This week, nine woman tell us ‘the moment i knew my marriage was over, REALLY over’. From the woman who discovered that her husband had left for their honeymoon with another woman (her friend, no less!), to the woman who got a snapchat message (yes, SNAPCHAT) from her husband saying their marriage was over – these women have seen it all.
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.
“He Went On Our Belated Honeymoon With My Friend“
Four and a half years after their wedding, Kathryn and Tim finally booked their honeymoon. They’d been squirreling away money for a house, but now they were ready for a romantic holiday before they had children.
But, before the honeymoon their relationship seemed to unravel, until they ended their marriage entirely. Still reeling from the shock split, another shocking piece of news was about to hit Kathryn: her husband had still gone on that holiday. And, he’d taken one of her best friends with him.
“I’m in such a better place to where I was two years ago,” she says. “I do still feel a great deal of anger from time to time – Tim is still with my former friend – but I’m not in love with him anymore. Now I see him for who he truly is, and I do feel grateful I got to see that before I had children with him.”
“He Ghosted Me…“
Dating can be hard – and anyone who has been through it anytime in the last decade will likely have experienced being ghosted. Maybe you’ve even ghosted someone yourself.
But, while it seems to be par for the course while dating, we certainly don’t expect it to happen in a steady, loving relationship – let alone a marriage.
But that’s exactly what happened to Renee. She left for an early morning flight for work one morning and kissed her husband goodbye on the forehead – he slurred ‘I love you’ as he went back to sleep. Those were the last words he ever spoke to her.
“I called his number hundreds of times but he never picked up. I can’t believe that I literally got ghosted by my own husband.”
‘He Left Me a ‘Dear John’ Letter’
Nina arrived home from work one evening and found the lights were on in the house, but her husband wasn’t home. On the dining room table was a bunch of flowers and an envelope next to them with her name on it.
Her first reaction was, “How sweet!”
But that quickly changed when she opened the envelope. There were eight handwritten pages to Nina, and as she began to read them she realised they weren’t a love letter. Her husband was explaining to her why he felt it was time to end their relationship. The thrust of the letters was that he loved her, but not in the same way anymore and it was clear to him that they’d both changed and grown in the years they’d been together.
“He said – and I’ll never forget this bit – ‘I know how much you love that movie Dear John, so I wanted it to be like that for you.’”
‘I Had an Abortion and Didn’t Tell Him’
Emma did not want kids, and thankfully, her husband said that wasn’t a dealbreaker. But, when she got a positive pregnancy test, she decided not to tell him and get an abortion.
Kyle found out a year later by accident, and was – understandably – shocked and heartbroken. For him, the trust was gone from their marriage.
“Kyle would want the baby,” tells Emma. “Looking back, that’s terrible that I did that. I knew that it would be the end of our marriage, because either I would get the abortion and he would be upset about it, or I would go through with the pregnancy for him, so that he could be a solo dad. I loved him, but not enough to have a baby for him.”
‘He Lied About His Finances’
Kate’s husband suddenly announced that he’d quit his job and was going to work for himself. It came as a shock, because they were saving for a house deposit and were ensuring they were doing everything to make sure a bank would lend them money. This was going to kill that – and, he did it without even discussing it with her.
But the worst was yet to come – months and months of lies, where her husband fell into so much debt that Kate was unaware of… until she discovered he’d taken out $75,000 in loans, had spent all the money – and she was now just as responsible for paying it back.
“I wouldn’t wish that on anyone,” she says. “I felt like such an idiot – and so many people said things like, ‘didn’t you think it was weird how he did X…?’ or questioned me about things that had happened, which didn’t help. I thought he was going through a rough patch, but we were married and I trusted him and I thought we’d figure it out.”
‘We Finally Had THE Conversation… He Was Gay’
Even on the morning of her wedding day, Anne wasn’t quite sure she was doing the right thing. She absolutely loved her husband, but there was something she couldn’t quite put her finger on that didn’t seem quite right between them. Her bridesmaids told her it was wedding jitters, very common, and not to worry – her husband loved her to bits.
But over the years it became more and more apparent that something was wrong – although, Anne didn’t want to see it, so she ignored every sign of a problem. Until, finally, one day, decades after they married, things boiled over and they had a true chat: her husband, Bill, was gay. They talked all night and by the end of it, she says, she’d lost her husband, but had gained a true best friend.
“I felt so very sad for Bill,” she tells, her voice catching. “I felt so sad that he had made himself keep up this incredibly exhausting façade and denied his true feelings. And I felt so very guilty and ashamed that I’d allowed that to happen. I’d turned a blind eye to all the signs, and left him to suffer all those years.”
“I said to him that night, ‘How are you ever going to forgive me?’ but he said, ‘How are you ever going to forgive me?’ I don’t know how it unfolds for other couples, but we sat there that night and cried and talked for hours.”
Read the full story here
‘It Was Announced Auckland Was Going into Lockdown… And He Announced He Was Leaving’
When it was announced that there was a positive Covid case again in the community in 2021, Amanda swung by the McDonalds on her way home, because she imagined that it might be her last chance for a while.
When she got home to her husband and children she discovered her husband was packing. He said he couldn’t do another lockdown, so he was leaving. He was leaving her and the kids – and no, he wasn’t just taking a holiday, he was done with the marriage.
“I think he said, ‘I cannot take another lockdown in this place’. I was furious. None of us wanted to go through a lockdown, but what, he wanted to run away and be on his own and leave me to look after everything?!? I think he said ‘I can’t do another lockdown with you, I’m not leaving for lockdown, I’m leaving for good.’”
‘I Came Off the Pill to Start Trying For a Baby, and I Suddenly No Longer Found Him Attractive!’
After 10 years together – five of them married – Hayley turned 32, the age they agreed they’d start trying for a baby at. So Hayley came off the pill, after being on it since she was 17. Quite quickly she started feeling different – her skin was a bit of a mess and her periods were a lot heavier, and her libido was shot. She wondered if it was short-term – or maybe the bad PMS she used to suffer from was returning and making her grumpy. Except, the feelings didn’t go away. Hayley no longer found her husband attractive. Interestingly, there are several studies that support this phenomenon (check them out in the full story!)
“I felt terrible finally admitting it to myself, but suddenly I felt nothing toward Pete. I couldn’t find him attractive. I started having a crazy crush on this guy at work, and on the guy at the café where I get a coffee each morning.”
‘He Broke Up With Me On Snapchat‘
Claire and her husband were due to attend the wedding of their close friends in a few weeks – and in the lead-up Claire went to a hen’s weekend away. Next up, it was her husband’s turn to head away for a stags do. Her husband was the only person she used Snapchat with – it was their own special channel.
The stag-do seemed to be going well, and her husband was sending her snapchat videos and messages. Then, things fell quiet. Things got a bit strange – then even stranger, when her husband sent her a message on Snapchat. It was long, and the first things that jumped out to her were the words “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately.” And “I can’t do this anymore, I’m sorry.”
In shock, she jumped out of the app – but when she went back in, obviously, the message had disappeared. She wondered if it was a mistake, a joke, or a weird stag do prank, but unfortunately, no. Her marriage was over.
“I was in shock,” says Claire. “My husband had just broken up with me over Snapchat. It was too insane to be real.”
