BONUS MATERIAL: EMAILS TO BENOIT
If I’d examined my own words, I would have known things were long over…I just hadn’t wanted it to be true
I usually reserve bonus material for paid subscribers but this piece is FREE today as a thank you for subscribing. Thank you. It truly means a lot.
Bonus material, for anthropologist-y-minded people (or even literary people), is like the “primary source” material of my life but I’ve added dates, commentary, and context.
Quick recap: Right now, I’m writing about my first husband Benoit, AKA the fourth person I met at Starbucks, a Lebanese-American US Army officer who took me to Germany with him. The beginning of the story starts at Chapter 72 with how we met, how he was the most different, and intriguing man I’d ever dated and how he really seemed so into me – and that was intoxicating. Who doesn't want to be wanted and promised this magical future of rainbows and unicorns?
I talk about our first date (Chapter 73), the other guy I went on a date with (Chapter 74) after I’d met my first husband, then there was also another man I slept with from my past (the Air Force Guy – Chapter 52) so maybe I wasn’t quite ready to leave my party-girl messy past behind.
“We” bought a house in Columbus, Georgia (Chapter 75), where Benoit was stationed as an officer at the time, and life seemed good. We got engaged, and secretly married (Chapter 76). We moved to Germany, attended my cousin Pam’s wedding in England, and then the cues of all the ways to be “a good wife” came in (spoiler: I wasn’t cutting the mustard) (Chapter 77). We seemed to have a lovely life in Germany (Chapter 78) with friends and travel, tinged with some not-so-nice bits, the cracks started to appear (Chapter 79), and then he dropped a bombshell (Chapter 80) after our Lebanon trip: he was changing careers without consulting me and we had to move back Stateside, a year earlier than planned. I was, understandably, upset but according to Benoit, not allowed to be upset because my thoughts didn’t really matter.
The latest chapter is about our final days in Germany, visiting my family in England to say goodbye, and moving to Minneapolis, Minnesota where Benoit had accepted a new job (Chapter 81).
Email from Elaine to Benoit: 28 October 2015, Benoit was interviewing for jobs in the States and was gone for a month
Subject: Can’t sleep
No exercise + more sugar than I've consumed lately = no sleep
It's terrible. Plus, I'm super horny so I couldn't get to sleep because of that, plus thirst, plus sugar jitters.
I really needed a vibrator. Sigh.
I know you don't believe me but I have barely been having sugar each day and mostly eating fruits and veggies and healthy foods and eating less, so today was a crazy overload. Eek!
Love you lots and sorry your head has been hurting and that you're very, very sleepy.
I love you so much. Kisses.
I forgot Benoit used to have headaches and put an ice pack on his head, which was a very quirky habit. He had one of those old-fashioned ice packs that had the screw cap lid and he’d fill it to the brim with pure ice and sit with it on his head like a hat.
Email from Elaine to Benoit: 5 November 2015
Subject: My thoughts for tonight…
[Benoit], my love,
I have spent time reflecting today in light of your being unhappy with me and messaging me sparsely. It won't be pleasant, but please hear me out. These are things I have been unknowingly ruminating on, things I have been thinking now and for a while, and I am trying to share them so that we may better understand each other.
My whole life I’ve made sense of things by writing about them…and as usual when he was away he didn’t message me regularly despite the fact that, let’s get real, people are always on their phones.
I get that some people are forgetful and overloaded with messages and just save them for a later time that never comes but not when you’re married. I think we had a few Skype calls but he mostly ignored me and that felt painful.
I remember when we first came to Germany and all the wives would talk of their husbands and I'd never have a single grievance to share. I loved and adored everything about you and you worked to make me happy, and we had our odd problem, but overall the way I talked of you and never shared complaints seemed to make my friends almost envious of what good fortune I had in a husband that is until recently...
I think I was just delusional and they were more realistic, to be fair. Many were also older and wiser, in their 30s and 40s, and I was still in my late twenties. And it’s ‘normal’ to confide in your friends about the odd grievance.
Merely four months ago, you made a life-altering decision on your own without my input – to quit your job – and acted like that was personally fine.
You still don't think it was wrong that you never even bothered to talk to me about it but it showed me I didn't live in a partnership where my input was valued. I lived in a dictatorship where decisions were made for me regardless of how I felt about them.
You know or I hope you know I would have sided with your happiness if you were unhappy in your job but the fact you didn't feel I was even worth having a conversation with me cut deeply and hurt me more than you could know. And it's even worse that you cannot see it from my perspective, that you continue to argue that you did nothing wrong at all. Every single friend I have is shocked that you'd make this decision alone.
I know you do not care for their opinions, but despite all their husbands' faults, they would never have made this decision alone. Even [redacted friend’s husband] when he has been unhappy has told [his wife] I want to quit [the military], but they've talked through the decision together.
[Another couple] too. Everyone. They see their wives as partners and discuss major decisions with them, but the fact that you didn't speaks volumes, and I'm afraid whatever it says about us is not good at all.
Yep, I guess I hit the nail on the head…
Everything that follows may be jumbled and in no particular order except the order in which it comes to mind.
I have missed you so much every time you have been gone, but even when you are home not enough time is prioritized when we are together. You cannot even give me an hour sometimes. Even when I ask you to cuddle with me in bed it's always, I have to pack for tomorrow or I have to do this that and the other, which may be true, but I guarantee at some point you've spent an hour watching videos or scrolling on Facebook whilst having a beer, but you're too busy for an hour with me lately.
I look forward to your return but I fear with your leaving date coming so soon you'll go into full on panic mode which will mean I will be pushed back even further. You'll be too busy. You'll insist that instead of our past Saturday or Sunday mornings of lounging around and eating breakfast you have to get up at 7 am and run or go and fix a car or help someone with this or that. And then you'll come home late, and just want to watch a show and scroll on Facebook and talking to me is just the last thing you think about.
You keep speaking of my past and idealizing the person I was when we met. You saw me as this girl who worked hard and did three jobs and exercised and ate healthily and did all these things, but now you don't think I work hard or have aspirations.
I have aspirations and goals now, but the things you decide take precedence and you do not see how what you decide affects what I can decide and the choices I can make about my future, the choices I can make about getting a PhD or working in publishing or any number of things I want to do.
I'm not saying that's bad, but don't beat me down for not being what you thought I was. That girl who worked three jobs was exhausted. All I had time for was to do those basic things and maybe grab a bite to eat with a friend during the week or on the weekend, but she'd wake every day to work two to three jobs a day, and exercise, and eat and rinse and repeat.
She wasn't happy. She'd go to bed hungry from exhaustion and sadness. And then she met you who made her happy, but blamed her and belittled her for getting heavier.
Ugh!
When you announced your career change I did mention how friends and travel were important to me and you couldn't see why those things were important, but how could I have survived here at all without those friends?
My friends prioritize me. They know me. They talk to me. They know my goals and dreams. Does my husband ask me what I want in life or does he belittle me as a dreamer when I try to let my imagination speak of my dreams or fantasies or wishes, real or unreal, possible or impossible?
Even when we are together lately you're so moody. Often you imply I make you unhappy. I am accountable for your unhappiness. That hurts. It makes me miserable to see someone I love dearly unhappy on my account.
I don't know if you notice lately, but you make all my decisions for me or you try to. I run all my purchases by you. You watch the account like a hawk and ask me about everything I spend. Do you ask me when you buy something? Do I check the account and ask what you spend and why? You ask me why do you want this? Why do you want that? Do I ever ask you the same?
I am frustrated too that everything I say or do has to align with your views and if it doesn't I am wrong; I am at fault. You rarely try to see anything from my perspective, especially with this class business. When I said to Megan how you said you can't spend three weeks in England because you have to set up your job and your house and everything, Megan asked if you even wanted me to go with you. That was so hurtful to hear it from someone else's perspective.
Orienna even told me when I was discussing about Bahrain one day how you said you thought you'd work in Bahrain and I would be in England. You keep implying separation. Apparently to me and to others.
I guess the writing was on the wall. It shouldn’t have come as a shock.
Another issue is you keep saying how you won't interfere with my weight but you do. I know I haven't made progress but I do try. It does bother me. But it bothers me mostly that even when I try nothing is good enough. I can always be doing more. You rarely say good job. A kind word would encourage me infinitely more than a harsh one.
Another thing lately is that you imply you only like when I work a lot and try and dictate my day. Now that I haven't been working two jobs you ask how my day is and almost seem to resent that I wake up late and spend time relaxing. But that's mostly because I have been really down with you gone a lot and the weather changing.
Today, I was with Victoria all day and I didn't once feel I needed a nap or feel tired or feel glum. I had a different level of energy, but it's not the same when I'm home and lonely.
Yep, being with people who uplifted my spirits, unsurprisingly, was motivating. Being with someone who criticised me made me sad and prone to depression.
I have been reflecting on past instances too. Things that hurt me early on in our marriage. I remember when we were in Budapest and you'd made a post about relaxing and [Bob] had made a dig about something and then I had innocently responded that you'd been working so hard and needed a break and then he got incredibly rude with me, and you said how I should have known that's how he is, but I didn't and I was terribly hurt and offended that someone could get so nasty with me so soon when he didn't even know me.
And you know what you did? You defended him. You didn't even write to him and say that that wasn't what I meant and that I was really a kindhearted person who didn't mean anything by it. When I was so hurt by the nastiness of his reply I began to cry in the bathroom, and do you know what you did?
You got angry and yelled at me and blamed me for ruining our trip which made me cry even more, and you could not handle it. You could not handle me being a real person with real emotions. So I tried to stop crying and pick up from there, but I have never forgotten it.
I have never forgotten how alone I felt in that hotel room with you. My husband. With a man who I had married who didn't stick up for me.
And this is how you don’t do a marriage…
And I was reminded of that same feeling recently in Prague when you invited [Andrew] on our four-day weekend.
You didn't think about the fact we hadn't been together in a while and that maybe I'd want that time with you. No, [Andrew] was going to Hungary soon and you felt bad for him, and wanted him to have a good weekend.
[Andrew] was more important to you than me, but you see me as selfish for even thinking that. And then you go away for eight hours on that run that [Andrew] bullied me into encouraging you to go on and guess what happens?
I get yelled at and berated. I get told you cannot handle my mood. I get told how I am making [Andrew] feel awkward and unwelcome. How I feel doesn't matter. The fact that I'm upset doesn't matter. Any number of reactions could have smoothed the situation – you could have hugged me and kissed me and apologized and maybe said, c'mon let's get a nice dinner – but you yelled at me and then acted as if I was a big, fucking awkward disappointment all night.
[Andrew] always makes me feel like I am awkward, like he feels I don't like him, but I am not awkward. No one thinks me socially awkward or socially inappropriate except you.
But perhaps even if we had had that weekend together – and remember it began as a blissful weekend where we had sex two or three times – lately you spend more time on your phone than talking to me. In social situations and parties, you talk away and chat away and share your life with people and you do not check your phone every few seconds, but when you're with me I feel even less important than strangers at a party.
My bar was very low for happiness. My husband actually paid attention to me. Wow!
I do not feel valued or cared for like I used to feel. You've never been all that verbal, but that has been a point of contention because it seems as if you're almost verbal with anyone but me. With friends, you chat away. With your family, you never stop talking. With me, you stare at your phone. That hurts more than anything.
Also, it seems in the past our visions of life used to be okay with me having a small job and you being the provider but lately you imply that I'm a lazy leech on you and I make you miserable and I don't want to help financially, and I am just so terrible and such a drain who doesn't bother to help or care or think how you feel.
Anothing thing that has been bothering me that I may never know is why did you want to keep our marriage a secret? What were your reasons behind that? I never did understand why our marriage should be a secret from your family and your close friends. Is there something disagreeable in marrying me that you didn't want to tell people?
It bothers me that you lied and then you continued to lie even when you revealed it to people. You couldn't just come out straight. This secretiveness and these white lies you tell will always bother me. The truth is much easier to keep track of.
I don't understand why you tell little mistruths to your family. That when you revealed to your parents we were married why you didn't give the correct date.
Why when we had that awful drama in Dublin again you told [Karen] a lie instead of just telling her the truth and then got mad at me for telling the truth and speaking with her when she had had the audacity to write "husband?" on my Facebook wall and her daughter in law had had the audacity to message me, "I hear congratulations are in order." How rude!
No one I know would ever speak to you like that. And another thing with the whole [Karen] situation is that they really must think that this bitch of a wife came along and has taken your attention away from them. It seems you were close to [Karen’s grandson] and would remember [Karen’s] birthday and send gifts and you have chosen not to do those things since we have been together and I don't know why, and they must certainly be thinking the same and blaming me for it.
Many times you act like I'm a child and too stupid to understand. Just because I don't like adult tasks doesn't mean I'm unwilling or incapable of performing them. When you're away the house doesn't fall apart. Bills get paid. Things get done. Not always in the way you'd want them, but it gets done. I've done it before. I have survived without you, and I hate how you act as if I cannot do things for myself.
You do not have to do everything alone, but I thought you were happy doing those things, but it seems since you've been unhappy with our marriage, you have been increasingly unhappy with doing those things.
Our marriage is not heading in a good direction, and it makes me so sad. I hate that you cannot relinquish control. You control every single aspect of our lives, and I do not like it.
I want a marriage. I want a partnership. You do not let me help out with a budget. You do not tell me the truth about our accounts. You do not tell me how much everything costs. You do not let me make decisions about what we buy and what we sell. Everything. So many things. You control. You do not want me to help or to decide.
So much frustration and no answers. No solutions to work on the marriage. But I guess for Benoit, walking away was just easier than fixing anything. However, I’ll get real with myself: I deserved better.
When you spend time with me I feel so happy and I feel connected but most of our life lately is apart. You may have been gone more, but you were gone in April, you then went to Lebanon, you were then on the Range, you went to Prague for a month and then you went to Hungary, and now you're away for this month and there have been possibly countless other times we have been apart.
My friends have been the people who care about my day and listen to me and if I say how I feel to you I am deemed as unsupportive, and I shouldn't burden you with how I feel. My friends tell me I am valuable. I am intelligent. I am caring and kind. But I have never heard such things from you.
Whenever I ask what you love about me or why you fell in love with me all you say is I don't know. And I think that has been a problem. In times like these, you have nothing to draw on. Even when I am sad and reflective today I have a long, long list of all I love about you, but when negatively creeps in you forget that you love me. All I am is negative to you. You do not see my values or merits, only my faults. It's such a burden to live a life in which you feel undervalued, in which my husband doesn't say a kind word about me to me.
I understand you want to be happy at your job but you don't take things into account that I want. Your first choice happens to align with mine with France but my heart wants to be close to family if we make it to having children of our own and this vendetta to get more money seems to move far away from what I thought we wanted. You used to want to be closer to [your sister] for when we had children or, alternatively, we can be closer to my family, but it doesn't seem like either will happen. We will be isolated.
Even writing all this negativity makes me sad. You don't take things like this well. And you'll claim I make you further miserable and I'm sorry for that. We need to make changes so we can align again but as we stand now we aren't aligning and it's tragic.
I need you to treat me like you respect me and not like your child. I need you to value me for how I am and not on conditions of being more attractive and slimmer and more driven in the ways you consider driven and whatever else.
People simply change and grow as time goes by and it's always a hope people grow together but we haven't been together and we have been living separate lives and I share my life with you and you don't share yours with me and I feel cut off from you except from your anger.
That's alI I get. Anger and frustration and sadness. And you never have time for me. I get you are busy, but it hurts for you to always say you have to go. Always. And if I protest you claim I just don't understand and I'm so stupid for not understanding.
You always treat me like I am pining for your time and I'm just annoying to you. You do not value me or seem to prioritize me. Everything is more important. Everything.
I am only given the dregs, what little you have left to give. And lately you are simply too tired for anything but me hugging you and scratching your back.
You haven't bothered to "give" to me sexually in months and that doesn't bother you and that isn't a problem to you. You don't even want blow jobs from me. You don't touch me or randomly kiss me. Kissing me has become a chore and something tiresome and I demand too much.
I don't know if all this is stress or if you have simply fallen out of love with me. But it hurts. It is a problem. When I worked two jobs and we were both exhausted it was less of a problem, but we are even less likely to have sex on weekends when we should have time than at any other time.
No sex = deep issues with our marriage.
Sex is a healthy and happy part of a relationship and we don't have it. You do not desire me. I still desire you, and it hurts to be rejected all the time or always to be the sexual instigator.
Eek! So many problems so early into our marriage.
You need to figure out what you want because all of your actions are pushing me away. Is that what you want? It won't be without pain but I can slip out of your life if you need since whenever you talk about the future you use "I" not we.
I was clearly being dramatic because in no way did I want or expect this outcome…
Furthermore, when I even asked if you'd give me a roundabout idea of when you'd want a child which seemed to be something that you so desperately wanted when we were first together and now there are just so many obstacles and you don't want to tell me if you even want a child in 2017 or whenever.
All you say is we cannot afford it. We cannot predict where we will be. We have so many changes coming up. We cannot afford anything. We are so poor. It's exhausting and heartbreaking.
We can build tentative plans. It's okay to do that even if they do not happen. I just want to know if you want children with me. If you don't then we need to deal with that. And lately when I've asked about trying you've rejected the idea with the fact that I am too fat to get pregnant now.
Pretty sure being too fat to get pregnant is not a thing and, for context, we made more than I’d ever lived with in my life and he was going to a ridiculously well-paid job, but the signs were all there that things were not going well.
I don't even get praise when I try to exercise. It almost has the opposite effect when you badger me and bring me down like I don't want to get skinny even though I do want to be skinny because you'd just appreciate me more than for my lack of being fat when you couldn't make yourself love me for being fat.
It cuts deep. It cuts my confidence. My entire life and personality are not dependent on my fat. My friends and family don't love me less for being fatter but my husband does. It makes me despondent. I think about it every day. I think about how you will only seem to look at me in the same way when I am more sexually attractive to you. I feel like the fat sister that you love, but not in that way. You love me because I'm your wife and you're obligated to me, but not in the desiring way.
Let’s get real, girl: he never loved you, which is sad but his loss, eh?
And further with the children stuff you fear our child getting my Dad's condition. It is a fear but you act like it's leprosy and that would be so horrific and how could we do that to our child? There's no way of knowing for sure if I will pass it down or not, but it seems ridiculous for us not to have a child because of this small chance.
I think genetically there was less than a 25% chance of our child having my Dad’s very rare genetic condition called hereditary spastic paraplegia (HSP) and my sister has it but I don’t so I’d imagine a child of mine wouldn’t have it. Plus, my Dad had at least fifty healthy years before he truly deteriorated and couldn’t walk. And my niece doesn’t have it and my sister has it full-blown and it impacted her much younger than it did our Father.
I think worst of all I just feel I disappoint you. I try and live up to your standard but I always fail. I feel I love and accept you for what you are. I encourage you. I compliment you. I tell you how wonderful you are but you never do the same. When was the last time you told me I looked beautiful? When was the last time you said I was intelligent or wonderful? When was the last time you called me capable? Can I go through life never feeling valued by my husband? Do you feel I value you and care for you and respect you?
I think everyone knows how much I dote on you. I feel as if you've beaten down my confidence. I have none. I go out feeling like a sack of potatoes. I never feel beautiful or confident anymore, and it isn't just to do with my weight. I have been heavier before and I have always felt confident in my life.
Why I couldn’t see that this was not healthy and I shouldn’t have to put up with that is beyond me.
I need you to reveal yourself to me. I need to know you. I need you to love and value me. I need you not to be so secretive. I need you not to keep everything to yourself. I need you to want to share your life with me.
Tell me when things need to be done. Don't act like I'm not capable and that I need a thousand instructions because I'm too stupid otherwise. Act like you want me there every step of the way to help you set up our new life – otherwise it's your life alone.
I cannot be an interloper in a life we are supposed to share.
You aren't being good at sharing a life. You do your own thing and try to dictate and boss around "my" life and act angry if I have my own thoughts or do my own thing or disappoint you. That is not marriage. That is not equality or partnership.
You act as if the only way to be "equal" is by my working as many jobs as it takes to make you happy. But it seems no matter what I do you are deeply disappointed and won't be happy.
I'm sorry I don't measure up and that I'm this silly thing you feel obligated to and perhaps regret marrying. I will tell you what. I don't regret marrying you. I married for love. I love and accept you for all you are but I feel you don't do the same.
Another thing: You haven't yet signed for a job and you don't know any start dates but you have already inflexibly decided that you cannot spend more than 10 days in England. You didn't say well, we will see when I have to begin my job. Then you didn't act like you give a fuck about me flying back to the States with you.
In fact, you never said you'd like me there or anything of the sort. You didn't ask me what I wanted. You just assume all I want is to be in England. I can go back to England later but I wanted to set up our new life with my husband but you seem to do everything on your own these days or at least want everything alone.
You used to be delighted to have me around. Remember at every party I used always to be by your side or would always come to greet you and put my arms around you and kiss you and you squashed that out of me. Everything is a nuisance to you. Asking to cuddle or spend time is a chore. I am sorry I take you away from scrolling on Facebook and videos.
You used to get me flowers just because. You used to want to see me smile. You would plan dates, walk with me (oh how I loved long walks), you'd try and teach me Arabic, you'd actually spend time with me.
The last days you were here before you went away this time I felt happy we were clicking again and you had begun really to talk to me and share your thoughts and fears and we were making progress I think, but maybe all these issues are always underlying.
I don't want a lifetime of silence and moodiness from you.
If we are going to make things work, we need to learn to communicate. Every other friend I know has a healthy channel of communication. You often look at others' marriages and note how they are doomed to fail, but should we be looking inward?
Please don't just get angry at this.
Really think about things. I want the lines of communication open. These are just my thoughts today. I had to get them off my chest. I may not feel this way tomorrow. I may not feel this way a week from now, but today this is how I feel. I feel deeply sad and hurt. I feel unloved and undervalued.
I feel alone.
I was alone in a marriage. I always feared his anger.
Email from Elaine to Benoit: 8 November 2015, 3 days after the email above
Subject: Thinking more...
[Benoit], my love,
Emily and [her husband] just left. They came for brunch/lunch but we ate breakfast food. I cooked an English breakfast and it was lovely. I enjoyed having them over. Emily brought some sausages and some lemon poppyseed muffins.
Yesterday, Victoria and I watched season 1 of Orphan Black. It's really a great show, and I think you'd like it. Great acting and a good story line.
I never did fully finish this series but I remember enjoying 2-3 seasons of it.
Since I'd gotten things off my chest, I was lulled into a false sense of peace and happiness, despite the fact you never addressed a single word of what I had to say. I have been thinking again today on the drive home, and as I spoke with Pam on the phone.
Pam is my cousin.
We need to learn to communicate with one another.
I don't know what you want out of life right now except to make more money, but I'm not sure it aligns with what I want out of life. We need to get on the same page so we can work towards the same goals.
Something that is still bothering me is that prior to your announcement to change our lives forever, we had kind of set up the next year of our life. We had decided that we'd try for children in December.
My kindergarten job would be over in the summer and I could have our child in England that summer. Then we'd move to the next location. We had a plan. It aligned with what I thought was your goal to have children, and my goal to have our child in England.
Now I ask you if you want children and roundabout when you'd want them, and you say there are so many factors you cannot plan and we cannot afford them and everything else. I am starting to wonder if you think you made a mistake and you do not want children with me at all, and that hurts me deeply. You wanted kids the minute we met and now you don't. Now you don't even talk about it. You don't allude to it. You don't discuss me as part of your future.
I had wanted a child born in England for dual citizenship purposes.
You also cut me deeply when you say I'm not supportive.
I am not sure what I am doing wrong, but I think I'm supporting you the best I can. I'm not full on opposing you. I am trying to work with the cards you have handed me. You alone. Without me. Without my consent. You made a decision without me. You acted alone and acted as if it only affected you since YOU were unhappy with your job and wanted change.
You don't think that in a partnership you should discuss these ideas with me? Essentially, you made a decision that affected both of us and acted as if I didn't matter in the equation. Imagine for a moment I had a full time university job and I just decided I didn't like it and I quit without telling you. Or imagine if I hadn't discussed with you every bloody time I was offered a class, and when I wanted to quit the kindergarten job, I didn't just quit, I discussed it with you. I asked if I should even go back and you said yes, even when I hadn't wanted to.
You used to act like my opinions mattered. You didn't have to say it. You included me in every decision you made. What changed? Why don't I matter anymore?
Quality time and spending time with me used to be important, but now I feel like we are passing ships in the night. Even now we have been apart and you cannot set aside twenty minutes a day to Skype with me. You always have to go.
When you were in Prague, you were living your own life and perfectly happy. Maybe that was it. You decided you liked life without me. You rarely ever spoke to me when you were there, and you were resistant even to have me visit at all, which hurt so much. I wanted nothing more than to see you and you did not care. You were too busy for me.
I’m sure he was very busy when there…
I feel you're driving a wedge into our marriage, and you either want to work on it and help us come together or you do not.
I don't even know what you want out of life because you claim you do not care, that you will live anywhere, but then I tell you what I want out of life: to be close to England, to have good friends we care about, maybe to get my PhD, to travel, and every decision you are making moved me further away from those things. You do not once consider how we can both achieve our goals in life.
What are your expectations in life? Don't you care about where we live? Don't you care about the people we are around? Don't you care where our children grow up? Don't you care about being close to family? Don't you care about travel?
You spend too much time comparing us to your family. Their goals differ from mine. They work most of their lives and do not travel and that is what they want. Their life revolves around friends and their children's activities, and that is fine, if that's the life they want, but their main focus and their main drain is working, working, working. I do not want a life that is all work. You say this is life, and I say this is not living. I want to live not simply to eat, sleep, and breathe working. That doesn't mean I don't think we need jobs. That doesn't mean I don't think we need money, but it does mean that we need to achieve balance.
Again, I told you I wanted to be closer to England, and you say you don't care where we go, but you also don't tell me how you feel about that. Be straight with me. Be honest. If you never see yourself living in England, and that's not where you want to be then say so. Don't give me false hope, but then do everything in your power to work AWAY from that goal. Every job you have applied for has been in the States even when I said I'd prefer at least to be in Europe. And maybe that has to do with where you have to start, but then say that. Say you're working towards things that we both want, or tell me you do not want that.
He was telling me without telling me. I just didn’t want to face it that I didn’t matter.
Are we going to define goals together and work on them or are you going to continue to do your own thing? If so is it worth going forward? We need to be on the same page. We need to work together to have a life and marriage, because as it is you seem to be doing everything alone, and implying that you want a life alone.
I love you so much and it's so hard even to say this but you don't want to communicate with me. You don't want to let me in. Now is the time because we never have time. We rarely see each other lately and if I try and talk to you and say anything other than what you want to hear it's an argument when it isn't. You never hear what I am saying. You always respond around the issue and go off on tangents that aren't related to what I'm saying.
To me living to work isn't life. Travel and family are important. If you don't care where you live or if you have a life rich with friends what do you want? Do you want to be Smaug (the dragon in The Hobbit), lonely and hoarding the gold whilst everything around you falls apart? If you keep going on like this and making decisions only for you then I just don't see that I work in your life. I do not fit in anymore.
Relationships take work and attention and lately you're saying all the wrong things. I ask for more time with you and you tell me you can't text me in the corporate world and you'll have to travel minimum 25%. Do you hear yourself? Are you telling me that your job will leave no time and attention for our marriage? If so, why continue? Why not just work and keep all your money to yourself since I simply drain everything. Your actions and words are screaming at me – and they are simply saying that I no longer fit in your vision for life – whatever that vision is because all you tell me is you need more money.
You're not trying to make me happy like you used to. I think you love me, but I am not prioritized.
You maybe got my daydreaming impression that material possessions are important to me, but that's mistaken. Yes, I enjoy things but more money just brings upgrades but not happiness. What makes me happy is time with you but you continually act like I am a nuisance and I don't brighten your day anymore. When you'd come home I'd race to the door to hug and kiss you and I stopped as soon as you began pushing me away.
You've pushed away the loveliness in our marriage and poisoned and labeled it as nuisance. The fact I wanted to hang on you and kiss you at home. Gone. You always had more important things to do. Our evenings too often are spent apart in different rooms because your show is more important, or if we are in the same room scrolling on Facebook is more important. You're too tired for me, too busy for me, too wrapped up for me. And that is what you want. Clearly. You aren't working on changing at all.
Are you going to tell me what you want from life? Are you going to make an effort to make our marriage important again? Are we going to work together, or do we need to be apart?
Please call or Skype, and talk to me. These things need to be discussed. They cannot further be ignored. You keep saying you don't want life without me, but what are you doing and saying to say otherwise?
I love you with all my heart and it's so heartbreaking that things have come to this stage, but something needs to change.
Here I am reading these back and thinking I’m clearly delusional but his actions did say one thing and his words another. He kept saying he was married for life. I am not sure if he ever responded to my ramblings, though.
Email from Elaine to Benoit: After he dropped the bombshell and told me about the move, 29 July 2015
For context, the emails above were from November (and this was a few months prior when he first told me).
Subject: I love you
Darling,
I've really been wrestling with my feelings on moving since last night. I understand all your reasons for wanting to move into a job so quickly, and I'm not opposed to it at all, but five years is a long time. I know you do not care where we move and what you do as long as you're earning the money, but I do, and I really think we are missing the point of life.
As I'm getting closer to the concept of what I really want is to settle with you and have a family – even if that means only one or two holidays a year together (I can see all the places I want to eventually – it will take time) – I feel that it's so important to be close to those I love and who support me and us. I want my children to grow up around a support network. I want to have friends. I want to have family. I want you by my side always.
You're being very uncompromising and worrying to me in saying that you'll make any decision and have no preference. Five years is a very long time – we have only been together three and so much changes in three years – just think of five?
I know you're making all of these decisions because you think it will improve our future chances, and you're absolutely right. Having more money will help us tremendously. It will improve our lives, but if we aren't around those we love what have we gained? I know you do not agree with me here at all, but I have to tell you how I'm feeling.
I hope you know that I will support you to the ends of the earth in any way you decide, but you have to know how I feel. I know you feel like this is me "arguing" with you, but you've got that all wrong. I am never arguing with you on this point. Like I said, this is OUR life, and the decisions you make (the decisions you are seemingly making alone) affect us both. I love and respect you tremendously and I know you'll always make decisions that are the best for us both, but you're leaving me feeling alone and frightened about our future, and how things aren't going according to the plan I had imagined at all.
Pah! No, he will not make any decisions that are best for you both because you don’t factor in, Elaine, obviously.
I was chatting with Pam last night via WhatsApp and this is some of what I said. I didn't intend to tell her, but it was weighing heavily on me:
Pam: [about our trip yesterday] I wish I could've come with you x
Elaine: I wish you were here. I'm really really really starting to feel I want to live close. I wish I could so badly. It will be 5 years or so before [Ben] even looks for jobs in England because it's all about the money for now...
Pam: I wish you lived near too. We'd be like sisters from a different mother. xx You really are my best friend and I love you x
Elaine: I feel the same with you. I love you so much. It's nice to know I'll always have someone around who cares. Besides my husband. :P But you know what I mean.
Pam: Elaine, don't be silly. You know you're loved by all of us (but me more ;))
Elaine: I don't mean I don't feel loved by all of you. I just know you're always there.
Pam: I know what you mean, silly. I'm just being daft.
Elaine: I'm really going to miss my friends. And my home. And [Ben] is adamant that he has no plan and doesn't care where we live as long as it pays. And I hate that. Because it matters to me. Life isn't about making money. I don't want to be miserable but have thousands saved.
Pam: I know, sweetheart. I know what you are trying to tell me. Have you spoken to [Ben] about how you are feeling? xxx
Elaine: Yes. He's just in this mood I don't understand. When I ask him for a plan he just gets angry and says, "I don't want to have the same argument over and over" but I didn't think we were arguing. Asking him what he wants from life isn't really badgering. It's a life we are sharing and I'm feeling unsettled by his need to press the "reset button" on our life. That's what he's calling it. He wants to "reset" and start over. Not without me or anything but it's stressful. I wanted to be settled and to have a baby in England next summer. And all of that will be pushed back.
Pam: Is it since you've come back? Or was he considering leaving the Army before this?
Elaine: He had considered it in the past, but not seriously. It's to do with seeing his father if he's sick. He doesn't want to be owned by the Army. He doesn't want to work 14+ hour days with no reward. I get it. I'm not worried that he wants to leave the Army. Just that he wants to do it so fast. He wants to start a new job on January 15. He will leave the Army December 15. We'd come to England for Xmas I think and then move to a new life like that. So suddenly.
Pam: I can understand that too, but is there not another way of achieving a high standard job somewhere closer? x
Elaine: That isn't a priority to him. He doesn't care if we are in Texas, Dubai, Norway, New Mexico, wherever.
Pam: Has he handed in his notice already?
Elaine: He simply doesn't care. He's trying to. He has to get the Lieutenant Colonel to sign his papers and no one wants to lose him so he's dragging his feet, which is pissing [Ben] off.
Pam: If they offered him a promotion would he stay?
Elaine: They tried. He got an offer to teach at West Point in upstate New York, but they'd send him to get a master's in something he doesn't want it in. And either way the money isn't any better. The pay scale is mostly set. It's worrying. I've never seen him so hell bent and so illogical. But to him it all makes perfect sense.
Pam: Oh, Elaine. It's so difficult. I can't imagine how you must be feeling. [Ben] loves you and I'm sure he feels that he's trying to make a better life for you both.
Elaine: I know that's what he wants and maybe it will be better in the future, but it's hard to go through it now. We go to Frankfurt this weekend to meet with the headhunter company. They basically do interviews and stuff for him and they will find him a job in his salary range. They do all the job hunting work.
Pam: Maybe they will be able to settle some of your worries, and if you are involved then you could suggest places that you would/wouldn't be happy to go. I think you should sit down with him and tell him our fears and worries, and be honest about your feelings. x I love you, hun, please try and get some sleep. I will try and ring you tomorrow during the day if I can. xx Love you xxx
I hope this doesn't upset you that I said these things to Pam. I love you and I'll always support you, but I want you to see things from my perspective too.
I know you have many worries on your shoulders, but you'll always be successful wherever you are.
Please understand my perspective too.
I love you, darling xxx
The fact that he considered any open discussion a threat to him and I always expected him to respond with anger was definitely not a good sign. He never answered any of my emails. I am not sure we ever discussed anything in person and he was never prepared to see anything from my perspective because, quite simply, I don’t think he gave a fuck about my opinion.