Louise had been married for 20 years when her world turned upside down. She thought she had the good fortune of being married to the ideal man but then things started changing. For three years their relationship was anything but ideal.
“Couples counselling wasn’t working and our fights were getting worse and worse until one day, after more than 20 years of marriage, my husband told me he was leaving and not coming back,” she wrote to Huffpost.
“I was devastated. Numb. I hadn’t been on my own since my early 20s. I was graying, had a sagging body, and had been a complete stranger to the traditional job market for more than two decades,” she continued.
“I was also coping with chronic depression and anxiety, and the thought of online dating terrified me. The internet didn’t even exist the last time I went on a date.”
During their marriage, her husband had taken charge of the otherwise non-traditional roles in the home like looking after their children and cooking. Louise also left the managing of the family’s money to him.
Now that she was now on her own, she was forced to take up responsibilities like managing her money and taking care of the house repairs.
Her now ex-husband gave her access to their shared bank account and when she started going through the details, she was shocked beyond belief.
“I noticed a recurring charge I didn’t recognize,” she wrote. “It appeared to be from a tech company, but I didn’t understand why it would be listed in our personal account since my husband put all of his work expenses on his company card.”
Louise proceeded to research the company only to discover that it was linked to a website that promised to link men (sugar daddies) to willing young ladies (sugar babies).
She dug even deeper into their bank statements and found credit card charges to hotels, restaurants and expensive shops that even she had never visited.
On her ex’s Paypal account, she discovered that he had been making various payments to his sugar babies.
Her shock gave way to anger, disgust and shame. She tried confronting her husband but was left with even more questions.
It took all her will-power to pick herself up. Being a yoga instructor helped her “find herself” again. She got a job teaching yoga to school-going children, took charge of her finances, bought a house and has now taken charge of all aspects of her life.
On her journey of self-discovery, Louise has come to accept that her husband’s actions were his own and are not a reflection of her worth.
“I’m not saying I had no part in the dissolution of our marriage — I certainly played my role and played it with gusto — but I came to understand that my job was to acknowledge that part, forgive myself, learn from the experience and move on,” she confessed. “I didn’t cause my husband to cheat on me. That happened because he made that choice.
“It’s been almost a year since the sickening day when I realized my life was not what I thought it was. I still get angry and sad, and I still shed more tears than I care to admit. But every day I get up and go to my new job and fix a leaky faucet in my own house or hang up a picture wherever I want, and I realize that I’m going to be OK,” she concluded.?
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