The League of Evil Exes

(No, I didn't die or get sucked into a vortex.... I GOT ENGAGED!!  I also got a job where writing is 83.5% of my day, so it's like a chef that doesn't quite feel like cooking gourmet meals for herself at home.  But, more about that later.....I hope.)

I had a rather awkward experience at my daughter's basketball game today.  I was sitting on the bleachers with my fiance, minding our own business, when in walks my ex-husband with his baby momma and proceeds to walk all the way down to where we were sitting.  Then around half time, in walks his ex (let's call her First Ex), with whom he cheated on with and had a baby with Baby Momma, and she too proceeds to come all the way down to the end of the bleachers and sit right next to me.  She was the first relationship he had right after our divorce and they dated for a few years, so she is very close to my children (thus why she was even at the game).  She and I are friendly towards each other; our daughters are about the same age and are sisterly toward each other, and I'm not the one to unnecessarily burn bridges, so I guess you could say we are cool.  Baby Momma, on the other hand, HATES this particular ex, and pretty much hates me because she felt like I was taking her and my ex-husband's "side" when they were going through all their back and forth issues.  Um, I had nothing to do with any of that, despite the fact that Baby Momma tried to drag me into it against my will.

So here I am, wedged between First Ex and Ex-Husband and Baby Momma.  Aw-kw-ard.  And of course I'm talking to First Ex, because like I said, we are cool, and she's sitting right next to me.  But understanding human nature, I know she still had some bitterness leftover toward the Baby Momma situation, and by her sitting there being friendly with me, I know that also probably brought up some negativity in Baby Momma since she accused me (and my then 12 year old child) of taking sides against her.  Not that I allowed it to change my behavior-- after all, I am happily engaged to the man who I believe I was supposed to be spending my life with-- but I started to get a very pawn-like feeling as I sat there and watched my now almost 15 year old play basketball.

 I don't to be a part of The League of Evil Exes

One of my most favorite movies is Scott Pilgrim vs. The World.  If you haven't seen this fantastically odd piece of movie goodness (which I have seen at least 100 times), basically it's about a guy who has to fight and defeat, video game style, his girlfriend's Seven Evil Exes in order to have a relationship with her.  The seven exes have formed a "league" that has agreed to fight Scott.   As art often imitates life, I have seen time and time again where the exes of a guy will later become friends, whether or not its for the purpose of engaging in "He ain't shit!" sessions or just because they have something in common.  Either way, that's just not my style. Not only do I not want to be out here fighting my ex-husband's current girlfriend, I also have zero desire to form my own League of Evil Exes.

Over the past 6 years, I've been friendly toward my ex-husband's girlfriends, just because there's really no reason not to be, but I was never interested in becoming BFFs with them when they broke up and/or get together to talk shit about him.  Baby Momma tried that with me when she broke up with my ex-husband the first (second?) time, and I wasn't having it.  There is no need for us to become close friends premised solely on the fact that we used to date the same person and now realize the error of our ways.  First Ex and I have more in common than just my ex-husband both professionally and personally, so I don't have a problem being social with her, but we never talk about him.  Now, his most recent girlfriend (whom he kicked out of his house around the holidays and then promptly got back with Baby Momma), we really have nothing in common.  Again, we were cordial toward each other, but there is really no reason for me to be friends with her after the fact.

I really hope I was reading more into that situation today than what it was, because I don't like feeling like a pawn in the game of emotional chess.  But whether it was intentional or not, that's how I felt.  Other women may bond with their ex's exes, but personally I want no part of the League of Evil Exes.

We can't be friends

Well, I tried. Tried being the bigger person, tried to be friendly, tried to make the adjustment to this newest Adventure in Divorce as easy as possible, but it ended up blowing up in my face. I made the grave mistake of attempting to be friendly to Baby Momma #2.

A few weeks ago I read a blog post about how befriending your ex’s new woman and/or ex is a really bad idea. I admit the post had some very valid points which I filed away in my mental filing cabinet. However, also stored in my mental filing cabinet were points made on one of my favorite divorce/blended family websites, Today’s Modern Family, where the ladies have talked about how being friendly toward your ex’s new mate is an ideal situation for the children because there is less tension and animosity that they have to deal with. Being the sucker nice person I am, I opted for the second route while still being mindful of the pitfalls of the first.

At the time it seemed like The Ex was trying to make a go at having a relationship with Baby Momma #2 (hereinafter BM 2.0). She was always around, there were Master Lab photos of them with Lil Meech on Facebook, and for all intents and purposes they looked like a couple and it seemed she was not going anywhere any time soon. So when she would come to Son’s football games with Lil Meech I would say hi, come over and play with the baby, and even sit with her when The Ex ditched her to go watch the game with the other football parents (because I hated when he used to do that to me). We never really talked much, just basic chit chat pleasantries. I mainly just didn’t want Mini-Me to have to run from one end of the stands to the other in order to spend time with me and her baby brother, and admittedly I wanted to play with the baby. I even bought Lil Meech a handmade bear hat, partly as a peace offering and partly to support my friend’s business, Issaino (she makes great custom handmade crochet items), and partly because I believe every baby should have one of those bear hats.

It was actually the bear hat that kicked off my descent into the mouth of madness. I was at a football game and BM 2.0 wanted to share a picture of Lil Meech in the bear hat with me, so I gave her my number so she could send it via picture mail. No big deal. I had no intentions of every calling her or otherwise hearing from her. (Mistake #1) Then I few weeks later I get a text from her out of the blue with her asking if she could send me a friend request on Facebook, which I was a wee bit wary of but because of my stance on Facebook I figured it couldn’t hurt. The texts then lead to a conversation where she is telling me all about how badly his ex-girlfriend (the one she ousted) talks about her and the baby, and then about how the ex-girlfriend has talked badly about me, and so on and so forth. I didn’t really give much by way of info and kept my responses pretty basic, but I should have never entertained that conversation in the first place. (Mistake #2)

It is well known that all good things must come to an end, and all bad things come to an end even sooner. Long story short, she and The Ex get into it, something to do with him talking to and supposedly getting back with his ousted ex-girlfriend, BM 2.0 getting stuck here in town after her car got wrecked and staying with The Ex, and a whole lot of other dramatic antics that I had to hear about from Mini-Me and my own dad (yea, don’t ask). I then started noticing a form of female “reindeer games” on Facebook that I have termed “pissing on people’s pages” similar to how animals mark their territory. She would comment on pictures I had of the kids and Lil Meech with how much of a daddy’s boy he was and how his daddy loves him, then would tag Mini-Me on pictures of the baby and The Ex talking about how much she loved the two of them, then left comments on Mini-Me’s page and The Ex’s mother’s page about us seeing the baby, even mentioning that I had come over to visit (I was picking up Mini-Me and stopped in for 15 minutes, 10 of which was spent trying to console Mini-Me because BM 2.0 and The Ex had been fighting). The tactic was so transparent: she was obviously trying to get to the ex-girlfriend via her friends, i.e. my daughter and The Ex’s mother.*

(*For those not well versed in how Facebook works, when a person is tagged in a photo it shows up in their friends’ news feeds, even if they are not friends with the person who posted the photo. So, using the situation above, BM 2.0 takes a photo of Lil Meech and The Ex sleeping and notes in the caption that it’s 10am on a Wednesday and tags Mini-Me in said photo, even though she is nowhere in sight. The photo shows up in Mini-Me’s friends’ timelines (which includes the ex-girlfriend) and when viewed conveys a myriad of information: 1) BM 2.0 is in town, at The Ex’s place during the week when she should be at home in the next state; 2) How much she just LOVES the both of them and how much she LOVES taking care of them; and 3) A reminder slap in the face that he has a new baby with another woman in the first place. A similar marking of territory occurs with wall posts. Yes, Facebook was designed by the devil’s mistress.)

I was starting to get a bit annoyed by the use of my daughter’s Facebook account as a means of throwing jabs at the ex-girlfriend, but I figured I would just monitor the situation and say something to The Ex if necessary. But then BM 2.0 crossed all the way over the line, set up camp and posted a flag in my shit. First I get a text asking if my mother could get BM 2.0 a ticket to go to The Ex’s grandmother’s funeral….not from The Ex, but from BM 2.0 herself (I’m almost positive that The Ex had NO intention of her going). I called my mother to ask her about it and that’s when I got the earful about the insane events between BM 2.0 and The Ex that week that had Mini-Me so upset. Then the next day I get a text from her telling me things between her and The Ex were over and that he was going back to the ex-girlfriend, and I responded by wishing her the best and conveyed Mini-Me’s concerns about seeing her baby brother. That’s when things started getting messy and ugly. She starts telling me about all these “secrets” about our marriage and divorce that The Ex supposedly told her in confidence, the coup de grace being that he had slept with my (former) BFF of 10 years in high school and he had never told ANYONE about it. She acted as if she was doing me a favor by sharing all this info with me, but she did not appreciate how truly reckless and hurtful these lies were because she did not know the whole history of that situation, but needless to say I was LIVID. It ripped open some old wounds from my marriage that I had already healed over and I had done my best to forget about. I lost it (textually…. at work I was outwardly calm) and ended up in a triangular text battle with her and The Ex all morning, basically telling them to leave me the fuck alone and out of their mess. I did not know who was lying or who was telling the truth so I was just mad at everyone (kind of like how your mom gave you and all your siblings a whooping when nobody would fess up). All I knew was that I was fed up and angry at being used as a pawn, angry that my children had to be subject to the stress of their fighting and not knowing if or when they would see their brother again, and angry over getting dragged into their mess, a mess that The Ex created with his utter carelessness and inability to manage his own life.

After I had calmed down, I realized that this woman was just using me as a pawn because she was mad at The Ex and wanted me to be mad at him, too. She wanted an ally, someone who hated him just as much as she did (at that moment in time). Because it was Shark Week (i.e. PMS time) I let my emotions get the best of me and let myself get dragged into it. (Mistake #3) I later got some info from the kids that let me know I needed to stay far, far away from The Ex’s mess with this woman. After that I took her and her daughter off my Facebook friend list so that I could go back my arm’s length dealings with her, civil and cordial but that is it. I got a text from her after that about taking her off my friends’ list and her accusing me of never being on her “side” to which I had to respond that this was never about sides and I was not friendly toward her just to be able to engage in ex bashing sessions, that it was always about the kids. I have not heard from her since.

I am really not sure what to take away from all this besides reinforcement of the notion of being more cautious of people. I am a person who tries not to involve innocent people (and especially innocent children) in my problems and use them as pawns, so I sometimes take for granted that others are not so considerate and often have agendas that are not in my best interest, even when the agenda really has nothing to do with me. I was really trying to be a decent Baby Momma #1 ex-wife, not one of those nightmare exes that people talk shit about, but rather one that has moved on with her life and does not feel the need to reach back and make people’s lives hell. I tried being nice, tried being supportive, tried to not be a hindrance to a relationship between my kids and their baby brother and it came back to bite me in the arse.  I feel like she took advantage of my kindness and attempted to use it as leverage against The Ex. I am not one to be used, and I certainly will not allow my children to be used. *momma bear roar*

I really hope BM 2.0 can work something out with The Ex so that he and the kids can have a relationship with Lil Meech, but based on what I have heard and experienced in these past few days, unfortunately I am not very hopeful that she will be mature enough to put her differences aside and put the kids’ interests first (after all, she left her other kids behind in the next state to chase after a man who obviously does not want her). I told her I hope we can be civil and cordial and that Lil Meech is always welcome to visit his sister and brother while with me, but that I had to protect my emotional well being by distancing myself from her and her drama with The Ex. Ultimately, I have to accept that facilitating a relationship between the kids is not my responsibility. I cannot control the actions of two adults who cannot sort things out between themselves. We can be civil, but obviously we can’t be friends.

"I play my (fr)enemies like a game of chess....."

Frenemy.

1. A person who does not treat a friend as friend but more like a enemy.
2. A "friend" who really doesn't like you, nor you like she, yet you are drawn together by some sick dramatic bond.
3. An enemy disguised as a friend.

"What do you think about frenemies?"
"I say, keep your friends close, and your frenemies closer"

During the course of my separation and divorce, I've discovered that many of my so-called friends are not friends at all, but rather frenemies. These are the individuals who are often the most concerned, the most sympathetic, the most willing to be that shoulder to cry on. In reality, though, they are using your pain and turmoil for their own sick amusement, like their own personal reality TV show, and/or so they can be "in the know" and have the most information so they can run back to their circles and have the best "scoop" on your situation, thus increasing their own status amongst their peers (and often yours).

You can detect a friend's frenemy status in a number of ways:

1. You and the person weren't really that close before your personal drama, but then all the sudden they are offering you their phone numbers, e-mail addresses, instant message usernames, MySpace profile names, and inviting you over to their house, telling you to contact them ANYTIME you need to talk.

2. Amongst your group of friends, they are constantly gossiping about the one person who is not present at any given time. Also, they often start conversations with "Have you heard what happened to so-and-so??" Chances are they are talking about you when you are not around, too.

3. The question to listening ratio is disproportionate, and the questions are about details that really aren't critical to what you are talking about. Asking questions is usually a sign that a person is truly interested and concerned and wants to have the most information so that they can help you out the best. Not so with frenemies..... they want the most information so that they are the most "in the know".

The Ex is completely oblivious to the concept of frenemies and will blather on to anyone who will listen every single detail of our relationship, from our first meeting in the high school cafeteria freshman year til the last conversation we had on Monday. (I basically had the woman in the loan department of our credit union repeat back to me my life story on the phone once.) And much to my dismay, the person he chose to confide in and cry to during our divorce is a mutal friend of ours who is one of the most open people in the city (i.e. he tells all his own business so has NO problem telling yours) AND, on top of that, knows damn near everyone in the city, AND has no problem embelishing facts when not enough are provided. *holds head in hands* I tried to tell The Ex that this was not the best idea in the world, and that maybe he should just call a relative (which he was doing as well...... I paid the $1600 cell phone bill to prove it), but he just could not stop calling this man and going to his house and hanging out over drinks crying to him. I count this person amongst my friends, but I also recognize that in this respect, he has frenemy tendencies.

One interesting and unfortunate side effect of confiding in frenemies is that the information starts to flow both ways, and not in a good way. I was constantly getting upset calls from The Ex talking about so-and-so saw me out somewhere with this person doing XYZ, or they heard this or that about me and what I've been doing, and 95% of it was complete speculative inaccurate bullshit. I would just laugh at him, tell him to quit being stupid enough to entertain these fools, and that he needs to find better sources. Frenemies want to seem like they are contributing something to their parasitic relationship, so they come back with this "information" to share like some cat bringing you a dead, mangled bird as thanks for feeding it Fancy Feast every day. Don't fall for it.

In order to compesate for the flood of information that I knew was flowing through the streets like Lake Pontchartrain after Hurricane Katrina, I basically dropped off the face of the Earth for awhile (and really still haven't gotten myself back on). I quit going to functions, quit my involvement in professional organizations, and only hung out in places and with people with no ties to my former life. I basically decided to lay low for awhile. I also adopted a rote answer for when people would ask me about "what happened?" when it came to my divorce: "We just grew apart." I didn't volunteer information or try to put my side of things out there. Whatever people were going to say, they were going to say and there was nothing I could do about it. Trying to state my case would just add more fuel to the fire, so I decided to just let it die out on its own.

However, I wasn't totally passive when it came to these types of frenemies. Sometimes I would share info knowing it was going to get back to a certain person, and therefore would put the spin on it that I wanted (in true lawyer fashion). Thus, I was able to use my frenemies by being cognizant of their nature, and use this to my advantage instead of my detriment by not falling for their false concern. As Lauryn sez, "I play my enemies like a game of chess......."

So, if you are going through a divorce (or any type of major personal drama), be careful about who you let into your life and what you say to these people. That person who tries hardest to be there for you may be the worst person for you.