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Why I Left My Beta Husband
MSN Lifestyle ^ | August 2007 | Amy Brayfield

Posted on 08/29/2007 2:18:39 AM PDT by Caipirabob

A few years ago, my husband, Mark, and I were at one of those hip downtown restaurants sipping mojitos and nibbling on lime-spiked seviche when one of my bosses appeared from a cloud of Cuban-cigar smoke and patted my shoulder. When I introduced him to Mark, he naturally asked what he did for a living. We both froze.

"I do some freelancing," Mark said.

"He studied film at NYU," I said at the same time.

Mark looked at me and shrugged. "I stay home with our daughter," he said, as my colleague quietly balked.

"He makes it possible for me to do my job," I said, laughing. But inside, I was mortified. Technically, I had it all back then, including a gorgeous toddler and a cool job.

What I didn't have was a husband I felt proud of.

(Excerpt) Read more at lifestyle.msn.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Miscellaneous; Philosophy; Unclassified
KEYWORDS: divorce; feminism; marriage; narcissism; narcissist; relationships
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To: Caipirabob
In retrospect, I realized I had this preconceived idea of what a sexy, attractive man should be like. I imagined being married to, well, someone like me. Someone whose job sounds interesting to other people. Someone who walks out the door with a pressed shirt on, a leather briefcase, and a confident gait. Someone who wins bread. Does that make me a sexist? "I always felt embarrassed and guilty—you had all these ambitions for me that I felt like I wasn't living up to," Mark said to me after our divorce.

Her fantasy list is clearly missing one thing. It especially stands out as it is the top of my list: a man with a solid relationship with God and a value system that stems from that relationship. Where girlfriend is God in your life, your ideals, and your relationships?

So nobody was more surprised than I was when I went ahead and fell for another stay-at-home dad.

Another major question? Well if he was a stay at home dad when you met him, who pray tell was paying for this man and his child to live? The guberment? His ex-wife? His present wife he was separated from? Was he independently wealthy? If so, that is all that made him different from husband one is that he had money and didn't feel any pressure to prove himself that way. That money is probably what warmed up the sheets. I hate to think this man's ex-wife was paying his paycheck. Now that would be a real icer for me. The women is clearly attracted to men to be there for her. Own it lady. She doesn't take the time to explore HER motives and what compels her to these sort of men. It is all about her and serving her needs and how she feels. What does the child take from all of this?

Here's the difference, though: Jason knows what he wants—and it's not a corner office. He wants to have his afternoons free to hit the park with my daughter or paint or translate the writings of Pablo Neruda. There's nothing thwarted or self-pitying about him. When we're cooking dinner together on Friday nights in a kitchen fragrant with curry, or trying to drink coffee in bed on Sunday mornings while my daughter dances around us, I'm so attracted to him that it's all I can do not to rip his clothes off then and there.

I'm telling you she either found someone who is independently wealthy through family money or he is living off a paycheck from his ex-wife for taking care of the child. My guess is the former. She couldn't stand a man who was more into his work then her. So in the end it is all about sex? Hope for her sake that doesn't wear off. Then it will be on to husband numero three.

21 posted on 08/29/2007 2:48:18 AM PDT by GOP Poet
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To: Caipirabob

Ping for later read. What a pretentious bitch. People like this make me glad I live in the woods.


22 posted on 08/29/2007 2:51:33 AM PDT by Past Your Eyes (Criticize me if you will but just don't circumcise me any more.)
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To: Izzy Dunne

good catch. Girl couldn’t quite take personal responsibility and make changes herself. Throw him away. Next!! Repeat . . . repeat . . . repeat.


23 posted on 08/29/2007 2:51:57 AM PDT by GOP Poet
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To: Razz Barry
BTTT for later.
24 posted on 08/29/2007 2:52:19 AM PDT by Razz Barry (Round'em up, send'em home.)
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To: CitizenUSA

“At its core, I believe feminism is a rebellion against the ultimate male authority figure, God. The feminists refuse to submit to anyone. They are their own masters, beholden to no one. That is not a path to spiritual success (or a happy marriage).”

You are spot on.


25 posted on 08/29/2007 2:52:55 AM PDT by cowtowney
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To: wildwood; Caipirabob

Hard to relate as I have been married happily to the same woman for 27 years but I couldn’t help thinking that if this were a guy talking about dumping his wife for a slightly better version of the same thing, the feminists would be all over him. I just get very tired of the glaring double standards.

As Dr. Johnson said about marrying a second time, “It is hope triumphing over experience.’


26 posted on 08/29/2007 2:53:03 AM PDT by Roy Tucker ("You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality"--Ayn Rand)
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To: Caipirabob

I blame the mojitos!


27 posted on 08/29/2007 2:54:24 AM PDT by durasell (!)
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To: Graymatter

She doesn’t realize her major malfunction is she’s exceedingly shallow and self-centered.


28 posted on 08/29/2007 2:56:29 AM PDT by visualops (artlife.us)
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Comment #29 Removed by Moderator

To: visualops

I don’t see anything wrong with her. She’s living the life she wants to live and isn’t bothering anyone.


30 posted on 08/29/2007 3:00:32 AM PDT by durasell (!)
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To: just mimi

” While the real father of this little girl misses out on this and the little girl misses out on her daddy. A failing relationship is one thing, but this articles makes it completely another. “

Let’s see — a daddy who ‘can’t find a job’ and a mommy who’s so self-absorbed that she can’t crawl out of her own navel.... What we have here is a little girl who has learned completely wrong life-lessons from the cradle: “The highest moral rule is ‘I want’”......


31 posted on 08/29/2007 3:01:30 AM PDT by Uncle Ike (We has met the enemy, and he is us........)
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To: sure_fine

No, it’s a redundancy.

We went over this already. Get with it! ;^p


32 posted on 08/29/2007 3:02:50 AM PDT by ovrtaxt (Sworn to oppose control freaks, foreign and domestic.)
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To: Graymatter
You know this is a good point. When she said she fell for another stay at home dad, I thought she meant this literally that this man also had a child he was staying at home with.

But this is even worse. Because it skips over the untold truth. She met a man that did not have a job and/or did not have a job of any personal interest. He quit his job (if he had one) fairly quickly after they got together (another very bad sign) to babysit her kid, because he saw an overall free ride. And this is turn on central? The woman is a mess. It sounds like she just wants someone to be a nanny and nursemaid to her.

She is a user. She is being used and allowing it. This is signature feminist thinking. Loser central . . . come to mama! They call this freedom and independence? Ha! Poor daughter. Her mom probably telegraphs that her real Dad is a loser and that this loser is the full moon in a dark night.

33 posted on 08/29/2007 3:04:32 AM PDT by GOP Poet
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To: Caipirabob
Career oriented, goal driven and fierce competitors in the corporate world. And Alone

Vital topic, nothing is more responsible for our collective misery, nothing sells more prozac.

Here's my 2c:

Women are sexually attracted to worldly success in men. Other things play a role, of course, but that is one of the fundamentals.

Men, on the other hand, are indifferent to worldly success in women. We don't fear it, we don't hate it - we just don't care about it.

Many high-end successful women expect that men will be attracted to their success in the same way they are attracted to successful men.

Alas, it's not so. Successful men can choose partners from essentially all available women, while successful women rule out all but 1% of men.

The resulting imbalance makes our successful women bitterly unhappy, and, given their verbal and manipulative skills, their unhappiness is being very effectively spread around.

34 posted on 08/29/2007 3:04:42 AM PDT by Jim Noble (Trails of troubles, roads of battle, paths of victory we shall walk.)
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To: Caipirabob

I would gratefully hold down two or three minimum wage slop jobs before I would spend a single day with a toddler at home.


35 posted on 08/29/2007 3:05:57 AM PDT by Thrownatbirth (.....when the sidewalks are safe for the little guy.)
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To: Caipirabob

What possible reason could she have for spewing intimate personal info about her ex into an article that’s notable only for its vacuity? Oh, yes, she has to pronounce to the world how superior she is to her ex, the ultimate post-divorce revenge motive....... fwiw, her ex sounds like a real putz and so does she.


36 posted on 08/29/2007 3:06:10 AM PDT by Enchante (Reid and Pelosi Defeatocrats: Surrender Now - Peace for Our Time!!)
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To: Izzy Dunne; Caipirabob
Ah...there is the rub. The answer is yes, he had to make the offer to an alternative. Kinda like when my mom told dad she was going back to work. Dad didn’t tell her to go back to work, she had to offer the alternative. If he wanted something different then he needed to communicate that need and take the responsibility to initiate the change in the relationship.

Men are usually(note I said usually), embarrassed if they don’t make as much of themselves as their wives. My ex-husband was always struggling to keep up with me and I never took him to any company functions lest I’d have to explain his work status. In my case, I put him through college, let him leave home for 10+ weeks to try a new career thousands of miles away, and he still wouldn’t/couldn’t(?) be happy with himself or his life. He didn’t seem to have what it takes to succeed. His perpetual unhappiness led him to the road of cheating with women of a “lesser class” ahem...

Yes, that was the final straw after 14 years of his nonsense.

How are things today? Good question. You are correct that feminism has created a whole set of lonely women. I have been divorced 11 years now and have only had a handful of real dates. I have found those men to be so emasculated that they are a turn-off and they have found me to be too brazen, harsh, and independent.

37 posted on 08/29/2007 3:06:48 AM PDT by EBH
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To: durasell
I don’t see anything wrong with her. She’s living the life she wants to live and isn’t bothering anyone.

What do you mean? She is bothering me! LOL.

38 posted on 08/29/2007 3:06:55 AM PDT by GOP Poet
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To: GOP Poet

She’d be so much less annoying if she took a job answering phones at a small insurance agency while married to a guy who worked in the pipe and fittings department of Home Depot.


39 posted on 08/29/2007 3:11:52 AM PDT by durasell (!)
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To: Caipirabob

How long has marriage #2 lasted?


40 posted on 08/29/2007 3:19:45 AM PDT by ican'tbelieveit ((Join FreeRepublic's Folding@Home team (Team# 36120), KW:Folding))
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