Sanity Check's Story

I attended a reunion and met N again after a couple of decades. At the time I was in a bad marriage (another sad story) with two small girls and was just hoping for a fun night out for a change. He was there, and we had a really great night. Several weeks after the reunion, I left my bad marriage with my daughters and started to date my N, certain my life had changed for the better.
We were married three years later. He is a highly educated man, very gregarious and charming. We built a good life for ourselves and the girls. At the beginning, he was rather aloof with my daughters. He did harp on them about their manners, but this wasn’t an altogether bad thing….except ten times during dinner would get a tad annoying. I thought it was because his mother was a stickler for manners. Once they got older, he developed a greater interest in what they were doing and eventually this morphed into an overblown control thing where he kept track of how long they were on the phone, how long they were on the internet (kept a spreadsheet of broadband usage), etc. He would lecture them for hours at a time, cornering them when I wasn’t around. Facial expressions of displeasure would cause him to go off the deep end, so usually we all kept our poker faces on.
After the death of his mother, he received an inheritance. There was an added amount for the girls which initially were to be deposited as savings. Then, he had an idea that he would take them on trips with the added money – not just any trip, but an over-the-top trip such as his mother would have done. Given that the money was not earmarked for me specifically, and that his mother would have thought the trips were a great educational tool….plus the fact that I was hoping that he would use the trips to better his relationships with the girls, I did not oppose him and I had no role in planning the trips at all. I wanted by daughters to see these places. I trusted him – I deeply regret that now. I thought N was trying to do something good and encouraged my daughters to give him a chance.
Keep in mind the next few paragraphs describe the “straw that broke the camel’s back”. There were three trips in total – two with my eldest to major cities at one major trip with my youngest – cost wise, they were about equal. Money was no object for any of the trips and the girls could have whatever they wanted. Given the strained relationship with my eldest, the first trip seemed to go okay but towards the end of the trip, N was frustrated at the eldest’s lack of warmth. Mostly, she was trying not to inflame him – he arrived home complaining about how cold she was. I thought it was because she did not show appreciation, i.e. say thank you or something. My birthday was right around the time they got back. There was no present from N to me. I noticed the gift stupidity was a common theme among Ns.
Months later, and many strange events later, the youngest went on her trip with N. It was a group trip, so luckily lots of people around for the most part. Their relationship seemed more strained when they got back.
About the fifth day of the second trip with my oldest daughter, I received an early morning phone call. She was crying – very upset and wanted to come home immediately. She and N were going on a tour. N was already upset with her and went ahead of her to get on a train as it was about to leave. She was trying to put her ticket in the slot, but the doors closed and she was left behind. She said that N looked very angry and looked to be shouting from behind the train doors, but she couldn’t hear him. She decided to go back to the hotel. She was concerned about getting in trouble and wondering if she had made the right decision to go back. I told her that it made sense to go where you know, especially when you are in the middle of a big city that you are not familiar with. She had to go because her phone funds ran out. [This is when I looked down and the front of my shirt was covered in blood…..more on this later]
Her next e-mail described the hellish events when he returned to the hotel, but also that they had managed to come to some understanding and she was okay. One line in the e-mail stood out – she mentioned that she had to sleep on the floor due to N’s snoring. I woke up in the middle of the night and realized that there must be only one bed. I know that sounds stupid and obvious given what my daughter said in the e-mail, it just never dawned on me that the trip was intentionally planned that way. I felt sick. I asked my daughter about this when she got home and that was when she told me that not only was there one double bed on this trip and also the last trip that N took her on.
Later that night, I talked to N about the trip. He asked if I thought it went well – I said he would be in a better position to judge given that he was there. He said that he valued my opinion – the last time he said something like that was over ten years ago. I said that getting a call like that from my daughter was really upsetting and disturbing. He said that was only one incident in 6 days, why was I focusing on that. I asked him about the booking of rooms with one double bed. It was then that I met Mr. Hyde. He appeared to be very jittery at the mention of this and was visibly uncomfortable - his eyes were darting back and forth and he was literally squirming in his seat. He said that he had trouble booking it online. I asked him why he didn’t go to the front desk once he found out there was only one bed or why he didn’t ask for a cot. He said he didn’t think of that.
It was obvious that I had touched a nerve and I realized that things were very wrong – I felt like someone had pushed me into a well. I met with my lawyer and told him what had happened, among other disturbing behaviors. He agreed that this situation was not at all normal. He told me to get the girls and leave as quickly as possible. He told me that N was obsessed with the girls and also that the girls were not telling me everything. I had a conversation with my oldest daughter later that day and asked her if she was telling me everything. She said that she had told me everything – she described some strange things but nothing prepared me for what was to come from my youngest daughter.
After a conversation the next day about how uncomfortable my oldest was on her trips, the youngest broke down and told the oldest about an incident that had happened two years ago in the summer at the family cottage. [This was the day I started to find out what the blood was on my shirt…several doctors appointments, mammograms and biopsies later revealed I had cancer in my left breast – N didn’t ask about this appointment or the outcome]
When I arrived home from work I went upstairs and poked my head in my eldest daughter’s room and the youngest was sitting in her closet. They told me that they needed to talk - we had dinner, and then went for a walk. Crying uncontrollably, my youngest told me two years ago, when she went to the cottage with N that they slept in the same bed and she woke up in the middle of the night to find N’s hand in her underwear. When she woke up and found his hand there, she got out of that bed, and went to sleep in the other room. She said that nothing was said about it afterwards. She told me that she thought at the time that it was something he did to me. (N had done that to me on several occasions in the middle of the night and it woke me up. It made me feel angry and violated and I told him that I did not appreciate being woken up – he never admitted to doing this). About sleeping in the same room, my youngest said something about sleeping in the same bed like she used to do when she was little. I told her that we never did that when she was little – we did not sleep with our daughters.
I told her that I loved her, I believed her and that we would be leaving the next day. We waited until N left for work and took all of our clothes, some other personal effects and the dog and the cat and went to my sisters. I left a note and requested that N refrain from contacting us for the long weekend. He did not contact us.
Spoke on N several days later. He asked why. I told him that I had made a decision to allow him to be able to speak to the girls if they were bothering him but in the past couple of years, this has gotten out of hand. I told him that I could no longer voice an opinion without being told I was interrupting. I then brought up the subject of the trips with the eldest. He said that he spoke with my eldest about only being able to arrange for one bed at both hotels before going on the trips and she agreed that it was fine. She denies this. I then told him what the youngest told me about waking up in the night to find his hand in her underwear. He was lost for words initially and I don’t recall him denying it right away but he certainly remembered the night. He said that it was her idea to sleep in the same bed, kind of like a sleepover. He thought it might not be the best idea, but went along with it anyway. He said that he agreed to the sleepover idea because he was “weak”. He said that it would be strange that there was only one incident. I said I had no way of knowing whether that was strange or not, but once was enough. He asked why she would wait two years to tell me. I said that I didn’t see anything strange about that given the circumstances. He asked why she didn’t scream or call out to someone, but again, I didn’t think that was strange for someone of her age at the time. He said that if this issue was threatening to break apart our family that we had to deal with it together and said that it was serious. I agreed that it was serious. He also said that “if this is her experience of me” then it we should be seeking counseling.
N would later say that I knew in advance about the room situation. I told him that I had no idea about that and if I had known, I certainly wouldn’t have agreed with it. Other discrepancies came up – he then said that he had done some research and that sometimes young girls first identify sexually to their fathers and that I should do some research on that. He then said that there was a thunderstorm and that my youngest was frightened and that’s why she was in the same room. Another version of the story.
N told my oldest that she “would not find another man who will love them as completely as I do.” He had also said the same thing to me, and although I thought it was strange, my mind wasn’t in the gutter then. He also told my oldest that he was jealous of her boyfriend.
I could go on and on - there’s a lot more to the story – I guess there always is when dealing with an N. We’ve endured a police and child services investigation – the girls have suffered immeasurably and have been on antidepressants - I’m still paying a mortgage for a house I don’t live in - I’ve endured a bilateral mastectomy six weeks ago. Cancer seemed secondary and far less painful in comparison. Maybe the good part about not having breasts is that it pretty much guarantees that I will be alone and at least I won’t be hurt like this again – and there won’t be any sick pig trying to go after my daughters. I didn’t realize what I was dealing with all of those years – at first, I began to notice that I could only decide on things that really didn’t matter all that much – like what to have for dinner. Then, ever so gradually, it seemed that my opinions didn’t count and then finally, I didn’t count…I did not matter. And then there were the explosive rages, controlling behavior, superior attitude, invasion of boundaries, obsession with appearances and ….oh yeah, the porn. It’s one thing when an N goes out with the OW, but another thing altogether when he goes after your daughters. It’s so sick and disgusting. It breaks my heart to think that my daughter kept that to herself for two years – what strength it must’ve taken for her to tell me. N told them both that they could break up the family by their actions….this must have been projection….by his actions was the correct way to end that sentence.
The divorce proceedings are underway – there has been one court appearance and another coming up in a few weeks from now. I’ve been NC for the most part for almost eight months. We have exchanged a few e-mails but I’ve kept things very formal. This has been a hellish nightmare – we’ve all gone to therapy, but it doesn’t take the pain away. My youngest is constantly angry but now refuses to continue with therapy. I’ve told her that she can go back at any time but realize that I can’t force her to – that would be counterproductive.
I feel constantly guilty for not having done something sooner, to have been smarter, to have seen through this ruse. I was using the wrong test – I thought that he was intelligent man and surely an intelligent man would see the damage, pain and upset he was causing. I didn’t realize at the time that he truly enjoyed the pain he caused – crying would only make him go in for the kill like a shark and the smell of blood. A cold-blooded predator…people like him should come with warning labels.