Dealing With An Ex-Husband

by Anna

If anyone out there has any advice on how to deal with ex-spouses that you have to be in contact with because of the kids, please let me know. I have an ex-husband who I am trying to be friends with for the sake of our two sons, my daughter-in-law, and my grandson.

When I married my ex-husband in 1975, I was very young. He seemed so strong and outward and I was very withdrawn and shy at the time. I grew up in a family where my father was an alcoholic and my mother was cold and emotionally abusive. They had their good points too, as everyone does, but at the time, I just couldn't see that. My self-esteem was so low that there were times I did not believe that I deserved to live.

When we first started dating, my ex told me that he liked the fact that I didn't talk too much. When we went to places, he would tell me to just let him do the talking, and I went along with that. My mother had always tried to teach me to allow the man to be the boss. She said that all women had a subconscious need to be dominated by men.

After we were married, my ex-husband became very emotionally and verbally abusive and started drinking a lot. He never really hit me or physically abused me, but his emotional and verbal abuse was horrible. I usually just took it and played the passive role that I had learned a child.

During the marriage, my ex would often put me into dangerous situations. While we were out together, he sometimes drove the car crazy with me in it. We lived in the North and the streets were sometimes a sheet of ice.

Once he drove up to the top of a cliff at a ski resort and maneuvered his truck to the edge of the cliff so that the front wheels were starting to go over the cliff. When I started crying, he backed the truck up away from the cliff and started laughing.

Those are just a couple of the things he did that I felt were dangerous. There were more situations, but it would just take too long to write about them here.

I spent 20 years with my ex, except for 1-1/2 years that I was divorced from him when my sons were younger. During the 1-1/2 years I was divorced from him I ended up living in the same apartment complex that he lived at. He had a job as a security guard at those apartments. I know that he was supposed to check up on the residents, but when he checked up on me, it was more like stalking. I didn't complain about it to the authorities because I just didn't have the self-esteem to.

Once, while I was living at those apartments my ex came over and tried to rape me. The boys were asleep in the room next to mine. I struggled so much that he finally let me go. When I brought it up to him the next day, he said that I probably dreamed it and to just drop it. I never brought it up again.

It got so bad, that I finally had a breakdown and ended up in a mental hospital for two weeks. My ex took care of the boys while I was in the hospital. I was lucky that he did not want custody of them, so I got my sons back when I got out of the hospital.

At one point I moved back to Colorado with my sons. I stayed with my parents until my mother angrily talked me into going back to my ex-husband for the sake of the children. I finally gave in and went back to him.

As far as everyone else could see, we got along pretty good on our second try at marriage. My ex was very concerned about what other people thought of him. He rarely ever abused me when others were around.

During the time I was married to him the second time, I started buying self-help books and recordings. Some of them were really good and helped and some of them were just confusing to me. At one point, my shelves looked like a library of self-help material.

While I was with my ex-husband I started to get some counseling and joined a self-help support group. I even started to be more assertive with my ex at times. My ex didn't want to have anything to do with the books, recordings, counseling or groups, so I just did it on my own. He said that he didn't want to go to counseling and spill his guts out in front of a stranger.

Sometimes my ex was decent to me and sometimes he was very abusive. It was like one moment he'd be a certain way and then the next moment he was the exact opposite. I never knew what he would be like or how he would react to something. He had terrible rage attacks. I often tried to understand him by learning more about his childhood. However, I remembered reading somewhere that you can understand why a dog bites, but don't try to pet it. I also tried to do some soul searching to figure out what I could be doing to contribute to the problem.

When the boys were grown, I felt an intense energy pushing me away from my ex-husband. It was like even if wanted to stay with him, I couldn't. I had no choice but to leave him. He was very angry when I left.

My two sons moved to the South when they were grown. After I left my ex-husband, he also moved to the South, though he made no attempts to see the children. My ex-husband's family lives in the South.

When my son and daughter-in-law had their child, they asked my ex if he would come by and see them every once in awhile so that their son would have a Grandfather. My ex began to come by and see them, and according to them, he is acting very civil and being a good father and grandfather now.

I began to write my ex some e-mails trying to be friends with him so that if we ended up being at our children?s houses at the same time, we would get along for the children's sake. He agreed and wrote some nice e-mails back. I thought that this would work, until I received an e-mail from him recently that seemed threatening to me. He said that he thought I would get a laugh out of it. The e-mail was a photo of a garage with a car in it with a truck on top of the car. It looked as though the truck was driven to smash into the car and ended up running over it, ending up on top of it. The caption said, "The perfect revenge." He may not have meant it as a threat, but I didn't think it was very funny.

It may be that he's just trying to scare me, but I would really like to have some advice on how to deal with being around my ex when I go to see the children and grandchild. My oldest son who lives in the South told me one time that he just wants me to be safe. I want my children to be safe, too. I really would like to see this end up with my ex-husband getting the right kind of counseling, but I know that I'm not in charge of that. I pray for it, and I hope it will happen.

My ex-husband was married again after I divorced him the second time. His marriage to her lasted for two years. According to my youngest son, his father's marriage to his other wife ended when he beat up her daughter. My son said that his father's brother who is a police man covered for my ex and got him out of trouble. His step-daughter was hurt bad enough to spend some time in a hospital and then she left to go back to Canada where she lives.

When my present husband and I finally started going through the process of beating pillows and doing the tantrum exercises to get out our anger, I was shocked and sometimes mortified at how much rage was inside of me. I stayed with it though, until one day I was surprised to feel a certain calmness that I had never felt before. I often wonder if I had gotten out all of my anger at my ex-husband, or if there is still anger in me that contributes to my having problems with him now. When I think about him now, all I can feel is fear.

I really need to resolve this problem, because it is so huge in my life. When my children were still young, I found myself treating them similar to how my mother treated me when I was growing up. I knew that I couldn't raise them that way, so I tried to get the help I needed to be a better mother.

When my sons grew up I apologized to them about anything wrong I had done to them while they were growing up. They both said that they thought I was a good mother and that they had good memories of me loving them and paying a lot of attention to them while they were growing up. That means so much to me. I really just want to love my children. I know that if they feel loved and cared about, they can face things in their lives better.

Wow, I didn't realize I had written so much. Anyway, if anyone out there has had a similar experience with this, or understands it, please give me some advice.


Response from Dr. DeFoore

Thanks for this powerful and moving story, Anna. I think other visitors will benefit from reading it, and may just have some helpful insights or suggestions to offer. You might want to try these imagery processes for emotional healing. I think they could help you.