My husband is becoming unhinged. He’s someone I barely recognize. His emails and texts to me are getting increasingly nasty. One moment, pouring out his heart about how he always loved me, the next moment spewing hate. It’s Jekyll/Hyde behavior.

This behavior lends credence to his ex-wife’s claims that he became toxic to her after their divorce. That it was his behavior and words that turned their daughter against him. That caused her to distance herself from him, not speaking to him for several years.

It’s all making sense now. Like the final pieces in a puzzle.

I don’t recognize this person. Is this toxic spew coming from hurt and anger? He is ridiculous. He thinks he can have his cake and eat it too. He thinks he can be hateful to me while also openly grieving the loss of me, his best friend?

One moment he tells me he understands why I must file for divorce. The next moment he makes nasty accusations against me that are lies. Is he projecting? Perhaps. I never lied to him.

Now, he is denying having a sexual experience with a man. (Something his ex told me happened during his teen years, and that he confessed to her.) I don’t care that he’s gay. I’m not homophobic. I’m angry that I’ve been deceived about the nature of his sexuality.

I thought I was marrying a heterosexual man. But I didn’t. I married a closeted gay man who was unable to have heterosexual sex with a woman. I spent 13 years sexually frustrated, forcing myself to have lousy sex with him – which in itself is traumatic, because it was not what I wanted. It was what I thought I had to do.

He accused me several times of “giving up” during the marriage. He did this when I would (rarely) try to talk to him about his sexual dysfunction. I tried to avoid the topic, knowing how deeply it embarrassed him. I’m not a sadist. I don’t derive pleasure from exposing other people’s weaknesses.

But the loneliness and frustration made me resentful and sometimes, angry. His refusal to see a doctor or to try to solve the problem in other ways (supplements, losing weight, seeing a therapist, reading books about the issue, pleasing me sexually in other ways when he was unable to get an erection, etc) was wrong and unfair to me. He was prioritizing his ego and pride over my happiness.

And that’s the bottom line isn’t it?

It’s all about him. He’s lost his best friend (me). He’s lost the pleasant companionship. The evening walks. The talks on the front porch. The couch chit-chats in the mornings before the kids got up. Someone to do his laundry, clean his living spaces, share ideas that made his life better.

So because he’s lost these things, he now gets to be verbally abusive and send me nasty emails and texts.