From Thai Restaurant To Visiting Family In Isan

If you’re looking for a way to describe me as a person before all this happened to me, you wouldn’t be too far off the mark if you called me green around the ears when it came to all things Thailand. My story starts when I was 42 years old. I was single. I had not had a relationship for as long as I could remember. And I got to the point where I’d come to terms with the fact that I most likely wasn’t going to find someone and have a family because it was starting to feel like it was nearly too late.

I was from a small town, which I don’t want to name, about an hour outside of London, and I commuted to work in London every day, something that I just thought was normal, something I was happy with, and something that I did religiously ever since leaving university over 20 years prior. I hadn’t once thought about going to Thailand. I hadn’t thought about leaving where I was from. And I guess you could say I was busy trying to appear that I was busy and that my life had meaning and purpose and I wasn’t just another cog in the machine.

This was a while ago now and my story does play out over quite a long period of time. We’re talking back in 2014. I remember it being winter because it was so cold and what happened was a turn of events that put my life on a very different trajectory.

The Thai Restaurant

A brand new Thai restaurant had opened up in my town and I hadn’t been in. Although I had driven past it countless times, there were already a few Indian and Chinese restaurants. And Thai was a cuisine I had never tried before. Although there were those meals that you could get from the local supermarket where you could try and put together your own version of a Thai green curry, yet following the instructions, what you’re left with I would learn a lot later on was nothing like your actual green curry in Thailand. That was my little Thai experience, trying to make dishes that I bought from the supermarket at home.

I decided though that I was going to go and try this restaurant. They had a takeaway as well and that’s what I did. I didn’t go and sit down. I just wanted to go and order some authentic Thai food or as authentic as you could get given where we were. I went one Friday after work, 3 or 4 months after it had opened. Walked in, ordered something, and sat down in the waiting area. I think that was my first time hearing people speak Thai.

The owner was from England, like I was, but his wife was Thai, and she was the one that did the cooking. She was the one that wanted to do this business, and he was the one who invested in it. I didn’t know this at that moment, but I would find out later on.

Meeting the Waitress

About 10 minutes after I ordered, I wasn’t expecting that I would be waiting much longer, but there were people coming and going all the time. And it was then that a girl walked in. I guess she must have been mid-20s, and I was in my own world, not paying much attention to what was going on, but she just smiled at me like it was the most natural thing. Said hello, and I said hello back. She then walked behind the counter and went and put on an apron, came back out, and it was clear that she was a waitress.

She just seemed so outgoing. If I was shy and reserved and an introvert, she appeared to be the exact opposite of that. Speaking to people appeared to come naturally to her, whereas to me it didn’t. I was very intrigued by her, and it was she who handed me my takeaway when it was ready. The first thing she said was, “You like spicy, na?” A word that people seem to use in Thailand I would later find out. “You like spicy, na?” I just said, “Absolutely not. Thai food spicy.” She said her English was broken, but still very understandable.

I wanted to speak to her. I wanted to say something, but I was so shy and out of place that I didn’t know what to say. But she said when I was just about to walk out, “Don’t worry. Not spicy like in Thailand.” And to that I said, “How long have you been in England?” Those words came out of my mouth without me thinking about what I was actually saying. She just said, “6 months.” And I asked her if she liked it. And she said, “It’s okay, but I like Thailand more.”

I remember thinking all this talk from people saying that everybody wants to come to England. Everybody wants to be here because where they’re from is dreadful. To her, it seemed that she was there for another reason, not because she liked it. I didn’t know what that was yet.

Returning for Dinner

I left and enjoyed my takeaway, but she was something that I thought about every day throughout the weekend and the rest of the following week. I thought I would go the following Friday to the restaurant and maybe have a sit down meal. At the time, I didn’t know the connotations of a girl like her in the UK and working at a place like that. I didn’t know anything about Thailand, but I did go back the following Friday, not expecting anything, but kind of inquisitive, wondering if she’d be there again.

She was there the following Friday, and I did go and take a seat at one of the tables in the restaurant. It was only a small restaurant, but the food I had the previous week was great, so that was my excuse for being there. Although, I just wanted to see her again. She was the one who came over to take my order, but she didn’t recognize me. I felt a bit dumb because I hoped she would recognize me, but again, there were many people going into that restaurant all the time, and she probably spoke to tens of people every day. She was still very bubbly and lively and talkative. And when I told her I had a takeaway last week and I came back because the food was great, she said, “Yes, I do remember you. Thank you for coming back.”

It just felt like because I was there, I had to say something. So, I said to her, “Last week, you said you’ve been in the UK for 6 months. You said it’s okay. I’ve never been to Thailand before, but are you just here to work?” I felt like I might have been a bit nosy, but she was so talkative that I bet it wasn’t a question she felt uncomfortable about answering. She said that she met her husband about 3 years ago in a town in Thailand called Pattaya. I had never heard of Pattaya before, but she said she met her husband there. They got married and he wanted her to go to the UK with him. She even went on to talk about now, this was a very brief conversation when I was ordering my meal “I wanted to stay in Thailand, but he wanted to come here and that’s what we did.” She said, “We’re hoping to retire in Thailand in the future,” telling me she was just working because she was bored. I think that was it.

I kind of sat there and she walked away, brought me my drink not long after and my meal not long after that. And in a way, I was a bit upset. I was hoping she was just there to work and she didn’t have a husband. But that kind of made me feel really upset. It really did.

That restaurant became one of my go-to places. Not only was the food amazing, it was affordable as well in comparison to what I used to spend at the Indian restaurant. If you’re going five times a month and you’re saving 5 quid a time, then it does add up. It became a place I went often and before long we were on very good speaking terms, as well as I was with one of the other people that worked there, a much older Thai lady who was also married, but I just didn’t feel as friendly with her.

Becoming Her Confidant

It was a few months of me going in there at least once a week. Yet the last time I was there and she was serving me and she recognized me all the time, but this time she was upset about something and I didn’t have to ask her what happened. She just said she’s having problems with her husband. She said he likes to drink and I don’t know why she was giving me so much private information about her relationship, but she was talking as if she needed someone to talk to. And I thought, how awful.

More weeks go by and I’m still going to that restaurant and it’s like she’s starting to confide in me. It’s like she’s trying to talk with me about things that are going wrong with her life. And I was happy to listen. I was happy to be a shoulder to cry on. And if I actually think about it, and this is very embarrassing, I guess I was a guy who was hoping that if her marriage collapsed, I would be able to step in and take over. Crazy, I know, but we all have our little quirks.

I told her once after it was clear that her relationship wasn’t going well as the weeks had gone by, “If you ever need anyone to talk to, don’t hesitate. You can always call me.” I told her, “My house isn’t far away. Call me if you need to.” And I took out my phone and showed her my number. She took out hers and jotted it down and said she would call me. Didn’t actually expect her to call, but I really hoped she would.

I didn’t have to wait long.

The First Call

The restaurant had become my go to every Friday, and the Saturday and Sunday were just my days to relax, do a bit of gaming, wind down, and get ready for the next week of work. I was halfway through a film that Saturday evening, and my phone started ringing. I’d given her my number, yet I didn’t know what hers was. That number that showed up, I didn’t recognize, but I always answered my phone regardless. It was her. When I knew it was her, my heart started racing like, “Wow, she’s actually called me.” I couldn’t believe it.

And she said she’s just finished her shift and she doesn’t want to go home because her husband is being not nice to her. She said that I said I could call if she needed anybody to talk to and she asked if I wanted to go to the pub for a drink. I had to ask her if she thought that was a good idea. There were only two pubs in the town. If we go to one of them, then maybe your husband will find out. She thought for a second and said, “I suppose it’s not a good idea.” There was a bit of silence on the line before she had a chance to think. “Perhaps it’s not a good idea.” I just said, “You can come round to mine if you want.”

Before I had a chance to hope that she would say yes, she’d already said yes, asking for directions, which I told her. She said she’d be there soon. When she hung up, I couldn’t believe it. I hadn’t had a girl in my house for over 10 years. I hadn’t been in a relationship for about the same amount of time. And now, this really stunning Thai girl, who I found out was 26, was going to be coming around to my house because she’s having problems with her husband. I didn’t know if she’d even show up. I mean, I thought she would, but things like this just didn’t happen to somebody like me.

Sure enough, there was a knock at the door not long later, and it was her, and she’d brought two bottles of wine, saying she wanted to have a drink. Luckily, I’d thought to go and have a shower before she arrived to make myself look presentable, because the weekend was my time to let go and let loose. I had just about enough time to get ready before I heard that knock at the door.

The First Kiss

She came in and asked, “Where are the glasses?” I told her the kitchen, and she followed me there. And I’m trying to be cool. I’m trying to be calm and collected, but inside I’m terrified. I’m nervous, and I’m lost about what I’m meant to do. I took out some wine glasses from the cupboard, found the bottle opener, and asked which one she wanted to open first. I opened it, poured the drinks, and handed hers to her. But she did something I wasn’t expecting. She took the drink out of my hand, put it down on the table, and grabbed hold of me, pulled me towards her, and she kissed me.

I definitely wasn’t expecting that. And pretty much as soon as she did it, she stopped, saying, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.” I told her not to worry about it. I just said, “Let’s go and sit down.” So, we went into the living room and I guess we spent three or four or maybe even 5 hours together. And she spoke about everything that was going wrong with her marriage. The way she described her husband he was loud, he was obnoxious, he was stubborn, he was violent, he was selfish, he was everything that you wouldn’t want a person to be. And I felt dreadful for her. I didn’t know if what she was saying was true or false. But the way she had so much emotion in her voice when she was talking about it, the way it felt so real for her, there was no way I could have thought that she was lying to me.

We polished off those two bottles of wine and she said she got up and left. I felt like I wanted her, but the problem was she was married. The good thing was the person she was married to didn’t appear to be a very nice person, so I didn’t have to compete very hard with him. “Compete” was a word that I was actually using and it was going through my mind at the time, as ridiculous as that might sound, but that’s what I was thinking.

I couldn’t sleep that whole night. I wanted to send her a message or call, but I didn’t. I thought that might come across as being too keen. But again, I didn’t have to wait long for her to call again. She called me the following day, Sunday evening, after she’d finished her shift at work, asking if she could come again, and she did. And that time, she spent the whole night.

Her Marriage Is Falling Apart

I knew what I was doing was crazy because she was married. But everything she said, it really seemed like her marriage was on very rocky grounds and was about to end soon. And I’m not going to give everything away. I want to tell you what happens later on and leave you thinking about things. But that following morning, I think we both had a hangover. But she said she made a very big mistake by getting married to her husband because of everything about him that’s so wrong. But she’s scared of him and doesn’t know what to do. She said if she could do anything, she wanted to stay with me instead.

I couldn’t believe it when she said that to me. Here she was saying that she wanted me more than her husband. And at that point, I wanted her more than I wanted both my arms. As stupid as that sounds, but it was true. I said to her, “If that’s what you really want, I would have to go and speak to your husband, see if I can help you to get divorced from him. Maybe if you’re not getting on, maybe that would be better for him as well, and I’m happy to do anything.” She just said, “No, it probably wouldn’t be a good idea.” But I even said, “I don’t have to go as someone who wants to be with you. I can just go as a friend.” But she kept resisting.

She left not long after, and I was thinking, what’s her husband going to say when she arrives back after having spent the whole night away? I was worried for her, but she told me not to be.

Asking Me to Confront Her Husband

I didn’t hear from her again, and I didn’t call until Wednesday. I thought if I didn’t hear from her by Friday, I would call then. But it was Wednesday when she called, asking if she could come again after she finished her shift. And that time she said that she’s made her mind up. She said she doesn’t want to stay with her husband anymore and she wants to be with me instead. She asked if there was anything I could do to help.

At this point, because I didn’t have her with me all the time and I didn’t know if it was going to be possible, and because I wanted her as much as I did, and in a way, my mind was playing tricks on me, I just said, “Whatever you want, just let me know.” I started to tell her that ever since we met, I’d felt things for her that I hadn’t felt for anybody else. And if you don’t want to be with your husband and you want to be with me, let me know and I can help. She just said she doesn’t want to go back to see her husband because she’s scared of him and asked if I could go. I thought that was probably a very bad idea, but if that means that when I get back home she’s going to be there waiting for me, maybe I will. I thought about it and told her I would. Crazy to think about, insane to think about, but I did.

She told me where the house was and I made a plan that I would just say that I went to a restaurant a few times and she was having problems and she asked if I could help. I was just a friend. That was what the plan was.

The Confrontation

It was one of those occasions. I was there in the car thinking about what to say all the way there, planning out the perfect lines as soon as the guy opens the door. But all that gets lost when you’re in the moment because it’s all too real. I knocked on the door, the guy answered, and I explained as clearly as I could in a way that didn’t appear like it was my fault. But his reaction wasn’t what I was expecting.

“She’s been trouble the moment she arrived in England,” he said. I asked him what he meant. “As soon as she came, as soon as she arrived in England she’s been trouble.” What kind of trouble? I was trying to push him to get him to tell me what trouble you’re talking about. It felt like he didn’t want to say. He did say though that bringing her to England was the most stupid thing he ever did. And if she wants to leave, fine. But he doesn’t have any money. He can’t give her any money. She can’t have any of his money. He did say that three times.

When he started talking about money, I thought to myself, not once has she talked about money with me. Not once has money been involved. And I said, as far as I know, she’s struggling. She does want to leave you, but money isn’t something she’s ever talked about. When he started talking about money, I still didn’t know what was going on. And he said, “If she wants a divorce, and she’s willing to do that divorce, I’ll be the first person to sign the papers.”

I left quite puzzled, not really understanding what had just gone down. I was expecting him to be heartbroken, angry, and furious. I expected him to feel disrespected, but from what I gathered, he just appeared to be that getting a divorce for him sounded like it would be something he wanted to do. I would just like to say that he was well within his rights not to say anything about anything to me because it was none of my business. I just wish, I mean, I wish beyond all wishes that he’d given me a little bit more of a heads up as to why the thought of getting divorced so easily from his wife sounded so great to him. I guess I’d entered a world that I simply didn’t understand.

Her Divorce and Moving In

When I returned to my place and told her that he seemed to be okay to get divorced, she breathed a huge sigh of relief. I did say to her that he mentioned the fact that he doesn’t have any money to give her for getting a divorce. And she said something that I didn’t understand at the time. She said, “Story of my life,” or something to that effect. It was as if, now looking back, she went into this with him believing she was going to get something. She didn’t get what she expected, but it was his fault according to her.

At the time, I felt so happy because I’d never felt like somebody wanted me before. And it was a feeling that I couldn’t get enough of. She asked me if it would be okay if I could go and get her things. Didn’t know what she meant. What do you mean, get your things? You want to bring them to my place. I thought she meant that she wanted to keep her things with me for the time being until she found somewhere else, but she was insinuating that she actually wanted to move in with me. I felt that was so quick and I didn’t really know what to say. But when you’ve got a beautiful girl in front of you asking if she can move into your house, who you think is going through a very difficult divorce because of everything she said about how her husband isn’t nice to her and how you feel you can step in and help, you’re not going to say no. And I didn’t say no. I said, “If that’s what you want, let’s do it.”

To have her living with me was a very strange thing, but it was also, I felt at the time, one of the best things that ever happened to me. Eventually, she got divorced a couple of months later. And it was after that when I started hearing a few things from friends of friends or acquaintances that her ex husband was telling people that he dodged a bullet, how getting divorced the way he did had saved him. I didn’t know what he meant, and I chose to ignore it. People are always very opinionated and one sided, and some people could be on his side, and some people on her side, and I was definitely on her side.

Building a Life Together

I told her everything about me: my job, how much money I had, how much my house was worth, everything. I just thought that’s what you did when you meet someone. You learn about each other. I learned about her. She was from a part of Thailand called Isaan. I hadn’t heard of that. Apparently, it was the northeast of the country. And as I said, she worked in Pattaya where she met her ex husband. I didn’t know anything about Pattaya, but I guess one simple Google would have told me everything about Pattaya that I needed to know.

From then, she was just living with me and I had someone to come home to after work. I had someone to spend time with, someone to do things on the weekend with, and I felt like she made my life so much better. She kept telling me that I was the best thing to ever happen to her. When a girl says that to you, especially someone like me who hadn’t had much luck in his life, it was very exhilarating.

Planning a Wedding in Thailand

She lived with me for just under a year, and by that time, I was ready to get married. I was ready to have a family with her. I was ready to be with her for the rest of my life. She always said that that’s what she wanted, but she did say she wanted to go to Thailand. She wanted me to go to Thailand to see where she was from, to meet her family, and to do the Thailand side of things, and I thought that would help me to learn more about her.

I was up for going to Thailand for a few weeks. It sounded like an amazing thing to do. We decided that we would get married in Thailand. It was supposedly very easy to do that, and I would be introduced to her family, and I could learn about her world, and then we’d return to England and just get on with things.

The First Trip to Thailand

My life, ever since I met her, had become so much better and more exciting, and I just felt it was getting better as the days were going by. I couldn’t wait to go to Thailand for my first time in Thailand, my first time in Asia, and my first time out of Europe. It was really the pinnacle of my life up until then.

She talked about Thailand so much ever since we met that I felt like I knew exactly what to expect. But when we arrived, it was nothing like I expected. I wouldn’t say that Thailand changed my life and made me want to change what I was doing with my life. My initial impression was that it was an interesting place, different from anywhere I’ve been before, but I don’t think I was somebody, as you hear many people describe themselves as being, who felt like Thailand changed me. Bangkok was an endless sprawl of concrete hardly any green spaces anywhere. Although there was one quite close to the hotel we were staying at, just over the intersection when we were there.

She was really guiding me on the places that we went and where we went in Bangkok and the places that we didn’t go. I didn’t know much about Thailand or the bar scene or anything like that. And it was like if I think about it she was trying to avoid certain places, not talk about certain things, as if to try to keep me in the dark about that side of Thailand. I didn’t know at the time that that’s what she was doing.

I could see how happy she was in Thailand. I could tell that’s where she wanted to be. And it made me think that when she first went to England, it must have been a very big thing for her, uprooting her life away from everything she knew and everything that gave her her identity.

Visiting Her Family

Next was visiting the family, which I was apprehensive about, although I needn’t have been. That’s when you understand that there are two sides to Thailand. There’s the modern, huge city, expensive malls, expensive designer shops in those malls, restaurants that sell steaks that cost more than some people earn in a whole month. Yet, the village was like it was caught in a different period and a different century. And although they had electricity and internet and other modern conveniences, the houses themselves were not like the houses that you would be used to. We hear stories about how our own countries were in the past where houses used to share outside bathrooms. And while her family didn’t have to share a bathroom, they had their own, it was still outside and it wasn’t anything that I felt like I could ever get used to. Not that I thought I needed to because we weren’t there to live.

After we’d been in the village for a few days, we already got married by then. She said this is where she wanted to live in the future. She showed me all the family’s land that they owned and used for farming. And one thing that really interested me was there was a big piece of land not sure of the Thai conversion, but it must have been about 5 acres. She would point at little bits of this land saying, “This belongs to Mama. This belongs to Auntie. This belongs to cousin, this belongs to Uncle,” and so on. And it’s like I bet the family started with a huge piece of land that through the generations got divided into smaller and smaller plots. I wonder what farming in Thailand would be like in the next hundred years. Pieces of land a meter square because it’s been passed down so many times. But I guess that’s the problem that they’ll have to come to later.

I got to see the appeal in terms of the scenery, in terms of what it was like there and how laid back it was. But at that point in my life, I wasn’t ready to quit my job and do anything like that. And she didn’t appear to want anything like that anytime soon. It was, though, like she was planting a seed. Like this has got to happen at some point. I don’t care if it’s now, 5 or 10 years, but this is going to happen. And that’s how we left it.

Her brother wasn’t there when we arrived in the village about the same age as her, maybe two years older, but he came the day before we were due to leave. He didn’t speak any English, but it was great to meet him. She seemed to feel a lot better now she’d seen her brother, who she said was a very important person in her life. And with that, we left. We were married and we returned back to the UK.

She was on a spouse visa from her old husband and we managed to fix that so she could extend that when the time came to be married to me. And from there, I just thought it was going to be happily ever after. I felt like our lives really came together after that trip to Thailand and like we were putting in place a plan that if we followed, we would be able to follow her dreams to retire there one day. She became my life. She became what I was working for. She became what made me happy. And I felt like the turn of events that saw me meeting her in the first place were so fortuitous that I couldn’t believe I’d been so lucky.

The Cracks Begin to Show

About a year or so since we got back, we’d already got a joint bank account set up where our savings were. We’d already put her on the deed of the house. I know how that might sound. It might sound ridiculous, and it was, but I was a very western minded person. I’d seen what my friends had done when they got married. I’d seen my parents have joint bank accounts and joint ownership of things, and my dad always worked, and my mom was a stay at home mom. I didn’t think I was doing anything out of the ordinary.

If I take a step back and think about that, my house was worth about £200,000 and now she owned half of it. I had about £100,000 in the savings account and she had access to it. I mean,, it was one of those where we both needed to sign to take the money out, so she couldn’t steal from me but it was just what I thought people did. About £300,000 of my total value now belonged to the both of us.

That was when she started pushing, trying, and saying that maybe we should move to Thailand sooner than we originally talked about. I could see how much it meant to her and I could see that that’s what she wanted to do. It was like she was trying to bring this event closer. I told her that as far as I was concerned, we didn’t really have enough money to be able to do that yet. It might sound like a lot, but it’s got to last us for the rest of our lives, so it’s not that much. And I think she understood it and stopped talking.

The First Crack Appears

I guess this is where things start to take a bit of a turn for the worst. When I started to think about things in a different way, when I started to find out things about her that I didn’t know about up until then, that was when I realized that I’d thrown my lot in with her. And apart from the fact that we were two people, in a financial sense, we were like the same person. Everything was equal. And I’m not saying that I was so concerned that she was actually a different person from who I thought she was. But I was concerned that her vision and her dream of moving back to Thailand and building a house in her village and living there was something that was so much more important to her than I originally thought.

I was okay with that. I’d already told her I’m good with that when the time’s right. But to her, it seemed like that time was right now. I thought we were at least 10 years away from doing something like that. I think that’s when the first crack started to show. Not long after, I was starting to come to this realization. And you have to understand that on the surface, our relationship was exactly the same as it was in the beginning. We’re always together. We’re not fighting. She’s not demanding. She’s not going out herself. We’re not arguing or anything. Everything feels normal. But I was starting to feel this underlying sense of unease. What I found out later, not long later, was when that unease started to feel like dread and panic that what I thought was going on, what I thought was happening, and who I thought my wife was, I might have been wrong about every single thing.

It was around now that I got the sad news that my father had died. I’d always been reasonably close to my father. We saw each other once or twice a week. He never got on with my wife, but never said why. And I never paid too close attention to that. When he died, he left me some money, about £180,000, which went straight into our joint bank account after going through the probate process, which is when I was starting to think that the whole legal system in the UK was built to make solicitors money. It was also the time when I was starting to think that I didn’t really want to live in the UK anymore. It was my father dying and learning about just how ridiculous certain things were at home that I didn’t even think about before. I was now open to the idea of Thailand because we had this extra money. It was unexpected, but I still didn’t want to rush into anything or try to change anything yet. But it was clear that since that money arrived, my wife was starting to feel like she was able to control things more.

Not long after this, when I was still grieving my father, something happened. Now, this thing that happened was probably one of the most awful things that ever happened to me. Yet, it was also the thing that happened to me and how I reacted and how I behaved after finding out that would quite literally have a huge determining effect on the rest of my life.

Buying Her a Computer

It was my wife’s birthday and every birthday I bought her anything she wanted as long as it was under £1,000. She said she wanted a laptop. She didn’t have a computer. She didn’t really spend much time online aside from on her phone. It sounded like it wouldn’t be throwing money away could actually be a worthwhile birthday present. So, I took her to the shop and she picked out a MacBook slightly more than £1,000, but I thought it was something that could add to her and give her something to work on. And maybe she’ll find something to do.

I guess I’d forgotten to say that as soon as she was living with me, she stopped working at that Thai restaurant. I don’t know why I didn’t mention that before, but anyway, I thought I should put that in now. So, I got her this laptop, took it home, unboxed it, and helped her to set it up. It was quite clear that she wasn’t very able to use the computer. I found out quite early on that she left school when she was 12 and spent time helping her family on the farm. Lots of things like that shocked me. I suppose her inability to use that computer would be why I was able to find out what I did.

I never questioned how much time she spent on her phone ever since we were together because I too spent a lot of time on my phone. Occasionally on the internet, reading the news, just normal things. And I thought that’s what she was doing. When she had the computer, she was doing that, too. But when she had it, she was using that to message people back in Thailand and talk to friends and watch things and, you know, do what people do. She was always asking me for help and I was always willing to help. I worked with computers so it wasn’t difficult for me. I think because I was always on her computer, always helping her with things.

When she was asleep and I woke up one morning earlier than I usually did and I decided to go on her computer, it was a lot nicer than mine. I just thought I’d have a bit of a play around, not thinking anything. You know the feeling when you do something with a feeling deep down like you’re hoping to find something, but you don’t know what you might find. “I’m just helping her on the computer, so that’s why I’m looking. And I have every right to use it.” That’s kind of where I was mentally.

What I Found on Her Computer

I was just about to go back to bed, but I opened the photo app on the Mac and started scrolling around. That was when I saw a load of extremely inappropriate pictures that she’d obviously taken of herself. Now, I hadn’t seen these pictures before, and those sorts of pictures are usually the sorts that you only send to your husband. I hadn’t put two and two together yet, but I felt something was wrong. I guess that’s why I’d been looking at her computer in the first place. I knew something was wrong, and I started looking at everything. And then I opened the messaging app that she used. There was one person that she seemed to contact more than others her brother, the same guy who we’d waited for in the village before we left last time. I did think when it was clear that those pictures I’d seen were intended for him that he wasn’t her brother at all.

That was the moment where you think, “Oh, f***, what have I done? Not only does my house partially belong to her, not only are my life savings in a joint bank account with her, I’ve just found out this.” The only thing I could think of doing was quickly closing the laptop and running to the bedroom and starting shouting at her, asking her what she thinks she’s doing. But something stopped me before I opened the bedroom door. If she knows, it’s over. If she doesn’t know, maybe I still have a chance. I was 3 seconds away from slamming open the door and confronting her. But I stopped just in time.

It was a mess, but I knew I needed to keep it together while I processed this life-changing event that had just happened. I decided to go and sit in the kitchen and cook breakfast. What I thought the most sensible thing to do, what I thought the best thing to do was to actually cook breakfast and take her breakfast in bed. Nothing wrong here. Everything’s good. So that’s what I did. I’d never done that before. And I guess luckily she wasn’t clever enough to think, “Why is he doing this now?”

It did make me think back to her ex husband and what he said. And perhaps he found out things about her such as this, and that’s why he was so happy about the thought of getting divorced. That’s perhaps why he talked about money. He said she’s not having any of my money. And all these things are going through my head. I’m also thinking to myself, perhaps that’s why she divorced him and wanted me because she knew I had money and she thought I could be a better candidate to scam than her ex.

I was really a bag of nerves. But even though I found this out, I think I behaved in a way where she didn’t know I found anything out and she was just okay in the knowledge that everything was still the same. Life continues as normal, as normal as it could be. And I’m trying to put this side of things to the back of my mind whilst coming up with some kind of solution because the thought of my wife now made me feel sick.

Speaking to Her Ex Husband

I did go back and tried to have a conversation with her ex. I knocked on the door, he opened it, and I asked if we could talk. He just looked at me and said, “She’s your problem now, mate.“ And slammed the door on me. I knocked on the door again, and he opened it looking quite angry. But I was so desperate. I said, “Look, I’m going to say one thing and you can tell me where to go if you want, but if I could give you a couple of hundred quid, would you allow me an hour of your time?” He could tell I was serious and I had the cash with me. So, I handed him 250 quid and he said, “Go on then.” So, I went inside.

That’s when he spilled the beans about everything that happened. He said he met her in a place called Pattaya, just like I knew. I didn’t really know much about that place as I said, but he said he met her in a bar on a street called LK Metro. I had no idea where that was. So, actually and this is ridiculous but I had a notebook with me and I wrote down “LK Metro” in the notebook, thinking I would look at what that was later on.

He told me everything. Everything went wrong when she realized that he wasn’t going to give her control of his stuff. I was waiting for him to reveal the “brother,” but he never did. So I asked him, “What about the brother?” He said he didn’t know anything about that. I told him what I found out. And I think that was the time he actually let his guard down and said, “I feel for you, mate, but she’s your problem.” It was clear that everything she said to me when we met was all a lie. She tried to make me feel sorry for her and to make me feel like she was this innocent victim and he was a monster, whereas most likely it was the exact opposite of that.

When I left, he tried to give me the money back. I told him not to worry about it and left and that was it.

Making a Plan to Protect My Money

That was when I knew I needed to come up with a plan because if I didn’t and things went how she wanted them to go, she could end up in a much better position than me with her “brother,” who was not her brother at all, living a life that my money paid for. That was something I didn’t want to let happen. But the problem was, what was I going to do about it? She did own half my stuff.

The only thing I thought about was that we were in England. She doesn’t know anything about England. She doesn’t know how anything works. And if I can make her feel like she’s in control, if I make her feel like she’s everything to me and I love her more than anything, then when the time comes that she needs to place a little bit of trust in me, she’s not even going to think that she is placing trust in me because she thinks she has me wrapped around her finger exactly like she wants.

I didn’t come up with all this there and then. And it was a day-by-day process. Every time she goes into the other room to go on the computer, I know what she’s doing, but I don’t mind. I mean, I do mind. I hate it. But what I’m trying to say is that I became a better husband, a better provider, and a better everything, just to keep her where I needed her, waiting for something that was her idea that I could use against her.

It took me a long time to work things out. But that was what I needed to do. Let me just say this one more time. It was my plan to use any idea that she came up with that involved doing something big with our lives, such as moving to Thailand, against her. I didn’t know how I was going to do that, but I knew that I couldn’t just start coming up with something out of nowhere. It had to come from her.

Planning the Move to Thailand

Before I found out all these upsetting things about my wife, she was always talking about moving to Thailand. “When can we move to Thailand?” Ever since I got that inheritance, she talked about it even more. And what I’m doing is slowly appearing to warm to her idea. As if to say yes, I honestly think that perhaps now is the time. My house, my savings, and the inheritance I received we’re talking about close to half a million. And there were two outcomes. I have half of it, or I have all of it. And under no circumstances, at least I hoped, was I going to only get half of my money.

It was a very difficult situation. I was falling behind at work because I’m going through every eventuality and every possibility in my head. One thing that I kept telling myself ever since my father died, I felt like I didn’t belong in the UK anymore. Going to Thailand had opened up the possibility that there was so much more than home out in the world.

I was always drawn to the idea of her believing one thing, me saying I’m going to do that, and then flipping it around at the end and doing something different. I told myself the next time she talks about Thailand, I would drop everything and say, “Let’s just go.” I even thought I would quit my job. I had more than enough money if things worked out to not work again. And I couldn’t sleep in the same bed as my wife anymore, who was sending pictures to her so-called brother, pictures that she would never have thought to send to me.

Booking the Trip to Thailand

We didn’t have to wait very long. In fact, it was the next day after I’d come up with this plan at work. In the morning before I was due to go, she said, “I can’t wait to go back to Thailand. You think we can go this year?” We hadn’t come up with an idea about when we were going to go yet, but I told her, “I have been thinking about it, and I can see how much you want to go. So, how would you feel if we went next week?” Her eyes lit up. “Really?” she said. And I just said, “Yes, I’ve been thinking about it. I’m starting to think perhaps we need to go and have a look and we need to plan and work everything out. What could we do in terms of everything we need to start our life there?” I told her we’ve got enough money now and I can see how much it means to her, so we need to go soon to find things out. I didn’t really have to ask her that question. It was obvious that she would have said yes.

So, it was arranged and that day at work, the company I’d worked for for such a long time, I quit, telling them I had an emergency and I can’t give you any notice. I was on good terms with them. I’d done a good job for them. And just like that, I didn’t have a job anymore. It felt amazing because I didn’t need it.

Now I think I was going above and beyond what I needed to have done just to keep my wife exactly where I needed her. I told her that I’d booked tickets for us to go to Thailand just like I promised and I’d even paid for business class because I think it’s time to start thinking about our future life. She was over the moon by that. She thanked me and, well, I felt very dirty for a lack of a better word with my wife now based on what I knew. But I couldn’t let on. I just did whatever I needed to do to appear normal.

We weren’t going to be moving to Thailand then. We were actually going for a month. The idea was to check things out, decide what we were going to do, and return back to the UK, sort everything out, and then let’s do it. I knew when it came to transferring any money, we both had to sign on the account. And I was very close to saying, “If this is what we’re doing, we will need to come back. If you don’t want to, maybe I can come back, but we need to change things now.” I decided against that because it felt like it could make her have a tiny doubt about things. I very much doubt she would have done, but that’s how ultra cautious I was being.

Returning to Thailand

We got to Thailand, stayed in Bangkok, straight up to the village, and there was a really nice hotel in the town close to her village where we stayed. Yet, as soon as we got there one evening, the following morning, she woke up very early saying she’s going to see her family. She was there all day and called me at 8:00 p.m. saying she’s going to stay with her family, and it was pretty clear that she was with her so-called brother.

We did spend a bit of time looking at land that she said would be perfect for a house. And I was always positive about everything she said. “What about this land? It looks amazing. I want to make sure you’re happy and comfortable with things, so let’s look at more. What about this one? It’s more expensive. Don’t worry about the money. Doesn’t matter about that. We need the perfect place because this is where we’re going to live for the rest of our lives.” It was like I was just trying to fill her head with confidence that she knew things were going her way.

She called me one evening when I was in the hotel saying she’s going to stay with her family overnight again. And I told her go right ahead knowing what she was doing. But it was one of those things you have to accept when it comes to the life or death situation of your own money.

By the end of that month, I’d already confirmed to my wife that we would be building a house. We were going to have a 5 million baht house, a three rai plot, her dream car a BMW 3 Series. Everything she wanted, we were going to have. And I told her, “Well, now we need to go back and sort everything out and then send the money to Thailand.” She even said, “Can you go and send it yourself?” And when I told her I can’t because you need to sign at the bank, she asked if there was anything we could do to not do that. I kind of wished I’d done what I thought originally, but said, “No, we need to do it together.”

I could see how excited she was at the prospect of her dream coming true. But her plan was to scam me and get all this money out of me, and I just had to continue to play along. I told her once we were back, we would need to put the house on the market, sell the house, and we need to get the money together. Then we can send it. We can’t do it too quickly because things take time. But don’t worry, we don’t need to rush. We’ll get there soon. With that, she kind of resigned herself to the fact that it could be a few months, even longer, before we’re back in Thailand. But in her mind, her plans were coming together so well.

The idea that I had and this is what the idea changed to when we were on the way back was when I got to see how much my wife wanted to be in Thailand, I could see how important it was to her to be there as quickly as possible. I thought about maybe trying to change things so that she could go back to Thailand and then I’d be free and clear. But in a way, I wanted it to be her idea.

Selling the House

From there, we arrived home. We put the house on the market, and I actually instructed the estate agency to put it on at a slightly higher price just to delay things. While she was okay over the first month of us being back, I could tell she was getting restless when we weren’t having much interest in the house. I put the price down, saying it’s going to take time, but I’m just being as calm and collected as possible. I’m telling her not to worry, things will happen soon. But it seems she’s getting desperate.

Sure enough, when we got an offer on the house after putting the price down, she said, “Now we have that. Is it okay if I go back to Thailand first?” I told her we needed to go to the bank to change things over so I can send the money when the house sells. This was the pivotal point because the only thing I didn’t want her to say was, “Can we send some money to Thailand?” Now, I already had an answer for that just in case she asked, but she didn’t. I don’t think the thought crossed her mind. I had this elaborate scheme going on in my head so much more elaborate than her scheme to scam me. She just said, “No problem at all.”

We went to the bank that day. Everything was changed over and I told her it’ll be 2 or 3 months. I did make a small sacrifice which wasn’t small, but small in the terms of everything and I said, “Because it could be 3 months, I’ll give you £5,000 so you can use that in the meantime, and then when everything’s ready, I’ll go too.” She said, “Okay.” A few days later, I took her to the airport, watched her check in for the flight, and said goodbye. And that was when I felt I was safe. I wasn’t there yet, but I was close.

I’d been doing a lot of research ever since I found out what I found out about countries where I could put my money. The country that kept coming back as a safe place was Singapore. I decided that this could be my best option. When the house sells, transfer the money to an account in Singapore, then start living my life free from my scamming wife. I didn’t know I would have to go to Singapore to open the account, but it appeared that I would. So, a couple of weeks after my wife left for Thailand, I left for Singapore. Because I had a big deposit, that was why it was easy to open. And that’s how things played out. I went to Singapore, a country I actually really liked, a lot more than Thailand, in fact. It was a lot more modern, a lot cleaner, and just a lot more my cup of tea.

I got my bank account set up, went back home. The house sale went through eventually, and at that time, I was continuously speaking to my wife. It’s clear that she’s in the village, and if I don’t call her, she’s not calling me. When we do speak, she’s saying, “I can’t wait to see you.” The lying? Well, I don’t want to be rude.

Leaving My Wife Behind

When the house sale finally went through, I sent everything to that account in Singapore. I didn’t need to work ever again because I had enough money and I finished it with my wife in the best way that I could. I called her and said, “I’ve changed my mind. I think you should stay with your brother.“ She played dumb when I said that. I just said, “Thank you very much for taking all those pictures and sending them to your brother who’s not your brother. So, I’ve changed my mind.” Then she started shouting, saying, “Don’t be stupid. We have plans. We have plans.” I told her I had a plan, too. And then she said, “Please, I will come back to England. We can fix.” Then I just told her, “I want goodbye.” And I hung up.

I never heard from her again. Never spoke to her again. And I spent the next 6 months traveling around the world on a budget because I wanted my money to last. I eventually decided to live in the country I’m living in today single and just the way I like it. If you’re interested in where I’m living, I’m living in Brazil. Never thought I would be a guy that lived in a different country. Never thought I would be a guy that had things happen to him like this. But in a way, my wife helped me get out of my shell. She helped me understand that there was a bigger world out there. But she also helped me understand that not everybody cares. Not everybody cares about you. Not everybody wants the best for you. And she didn’t want the best for me. She wanted the best for her at my expense.

That’s where I want to leave it. What should be abundantly obvious to anybody doing anything anywhere: don’t put what you have in jeopardy by involving somebody else. Because if you do, only bad things will happen. I was lucky. And most guys aren’t, and I saved myself.