This Divorced Mom Wants Her Husband Back
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
234.63687
Summary
In this episode, I sit down with my ex-wife, Penelope, to talk about how she found out that her husband was cheating on her and how she managed to stay with him through it all. We talk about what it was like being a single parent to a child with a father who was a serial cheater, how she handled the situation, and why she stayed with him.
Transcript
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Well, I, I, I came to him and I gave him the very clear parameters.
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I was like, listen, I figured this is happening.
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So let's just save our marriage and save our life.
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And so I said, you know, I need these three things to happen.
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And not only did they not happen, but it got much, much worse.
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And then it got dangerous and they got violent and then it got scary.
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And then I, you know, then I just felt like I didn't have a choice because things got so
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Cause there's just so much lies and deceit and can I trust this person?
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And then, but I really, really wanted to, to make it work.
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I was like, why don't we, we'll just have an open marriage, which I knew would probably
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You know, I was like, that's really, really, really wanted it.
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Like I just, I really wanted the marriage to stay together, but I just got scared.
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So if it was just strictly cheating, do you think it would have worked out?
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I needed some securities that weren't, that weren't, that weren't there.
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Well, when I found out that he was cheating, I also looked into like our life a little bit
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more deeply and I realized that absolutely nothing was in my name.
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And I was like, oh my gosh, I'm in a really vulnerable position here.
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And so then I was like, listen, I need to have some stake in our lives and it was a protective
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So did you, did you put yourself in that situation where you wanted to make it work for Penelope?
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So did also, I still love him today and he's watching right now.
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I mean, I was hoping he would come to London yesterday and have lunch with us.
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If, I mean, I would consider Penelope thinks I'm crazy, but I talk about it all the time.
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But why wouldn't you, I know you said you would, you would, you're doing it for Penelope
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You can do anything to keep, um, I think people would do anything, um, for their children,
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but don't you think that you should love yourself more instead of, uh, after what he's done
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and that feel like you can do, you deserve better and you don't deserve to be treated like
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I glorified what being a single parent was going to look like.
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And it was crazy cause I had a single mom, so I should have known better.
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But honestly, I think it's modern day child abuse.
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And I watched her and I watched her in my, I watched her growing up struggle so much as
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one person to do all the work at home, like just one person, no support.
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Like you were, I remember the nights you were like crying and it also struck a strong heart.
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And for me, that was like, I never want to have that.
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And I will do any, anything and everything in my power to never create that for my future
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Because if I have a family, I made a, I make a vow.
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I make a vow to, to God, to higher power that I will stick with this person for the rest
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I thought that I did that with your father too, but you know, it happened, but I can never
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And there was a spiritual, like there was a spiritual disconnection there.
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I thought we were in a monogamous relationship, but I, you know, found out otherwise.
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He wished he didn't do what he did and he, and he, and he wishes he could have changed
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Cause I just feel like majority, not all, majority of men do at some point in their life
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Then you have all these, you know, motherless and fatherless families.
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We're never like, we're never, as women, we're never told like how men are naturally.
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So it's like, we've kind of been told that if we get cheated on, it's the worst thing
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I think that most of, I think that most of society's problem really like come back to
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Like if you look at the prison population, it's like 80% single mother homes.
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If you look at youth suicides, you're way more likely to be abused as a child.
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You're way more like every big, I spoke to a homeless shelter director down the street.
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And I said, why, why like, are these people homeless?
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Like, cause he has like the worst type of homeless, which is like the street sleepers.
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Cause there's different like levels of people living in cars.
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And he told me that, um, he, that most of these, um, people came from single mother homes,
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especially with like multiple baby daddies or like whatever.
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And they, the kids that got ended up getting taken and like put in the system and they've
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never, they don't know any sense of stability or function.
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Um, and so if you look at all the like major issues in society, a lot are linked to single
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mother homes and single father homes don't have the same outcomes.
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If you're seeing a lot of, if you grow up in a single household and you see a breakup,
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Like what you were saying with your mom, you can, you can do this because your mom will
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So you might see it as this is something, it's not easy, but it's something I can do.
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And then when, only when you go through it, you realize that, right, this is mad.
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But if we have a lot more family units in the house and working at things, then the children
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get to see like, okay, my mom and dad went through this, but they managed to go through
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And because I've, I've been through my inner relationship where I've gone therapy and I've
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And even when you talk about therapy earlier, I don't think therapy is there to fix things.
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Not, not, not, I don't think therapy is there to fix.
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I think it's there to help you understand triggers and understand certain things for
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Honestly, to be very honest with you, after going to therapy for eight years, maybe 12,
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There are other ways to fix your problems and you can also just really get over yourself.
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Honestly, I just decided to get over myself and that's basically how I fix myself.
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Well, I think, I think that therapy, like it's outsourcing families.
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Because like, usually you would go to your siblings or you go to, because your, your, your,
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your mother is going to have a completely different take.
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Like if you're, let's say if you're in an argument with your boyfriend, she's going to have a completely
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different take on the situation because she knows you and she knows your positive and your negative traits.
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So it's like, if I tell my mom, like, Oh, this person reacted to me this way.
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Mom's going to be like, well, maybe you did this.
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Like maybe people are scared of that real truth.
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No, I just think that the therapist doesn't have that information.
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They didn't grow up with you, but like who knows your daughter better than you.
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She might be, she might be scared to go to her mom because she's going to get that harsh reality.
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And sometimes people don't want the harsh reality.
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Like the way you're, the way people raise their children dictates also relationships.
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And so she raised me, giving me the hard truth since I was little and I hated it.
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And I give her like all the props to being honest with me when I didn't want to hear it.
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She was like, you need to get up and go work out.
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I wasn't, I wasn't that big, but I was like, kept her pretty, pretty chunky.
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And my mom would always be like on me because I was just this diehard, like tomboy.
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And I still struggle with it to this day, but I'm like, oh my God, I would be so much worse
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Cause when you're a kid, you're just like, mom, like I don't want to.
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And she's like this, she has her master's in nutrition.
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And I'm like, I don't want you to tell me what to eat.
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Like, I don't want you to tell me how to live, how to work out.
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But I would sit in my room, like obese, fat, you know, crying.
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And she'd be like, open the curtains, rip the curtains open, be like, I'm going to take your phone away.
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But those are the kind of parents that you need.
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And I've been through some bad things and, and having that, her mentality that she raised me with being honest and saying, Penelope, you need to get up.
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Like the day you realize your parents were right about everything.
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It's like, it's like you just wake up one day and you're like, oh, I was like around 21 or 22 for me.
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I was like, oh my gosh, my mom and dad raised me so well.
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And they were right about everything they told me.
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I'm not listening to them for relationship advice.
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I'm in the best relationship compared to those two.
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I mean, I think that I think that mothers like actually we should ask our parents about those
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And I actually, he met my mom and my dad and I would, I wouldn't have been with him if they
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Cause that's just how, that's just how it should be.
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Cause even the girl that I'm seeing now, her family unit is strong and I feel like it wouldn't
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have worked if her, if her mom or things didn't like man.
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Like, I feel like, I feel like men respect women more when they have that family dynamic.
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Whether the, even if the dad's not there, if the dad's there, obviously he's going to
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respect it a lot more in it because he's going to come differently.
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But if, if he knows you have a strong support unit with mom, cousins, aunties, whatever.
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He is going to respect you a lot more than if a girl doesn't really have the same kind
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And I also find it really challenging to know when you find a good man.
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I mean, I think by now at 47, you know, it's challenging to find a good man.
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I think I found one whose values align, but it's not that easy.