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Just want to share my story, has anyone gone through something like this?

My exwife at the age of 37, decided that she was fed up with the wife and mom title.

She wanted to add, fun, friendly (create lots of friends), and party girl who posts her stuff on facebook.

The thing is, is now she seems like maybe she wants to try and come back to proving to everyone she is a committed mom. Not come back to me, but show she is a mom.

I posted a vent about her saying to me," the kids are my priority", so I think she will start to put efforts into that.

But anyone ( men or women), have a ex go brought an identity crises? I feel as though she tried to fill some sort of void with shallow things.

My EXW has priorities in clubbing, kareokee, and drinking above holding our family together.

At the same time, she wants to play like she is some super Christian women.

I can't see this life as fulfilling. It's just strange to me her choices. My attitude is be the best dad I can, but there is a strange curiosity as to why people make the decisions they do. Please don't tell me not to worry about her, I know that already. I guess I'm trying to see if being a mom starts to crawl in to her life more.

I'm interested in anyone's story that fits this description. Men or women.

[This message edited by Running the Race at 12:30 AM, October 18th (Friday)]

My EXWH had a major shift in identity. Or perhaps I never really knew him, I don't know.

Several years before the affair even started, he become way more focused on his career, until it consumed him and resulted in very little time for his family. In his industry, there is a lot of socializing. He began to drink more, go out, karoake, late night partying. He even covered his arm with tattoos.

Then eventually the affair, with a party girl much younger than me, who had no kids, and was a big drinker. I NEVER would have seen this shift coming. And like you described, it's so far from where my priorities are in life at this point, it made NO sense to me.

That relationship didn't last, but he upped and moved 2,000 miles away from his kids for what he claims was a job opportunity, has a new SO, that is just a new version of the last one...extremely young, an aspiring model, no kids, party girl. He goes out drinking nonstop, sleeps in all weekend, lives the life of a 20 year old, and sees his kids every couple months because now it involves a 6 hour flight. He's a big ridiculous cliche.

Maybe your ExW will get it and come back to her kids, maybe she won't. It's hard to know why people make the shifts they do, isn't it? Thankfully, they have you to rely on, so try to focus on that, rather than predicting what her next moves will be, since she's in another world right now. I don't think I will EVER be able to make sense of this new found lifestyle of my ex, and I'm done trying.

[This message edited by NWfleur at 1:49 AM, October 18th (Friday)]

I don't think your story is unusual. Hypocrisy is an all too common trait amongst the WS population. I read here all too often from the BS claiming that their spouse suddenly changed. I personally believe that they did not change. They were just faking who they really were while M to us. Some people are really good actors. KWIM ? I'm going to leave you with this verse from Billy Joel's "The Stranger" It seems to fit well during these trying times.

Once I used to believe

Kick me right between the eyes

Running, my stbxww did exactly the same! She was out every weekend , new career that we never even discussed, drinking every night ,new friends, Facebook junkie, neglect the children. Who the f--k was this person? Then after d day it lasted about two more weeks , all of a sudden when she realized I lawyered up and was fighting her in court , she changed back !!! At least she hid it ! Now she pretends to be an angel and thinks I don't know why . But I know that this is on the advice of her lawyer ! It will all change again when divorce is final. She is a liar and manipulator she will be whoever she can ,whenever she needs to. That is my experience , so no you are not alone brother! And forget about her is much much easier said than done! 6 months for me and I still have problems with that. Good luck . All the best!

They were just faking who they really were while M to us. Some people are really good actors. KWIM ?

I think Stronger is right. They were faking their true identity for a while. But yes I also do believe many do change or get a bit lost in their identities. I like to think mine changed but I'm not so sure if it was that or she was just an actress. Not long before I found out about her A she was hanging out a lot with a married female friend who was talking quite a bit to her about things. A year before I discovered her A we were on our way home from their house from a New Years Eve party at 3am. ExWW was a bit tipsy and in the car she started talking about how her friend (who was also married and a mom) wanted her to try smoking pot with her. Now my exWW at the times was a very straight-laced professional working mom. I could not believe what I was hearing from her. I told her the next morning that I wasn't sure what this was all about, but I didn't like what I was hearing and I think she needed to take a break from her friend. Needless to say less than a year later she was fucking a married guy in an Atlanta hotel room who was on his way home from overseas for his son's birth. So either she was changing or she had been acting for years. I suspect she got fed up with the wife/mom title in a way and was acting out immaturely. I think it was her version of a mid-life identity crisis (yes women get them too). That or nothing but plain ego from her job. Yet now divorced she seems very straight-laced back into her mom role of our son. Probably because all this woke her up and she knows I'm not there anymore to take care of our son at the drop of a hat like I used to be. She needs to figure herself out.

Nope, not unusual. Crappy, but not unusual.

I'm sorry you're going through this.

As many here know, my ex was gay and hiding a completely separate life from me. While at home, the devoted dad, great job, big house (although ignored me for the most part)...but on the exterior everything "looked" normal.

When he left to "travel for work" he became someone else. Overly gay acting, drinking, partying, long term affairs filled with travel. He even had a FB page that he blocked me from. I heard from the AP that people couldn't believe ex had "ever been married...he is such a queen!" Where he didn't act like that around me at all.

What you are describing is, unfortunately, very common.

My ex told me that he hated himself when he looked into the mirror, that his head felt like a tornado. He faked so much that I don't think he knew he he really was.

It is a hard concept for people who DO know who they are, and assume everyone else does too.

But, bottom line, she is an adult. She is making really stupid, poor choices. No one is MAKING her do anything. She may want to be a Mom because she knows she is supposed to want that...but doesn't really know how. Something is missing in her.

I'd say, three years out, my ex is a more involved father than he used to be. He still isn't anywhere close to what I think he should be. But, he didn't walk away from the kids, and for that I am thankful.

There will come a time that these questions just won't bother you any longer.

Yes, xPerv is talking a lot about what kind of parent he wants to be and I think in his odd, kind of slimy way, he's trying to still be a parent, though not a very present one.

Rather, he'd like to remote parent and still have the control and discipline, but not the every day ness or responsibility.

People to XPerv are possessions, extensions of himself and he likes to have his kids where he can take them out, play like a toy for a while, show them off and send them back again. He would be irate to hear that of himself, but that's what he shows, though he talks the right talk...the actions don't match it, though.

XPerv also holds OW over holding our family together, as your XWW with the keroke, etc.

So very hard, Running. So very hard.

My friend, the mom of the boy I wrote about, likens it to having another child, a grown up one and she thinks of her XWH as kind of a mentally challenged person and it helps because he just makes no sense, either.

My exW morphed from the best Mom, wife, sister, daughter, friend to a burned out sociopath in little over 6 months.

She started country line dancing with a couple of her cousins, drifted away from them, became a barfly then AP to a multiple DUI, unemployed lowlife.

The entire cast of losers at the roadhouse where she went became cheerleaders and enablers as she burned to the ground - staying out 'till 3 AM leaving our kids alone even when I was away on business travel.

When our kids stay with her, they experience her as some sort of housekeeper automaton.

Who knows what happened?

Ex-shat fits this. Started escaping the marriage by hitting the bar scene...loved being seen as the high roller, big shot. Would buy rounds for the entire bar. Partied with stripper whore and her stripper friends. Did god knows what kind of drugs. He wanted the life of an unnattached 20 year old.

Worked great for him until he knocked his stripper up. Damn, I love that Karma bus. Now he's trying to play family guy again. He really sucks at it though. He's great at throwing money at something but not so great at the actual family shit.