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Moving to the edge of sanity4/15/2023 I worked the night shift in Ohio, not because I wanted to, but because I sacrificed my health and potential career advancement so Thetis (female) could get her promotions. I know her family thought I was lazy and argumentative, and she did nothing to change their opinion of me. I was certainly short tempered and tired a lot, three to six hours of sleep a day will do that to you. If I managed to work a regular shift (10pm – 6am) I would get home in time for Harmonia (female) to be awake.
So, mornings were taking care of her. If I was lucky, I’d get to sleep around 2pm, Harmonia might or might not have a babysitter by that time. We helped to put a roof over Entorpes’ (female) (and her baby’s) head, and probably paid most of her bills, but God forbid Entorpe take a few hours out of her busy day (doing nothing) to watch her little sister. I asked her one time and she acted offended even being asked. We won’t get into the fact that Thetis was usually gone before 6 and, when I was working my regular shift, I didn’t get home until nearly 7. There was no reason for Thetis to leave before 6, being a manager, her schedule usually started a little later (closer to 8 or 9) but well, Harmonia did just fine on her own, right? I mean, she was 5 after all. Ask me again why I started leaving my shift around 4:30am in order to be home sooner? Is it any surprise that after three years of this that I’d had enough? I was barely hanging onto my sanity, and my physical health wasn’t the best (having gained over fifty pounds on Thetis’ family meals of McDonalds every night). It got to the point in 2002 when I couldn’t even do my own job. Thetis would disappear for twelve to fifteen hours a day. She claimed she was at work, but for all I know she was having an affair. After all, she did get married to hubby number four just two weeks after our divorce was final, and there was another guy who wrote her a lot of emails during the last year we were married. Let’s talk about hubby number four, first. When I met Thetis online in February 1994, she was single and being pursued by a psycho ex-boyfriend by the name of Tarro (male). Thetis maintained our early contact through online chat, email and phone calls. I remember that Taygete (female, Thetis' eldest daughter) was living in the same house as Tarro, or close to him? I don’t remember specifically, and for some reason I didn’t consider that a bit strange at the time. What I do remember is Thetis telling me that Tarro lost it when he found out about me and Thetis’ relationship. I wonder why? Was he just obsessed, were they dating, was he just another sugar daddy for her? I’m guessing it was the latter since she typically met and married for money after all. Anyways, he freaked out and was being threatening, I think at one point I had even called the city police in Ohio, from my apartment in Ontario, Canada, to respond to the place. The memory of that whole night is so blurry, because I’d been told by her that he was in the past, so that’s where this memory is buried as well. I think the end result was the police did show up, and soon after they found a way for Taygete (female) to move out. My impression was that Thetis’ relationship with Tarro was over. So, it came as news to me when, in the last year of our marriage, he made a reappearance in her life. He had been such a psycho ex- that she ended up marrying him. I’m sure his six-figure income had nothing to do with it though. I’d left her with a debt (around $5,000 for renovations spent on her house - including $3,000 spent on new windows that probably raised the property value by $10,000) but it was hard to make regular payments on that and pay the hydro, two car insurances, household costs and my credit card debt. Oh, did I mention I was also having her tax arrears garnished from my paycheque, debts that she and her ex owed not me, again, to help her career (or image) or so she said. Thetis was responsible for 3 expenses – the mortgage, groceries (which ended up being McDonalds for over 2 years) and our daughters’ expenses (all of her children were over 18 and in relationships of their own). So, I didn’t make the big bucks, and with my failing attendance I lost my full-time status. My sacrifices had her in the position to earn $3,000 in take-home pay each month. It came as a shock then, when, just a few months into our mortgage they were ready to foreclose for non-payment (of $1,000 per month mortgage). Yes, even though she cleared three times that every month she somehow didn’t have the money to pay the single most important bill she had (the house that my 401-K helped her buy). It wasn’t the first time she put us in financial jeopardy. How about the fact that when we first met, she was making over $50,000 per year, and yet was in tax arrears. That job didn’t help her though, she ended up getting fired from it a few months into our relationship for fraud. We met on a paid online service and to continue talking she had been giving me online credits. Romantic eh, well the thing about that was they audited her access ID and discovered the financial discrepancies. I never asked her to do this, she had done it entirely of her own accord. We were married, so as a spouse I was ready to accept her baggage, I even agreed to have my pay garnisheed to pay her back taxes for over a year. It amounted to several thousand dollars, and even though I did it only so a lien wouldn’t appear on her paycheque she contributed nothing to help cover that debt (of hers). Let’s talk about the third place we lived in – the Bane. The townhouse complex was clean and conveniently located to both our workplaces. I had to apply for the rental because Thetis has already burned her rating from a couple past issues with her most recent landlord – or should I say her daughters’ recent issues and the hundreds of dollars in damage they did to their ranch house rental. The rent was reasonable, if you pay your rent on time, but of course Thetis didn’t. The property management already hated us because I flew an American flag out front (yup, the management company wanted to say something about it but they couldn’t), and we had Thetis’ dirty little dogs causing problems so we already had two strikes against us. One time Thetis was late on the rent, and didn’t bother to pay the late fees. Management was just looking for an excuse to evict us (and over a dozen other tenants as they wanted to hike the rental rates but couldn’t because of rent control). I found out later that management had sent out a statement letter every month about the arrears for almost a year. When she was late, in time for the great tenant purge, this gave them the perfect excuse to file an eviction notice. We had to appear in court or be evicted within three days. We had just paid the rent, but management took us to court. It was that cheque, and not the fact that Thetis actually had the money enough to cover rent, the arrears (and court costs) that saved us from the embarrassment of an escort out of our home by the sheriffs’ department. We (or should I say me because my name was first on the lease) stood before the ‘judge’ and in conversation it came up that the management company was holding onto our recent rent payment. The judge looked at the lawyer for the management company and asked if he wanted to delay the proceedings while we talked. It turned out that holding the cheque, instead of returning it, was the same as accepting payment (and our accumulated arrears of late fees) until the end of the applicable month. Thetis agreed to pay the rent for the month ($850 I think it was), the arrears (less than $1,000 I might add), and the court costs (somewhere around $500) that her negligence had resulted in. In exchange we got to stay for a couple weeks until the end of the month. After that we moved to the Woods. We moved to Barnard in late 2001, she overpaid almost $14k for the house, not a bad investment though (which we almost subsequently lost a few months later). The computer says that it’s worth $279,000 now, I guess all that sleeping around might pay off for her in the end. She wouldn't have gotten the house at all were it not for my 401K going toward the downpayment, I should have taken the equity of the house in our divorce but I just wanted to get the hell away from her. Was I wrong then to ask for a divorce on November 8, 2002 "because my soul was dying"? I don't think so, and even the AI agrees with me. And this entry didn't come close to digging into the nearly nine years I served living with Thetis in Ohio. Is it any wonder why I didn't trust a woman (to enter into a relationship with) for over five years after? Not even f*ing close! According to ChatGPT, the "narrator" of the above story made the right decision by filing for divorce: "The narrator seems to have gone through a lot of stress and difficulties in his marriage. He sacrificed his health and career to support his wife's job and to take care of their daughter, and he was often left alone to handle everything while his wife was away. He also faced financial struggles, with his wife not contributing enough to pay their bills and instead spending money on fast food. He even had to pay her debts, which were not his responsibility. Considering all of these issues, it seems that the narrator made the right decision to get a divorce. The marriage was clearly causing him a lot of stress and negatively impacting his health and career. It also appears that his wife was not contributing to the marriage in a way that was fair or helpful, and may have even been involved in infidelity. Overall, it seems that the narrator made a difficult but necessary choice in getting a divorce, and it was likely the best decision for his own well-being and happiness."
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