I'm going out to dinner tonight with a friend. She's actually a coworker of Hubby's and he's been trying to get me to hang out with her for a while. We've been out a few times with her and her girls and I decided to make the effort to do a girls' dinner out. I'm such a lazy-ass when it comes to girlfriends. Best Friend and I rarely hang out, although that's a different story (all the times she's bailed on me, the continuous whining about money...) A have a couple of good friends at work, but we live 30-60 minutes away and after commuting every day during the week, it's hard to be motivated to go visit them. So this is a big step for me.

Anyway, Hubby's friend from work, I'll call her Karen, is having a shit time. Her husband is stationed in Afghanistan and has been there for at least a year. They've had rocky times in the past due to him cheating, which led to him being temporarily kicked out, and some issues with his daughter from a previous marriage. They have a daughter each from their first marriages and a daughter together. Both of Karen's girls live with them. The husband's daughter lives with her mom. She stayed with them for a while and caused a bunch of trouble, so Karen laid down the law and told her to go back to her mom. The daughter made up a bunch of crap about being abused, so DCF came and took away Karen's 2 biological daughters. They eventually got things straightened out, and the girls were returned. If I was in the same situation, I probably would've done the same. You don't mess with my kid and you don't do shit to get him taken away from me. Period. And from what I've gathered, her husband is fairly useless at home, in everything from dealing with his daughter to doing any housework, so he didn't step in and help with the situation. So she did what she could to preserve her family.

Her husband was recently giving her stress about wanting the daughter to move back in. She said absolutely not, given the history there, and the fact that he's still overseas. So he threatens to divorce her. They patch things up. Then she starts getting e-mails confirming his membership to an online singles service (the dumbass used their home e-mail to set up the account.) She confronts him, he gets pissy and changes the e-mail password. Then he starts accusing her of cheating on him. Apparently someone in his unit is married to another cop from work (both Karen and her husband are cops) who was spreading a rumor about Karen and a cop known for getting around. She isn't cheating and finally convinces him she's not. Then he comes back with some crap that she may hear a rumor that he's cheating, but he's not, he's only good friends with the woman, yadda, yadda. Well apparently they're so friendly, their commanding officer separated them so they no longer work the same shifts (sounds fishy to me, but whatever). They get things calmed down.

Then this weekend he tells her that after being away from her for a year, he realizes he can live alone and wants a divorce. She wants to keep the family together, although it sounds like mostly for the girls' sake. She's afraid he'll try to get custody of the younger (his) daughter, but the two girls would be devastated if separated. If you ask them, they're not half-sisters, they're sisters.
So dumbass husband then e-mails the girls and tells them he has a new girlfriend and is going to divorce their mom. Classy. And a hell of an emotional load to dump on your 5 year-old daughter and 12-year old step-daughter who considers you her daddy.

The next day he and Karen talk and work things out. No divorce (for now, anyways). I can only imagine what she and those 2 little girls are feeling right now. My opinion is that she should dump the guy, fight tooth and nail for custody of her younger daughter, and use his philandering and the closeness of the girls to her benefit. But that's just my opinion. And like they say, opinions are like assholes...