He cared more about impressing friends and strangers than showing up for his own family - for his wife, his children. He didn’t fight for them. He calculated the risk, justified his actions, and consciously, repeatedly, chose to cheat.
He spent years curating an image of near-perfection - charming, composed, often insufferable, yet impossible to fault - and worked tirelessly to protect it. But as she pull away, his fear grew sharper; it wasn’t just the fear of losing her, or everything she had built for them, but the deeper terror of finally being seen for who he truly was, and had been, for years.
A narcissist; a sociapath - incapable of accountability, fluent in blame.
He’d make himself the victim, pleading for sympathy, spinning stories of bad judgment and regret. He’d blame it on alcohol, on loneliness, on not knowing why he did it. He’d claim he was played. He’d say he felt guilty (sure, guilty enough to delete chats), disguise his messages as business, dress up his rendezvous as "discussions", "meetings". He’d plead for forgiveness.
But she was done.
It took her a while to see the pattern, but when she did, it was impossible to un-see.
Fool me once, shame on you.
Fool me twice, shame on me.
Fool me thrice, I learn what’s true.
Fool me many times - no more of me.
Losing her isn’t the punishment. Watching her thrive will be. Because access to her was always a privilege, not a right.
(I write stories about what I am going through, hoping someone else might find the words they have been unable to say aloud.)
