'AITA (still) because I grew from the divorce and became the husband/father my ex had wanted me to be?'
"AITA (still) because I grew from the divorce and became the husband/father my ex had wanted me to be?"
ReadFinancial7292
I was the AH, I know it. My ex and I (40s) married in college in our early 20s. We went from living in the dorms together to being married and living on our own in another state due to my job.
We enjoyed the honeymoon period with each other along with being young 20 somethings in an exciting new city. Not long after being married, she was pregnant and we had our first child a few months after our first anniversary.
She was a SAHM, I picked up overtime to cover everything. She matured way faster than I to support the baby. I was still closer to being a college dorm student than I was a husband/father/equal.
We had constant fights about how I wasn't doing enough to help or supporting her physically or emotionally. I kept trying to tell her how I was doing enough, how I worked 80 hours last week, how I changed a diaper last week, how I cooked my own meal (just for me) so she wouldn't have to, etc.
She would explain her problems and how I could help her but I didn't hear them, I just wanted to argue. I used weaponized incompetence before that term was coined. In my mind, I was working hard and she was just being unrealistic and couldn't see how much I did.
In reality, there was far more work than I realized. My ex was drowning and asking for help and all I would do was argue with her about how there was no way she was drowning.
Things would improve every few months, partly because I would do a little more work, partly because she just internalized her frustrations and stopped initiating conversations about them.
We had another child during this time, but this soon added even more stress and the fights grew even worse. Eventually, she said she couldn't handle it any longer and moved in with family a few hours away.
I tried to win her back through love bombing (again, before I knew what that was) and figured she would come to her senses. And so I was extremely surprised when I got served the divorce papers.
I couldn't believe it, I never cheated on her, I didn't abuse her, I had no vices, we loved each other, how could she be divorcing me? Yet she did, and when we met with lawyers I was caught off guard by how much resentment there was towards me, where had that come from?
We agreed to every other weekend visitations. The first time I had to take care of my two toddlers on my own for two whole days was an eye-opener. I had done it once or twice when married, but she had prepped everything, pre-made the meals, picked out the clothes, cleaned the house etc.
I was still learning how to consistently do the laundry and wash the dishes every day and pick up after myself. I had gone from living with my parents, to living in the dorms with roommates who constantly cleaned, to living with my ex. I knew "how" to take care of a house but never had to do it all on my own, someone else always picked up the slack.
And now I was fully responsible for that and for two little lives for 48 hours. I remember being completely overwhelmed, and hit by a huge wave of empathy and understanding of where she had been over the past few years and what I had done to her. I apologized to her, but that only made her angrier.
So I grew up. I vowed to make the most out of each weekend with my children. I learned how to cook (I actually liked cooking?!). I learned how to braid hair, I bought tons of unnecessary toddler supplies and packed them all in the stroller just in case my kids needed something on a walk, etc.
On my own time, I picked up new hobbies and went to the gym. I read the non-fiction, how-to/relationship books that my ex had been begging me to read. Overall, I worked on myself and tried to become a superdad to my kids.
A couple of years after the divorce I started dating again. Being a single dad in my late 20s was a turn off to a lot of women and I was rejected often, but I found myself being matched with other single moms and really connecting with them.
I eventually met my now-wife, a single mom whose ex had abandoned her for someone else and wanted nothing to with their children. And to her, I was the perfect catch: a loving dad who worked hard, did the household chores, and was devoted to her.
I learned from my mistakes in my first marriage, and took all the criticisms my ex had made about me to heart and improved from them. I became the husband my ex tried to make me into. I still slip up, and still have a lot to learn, but I do that with the support of my wife.
I would still see my ex every other week and the relationship improved somewhat, but there was still an undertone of resentment in each interaction. She went back to school, got a job, and raised our kids as a single mom.
I tried to get more visitation as they got older but she fought back and due to them living too far for daily visits, I only got longer summers with them. I have no idea about her dating life, I never ask the kids about her, but she is unmarried. I know very little about her life; she could be very happy and enjoying everything. But within our few interactions very little of that shows.
Now, our youngest is a senior and going to graduate and I've been talking to my ex more to prepare for it. Its mostly cordial, but occasionally hints of anger and passive aggressive comments come out.
I have thanked her for being a wonderful mother to our children and raising them, and again apologized for never being there or taking her seriously all those years ago. I still feel like the AH, though, sometimes because of how she understandably treats me, and other times just from my own guilt of how I treated her when we were married.
She is about to have an empty nest after devoting her life to children when I failed her, and I am living the suburban family life we had planned for but with someone other than her. Am I still the AH for learning from my divorce and becoming the husband I should have been with my ex?
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's post:
3_wheeler_of_doom
NTA for growing and learning and apologising. However your ex probably doesn't see it the way you do. You see it as you getting a rude shock - divorce - and realizing just how much you'd let your ex down, and that you needed to become an adult and be able to parent your kids, and to your credit you seem to have done exactly that, which is admirable.
Your ex might see it that you refused to listen to her, refused to deal with any of the issues she was struggling with, and made her life a lot harder than it should have been
now she see's you with your wife, and the perfect life that she should have had with you.
But you wouldn't/couldn't give that to her, so she might be feeling that she wasn't good enough, that you didn't love her enough to do all that you do for your wife now with her.
recyclopath_
You need to understand that you will always be the villain in her story. That you hurt and abandoned her so deeply when she was at her most vulnerable. That you can't fix what you did, or didn't do. That becoming a good husband and father only hurts her more because it means you were capable of being that man, just that you didn't care enough about her to do it for her.
Whoever you are now, will never fix who you were or what you did. The second best thing you can do is accept all of that. The best thing you can do now is to be upfront with your now grown children. Be brutally honest about how you failed as a husband and father with your ex. Help them to not make the mistakes you did and to understand that part of their family history.
noelle588
NTA but your apology doesn't undo the harm you caused. She may never be friendly with you; you just have to accept it. She probably questions why she wasn't worth the effort you put in after she ended things.
TimeSummer5
What do you want from her exactly? She’s polite, you coparent just fine. Do you want her to say she forgives you for wasting her life, so you can stop feeling guilty? Because I wouldn’t hold out for that.
CuriousCuriousAlice
This is a bad faith question and I think you kind of know that. You’re not the AH because you took criticism seriously and changed and are a better husband and father for it. You are the AH because you robbed her of the life she deserved with your incompetence.
It’s great you grew up but it wasn’t her job to raise you and you forced her to anyway. Then you had not one, but two kids with her while making zero effort to change until it was too late. You didn’t bother to change for her, you didn’t listen to her, you changed because you had no choice.
You left her a divorced single mom because of your actions and then you ran off and found the life you wanted, the life she worked for and made possible for you. Single moms are judged far more harshly by the world and potential partners than single dads.