Is It Right That My Ex Husband Is Trying to Become Great Friends With My Family Members?
Question by Jules Bee: Is it right that my ex husband is trying to become great friends with my family members?
Okay I’ll try to make this short and sweet when there is so much info that may be pertanent to getting the answers I need but it’s the bottom line that counts. I spent almost a decade with my now ex husband. We have been apart for about a yr now. I thought my family would be there for me to see me through these rough times as families do….as his family has done for him. Not an unlikely request as loyalties lie withing a loving family and my ex husbands family would be polite to me when they see me yet they would never be there if I needed a shoulder to lean on and they would never allow me to badmouth their son/brother/cousin…etc….that’s a fine line to cross. His family is their for him when he is in need of someone to help lift him up during trying times like these. My family has done the opposite. One second my mother is telling me to get as much alimony as I could from my ex and he was in her words extremely stubborn and abusive and he deserved to be dragged through the mud.Then my mother wrote a letter to a girl my ex was dating telling her how beautiful and intelligent she is and how she would love it if she married my ex and brought my three yr old son to visit her with my ex all the time. After that I was so devestated I didn’t know who I could trust I just felt like what she had done was crossing a line you just dont cross as a mother especially when this girl spent 20 yrs of her life abusing and selling crack cocaine and heroin and has been implying on social networks such as facebook that she wanted to beat me up etc etc….I made the decision to cut my mom out of my life, so most everyone in my family cast me aside. So in the midst of all this mess, I find I must deal with my own heartache and loneliness and unanswered questions alone because my ex decided to become the best of friends with my mother, my brother and his wife, and my cousins…My ex told me that half the reason he was leaving me was because of the drama that came along with my family.I thought my family would have some sense of loyalty. Instead my brother and my sister n law hangs out with my ex on a regualr basis and refuses to answer my calls, and to top off this crazy trailer park story, my ex is now close buddies with my female cousin Vanessa, and I find it so uncooth and weird never mind completely WRONG. My ex NEVER said more than 2 words to Vanessa the entire time we were together. In fact he didn’t even care for her. So why does he find the need to become friends with my family members who all have major mental problems as well as problems with addiction yet my family cast me aside and my ex tells me how much he is trying to remain friends with me but because I voice my opinions of this just not feeling right, I am making it hard for him to want to be any part of my life. WHere do loyalties lie> Isn’t familyt supposed to have the backs of their family….I feel he should spend time with his own family and make his own friends rather than clinging to my family who aclearly have psychological problems, and above everything else, not squeeze his way into being friends with a female family member of mine. Is this not an episode of Jerry Springer? Does this sound normal to anyone or am I overreacting? How should I handle this. I want to give credit to my father cause he has my back and would never befriend Luke in a manner as my other family has and my father knows where his loyalty lies………with his blood, his daughter..he has his own family, I need mine…This is just crazy
Best answer:
Answer by Janie Salinger
This definetly is a little odd of a situation, but you are probably better off not talking to any of them. Their loyalty should have been with you, since you are their family member, not your ex. It is very intrusive and invasive for them to do this to you, by having your ex being his friend, and it is definetly unappropriate and I am sure this is mind boggling, but its not worth fighting with them over it, since these people aren’t really bright in the first place to understand why this is so wrong on so many levels. Leave them alone, you don’t need them. You also answered your own question, in a way, your family has problems with addiction, along with mental problems, so they probably all just are friends due to drug use. They probably get high together. To tell you the truth, you don’t really need them.
Answer by Juelann
I’m so sorry to “hear” about your situation; I thought I was the only one who had unloving family after a divorce– at least mine aren’t all cozy with the ex like yours is though. I know how gut-wrenching this must all be to you–thankfully you have your dad in your corner– I don’t have that much. Who knows what makes family do what they do– they say we are born into a family with no choice, but we choose our friends–who often are more loyal–which kind of makes sense to my way of seeing things.
I was married twice, each with different endings (and reasons, naturally). My first ex went round to women I thought were my girlfriends and began chasing them– three of them consented, which showed me where their loyalties lay–that was more of a slap-in-the-face than what he did. I figured he was trying to “show me up” to those close to me –what he just ended up doing was reinforcing my poor opinion of him, and showing me who my true friends were. With the last dude I was married to for 18 years just went back to his family–who all support “poor JR”, and that’s okay– interesting thing though, the female in-law members of his family are in my corner–so go figure.
I’m just sharing with you to let you know that you’re not alone in the “nutty family relations” and/or betrayals in life. It sucks, it hurts and yet, there’s nothing we can really do about it. It shows us whom we can really trust, which is good in its own way. I’ve learned through all of this that what really matters is how I behave– I don’t answer for their choices–that’s their karma,not mine. And while we can allow a certain amount of time to grieve over the loss of trust, we can’t let the negative actions of others pull us down– it’s their crap, let it go. We’ve got to move on and make the most of our own lives, cause that’s who we live with, ourselves.
I wish you all the best– I hope you’ve got at least one or two awesome friends in your corner; just don’t dwell so much on the hurtful actions of your birth family that you miss the joys that are in front of you– if you keep sweating it, they win. You fretting isn’t causing them to loose any sleep– so don’t let it make you go nuts either– find those who love you and respect you and your feelings and surround yourself with encouraging people!
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