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agonyaunt2020-11-13 11:54 am
minoanmiss) wrote in agonyaunt2020-11-13 11:54 am
Entry tags:
Dear Prudence: I've Fallen In Love With My Ex's Ex
From a transcript.
Subject line is my X is X. Dear Prudence. My ex and I were married when I was 15 and he was twenty three to stop my rebelliousness. We left our religious small town. When my ex went to college. I had my son at sixteen and I really tried to stay. But even being a single mother with no money or diploma was better than staying married. I also realized that a lot of my acting out had to do with being a lesbian. To my ex’s credit, he never told my family where my son and I were or tried to make me. We cope well and I’m lucky to have him in my life. Four years after our divorce, my ex introduced me to his new girlfriend, who our son loves. She’s great with him and I was blown away by her. Not only is she beautiful, but brilliant and charming, I thought this is who I would fall for. In other circumstances. We exchanged numbers to coordinate about child care, but eventually became friends. She told me repeatedly that she wasn’t into my ex and she broke up with him shortly after quarantine. She and I grew closer. After that, she and my son and I video chat almost every day after work to cook dinner together and talk. Now I’m in love with her, but that’s not fair, right? I hurt my ex so badly already, I don’t need to move on to his ex. To the worst part is she found out how young I was when we were married and I could tell it bothered her, even though I explained my family in the church set it up. She said someone in their twenties shouldn’t want to have sex, the young teen. And I think it was a factor in her breaking up with him. She told me she is bisexual. And I think we’re solid enough that if she rejects [I think something is missing or mangled here] those still be friends of pursuing my ex’s ex after divorcing him to crawl to my baby’s father. Right. Is it a faux pas until they stop harassing my ex like this or am I overthinking it? Should I ask him first? Like I said, a grab bag, there’s a lot there’s a lot going on here such that I kind of changed my not my answer, but like the way I structured my answer like five different times in my head.
S2: Which which one did you end up with?
S5: Well, the one I ended up with was the question of whether or not it is appropriate or acceptable for you to ask out. Your X is X is not really the main the main issue here, because that kind of goes out the window when you factor in. The whole entire situation of being married to this guy at 15 and everything that kind of transpired after that, which is a long way of saying, I don’t think that your ex has feelings about whether or not you asked his ex are of prime importance here. I don’t know. I would love to hear that kind of your reaction.
S6: Yeah, I think I went there, too. I think it would make sense to me as a strategic concern if it’s the sort of thing where, like, we I need to have at least a civil co parenting relationship with him. And if part of you worries that he would act out in ways that would make co parenting difficult. And that felt like a serious enough concern for you not to do it, that would make sense to me, not at all. Oh, no, it would hurt him too much that I don’t care about at all. I neither want to say to this letter writer. Like, you don’t get to think well of him now, you have to hate him and you can’t enjoy the nice co parenting relationship because of how you two got together. I will simply say, if you’re bar of like, you know, he’s great because he didn’t betray my whereabouts to my abusive family or like try to help them get my son away. That’s as far as bars go. I would say that’s like the bare minimum for being like a decent human being. That’s not a mark of great character. That’s just I would expect that from a stranger on the street baseline. Yeah. So I get that your family was much worse. Your family of origin was much worse than the marriage you used to escape once you were pushed into that marriage. And there may have been ways in which your husband was able to model to you some better or less abusive behavior than what you had grown up with. I want to take all of that into account. And I just also want to say there is no explanation for a 23 year old marrying a 15 year old where I feel like, oh, yeah, what a good guy. He was really helping her out. I, I, I think that that’s wrong. I think he shouldn’t have done it. I think if there’s a legal loophole for parental consent, for marrying off a 15 year old to a 23 year old, it’s still wrong and he should not have done it. And the fact that you were gay like that, that you think I hurt my ex so badly already. It’s just like you were a child. You were given to him by your parents to punish you. And then later it turned out you were gay. If any of that hurt him, I would simply say he participated in the sale of a distressed queer child. So I mean, can see that.
S5: Yeah, and that makes me wonder, like the way that this is written, it feels like she’s asking for us to go. Like, you’re right. He was hard done by or at least to making a decision. And I’m wondering, is that how he feels like? Is that something that he is saying to you, you know, like. I wonder, I wonder and kind of worry, like to the extent that he kind of feeds into this narrative where he has done you favors by not outing, you know, helping your family track you down or whatever, like it’s like I said, his feelings kind of don’t really matter to me in this situation. The relatively low stakes situation of can I date somebody that this person formerly dated?
S6: Yeah, I’ll just say your ex married you. You say you married him, you were married to him to stop your rebelliousness, which to me is a pretty clear indicator that you did not that he didn’t even have the sort of fiction of like, well, we’re in love while she’s old for her age. Like, it sounds like he was pretty aware. And so the fact that you gave birth the next year. I am also able to draw some conclusions there about his his conduct towards you. So I just again, without saying that, you have to say. I can’t be grateful to the ways that I was able to get away from my family because of that marriage, that can still be true. You can still value that this guy is not a saint who helped you out. He was not your social worker. He married and impregnated a child who was distressed and gay. I don’t think well of him as a result. And I don’t want you to worry about hurting him. Yeah, this woman was right to be distressed when she found out the circumstances under which he. Forcibly married you, I applaud her for breaking up with him as a result.
S2: My guess is once she found that out from you, she realized, like, not only did he not tell me himself, he doesn’t seem to have done any introspection on on his role in this, again, just like act of child abuse. So, yeah, good for her for dumping him. I’m glad to speak to her character.
S5: Although, again, baseline. Right like that is a baseline kind of kind of thing. And I mean also it’s like. So either he was in love with you when you were 15 and so now that would break his heart, which is gross. And as his ex pointed out, you or he wasn’t in love with you and it was convenience or whatever. And so you don’t have that kind of, you know, any hint of like an emotional obligation to him to protect his feelings in that way? Like in both in both cases, it’s just no good.
S6: Right. And even without all of this background, if it was simply just like, is it OK to ask out an X is X, my answer to that is almost always going to be some version of it might be complicated, but it’s not wrong. They don’t own someone after having ended a relationship and adults who are interested in one another and who are available for relationships should think about going out with one another. So if you decide not to because you think it would make co parenting too difficult or it would put me into more contact with him than I’m comfortable with, that would make sense to me. But if you simply think I really, really care about this woman, I want to go out with her and I can. My God, of course you can. Of course you can.
S5: And it sounds like you’re you know, you’re close enough that you’re already having like you’re in a relationship now, but like the level of intimacy, you’re talking to each other every day. She has a relationship with your son. She’s amazing with your son like that. And you seem very comfortable already with the idea of approaching this with her and not afraid of of it affecting your relationship. It seems to me like talking to her about it. It doesn’t seem like there are any downsides to that, know whether or not she’s interested or whether like this sounds like something to bring to the table. Because you just heard.
S2: Yeah, yeah, and I just again, I really want to stress, like, there’s just that language of like, this isn’t fair, right? I really hurt him. Is this a faux pas? And I just think there’s so many ways in which you still are in the mindset of I really owe him. He really did me a solid he really helped me out and I kind of failed him by being gay. I wish I could have returned his love. And I just really encourage you to rethink all of that, preferably with a therapist, preferably with a gay therapist, preferably with a gay therapist who can say things like that’s child rape that was smiled upon by the church and the state and your family of origin.
S5: Well, and by and by the way, if you had been straight, it wouldn’t have made a difference. And you still might have reached the age you are now. And like I don’t actually have real romantic feelings for this guy because that’s not that’s not the circumstances under which we came together. Like, it’s just you were set up for failure. You were abused and then put in a situation against your will. So all of the repercussions of that, insofar as other people’s feelings, it’s not not on you.
S6: Yeah.
S2: I’ll leave him there because I feel like we just give this letter writer a ton to process and work through. And I don’t want to I don’t want to overwhelm her. But good luck. Yeah. I’m glad that you have at least this great lady in your life. And if you don’t go out with her, I hope you go out with someone fantastic next. And again, I hope everyone you date in the future is able to say things like forcing a 15 year old to get married because they are quote unquote rebellious is wrong.
Subject line is my X is X. Dear Prudence. My ex and I were married when I was 15 and he was twenty three to stop my rebelliousness. We left our religious small town. When my ex went to college. I had my son at sixteen and I really tried to stay. But even being a single mother with no money or diploma was better than staying married. I also realized that a lot of my acting out had to do with being a lesbian. To my ex’s credit, he never told my family where my son and I were or tried to make me. We cope well and I’m lucky to have him in my life. Four years after our divorce, my ex introduced me to his new girlfriend, who our son loves. She’s great with him and I was blown away by her. Not only is she beautiful, but brilliant and charming, I thought this is who I would fall for. In other circumstances. We exchanged numbers to coordinate about child care, but eventually became friends. She told me repeatedly that she wasn’t into my ex and she broke up with him shortly after quarantine. She and I grew closer. After that, she and my son and I video chat almost every day after work to cook dinner together and talk. Now I’m in love with her, but that’s not fair, right? I hurt my ex so badly already, I don’t need to move on to his ex. To the worst part is she found out how young I was when we were married and I could tell it bothered her, even though I explained my family in the church set it up. She said someone in their twenties shouldn’t want to have sex, the young teen. And I think it was a factor in her breaking up with him. She told me she is bisexual. And I think we’re solid enough that if she rejects [I think something is missing or mangled here] those still be friends of pursuing my ex’s ex after divorcing him to crawl to my baby’s father. Right. Is it a faux pas until they stop harassing my ex like this or am I overthinking it? Should I ask him first? Like I said, a grab bag, there’s a lot there’s a lot going on here such that I kind of changed my not my answer, but like the way I structured my answer like five different times in my head.
S2: Which which one did you end up with?
S5: Well, the one I ended up with was the question of whether or not it is appropriate or acceptable for you to ask out. Your X is X is not really the main the main issue here, because that kind of goes out the window when you factor in. The whole entire situation of being married to this guy at 15 and everything that kind of transpired after that, which is a long way of saying, I don’t think that your ex has feelings about whether or not you asked his ex are of prime importance here. I don’t know. I would love to hear that kind of your reaction.
S6: Yeah, I think I went there, too. I think it would make sense to me as a strategic concern if it’s the sort of thing where, like, we I need to have at least a civil co parenting relationship with him. And if part of you worries that he would act out in ways that would make co parenting difficult. And that felt like a serious enough concern for you not to do it, that would make sense to me, not at all. Oh, no, it would hurt him too much that I don’t care about at all. I neither want to say to this letter writer. Like, you don’t get to think well of him now, you have to hate him and you can’t enjoy the nice co parenting relationship because of how you two got together. I will simply say, if you’re bar of like, you know, he’s great because he didn’t betray my whereabouts to my abusive family or like try to help them get my son away. That’s as far as bars go. I would say that’s like the bare minimum for being like a decent human being. That’s not a mark of great character. That’s just I would expect that from a stranger on the street baseline. Yeah. So I get that your family was much worse. Your family of origin was much worse than the marriage you used to escape once you were pushed into that marriage. And there may have been ways in which your husband was able to model to you some better or less abusive behavior than what you had grown up with. I want to take all of that into account. And I just also want to say there is no explanation for a 23 year old marrying a 15 year old where I feel like, oh, yeah, what a good guy. He was really helping her out. I, I, I think that that’s wrong. I think he shouldn’t have done it. I think if there’s a legal loophole for parental consent, for marrying off a 15 year old to a 23 year old, it’s still wrong and he should not have done it. And the fact that you were gay like that, that you think I hurt my ex so badly already. It’s just like you were a child. You were given to him by your parents to punish you. And then later it turned out you were gay. If any of that hurt him, I would simply say he participated in the sale of a distressed queer child. So I mean, can see that.
S5: Yeah, and that makes me wonder, like the way that this is written, it feels like she’s asking for us to go. Like, you’re right. He was hard done by or at least to making a decision. And I’m wondering, is that how he feels like? Is that something that he is saying to you, you know, like. I wonder, I wonder and kind of worry, like to the extent that he kind of feeds into this narrative where he has done you favors by not outing, you know, helping your family track you down or whatever, like it’s like I said, his feelings kind of don’t really matter to me in this situation. The relatively low stakes situation of can I date somebody that this person formerly dated?
S6: Yeah, I’ll just say your ex married you. You say you married him, you were married to him to stop your rebelliousness, which to me is a pretty clear indicator that you did not that he didn’t even have the sort of fiction of like, well, we’re in love while she’s old for her age. Like, it sounds like he was pretty aware. And so the fact that you gave birth the next year. I am also able to draw some conclusions there about his his conduct towards you. So I just again, without saying that, you have to say. I can’t be grateful to the ways that I was able to get away from my family because of that marriage, that can still be true. You can still value that this guy is not a saint who helped you out. He was not your social worker. He married and impregnated a child who was distressed and gay. I don’t think well of him as a result. And I don’t want you to worry about hurting him. Yeah, this woman was right to be distressed when she found out the circumstances under which he. Forcibly married you, I applaud her for breaking up with him as a result.
S2: My guess is once she found that out from you, she realized, like, not only did he not tell me himself, he doesn’t seem to have done any introspection on on his role in this, again, just like act of child abuse. So, yeah, good for her for dumping him. I’m glad to speak to her character.
S5: Although, again, baseline. Right like that is a baseline kind of kind of thing. And I mean also it’s like. So either he was in love with you when you were 15 and so now that would break his heart, which is gross. And as his ex pointed out, you or he wasn’t in love with you and it was convenience or whatever. And so you don’t have that kind of, you know, any hint of like an emotional obligation to him to protect his feelings in that way? Like in both in both cases, it’s just no good.
S6: Right. And even without all of this background, if it was simply just like, is it OK to ask out an X is X, my answer to that is almost always going to be some version of it might be complicated, but it’s not wrong. They don’t own someone after having ended a relationship and adults who are interested in one another and who are available for relationships should think about going out with one another. So if you decide not to because you think it would make co parenting too difficult or it would put me into more contact with him than I’m comfortable with, that would make sense to me. But if you simply think I really, really care about this woman, I want to go out with her and I can. My God, of course you can. Of course you can.
S5: And it sounds like you’re you know, you’re close enough that you’re already having like you’re in a relationship now, but like the level of intimacy, you’re talking to each other every day. She has a relationship with your son. She’s amazing with your son like that. And you seem very comfortable already with the idea of approaching this with her and not afraid of of it affecting your relationship. It seems to me like talking to her about it. It doesn’t seem like there are any downsides to that, know whether or not she’s interested or whether like this sounds like something to bring to the table. Because you just heard.
S2: Yeah, yeah, and I just again, I really want to stress, like, there’s just that language of like, this isn’t fair, right? I really hurt him. Is this a faux pas? And I just think there’s so many ways in which you still are in the mindset of I really owe him. He really did me a solid he really helped me out and I kind of failed him by being gay. I wish I could have returned his love. And I just really encourage you to rethink all of that, preferably with a therapist, preferably with a gay therapist, preferably with a gay therapist who can say things like that’s child rape that was smiled upon by the church and the state and your family of origin.
S5: Well, and by and by the way, if you had been straight, it wouldn’t have made a difference. And you still might have reached the age you are now. And like I don’t actually have real romantic feelings for this guy because that’s not that’s not the circumstances under which we came together. Like, it’s just you were set up for failure. You were abused and then put in a situation against your will. So all of the repercussions of that, insofar as other people’s feelings, it’s not not on you.
S6: Yeah.
S2: I’ll leave him there because I feel like we just give this letter writer a ton to process and work through. And I don’t want to I don’t want to overwhelm her. But good luck. Yeah. I’m glad that you have at least this great lady in your life. And if you don’t go out with her, I hope you go out with someone fantastic next. And again, I hope everyone you date in the future is able to say things like forcing a 15 year old to get married because they are quote unquote rebellious is wrong.
no subject
LW's ex abused her, and it doesn't sound like either of them have acknowledged that. LW says she hurt her ex badly, presumably by leaving him. Hell no! He hurt her. Maybe he has escaped the toxic community that forces teenage girls to marry, changed himself, and wants to atone for the abuse. It does sound like LW is open to forgiving him: she says she is lucky to have him in her life. But both of them need to process what he did, and I encourage LW to give some thought to what sincere atonement would look like.
Personally, I find this situation nightmarish and would support LW cutting ties with everyone from her old life, especially her ex, but I'm trying to base my response on what LW says she wants. Maybe counseling would help LW clarify what she wants. I also recognize that co-parenting complicates the situation.
The letter is actually about LW's interest in the other woman. LW, go ahead. You don't owe your ex anything.
no subject
Oh, well said. I left my 1000 word rant about Christian misogyny and the horriffic abuse of marrying and impregnating a teenager out of my reply, because I knew others would address it.
My parents might have done something liek this to me if I were less academically promising. I know from experience just how hard it is to see the actual evil one was raised soaking in. LW is grateful for tiny bits of decency from her ex, such as his letting her go and not letting her parents recapture her when she came out as a lesbian, because they shine against the background of all the shit the poor woman had heaped on her all her life.
I just wish I could write LW a poem about finding her sweetie as a star amidst the poison clouds she's been breathing all her life, or something. But I'm exxcessively romantic. :)
no subject
I struggled with this letter because ultra-conservative religion is so foreign to me. I can see that LW might want someone in her life who understands where she came from. But her (former) abuser? And I also hope her ex is freeing himself from the toxic culture in which he was raised and coming to grips with the ways in which he perpetuated the abuses encouraged by that community, but again, I don't think it's fair or healthy he do so with his victim. My instinct says LW needs to get away from him, at least as much as feasible while co-parenting, but as an outsider, it's difficult for me to feel confident putting my values on these two or feeling I understand what's best for them.
I am very sorry you grew up in an environment like theirs.