What happened next

Surprisingly, after all the drama of Christmas Eve, the children and I had a great Christmas. I finally had to fess up to my parents about...everything. They knew we argued now and again, but they had no idea that he'd cheated on me or that he was so cruel towards me. They were incredibly supportive and the day went well.  I hadn't pressed charges because I wanted him to see the kids on Christmas, but he did not take me up on the offer.  It wasn't until about a week later that I found out why.  

Sometime between Christmas and New Years, the baby got sicker.  The pediatrician wanted to hospitalize him, but I needed someone to get the girls. I called my husband and asked him to get the kids so I could take Austin to the hospital.  He had told me he was "hunting," and couldn't get them. Our baby was sick! What did he mean he couldn't get the kids??  He screamed through the phone that "this was the life [I] chose, and to figure it out (add in a few cuss words)."  The staff at the doctors office could hear every word, he was so loud.  

We ended up not going to the hospital, my in-laws later got the girls for the night in case the baby got worse, and the baby was on close watch.  My husband, who I thought was hunting...was really on a little trip in Washington DC with his girlfriend. Yep...the same one.

About a week after New Years, I got a phone call as I was feeding the children dinner.  I knew...the second I saw "blocked call" on the caller ID...I knew.  She told me her name, and told me that she had been with my husband for the past two years.  The reason she was calling NOW was because he had just told her about Austin.  His son, who was almost 7 months old, had been kept a secret...and she was mad.  So, she wasn't telling me about their relationship to help ME, she was telling me to hurt HIM.  

At that point, the police restraint was over and he was headed home.  She told me as much as she could in 15 minutes, and when he got home, I pushed him right back out. I regret that my kids saw that. But, they did. And I dare anyone to tell me how to handle that situation any better. I had been through enough.  

Over the next three days, she spilled the entire contents of their relationship...like we were friends.  And I let her. I sat there and listened to her talk as if it weren't my husband she was talking about.  And I thank God for every second of patience I showed that woman, because she gave me information I would later need.  I sat in a Target parking lot, nursing my son, listening to her describe the love he showered her with. It was excruciating.  I found out they had taken numerous trips together, that they'd even been to Disney World.  (He's never taken me anywhere...not even a honeymoon...and our kids have never been to Disney).  They went on ski trips, weekday and weekend trips, you name it. All the time I thought he was traveling for work.  And every Saturday night when he was "coyote hunting?" He was with her. And every night after work when he was "working late," he was with her.  At one point we sat down with calendars and could correspond the days they were fighting with the days he was trying harder to be nice to me. 

He had her in my home, in my bed. That vacation I posted with the beach pictures? During that trip, she was in my home, and she recalled no evidence of our son. He had hidden all the pictures, baby toys, and equipment and locked it in his room. 

She had been in my home while my children were asleep upstairs. There were no boundaries to his selfishness, his needs, his wants. He tortured me for years...not wanting me to leave but treating me like dirt, all the while he was with her on the side. He'd go from our therapy sessions, to sessions with her and her counselor. There were no limits to his deceit, his betrayal.  I have no idea how much money he spent, or where he got it, but God knows he spent a fortune.  

As painful as it was to learn all these things (and this is just the beginning), I will be forever grateful that she had the nerve to call me, even if she was being self-serving.  My fears, my doubts, my suspicions were all true. I wasn't crazy. I DID hear him talking on the phone with someone in the middle of the night. I DID catch him lying. MY INSTINCT WAS RIGHT.  

I also learned, I'm not dealing with a typical, "normal" man who's made a mistake. I'm married to a narcissist. He is incapable of feeling empathy, he is incapable of genuinely loving anyone. He loves things, he loves power and control. He will never truly be happy. It took a lot of therapy for me to begin to understand that.  All the "how could he's?" and "whys?" were eating me alive, and finally my therapist just said...you will never understand because its not who you are. He will always be this way. Narcissists can not be cured. They are their own worst enemy. 

And divorcing a narcissist...is pure hell.