Today we take a little trip back to the old PLFM you all know and love: A controlling, drug-addled and habitually unemployed infant of a man ultimately threatens to murder his wife, at which point she finally decides to leave him for her own personal safety.
In response, said infant sends his ex-wife a letter detailing how the end of their marriage was actually all
her fault, and really he did nothing wrong because, well, his psychologist once told him that threatening to kill your wife is actually a “pretty normal” occurrence. In the same way, we suppose, that finding your psychology degree in a box of
Chocolate Boo-Berry cereal is a “pretty normal” occurrence.
Heidi ran away from an abusive father at 17 years of age, and readily admits to PLFM “I was completely ripe for a new abusive relationship, because I had no idea what a healthy relationship looked like.” Of course, Heidi flew into the first set of open arms to accept her, and those arms belonged to a man named Phil. Unfortunately, in a sign of things to come, Phil’s open arms not only accepted her, but also extracted a $20 bill from her purse.
Heidi and Phil ended up attending the same college together. While Heidi busied herself with endless coursework and held down several jobs to pay her way through school, Phil received a steady supply of checks from his parents to pay for tuition, textbooks and rent. Not a problem for most people, if Phil
had actually spent that money on tuition, textbooks and rent.
Rather, Phil liked to spend his parent’s money on booze, video games, comic books, and a LOT of marijuana. When rent or tuition inevitably came due, Phil’s preferred method of payment was a pair of outstretched and empty palms, accompanied by a river of tears. “If you don’t pay for it, my parents will stop sending me checks,” he’d whine to Heidi, his tears ultimately falling to the floor and forming the words
“Boy, I sure hope she falls for this.”Tired of paying his way and literally running out of places to hide her ATM card, Heidi took on yet another job: Finding employment for Phil. Heidi first got Phil a job cooking eggs in a local dorm for two hours each morning, which lasted three weeks. He showed up late, left early, and took way too many unscheduled breaks to smoke pot, which, to his credit, “they didn’t tell him he couldn’t do.”
Heidi subsequently found Phil another job with her own employer, a call center that captioned telephone calls for the deaf. Phil repeatedly arrived late, or came to work only to leave five minutes later. Heidi learned Phil would punch in, then cross the street to smoke pot and hang out in his favorite comic book store. When Heidi tried to intervene, Phil would always scream “Stop coddling me, I’ll be back!”, causing Heidi to feel somewhat jealous of her hard-of-hearing customers. Phil would return each day, but was fired one month later for typing sexual obscenities into the computer program used to help handle calls for the deaf.
Phil eventually found a “job” selling his own plasma, which not only paid for several month’s worth of marijuana, but also caused a 726% increase in the sales of Funions, Cheese-Puffs and Sno-Balls to local hemophiliacs. But the job “didn’t pay enough for rent,” and Phil often came up empty-handed at the end of the month. Adds Heidi:
“During the couple of times that we couldn't make rent, he would call his parents and tell them, "Heidi spent too much money on food, she didn't budget right," and then his parents would get on the phone with me and scold me for not taking better care of their son.” Now, for those PLFM readers who belong to the “Always Blame the Woman at the Center of the Story” club, PLFM will now allow 5 minutes for you to soak your torches in gasoline.
Heidi figured Phil was just going through that “college phase” of irresponsibility and financial hardship, and of course things would change once they got out into the real world. As such, Heidi accepted Phil’s hand in marriage just before graduation, with Phil’s parents offering to foot the bill for the wedding. “I think primarily because they suspected after I graduated, I'd start to wonder what the hell I was still doing with this man-child,” says Heidi.
Unfortunately, her suspicions were confirmed when she overheard Phil’s parents regularly taking cracks at the couple after the wedding, such as
“We’re just glad she married him before she found out what he was REALLY like! HA HA HA!” Then, as an encore, Phil’s parents would often scoop up a defenseless kitten, bite it open with their teeth, and smear the entrails all over their faces as lightning bolts flashed in the background.
Needless to say, things did not get better.
Phil injured his wrist just prior to graduation while completely wasted out of his mind. Phil had neglected to purchase the health insurance his father had provided money for, so upon graduation Heidi immediately found herself knee-deep in medical bills while Phil stayed at home in bed nursing his wounds, playing video games, and sucking on a large bong for weeks on end.
No matter how hard Heidi worked, she simply couldn’t keep up with the bills. Soon the money all but dried up, and when the money disappeared so did all of Phil’s pot-smoking buddies. With no job or friends to occupy his time, Phil spent the ensuing months attempting to control Heidi’s relationships with her family and friends.
Heidi often tried to make overtures toward her long-lost mother and sister, but Phil took every opportunity to derail Heidi’s plans. Says Heidi:
“Whenever I spoke to them, or talked about speaking to them, he would refer to my family as "trash," and talk about how amazing it was that I had managed to grow up smart and pretty from such a bunch of "worthless trash.” He would tell me he understood how hard it must be for me to keep myself from being a ‘trashy person’ like them.” Phil referred to Heidi’s female friends as
“crack whores,” and every time Heidi tried to speak with a male acquaintance on the telephone, Phil would stand behind her and sing at the top of his lungs until she hung up the phone. When Phil introduced Heidi to his friends, he often said
"You should have seen Heidi when I met her, she was so fucked-up and trashy, hanging out with these people; she's lucky I put up with it."
Yeah, Phil, with no job and absolutely no life, you’re a real fucking rabbits foot.
As the months morphed into years, still-unemployed Phil began to shadow Heidi constantly around the apartment, kicking her cat (literally) and demanding ever-increasing amounts of money and sex. He smashed the walls of the apartment and told his friends he “needed a new fiancé.” He left it up to Heidi to provide for all of his rent, bills, and necessities like food and marijuana.
Until one day, when a funny thing happened.
Heidi met a man named Mark at work.
Mark was brilliant, kind, and good-looking. He was motivated. He had a good job, loved his work, and had a zest for life Heidi had never seen before. He had a wide variety of hobbies and interests outside of work, and loved to talk to Heidi about her life and her dreams for the future.
Heidi suddenly heard a dinner bell, and realized it came from her pants.
She didn’t even know guys like this
existed.Mark and Heidi quickly developed a close friendship, but Heidi never stepped over the line. Yet having to see Mark every day only increased her sudden longing for him, until she finally decided to have a discussion with Phil regarding her newfound feelings for Mark. “I told my husband, ‘I think I'm in love with another man, and it's made me realize how unhappy I am with you,” Heidi says. “Things need to change if I'm going to stay with you."
Well, things did change.
Immediately.
Phil packed up all of their belongings and moved them out of state.
Into his parent’s basement.With Phil’s medical bills still unpaid, Heidi felt she had no other choice but to go along. She knew she could never afford a new apartment by herself.
“I worked odd jobs in restaurants to support him,” says Heidi, “while he cried at home (in the basement) about how his hand was fucked up, his wife was leaving him, and he couldn't even smoke pot anymore.”
After six months, Phil finally threatened to kill Heidi and Mark.
Heidi knew the gig was up.
We’ll let Heidi take it from here, followed by Phil’s final letter.
Heidi:
The night I told him I wanted a divorce, he raped me, which is the "making love" he refers to. (I've come to understand he thinks it was all very romantic). After I left him, I got constant emails and voicemails. They were at first little one-liners about "Don't you miss me? I miss you. Do you think about me? Do you love me?" Then they became nastiness about "Why haven't you gotten the divorce papers filed yet? They'd really help me get laid right now."
“I hadn't gotten the divorce papers filed because I didn't have the money, and he wouldn't pay me the money he owed me, and he sure as shit wasn't going to pay for the divorce, and he was threatening to make a whole expensive legal mess if I tried to file divorce papers without, like, going out to dinner with him and answering his phone calls first.”
“I tried responding to his emails, but they just got pushier and crazier each time. Finally, he just showed up at my house and wouldn't leave, which was really scary. I got him to leave by promising to call him.”
“I did not have an affair while he rotted in bed, I was working extra hours to afford his medications; no, I did not “fool him” into thinking we could start over after I told him I wanted a divorce, I did not let him think things were okay by making love; he raped me. Everything he’s saying is so crazy and vile, to argue it is to give it validity.”
After a few more months of harassing phone calls and emails, Heidi received the following email from Phil. Remember, Heidi
never had an affair with Mark while she was married to Phil.
PLFM took the liberty of highlighting the word
“you” every time Phil assigns blame in Phil’s letter to Heidi. Look carefully, and you just might discover who Phil feels is primarily responsible for the collapse of their marriage.
Take it away, Phil.
Heidi,
There is a high possibility that this will be the last time we have any form of meaningful communication. Inevitably, there will be things I need to badger you about; little meaningless trivial details over photographs and loans. But aside from that, we may never speak again.
Where to begin? First off, I still love you. I’m sorry you couldn’t gather up the energy to actually try to work this out with me. Secondly, I’m sorry for a lot of things I’m about to say. It was a cheap shot when we last spoke to bring up the fact I could pursue alimony. I said it because I was angry, because you’d threatened me with cops. It wasn’t meant as a threat. I brought it up because frankly, you betrayed me. you lied to me. And you treated my family and I like shit. The fact that I could pursue legal recourses with you has less to say about my vindictive personality, and a lot more to do with how many mistakes you made over the last six months of our marriage.
On more than one occasion, you told me that you wondered if you were a good person. I inevitably told you not to worry, that you were a good person, that you had the capability for being even better. Now I wonder.
For six months I tried to atone and redeem myself. I opened up to you, and all you did was hold it against me. You had an affair, and when I voiced my concerns and my anger about it, you acted like I was fucking insane. It took going to a marriage counselor for you to even realize that there might be a problem with how you were acting.
After pleading, and cajoling and arguing with you to no avail eventually I reached my limit. I told you, under extremely bad circumstances that I felt like killing you and Mark. A statement that while understandably creepy, my psychologist assures me is fairly normal.
And why not?
You weren’t ever going to stop having the affair, and isn’t it easier to justify betraying someone you love if you can paint them like a monster? Fairy tale romances are a lot easier after all, when your flabby knight in sweaty armor can save you.
Looking back on that, I’m sickened.
Considering how unhappy your childhood was, considering your own unpleasant thoughts, considering your experience and knowledge of psychology, considering how you knew how unhappy and distraught I was, you instead used an omission I made at a moment of great personal weakness to help you justify your affair.
Because the alternative would have meant looking at me like a person instead of as a monster. What cowardice. Worse, what hypocrisy. You never let me get away with shit like that. Your mental problems were of limits to criticism. But fuck me.
You just wanted what was ever easier at that moment. When I was wasting my life smoking pot and staring blankly at wall, denial was the easiest option. But when I came to, realized how much of a fuck I’d been, realized how much of my life I’d wasted and how badly I’d treated you, suddenly it was all out in the open.
And you had two choices: you could work with me or you could just let it slide until you finally gave up.
And then Mark came along, and while I convalesced in our apartment incapable of moving from pain killers, you had an affair.
And when I demanded that you work with me, you said you’d try, but you didn’t do a goddamn thing.
And when you finally got up the guts to say you were leaving and I broke down crying and begged you to stay, you acquiesced, because that was easier. So you put on a fake fucking smile and made love to me and all the while it was a lie. You cowardly fuck.
When you told me one thing and then did another that made you a liar and a betrayer. When you hid yourself from me, when you held me to a standard you would never hold yourself, that made you a hypocrite.
When you did nothing but wait for our relationship to end all the while saying that you loved me, when you told me we may have a chance rather than break cleanly, when you hid from me afterwards and threatened to call the cops, that made you a hypocrite.
And after my family helped support you for finances, clothing, food, love and almost a grand in driver’s lessons you left in the night without saying goodbye, thanking them or frankly, anything. And there’s a word for a woman who takes and takes and takes until it no longer suits her interests; it’s called a whore.
[Editor’s Note II: His parents only offered financial support because all of Heidi’s
earned money went to pay for his medical bills. Because
he never purchased the insurance
he was supposed to buy in the first place.]
So if you’re still reading, congratulations, that’s all of the vitriol and anger I’ve been repressing for six months and that has sent me through a roller coaster of hell since the divorce. A lot of this I’m sure is just my aching, bleeding heart. Particularly the insults. But a lot of it is true. I loved you. I still do. It hurts, and I hate you, but I still love you to death.
But I look at what you did to me and my family and I have nothing but bitterness. And now you’re dragging another poor fuck into your life, who when the going gets tough you’ll discard like so much garbage. At least this one’s enough of a loser that it’ll be easier.
I love you. But you tore out my heart and then took a big steaming shit on it. If you ever want to speak to me again, in any fashion that goes beyond business, we’ll need to talk about this. I spent six months trying to atone while all you did was get your own punches in. My soul is hardly clean, but at least I know I tried.
I doubt you can make the same statement.
Well, that was refreshing, no?
And yes, Heidi is now in a relationship with Mark.
Thank God.
Years ago, Andrew dated Carla for a short time.
