Where Things Stand and Why

When the Hot Bench episode that had my case against Denise Santos aired on November 1, I received a lot of reaction messages. Those were posted here.

Strangely, I received several on Messenger (I really don't like Messenger as it caused problems back in May) from people (all women) I don't even know. Although they said they saw the show and were all in support of me, I did not feel it prudent respond to them, just in case they were some sort of set-up.

Here's one of them:

Hi saw you on Hot Bench..you seem so nice..i was hoping you got everything you sued for..wanted to say im sorry you didn't.  I hate to see anyone taking advantage of someone..which she obviously did.

I saw those yesterday after I checked in to the RV park I'm at in Topeka, Kansas with a decent Wi-Fi (I've been on the road since October 30). After reading them, I hit "ignore" and they have been erased.

To date, I have not seen the episode (not that I'm anxious to re-live it). A friend made a DVD of it and mailed it to me. I guess I'll view it when my trip is over.

Since the show aired November 1, I have refrained from making any comments except in emails or on Facebook with longtime known friends.

My only comments were as follows:

On what had transpired up to April:

Yeah, I would never thought a year ago that things would come to this. At that time, unknown to me, we were at the Narcissistic Stage 1 [Valuation]. It is amazing that Stage 2 [Devaluation] started in April of this year.

On what transpired after June:

Well, everything was enjoyable for a year. Our first fight came in January. We had a lot of fun in 2015. I would not take that away from her. I initiated "no contact" in June before we got to Stage 3 [Discard]. That rankles her because I reclaimed control. She tried "Hoovering" and had her flying monkeys spy on me. All to no avail.

I initiated "no contact" because I came to realize that I was being played as Denise was giving me a lot of nonsensical excuses on different things. I decided I had enough. It was intended to be a friendly parting.

Why things deteriorated after what was initially an amicable parting (despite the Small Claims case she knew was coming):

I was content so say nothing against her until she tried to set me up as some sort of stalker, which included a battle in court when she sought a temporary restraining order. That's when I fought back and ratcheted up the rhetoric [on this blog]. She dropped the action when my attorney and I came into court with months of text message transcripts showing that she was causing problems and was stalking me [we also came to an agreement there]. It is stupid to try to accuse someone of stalking when he was the one who initiated NO CONTACT.

Since the show was taped, Denise and I have had no contact with each other except on one occasion around September 18 that spanned two consecutive days. They began by her as angry and accusatory. But after a bit of discussion, the tone cooled down and became much more civil. The communications ended on a civil note, which is remarkable, considering everything. I am actually glad of that. (When I told Asya about all this, she said, "True true😅 looks like she is addicted to you☺")

The cases have been decided, payments have been made and that's that.

That's where things stand today. Nothing more, nothing less.