'AITA for not caring about my husband enough during his hospital stay, resulting in divorce?'
"AITA for not caring about my husband enough during his hospital stay, resulting in divorce?"
I (36F) have been divorced from my now ex-husband (39M) since February 2022. We got divorced because he left me the day before our 5yr wedding anniversary in February 2021 for a 20yr old he had known for 2 weeks! We are from Michigan, but moved to Arizona in Sept 2017, following a catastrophic car accident March 8, 2017 involving the now ex husband and 2 of my children.
My ex was driving, and our daughter in common who was 7 at the time was instantly paralyzed, and my other daughter she 5 at the time, suffered spinal injuries from neck to rear, as well as contusions from the airbag and ruptured bowels. My ex, suffered critical injuries as well (spinal and rib fractures, broken knee, punctured lung, etc). The accident was NOT his fault, I want to make that clear.
However, both my kids were airlifted to a children’s hospital 8hrs away from our home town within 12 hours of the accident after our 7yr old was placed on life support and underwent emergency spinal fusion to keep her alive, as well as my 5yr old having emergency bowel repair.
I was airlifted with my 5yr old as the helicopter couldn’t accommodate me with my 7yr old in critical condition. My ex also underwent surgery, and was airlifted to the connecting hospital as the kids 14 days later.
I spent most of that time between the girls rooms, and we even had to baptize our 7yr old as she went septic just days after he arrived and they once again told me she was dying. However, I did fly back to see him 7 days prior to his arrival which he does not remember.
When he left me, he kept using the excuse that I didn’t care enough about him when the accident happened, And even his mother has made comments. But would I have tried to explain to him is that I had two children who I birthed one of which was potentially dying and underwent 13 surgeries in seven weeks and spent 100 days in the hospital.
Trying to divide your time as one person between two critically and your children and your husband granted at the hospital was not easy and the first night when I was all alone I had to go to the psych ER because I wanted to ------- myself. He says I wasn’t in the accident and that my feelings were not valid. And that I didn’t care enough about him. All of this he says, led to his cheating and leaving me!
I am the full-time caregiver for our daughter who is now a quadriplegic and paralyzed from the chest down. I also have 4 other children (another in common with him who is now 8, the now 12yr old who was in the accident, and a 19 and 17yr old from all 3 from another relationship).
We spent 100 days in the hospital with our now 14-year-old, she was in pediatric intensive care for 50 days of which 30 were on life support and then another 50 on the rehab unit. We then went home for three weeks and moved to Arizona where the healthcare and weather was better to accommodate our child now in a wheelchair.
He is mad that my now 12-year-old who is not his biological child received more money from the accident than he did and still complains this day about that, I just didn’t care about him when it happened.
When we moved here, he lied about a whole job, bought fake security clothes and, for nearly a year, I thought he was working a job that didn’t even exist. In reality, he was gambling my money and going to strip clubs. Then in 2021 he finally left for good after he went to work and sent me a text, Blaming me for everything.
I figured out who his new girlfriend was, I found her baby daddy and slept with him as payback because she was obsessed with him. His coworkers also reached out to me and I slept with them too.
I don’t feel good about it now, but in the moment, it pissed him off and I wanted him to feel the way that I did. Everyone thinks I’m the ah0le for that. But. I think they all deserved it and he is the a#ole for doing what he did and continuing to abandon his children, even the one he made with his girlfriend that he left me for.
They had a baby nine days before our divorce was final and then got married 30 days later, but ended up divorced six months after that he does not talk to any of his children. Am I really the ah0le?
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's post:
scotswaehey
My god what is his malfunction!. As a father of two I would be more concerned from my hospital bed about my children being critically ill and glad my wife was there with them than getting annoyed my wife didn’t visit me. I am sorry he did that to you, but you definitely deserve a better person in your life.
Emotional_Assist5510 OP responded:
The nurses, my girls had absolutely hated him. As a matter of fact. Five days ago, was the seven year anniversary of me having to tell our seven-year-old daughter that she would never walk again. Which was the absolute worst moment of my life, she screamed and cried and scratched her legs, begging to feel something.
The next day when I was getting food for her, I was told they overheard him complaining about his legs and he said to our daughter “at least you can’t feel yours” they wanted to hurt him. I’m just sad that I lowered myself to a degrading level to piss someone off that I have less respect for than dirt.
scotswaehey
He is an utter scumbag!. People like him do not deserve happiness and you can bet at the end of his life everything bad will have been someone else’s fault he’s that selfish. Please don’t feel sad for what you did, Hurt turns to pain then the Pain to Anger and that’s an understandable thought process. Life can be so cruel and unfair 😢
Emotional_Assist5510 OP responded:
Thank you! Again, I don’t condone what I did. It didn’t help anything, but in that split second it made me feel like I had the power and I hope he dies lonely. his children don’t even like him.
He does nothing for them and that’s OK because they have me I even buy gifts for the two other children he has that are not mine because they deserve love from their siblings and they are family.
Violet0825
I think he used that as his excuse to leave you and his family. Anyone with a working brain would know you needed to be there for the kids. A loving father would have insisted you go and be with the kids.
Also, about your sexual behavior. It sounds like you were hurting and dealing with a ton of stress and grief and did what you did partly out of anger mixed with frustration, resentment, grief and hurt. Don’t beat yourself up. You learn from it and keep going forward. You sound like a loving mama to your babies.
[deleted]
Of course you aren’t! I’m sorry for everything.
Emotional_Assist5510 OP responded:
💚 thank you. I’m not looking for sympathy or approval of my actions after he left, but when he and his family continue to act like I was an asshole while he was hospitalized justifying his actions and again, only focusing on my reaction when he left, really gets to me from time to time and I feel like I deserve all the bad.
That last paragraph is totally ridiculous. I had a degree of sympathy for her before then (though I was confused who all the kids were). The adults deserve what's happened to them; but I feel sorry for the kids.
Emotional_Assist5510 OP responded:
How did I deserve what he did to me!? I was not and have never been “the other woman”. I was faithful to a fault, made excuses for behavior my parents pointed out as suspicious and supported his ass. He made me want to end my life a second time when he took off, and my response was not great. But, I certainly did not deserve what happened to first and foremost my children and myself.