
And this offended me.
And after enough times of this,I finally looked at him and
said, Thank you, but I didn'task how it could be improved
upon.
The question that I asked was,How does it taste?
(19:12):
Or, How do you like it?
He did not like his authoritynot being received.
Basically, he My perception isthat he always wanted to be
viewed as the king and theauthority on all and his, his
(19:35):
appreciation to be sought, hisstamp of approval as the, the
goal.
And that wasn't me.
And it came to a point, and hewould, he would take my things.
So, one of the things that didhappen, that he did give
approval of, is there was oneday I was making spaghetti.
And I did what I saw my fatherdo, which it was a jar of sauce,
(20:01):
and, but then adding in, Myfamily loves garlic.
I just realized kind of a littlefunny thing there.
My mom and my uncle, peoplealways called me garlic.
So, yeah, my family lovedgarlic.
Loves garlic.
Some people don't love meanymore.
I guess, I don't know.
It doesn't matter.
Doesn't stop me from shining mylight.
(20:22):
So, there you go.
Anyway, spaghetti sauce, addingmore garlic, garlic, whatever,
whatever additional seasoningyou want to just kind of kicking
it up a notch.
Well that just blew him away andhe was like, you know.
That's a really good idea.
Well, then suddenly he has gotto, you know, competition comes
in and he has got to be betterthan, than this.
(20:44):
He's got to do things his way.
And so suddenly he becomesmaster and commander of the
kitchen.
And anytime spaghetti sauce ismade, it's got, he's got to be
the one doing this because, ohno, it needs a little, let me
taste this.
No, it needs a little, yeah, itneeds this and maybe this other
thing over here.
(21:06):
For me, crickets are chirpingand it's like, uh, okay, thought
you liked the way I did it, butevidently that wasn't good
enough.
Okay, fine, whatever.
Somewhere in there he comes upwith this four hour recipe for,
for homemade from scratch sauce,and it's really good.
(21:27):
I'm not gonna lie, it's reallygood.
And great that I inspired him.
He even gave me credit for theinspiring of that.
And it gave him, honestly, histhing was that he was always
trying to grow up to be his dad.
And his dad worked shift workwhere he would have sometimes up
to a week off in a row.
(21:48):
And his dad used his timewisely.
And one of the things that hewould do is find a recipe or
create a recipe or whatever.
He would do some, some reallygood cooking.
And that's great because I gotthe benefit of that too.
So, but the point is from thenon, spaghetti sauce was his
domain.
(22:09):
So it was something that Istarted, but he had to take it
over.
And this was a repeatingpattern.
And it was a point, it became apoint of a contention at, at
some point that, and even ourfriends, he encouraged our
friends to mock me.
And I said, it's so frustratingthat I do something, but then he
has to copy it, but he has tomake it better.
(22:31):
And then everybody laughed andthey were like, well, what's
wrong with making it better?
And I was like, the making itbetter is not the point.
The thing is.
That it was my thing and it wasgood to start with.
But he had to turn it into acompetition and take it over.
So that my thing isn't goodenough anymore.
So why should I cook?
(22:55):
Why the fuck should I put forththe effort to do a damn thing?
If that's the way it's going tobe treated.
He even said at one point, Hesaid, well, I'm, I'm like the
cook and you, you're the baker.
You're a really good baker.
Well, no, that wasn't goodenough either.
(23:17):
He had to start being the bakertoo.
He had to start coming up withcobblers and, oh, you know, I'm
such a chef and so creative at,at all these things.
And everybody likes whenever Imake this or whenever I make
that.
And I, oh, you know, I got thisrecipe from someone and you
know, well, okay.
Okay.
Just grandiose bullshit.
(23:38):
So sick of it.
So what it encouraged me to dois stay the fuck out of the
kitchen.
You want all the glory and honorfor yours?
Fine.
Keep it because I am notcompeting.
I have plenty of other stuff todo.
(23:58):
So that was a thing in ourmarriage and I say all of that
to get to this point.
Um, he made really goodhamburgers and some of it was
inspired by my father and someof it was inspired by my
grandfather.
Actually, the steaks were moremy grandfather.
Um, but I expressed, you know,my thing was, if we were going
(24:21):
to be separating, then our kidswould be spending time
eventually at his house, myhouse.
Doesn't mean that the kidsshould go without some of the
things that they are used towhen they are at my house And it
doesn't mean that that theyshould be exposed to only new
things So basically I wasdeferring to him and his his
(24:44):
experience and I asked him toteach me I said I want to make
the burgers, but I want to makeit the way you make it Can can
you teach me?
So of course that stroked hisego.
So of course Well, the thing isI did it really well, and it was
good You And I enjoyed it andeverybody saw that.
It wasn't like putting on a showor anything, but the point was
(25:10):
made that I've always enjoyedcooking.
I just don't like you telling mewhat to do.
But in this case I have askedyou to tell me to do things your
way.
I just don't like when you comein and take over my things.
Well, basically everybody sawit.
(25:31):
And I think that that wasprobably a turning point.
for things not going as nicelyas they were, because there was
another incident where herealized that he had been
ignoring me all along.
He was nice enough to, uh, andwe'll probably get into this
later, but it'll come up in oneof the journal entries.
(25:51):
But I wanted to, uh, to cook aham and I wanted it my way.
I wanted it the way that My mommade it whenever I was a little
girl.
We were living in governmenthousing and there was this
beautiful ham.
And it had these pineapplerings, and these bright red
cherries on it, and pineapplesand cherries were things that,
(26:12):
that was such exotic stuff forme in this small, itty bitty,
teeny tiny town in what we callWest Texas.
It's just about as far west asyou want to go, but it's really
north central Texas.
And it was gorgeous, and wecouldn't touch it.
We couldn't, we couldn't drinkor eat any more of the other
stuff because it had to go onthe ham.
And the ham, I don't even knowwhat it was for.
(26:34):
I want to say maybe like aneastern star thing or something.
I don't know.
But it was this beautiful,shiny, glossy ham with this
super yummy, delicious stuff onit.
And I couldn't have any more.
But my mommy had made thisdelicious goodness.
And that was, that was, I guessa core memory for me.
(26:57):
And I wanted to make that.
Now mind you, he was reallyexcellent at smoking a ham.
Um, um.
Every chance I got, I got him tosmoke me a ham, and we'd have,
we'd keep the ham bones to putin a pot of beans later.
Are you getting hungry yet?
But I loved the, the smoked ham,and like I said, he was, he was
(27:18):
really phenomenal.
He was really very skilled, andthen that was a great benefit.
It's just there was no roomoutside of his grandioseness,
but when he realized that I hadskill, and I had desire to cook,
well anyway, so I was gonna makethis ham.
And he and our daughter went tothe grocery store and he had her
(27:39):
call me saying, dad wants your,your, your shopping list.
Okay.
So he was going to be buying thefood.
Okay, great.
You know, this is a really goodsign.
This is cooperation andeverything.
So I just screenshotted therecipe list and I said, but
don't, I said, nope, not cloves.
(28:01):
I can't stand cloves, just thepineapple rings and maraschino
cherries.
They come in through the frontdoor carrying the bags of
groceries and he's halfwaythrough the living room, we had
an open floor plan, halfwaythrough the living room almost
to the bar where he's settingthings down and he said, I am so
sorry.
(28:21):
I said, for what?
He said, if you ever told me, hegoes, I don't think you ever
told me, but if you ever did, hegoes, he goes, I didn't hear you
that, that you don't likecloves.
And he said, I've been makingthem all these years with
cloves.
And I just, I smiled and I said,I told you several times.
(28:42):
I said, I just, I am so sorry.
And I said, it's okay.
I said, I just didn't eat thatpart.
Well, I think that was, thosethings were beginnings.
They, they cracked his eyes opento how much he had suppressed
and oppressed me.
That I actually enjoyed cooking.
And I was actually good at it.
(29:03):
When he wasn't, in effect, beingan asshole about it.
Anyway, so that was, um, thatwas, uh, yeah, I got the, I got
the hamburger recipe here.
So that's, that's great becausehonestly, I've been, I've been
wanting it and there's nomeasurements here.
It's just a little of this and alittle of that.
(29:25):
And that's the process.
So back to, since that's, we'vekind of got you on a daily thing
here.
So I figured I'd go into thiswhole thing about, I've been
promising.
That I needed to say how measking for a divorce came about,
the details of that, and I'll behonest, it was, it was a year
(29:47):
ago and it was about an hour and15 minutes of conversation and
I'm just going to give you the,the parts that I remember as, as
best I can.
So this is February the 12th.
I couldn't stand the thought ofgoing into Valentine's with.
(30:08):
For all of that.
So my plan was to go about thisin the nicest possible way And
I've covered some of this withyou already.
So I'm just gonna kind of glossthrough some of it That I wanted
to start off with a show offaith So I gave him the
Valentine's card that says I'ddo it all over again because I
would As much as I'm happy to beout of it, that marriage
(30:31):
fulfilled a lot of dreams forme.
I told him repeatedly that hemade all the best dreams come
true.
I got my babies out of it.
Those are, those are probablythe best dreams, but I really
would do it all over again.
So there was 100 in there, andthat was to go towards the
(30:53):
concert tickets.
We wanted to go see Styx andForeigner, and we wanted these
good seats like we had hadbefore.
Um, so I put 100 in there, and,so he was, he was like, Okay, he
said, Why are you giving, givingme this early?
It's still, Valentine's is stilltwo days away.
(31:13):
Why, why are you doing thisearly?
I don't know.
And so I told him that I knowthat he loves me, or I know that
I love him, and I know that heloves me.
And I said, but can you honestlysay that you're still in love
with me?
Not gonna lie, it shocked thehell out of me when he
immediately said yes.
(31:37):
I'm pretty sure my mouth hit thefloor.
And I told him, I kind of noddeddown the hall.
So he was sitting in his seat onthe couch and I was sitting on
the corner of the coffee tablefacing him.
So in between him and the, thehuge ass TV.
(31:59):
And mind you, he was on his, hisiPad all the time playing his
game.
Because you know, I can't, Ican't be given his, his full
undivided attention.
Our son was months away fromgraduation and which meant that
our daughter was a couple ofmore months away from starting
her senior year of high school.
(32:19):
I nodded down the hall to wherethe kids rooms were and I said,
I said, he's about to graduate.
And then next year, uh, he'sabout to graduate.
I said, but even whenever heleaves this house, he'll still,
still be a member of our family,right?
He said, yeah.
And I said, and next year.
(32:41):
Our daughter will be graduatingand when she leaves our house,
she'll still be a member of ourfamily, right?
He said, yeah.
I was like, that's just it.
We don't have to be in the samehouse or married in order to be
family.
(33:04):
And he said, so what you'resaying is you want a divorce.
And honestly, I could not saythat word.
It was just, I, it's such anugly word being a child of
divorce and my parents beingchildren of divorce.
Just such an ugly word, at leastwhenever I was growing up and I
just, I couldn't, I couldn'tsqueeze that word out of, out of
(33:27):
my throat.
It just wasn't happening.
And I told him that I wanted apeaceful parting of ways, that
we could still be a family unitand we could work together and
finish raising these kids and,and go our separate ways.
But we didn't have to be marriedto do that.
(33:48):
I also told him, we got intothis without attorneys.
We should be able to get out ofit with attorneys.
And he said, no, I said, no, Isaid, we can hire a mediator,
which is basically a third partywho knows more than we do, who
makes sure that everything isfair and equitable.
(34:09):
And he said, no, he said, hesaid, I guarantee you it's going
to get ugly.
And I said, no, I said, whateveryou look for, that's what you
will find.
And I am not looking for that.
He said, I guarantee you it'sgoing to get ugly.
He told me that I didn't haveany right to the house.
(34:29):
And I said, yes, I do.
And he said, no, you don't.
I said, yes, I do.
My name is on the deed.
We bought this house together.
You have this house because ofme.
I'm entitled.
No, you're not, especially notat its current value.
Yes, I am.
And I had a small smile on myface, peaceful and calm,
(34:52):
speaking to him about the sameway that I'm speaking to you,
except heartbeat racing like athousand beats a minute, but
calm and peaceful and just likepaddling a boat, slowly
paddling, paddling slowly.
(35:12):
Um, I made myself some notes sothat I wouldn't get totally
sidetracked.
So he.
Somewhere in here, I forget someof the order of these things.
He gave me an opportunity totake it back because he promised
me that it would get ugly.
And, and somewhere in there hehad said that he still had hope.
(35:36):
I, I said, I said, honestly, Ican't believe that you're still
in love with me.
And he said, yeah.
He goes, you know, there aretimes he goes, I still have
hope.
Okay, shocker.
Because.
In my mind, I'm sitting therethinking, how can you call
somebody a fucking cunt andstill think that you're in love
(36:01):
with them?
But I didn't say that.
I just, okay, go, go along withit.
Finally, he's, he's giving me anopportunity to take it back, to
change my mind.
And for a millisecond, like halfa millisecond, I was like, Oh,
erase, do over what?
(36:22):
Cause he's saying he's not goingto be nice about this.
And he actually is in love withme.
What?
And then I think, no, no, Ididn't come this far for
nothing.
No, I've been thinking aboutthis for a long time.
No going back now.
And I said, how can you say thatyou still have hope?
(36:43):
I said, I don't, I don't see howthat's possible.
How, how can you say that youstill have hope?
And he goes, well, there aresigns.
And I said, well, like what?
And he said, well, there aresome times that I'm sitting here
on the couch and you come, comefrom the bedroom, which is
basically bedrooms at the backof the house and down, down a
long hallway.
And he goes, and you walk intothe room and your nipples get
(37:04):
hard.
Needle scratch off the record,crickets chirp.
What?
My mind, what the fuck?
In a nutshell, what, what'shappening, and I've told him
this repeatedly, but does helisten?
(37:26):
Obviously not.
So I tend to run a little hot.
I have very large breasts, verylarge, and they're real.
Um, it's a physiologicalresponse.
I'm warm natured.
I walk into a room where thesurrounding area is colder,
(37:49):
which he always had a fan.
Okay, the fan that we had in ourliving room, it was a big ass
fan.
Not the brand, big ass, but itwas, it was like, I think had
eight or ten blades on it.
And he always had it at a veryhigh speed.
I cannot stand the wind blowingon me.
(38:10):
Or the air blowing on me.
Near me and circulating whateverbut, and being out at the beach
or having the actual wind blowon me is one thing.
But having artificial air blowon me, Ah, there's, there's only
very specific circumstanceswhere, where I like that.
Well, of course, I walk intothat room where it's like a
hurricane in there.
(38:31):
It's not really, I'mexaggerating, but close enough.
I will just say that anywhere,any room where, where he was,
had any control over the air, Ihad a blanket in there.
Okay.
So basically I would walk intothe room and my nipples would
get hard because the, the airwas blowing on them.
(38:54):
So basically he thought that hewas.
going to get to have some funwith those nipples and therefore
the rest of my body?
Basically, he had hope that hecould still fuck me.
That's what he defined as beingin love with me.
That's what that came out to.
(39:15):
That was why he still had hope,was that he could stick his dick
inside me.
No.
Oh, and he did make it a pointto tell me that the last time
that we were togetherphysically, which.
was after a concert.
We were out of the ranch and itwas post concert.
(39:37):
I'm going to tell you right now.
It was date rape.
I don't care if I was married tohim or not.
The fact is I had kind ofdeveloped a bit of a routine
that anytime that we would goout, I would definitely drink
some cocktails.
And then by the time that wewould get home, I was almost
asleep and he knew it and itleft me alone.
(40:01):
In this instance, he wasdetermined to get some.
I was actually asleep when hestarted touching me and moving
my body and insisting on havinghis way with me.
I didn't actually fight him off.
I remember waking up saying,what, what?
(40:21):
And he's like, come on, youknow.
And when I realized that it wasgoing to happen, I I figured, if
I'm going to have to endurethis, then I may as well at
least try to get something outof it for myself.
He had a twinkle in his eye ashe thoroughly enjoyed telling me
(40:45):
that the last time we weretogether, the last time we had
sex, that was the worst sexever.
And I just kept looking,maintaining eye contact, and
with my little smile and saying,uh huh, uh huh, uh huh.
I was not disagreeing.
I got date raped by the man Iwas married to.
(41:07):
Yeah, just that alone ought totell you that it was really bad
sex.
Uh, he was doing really whateverhe could to start, you know,
with the jabs.
And he told me, you know, thekids have already decided where
(41:27):
they want to live.
Really?
Okay.
Okay.
Endeavoring not to show anysurprise because I know his
subtle and manipulativebehavior.
It was a shocker that he had hada conversation that deep with
the children.
(41:48):
Uh, he also, I think around thetime that we were talking about
sex, that, uh, he had asked meif I had been with someone else
that, that why was I wantingthis?
And I told him I hadn't beenhappy for a long time and I know
he hadn't either.
And I really thought I was justaddressing the elephant in the
room.
(42:08):
And thinking that we would, wewould all be happier because of
this.
And he said, we know if you'vebeen someone else, it's, it's
okay.
And he was giving me this, the,his tone and the look in his
eyes was, there was almost kindof a gleam as he was telling me
that it was okay that when hewas kind of looking me out of
(42:30):
kind of like the corner of hiseye, like, it's okay.
Like I have been.
So at first it was, At one, Iwas, I was shocked by it because
I haven't, I always have madesure that it was never called
into question whether or not Iwas, I was faithful.
(42:50):
Very old fashioned beliefs atthe time and I embodied those.
I tried to be the model motherand wife for my children.
So him telling me, you know, sois there someone else?
And I said, no.
(43:10):
You know, because it's okay ifyou have.
And this, this kind ofinference, this look in his eye
that tells me, oh yeah, he'sbeen with other people.
At first I thought maybe he wasjust trying to catch me in
saying something so that hecould hurl it against me, you
know, about maybe that I've beenjust um, a crazy fucking whore
or something, which I hadn'tbeen.
(43:31):
Always the picture of propriety.
Um, covered the rest of that.
He insisted on telling thechildren.
He said, he said, well, youknow, we gotta tell the kids.
And I was like, no, let's justkeep this between us for now.
And he was like, oh no.
Kids, come in here.
(43:53):
Now mind you, this man couldnot.
It's funny, I want to say thathe could not keep a secret to
save his soul.
But he turns out kept a lot ofsecrets.
Some of which are still comingto light.
So he called the kids in there.
(44:14):
Okay, so, um, I'm just going togive you an example of how he
could not keep a secret.
I was pregnant, and whenever wefound out that it was a boy, we
left the doctor's office at thehospital, and I said, Can we
just keep this to ourselves fora little bit?
I liked the idea of having asecret.
So, um, with my husband,something that was just mine and
(44:35):
his thing that only he and Iknew.
He and I made the baby.
We should, you know, he waslike, Oh yeah, sure.
He immediately gets on the phoneand calls his mother.
My jaw drops.
He gets off the phone and I waslike, so what happened to us
just keeping it to ourselves?
(44:57):
He was like, well, yeah, that'sfine.
He goes, I had to tell myparents.
Uh, that's not ourselves.
And honestly, that right thereshould give you a clue to, or a
lot of insight to the rest ofour marriage.
There were a lot of times thathis mother knew things before I
did.
And that by the time he gotaround to telling me, he, I
(45:20):
wasn't getting as much detailsor enthusiasm because he had
already told the story.
So much for the man who taughtme that, well, one, he was
celebrating himself for beingright.
Because.
One of his co workers was goingthrough a, whatever class it is
(45:41):
that, whatever church it does,before people get married, you
go through and you learn thesethings together.
And the guy comes, comes out andhe goes, man, I can't believe,
you know, the, the pastor,priest, whoever it was, asked,
asked this question and he gotit wrong.
And the question basically was,it's the future.
(46:02):
You and your wife, you havechildren.
Your wife and your child are inan accident and you can save
only one of them.
No matter what you can do, youcan only save one of them.
Who do you choose?
Well, he said the child becausethey're young and they haven't
started their life yet.
They're you're young andinnocent.
That was not the right answer.
Well, the man I wound upmarrying had the right answer.
(46:26):
And the answer was you save thespouse because theoretically you
can create more Children.
But your spouse.
Is the one person that you havespent your entire life looking
for and that you've committedthe rest of your life to.
(46:47):
Even if no one's lives werethreatened, your children will
eventually grow up and leaveyou.
And it is your spouse thatyou're supposed to keep, that
you're supposed to be with, thatyou're supposed to grow old and
die with.
So this is what the man who Imarried taught me.
(47:10):
But he ran into his mama everychance he got.
Moving on.
So he called the kids in andbasically I'm sitting there and
I'm, I'm really not, I, I'mcrying at this point because I'm
really not wanting to say thisto my kids.
(47:34):
But, basically I told him that Ifelt like I was addressing the
elephant in the room.
And that none of us had beenhappy for, for a while.
And that I was looking for apeaceful parting of ways and
that we can still be a family,but we don't have to be married
(47:55):
for that to be the case.
My daughter's jaw drops and shegoes, well I didn't expect this
to happen until after Igraduated.
So she was already expecting it.
My son was like, are youserious?
Like he, he literally had.
(48:17):
Difficulty believing that he,basically it felt surreal to him
because we were so calm andpeaceful about it.
Just like I'm speaking to youright now.
And let me tell you, this littleIrish English redhead, when I
get angry, mmm, yeah, the crazycomes out.
(48:42):
I am, I'm a very passionateperson is really what it boils
down to.
And whatever, whatever has myfocus and my attention, I'm very
passionate about.
And if it means, if it'sstanding up for myself or
standing up for my children orjust standing up and insisting
on being heard, I will be heard.
And historically that means nothesitating to use my outside
(49:06):
voice.
I've learned.
Other ways to express myselfthen.
But if I have to yell and screamand I will, which is crazy
because I never wanted to havethat kind of household.
But if I have to raise my voice,I will.
Because yeah, he, he often didnot like me speaking up and
(49:28):
speaking my truth.
And so he often tried to silenceme, which meant that I spoke up
even louder.
As I was telling my childrenthis, for one, I apologized to
them for the timing.
And expressed that I didn't wantanything to impact my son's
(49:54):
celebrations.
His birthday, him enlisting inthe Navy, his graduation, his
shipping off, all of it.
And assuring them that we canstill be a family.
We just don't have to be marriedto do it.
And we can still be an effectiveteam and get things done.
(50:15):
Be a winning team.
Um, I lost my train of thoughtthere.
Oh, the thing, and I said, Itried to, I said, nobody's been
happy for years.
And I really tried to try towait, to suck it up and wait
(50:35):
until after our daughter hadgraduated.
But then I realized, and thisis, this is, this is really
where it got me.
This is where I started bawlingand, you know, sinus is all
swollen up and you know, can'tbreathe through the nose, but
suddenly the water, the nosebecomes really watery and just
draining like a sieve.
And, but then I realized whatkind of example I was setting
(50:58):
for you children.
And I didn't want you to thinkthat it was okay to live that
way.
continue on in a relationshipwhere you weren't happy To force
a smiley face on when reallyyou're sad inside and I mean
(51:22):
that just that was that wasreally my big thing that was Um
So that was that was really thethe big things and So it turns
out that the whole kids havealready decided where they want
to live You Because I broughtthis up to the kids and I said,
(51:43):
so evidently y'all have alreadydiscussed this and you've
already decided where you wantto live.
And my son was like, what areyou talking?
He's like, I have no idea whatyou're talking about.
He goes, I haven't.
And my daughter was like, well,so what had, what it had come
down to is that on one of thesemany trips where they had gone
(52:04):
to the ranch.
So this is, Two hours and fortyfive minutes away.
We call it the ranch, but it wasreally just a little under ten
acres, and it was a propertythat his mother had inherited
after her brother had died.
Well, it was, it was my husbandand children who went and worked
like slaves to maintain thatproperty.
(52:26):
Excuse me.
And, but they would go up there,they would leave on a Friday
night or a Saturday morning.
Well, I worked on Saturdays.
So I couldn't join them,especially if this was not
planned ahead.
And a lot of my clients werebooked six months and a year
ahead.
So it's, it had definitely hadto be pre planned.
(52:50):
And that's my paycheck.
That's, God, you see my voice isnot one that wanted to speak
these things out.
But the point is that I couldn'tgo.
And it was a double edged swordfor me.
Either, A, I make money, or Idon't and that's a whole other
thing with that as far as thefamily or I take time off work
(53:15):
and go do these things.
Well, I enjoyed that property upthere and at the same time I
hated it.
When there were changes made tothe property, I had zero input.
The man I was married to wasknown for for yelling and
(53:37):
screaming.
All the while and saying allthese things about his mother
and sister who did make thedecisions for the property based
on whatever he said.
And then he and my childrenworked like little slaves to
enact their visions of what theywanted.
And he would always tell my kidsas they're busting their butts
(53:58):
and he's yelling and screamingat them for not doing things
good enough, that Yep, that theywere busting their asses on this
place and that his sister wasprobably going to inherit it.
And that they weren't ever goingto see shit out of it.
And the kids, especially my son,are like, Why the hell am I
(54:18):
busting my ass for a place thatI don't own, and that I'm not
ever going to own in the future?
Why am I having to spend myweekends doing this?
I would rather be playing gameswith my friends.
I'd rather be at my own house,in my own bed, doing my own
thing.
Why the heck do I have to be uphere busting my ass, with you
yelling and screaming at me,telling me I'm not doing it good
(54:39):
enough?
So in the end, they did have,they did of course have some
good times and everything.
It wasn't, it wasn't all bad,but I think you're probably
beginning to see the dynamic atplay here.
That there was constant yellingand screaming and you're not
(55:01):
good enough, you're not goodenough, you're not good enough
and let me take you away fromyour, from your mom and I'm
going to take you out in thecountry and we're going to do
stuff that I know you don't wantto do but you've got to do it
anyway because I tell you to andyou've got to be my little
slaves at it.
Well, on these three hour drivesback and forth then he had a
captive audience.
My son would be in the back seatbasically trying to go to sleep.
(55:25):
Daughter would be up front.
She's more daddy's little girl.
And she would be up front.
And so he would have a way ofmanipulating a conversation and
say things without sayingthings.
And one of his things that hewas known for saying is, Oh, you
(55:46):
know, I just, I try to be, youknow, it's, it's good to be
prepared for all situations.
You know, you think about thingsbefore they happen so that when
they do happen, you're preparedfor it and you're okay with it
and you can handle it.
You know, so I just, I testmyself all the time, you know,
like when my dad died, I was Um,yeah, it was a shock and
everything, but, you know, Ihandled my shit, I handled my
(56:08):
business, I was able to dealwith what I had to, but look at
my sister, she was completelylost, because she was so
completely and totally dependenton our father, and she couldn't
handle her day to day lifewithout him, because he was her
little bitch, and whatever, sohe would say these kinds of
things.
And then, so then that wouldmake it easy to lead into
(56:28):
something else.
Like, so what would I do in asituation if, you know, my mom
died or you're, or you know,what if your mom died and, you
know, or this or that, or, youknow, one of you kids, I never
want that, but it's like, youthink about these things so that
if they happen, then it's, it,you know, it doesn't have as
much hurt.
(56:50):
So he works into one of theseconversations and in one of
these hypotheticalconversations.
He's talking to the kids, toboth of the kids, primarily my
daughter.
And, you know, he's thinking,you know, like if, if something
like that were to happen, youknow, like if, if your mom
decided that she wanted todivorce me or whatever, you
(57:11):
know, whatever, the hypotheticalhypothetical hypothetical,
right.
Well, my son who is about tograduate high school and has
lived in the same house since hewas five years old says.
Well, I know one thing I'm notmoving Okay, so there were two
(57:35):
assumptions being made herenumber one the assumption from
their dad Was that he would havethe house?
that I had no right to it andWhen we had actually split up
before he had told me that Icouldn't afford the house and I
said it doesn't matter you'releaving I'm not That's a whole
(57:59):
other story.
And, the kids just automaticallyassumed that I would shoot up to
Abilene, to where my family isup there.
No, that was not my plan at all.
So, everything is inferred that,hypothetically, if we should get
(58:25):
a divorce, the kids aren'tleaving the house.
That's And he's assuming that hehas the house.
Ergo, the children choose him.
Well, that's not what was said.
At all.
At.
All.
But that's what he was saying.
(58:45):
So, that was basically howeverything went down.
And, you've listened to meenough to know that I see signs
everywhere and That I startedthis conversation at 616 p.
m.
And I was back in my chair inthe master bedroom at 838 p.
(59:06):
m.
Both of which were good signs.
And I thought it comical that hesaid that he had to get a new
hairstyle.
I was so grateful whenever hesaid that he was not sleeping in
that room again.
And that he was sleeping in thespare room.
Thank you Lord Jesus, Amen!Prayer answered, but I thought
(59:28):
it comical that he said he hadto get a new hairstylist.
Okay, whatever.
And I told him I was like I'mnot gonna jack your hair up.
I still have to look at you.
You're the father of my childrenOh, so this was speaking of the
kids This was one of the thingsthat I had said said when I was
saying this stuff about we gotinto this without attorneys we
can get out of it withoutattorneys and Of course he was
(59:53):
saying no and I said even if Wedon't have respect for the 20
years that we've been together.
So we should respect ourchildren by honoring the fact
that they are not only each apart of us, but that we are a
part of them.
(01:00:14):
We each are in our children andif we honor and respect our
children, we will honor andrespect each other.
Well, obviously he didn't agreewith that.
So, things got ugly.
By the way, we did have to get amediator because that's part of
(01:00:36):
the court process.
And, well, uh, I already kind ofoutlined what happened in the
next couple of days, but I hadfound a process where we could
get a mediator that it wouldcost us 75.
Fast forward, what did we windup doing?
We had a mediator that, I, Idon't recall if it was 5.
(01:00:58):
50 each or 5.
75 each or something.
It was, it was 500 somethingdollars each.
That we had to pay to themediator and honestly, we didn't
even get our full time worth.
That's a whole other story themediator called off the rest of
mediation when he saw That theman I was married to was
(01:01:20):
skirting around a bunch ofbullshit and hiding a hundred
thousand dollars But that's astory for another day.
Also I still have paid twentythree thousand dollars in
attorney's fees and my attorneyYou Is still wanting over$2,000
more.
$2,002 and 40 cents was the lasttally I saw.
(01:01:43):
And I straight up told her Ican't get what, give you what I
don't have.
So good luck with that.
Uh, lots more to that story.
So I know I've dropped a lot oflittle nuggets there, but
there's a lot more to come.
So now you have a lot more juicytidbits, not only of actually
(01:02:03):
how everything went down, butalso a little bit more insight
into what life was like withthis man.
And of course, it's easy to zoomout and to look at the
overarching things and to seewhat twists and turns affected
things in the past and what kindof ripple effect they created in
(01:02:24):
the future because you're zoomedout looking at things.
But.
When you're in the moment,you're just dealing with it as,
as life goes on, right?
If if, well, I guess if we'regonna keep using water analogies
and we're talking about rippleeffects, well I guess when
you're in the moment, you'rejust treading water or just keep
swimming.
Just keep swimming.
Just keep swimming.
(01:02:45):
So this is my story.
I hope you're enjoying it andlet me know what you think.
Please reach out to me, futuresingle lady@gmail.com or go to
my Facebook page, future SingleLady.
I'd love to hear from you andwhen you hear back.
It's gonna be from me.
Nobody else.
Just me.
So bring it.
Tell me what's going on in yourlife.
(01:03:06):
Tell me how this is affectingyou.
Alright?
I'd love to hear from you.
So I hope you stick around andyou listen to the rest.
I wanna be like Paul Harvey, therest of the story.
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