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Writer's pictureStephanie Nessen

Got Your Own Identity? Keep It!!


So I’m lying in bed one afternoon with the curtains drawn in a dark room, trying to relax through one of my afib events when my phone starts ringing. For me, when I’m having an afib event my heart starts pounding like it’s trying to jump out of my chest, and my heart rate is usually 140 – 160 bpm. I’m giving you this bit of info so you know how I was feeling to begin with. Not fucking comfortable at all.


“Hello?” Not even sure why I answered it since it was a number I didn’t recognize.


The voice on the other end asked “is Greg there?”


Great. Now it feels like my heart is pounding in my head too. “No” I reply angrily, “there’s no one here by that name.”


“Oh, OK, sorry to..” the voice starts to reply when I interrupt.


“Wait a minute”, I bark out, realizing that if I don’t take care of this now, they would call again.

“Did you say you were looking for Greg?” I asked the caller.


“Yes, Greg Simpson. He gave this number as a point of contact.”


OK, now I’m really freaking out and let me explain why. Greg Simpson is my ex-husband. Like almost 30 years ago my ex-husband!! Like I have had absolutely no contact with him for over 30 years ex-husband.


I not so calmly explain to the caller that no, I don’t know where he is and that I haven’t known that information for many a moon. Why was she calling me looking for him, I asked angrily. I’m assuming that she was lying when she said that he had recently left this number as a contact number, but who knows? And WTF???


I met and married my ex when I was very young, and we were only married for four years. We did not have any children or assets to speak of, so the divorce went through fairly quickly. We did not remain friends after we split – it was a matter of you go your way and I’ll go mine. That was until he and his new wife decided to forge my name on a check, and I had to deal with that, but that happened just after the divorce so in other words, a long time ago.

 



Here's the thing; even though we have been divorced and separated for over 35 years, I’m still getting calls from people looking for him. I haven’t had ANY contact with this individual for OVER 35 YEARS, and they’re still calling me. I have no idea if that caller was telling me the truth about him giving them my number, or where they got my number from. All I know is that for 35 years now I have been getting pestered by various people looking for him. Once about 10 years ago it was someone claiming to be from a Sherriff’s office in Florida. Other times it has been creditors.

 

My point is this – keep your own name. You can get married, and not take on a whole new identity. In today’s society a spouse doesn’t need to give up their identity. And the upside is you won’t have to deal with all the damn paperwork!  I’m talking at least 10 hours’ worth of forms for all the crap you’ll have to change. And if you’re already established in business, do you really want the confusion?


The funny thing is I’m a complete hypocrite! I (happily) carry my current husband’s last name. But having gone through the last few decades fending off my ex-husband’s creditors, etc, I would never do it again.

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