Hi there. So… I need help with my relationship with my ex husband. He struggles with a type of depression that I forget the name of and his parents think he is bipolar… for me.. I believe that my ex husband is litmus paper! All during our marriage, if I was good then he was good to me. If I had any negative feelings he would mirror them back. This happened in literally every part of our relationship and I when I noticed it, I realized I could save the marriage as long as I was always in a good place. I had to stay aloft my zen horse and never fall off or he would kick me when I was down, so to speak. It was exhausting! I tried all on my own for such a long time – thinking positive – listening to Abraham and Neville Goddard, and Marianne Williamson and.. and.. and.. all the teachers (before I found you).. but, if I had pms or Anything… all hell broke loose.. I was not allowed a bad day. He was allowed to battle his constant waves of depression – that I, naively thought I could help with – but I was not allowed a bad day. Double standards.

I had my own issues though… I had insecurities around my body and appearance and I think in my romanticized vision of marriage, I thought that if he could tell me how beautiful I was (like in every rom com every made!) then I could finally feel beautiful. I even asked him to do this for me, but he said no, that was my job. I get that you would agree with him. I get it too, now… but over time I kept thinking self loathing thoughts towards myself but hoping he would love me anyway. Well.. he did not.. he got meaner and meaner and meaner… he got abusive really. I had to set up safe houses for me and my kids because he began threatening to kill me. I know that I was the one who was meaner to me than anyone but having it come from outside of myself was truly terrifying. He would tell me how ugly I was and how I should fix my ugly face, and how he was planning on cheating on me, he would come after me like he was going to kill me then, while I would be cowering and crying and waiting to get my faced bashed in he would stop – because he didn’t want to go to jail… he was horrible, by the time we finally split, all I saw was a monster.

Now, he is with a much younger South American supermodel. Literally.

I want to be the type of person that can be emotionally mature enough to be around my ex and possibly even his girlfriend (she is tough for me too… besides being jealous of how gorgeous and young she is – she attacked me on Instagram with images of my own children at his request -he isn’t on instagram – when he was mad at me.. he gave her the gun and she pulled the trigger. A woman attacking another woman, a mother attacking the mother of the kids she spends time with! It’s hard for me to swallow. I want to not care though! I want this for me and for the sake of my kids.. but how? How can I spend time with someone who was and still is very cruel to me? How do you get that mature? Last month when it was time to give me child support he tried to skip town but I had something he needed, so I suggested a swap… he agreed at the last second and gave me a fake check and skipped town… so .. this is the type of human I am dealing with…. what do I do? I am sooo much happier when there is zero contact but we have three kids. They say the opposite of love is indifference and I want that for myself more than anything!!! Help!! Thank you!!!!