The Divorce Diaries: ‘He Left Me When I Was 10 Weeks PostPartum, With a Young Toddler at Home Too’

“He left me when I was postpartum” They’re words that Capsule reader Greta can hardly believe herself. But, while they already had an 18-month-old toddler and their very much planned and loved second child was just 10 weeks old, her husband dropped a bombshell…

Welcome to the Divorce Diaries. In our past instalments over the last year we’ve covered everything from when you’re most likely to divorce to whether they’re contagious to whether being on the contraceptive pill can effect your chances! and have now spoken to dozens of women – including one whose husband announced he was leaving her to have an open relationship with a 19-year-old, another who was quite literally ghosted by her own husband and one who discovered the real reason her husband divorced her was because he had a baby with her SISTER.

If you have a topic you’d like to discuss, share your thoughts, experience or advice about, drop a line to alice@capsulenz.com.

Greta was 10 weeks postpartum. It was her second child, a boy, after welcoming a little girl with her husband just 18 months before the arrival of their second.

“We’d always planned on having two kids – maybe even three, but we had planned on having our second at least a year after having our first to give my body time to recover,” she says. “But we got a surprise instead and you roll with. My husband was the one who was over the moon when my test came up positive. I was the terrified one, but I came around pretty quickly.”

She’d had a pretty difficult time following the birth of their daughter, who was born in the midst of Covid. “I was never diagnosed with PPD or PPA, but I was really anxious and struggled. I only really realised afterwards how tough it had been.” So when she discovered she was pregnant, after the initial terror, what made her feel excited was that she’d get to experience having a baby under “normal” circumstances.

“It was like a do-over,” she says. “I knew this time it would be a lot easier. Y’know, like that first time you don’t know what’s happening and it’s all new and terrifying. So, I wouldn’t be as terrified. But also, I wouldn’t have to worry about lockdowns, or social distancing or anything. I started to get excited.”

And, sure enough, she had the ‘baby blues’ for a few days after the birth as her body swung through the highs and lows of a hormonal rollercoaster, but then, she finally felt like she was enjoying this “newborn bubble” that she’d heard people excitedly talk about before.

“It was hard and I was sleep-deprived, because we also had a young toddler, but I was stoked,” she says. “I felt like I had everything I’d ever wanted.”

Until, at 10-weeks post-partum, something changed. She’d been pushing away some little nagging thoughts that something wasn’t right with her husband, when his phone beeped. She was right next to it, so she picked it up to hand it to him, but he jumped up, said, ‘what are you doing?’ and grabbed the phone.

Immediately, Greta knew something was very wrong, but she joked, ‘What’s wrong? Is it a message from your girlfriend?’

“His face went pale,” she says. “It was the worst. In my head I thought, oh shit, like this must be a message from someone who he has a thing for or something. He must have thought I knew more than I did, because he basically caved and admitted he’d been having an affair. I was so in shock that I laughed. I assumed he was joking.”

Unfortunately, as it turned out, her husband hadn’t been joking. He’d been having an affair with a colleague for six months. It’d started when she was about to enter her third trimester.

“He totally unraveled and told me everything,” she says. “It was so weird. I was numb. It was like I was in someone else’s body hearing a different story.”

It all felt so surreal, Greta found herself going through the motions – she folded some washing while he was telling her everything and getting things ready to wake her youngest up for a feed.

“It didn’t feel real,” she says. “But then he got up and packed some things and left, crying. I was so confused. It wasn’t until the next day that it started to sink in and I was so angry. He’d left a newborn and an under-two, probably to go stay with his girlfriend.”

That’s when she called one of her friends, who was in shock herself at hearing the news.

“Thankfully it was a Saturday and she doesn’t have kids so she could just be with us immediately,” says Greta. “She stayed a couple of weeks in the end. She was the best.”

Greta says that as time went on she began thinking more about the last six months. She thought about how her husband had changed a bit – he’d been spending more time at the gym, more time ‘working’ and more time with his friends, sometimes staying out late.

“I let a lot of it go, because I figured he was getting out there before we had two kids and it was too hard to leave the house,” she says.

It was devastating on a number of different levels, Greta says. There was the betrayal to work through, leaving her feeling shame and a number of sometimes surprising emotions. But also practically, there was so much to get on top off.

“I’d taken six months off for our first and planned to take a year off for our second,” she says.

But with her husband only paying the bare minimum in child support, she realised that financially, she couldn’t afford to take another six months off unpaid.

“I wish I could say who my boss is publicly and sing his praises, but I’d like this story to say anonymous,” she says. “Truthfully, I haven’t told many people the full story and most of the people I work with have no idea – maybe they’ll work it out reading this though. I thought my boss was a decent guy, but when I called him and told him what had happened, even though he’d hired someone on a one year maternity contract, he said he would get me back at the six month mark.”

Her boss arranged for her to come back on the basis that she was working on a ‘special project’.

“The kindest part was that he said, if we were going to convince people that he lured me back early to do this project, I should be able to say he made me a good offer. He paid me a bonus to come back,” she says. “It was unreal.”

It was a piece of good news amidst the most horrendous time she’s ever experienced.

“My self-worth took such a hit,” she says. “And my sanity – looking after two such young kids solo was hard.”

What made it even more difficult to stomach, was knowing that her husband was now living with his colleague – he’d moved straight in with her, and her three-year-old.

“That crushed me, particularly as time went on,” says Greta. “He has had very little contact with the kids – and that’s been his choice. I’ve tried. Instead, he’s playing Daddy to someone else’s kids. That one, even a year or so later still gets me in the guts.”

Greta says time is healing, and she’s been working on integrating more self-care into her life when she can, but it still hurts.

“I still have a lot of anger, but I try not to let it take over my life,” she says. “I look at our kids, and I think it’s just sad for him really, he’s missing out. They’re the best kids in the world.”