[MyBrainIsBroken]

My wife didn't take anything except her clothes and toiletries for a long time. The first personal thing she took was a kewpie doll she'd had since she was a little girl. I hope she was working through some of her issues from her early childhood at that time.

I took D32 and our grandkids to NYC for a couple of days after Christmas. When we got home we found my wife had taken most of her stuff from the house. GD14 was so upset she called my wife and told her she wished she had a different grandma. The next day was New Years Eve. I was chatting on FB with my wife about some things GD14 said grandma had taken that belonged to her when there was a knock on the door and I was served with divorce papers.

My wife has a display case that's about 18 inches deep, 30 inches wide, and 40 inches deep that was completely filled with pretty glass, crystal, and ceramic pieces that I had given her over the years for anniversaries, Christmas, birthdays, and Valentines days presents. Very sentimental stuff like glass roses and lovebirds kissing. I couldn't believe it when she took that. GD14 asked her once what she did with it, whether she sat around and looked at it and she told her yes, that was what she did, she sat around and looked at it. Very strange.

I thought when she left all of her stuff there for so long that it was there because she didn't feel like she could be that person anymore. I thought that when she was ready for that stuff that she would be back to being comfortable with being that person again and that she would want to come back home then. Apparently I was wrong.

[bipolared]

H took most of the baby picture albums with him. D15 was recently asking about them b/c she wanted to look at them.  He had said, "I took most of the pictures and arranged them so I am keeping them here".  I guess that was his connection to the kids and also maybe part of their thing where they act as if our near adults are still little children.

[Absolutely Fabulous]

Mine took very little of his clothes from the NYC apartment.
After 3 failed attempts to get him to pick them up - I packed them up and put him in his car when he was at work.

He ransacked my upstate house taking a $1000.00 Miele vacuum. 
He took every tool and cleaning instrument - including all my brooms.
He took all my pots and pans and my kitchenaid mixer. Mind you- the man does not know how to cook.
He took all the liquor. But he left most of his clothes.

When I saw that the house looked like a burglar had trashed it, I changed all the locks.
That ended the ransacking.

I rounded up all his clothes that he left in the house 6 months after BD and gave them to Goodwill.
He never even asked about them.

Oh yes, and he stole 2 of our cats and gave them to OW!!
 

Really!? The evil things these MLCer's do, and for what? Mind blown.

[Absolutely Fabulous]

H took most of the baby picture albums with him. D15 was recently asking about them b/c she wanted to look at them.  He had said, "I took most of the pictures and arranged them so I am keeping them here".  I guess that was his connection to the kids and also maybe part of their thing where they act as if our near adults are still little children.

Weird, mine did the same thing. He has almost all of the pictures with him when the kids were little ( kids are 20,15 and 11). I mean really little. Come to think of it, I don't think he took many of our youngest pictures with him.

Luckily, I found some in the attic to take with me. Funny, he left the negatives... And left most of the pictures of him when he was a kid ( up to his teen years ), and all the pictures of his father who's now deceased. I have pictures of his grandmother, and aunt both deceased as well. It's like he took the pictures that stopped time for him where he wanted it to stop. Bizarre.

[ArmySpouse]

Nah, you're too much. I couldn't stop laughing. 

Army, they all go to extremes, they either take nothing/very little, to wanting the kitchen sink. They're running on emotions. I think that the OP is usually behind the wanting of all the stuff. After all, they have to stake a claim don't they? Now how pathetic is that?

Mine took so little that I was shocked that he didn't want more. He left all his tools, all his old uniforms ( expect for one set of dress blues ), all his old clothes, all his important papers except his birth certificate/social security card, none of his artwork, or Ball memorabilia. How's that for not thinking anything through.

He did take a lot of pictures. Oddly enough, he left most of my In laws pictures. He even took a wedding picture of us; in fact, he took all, but the ones ( wedding pictures ) in the album. Crazy. 

But his OW is in Germany! She can do nothing with the stuff he has taken at all...lol...

[ArmySpouse]

Mine took very little of his clothes from the NYC apartment.
After 3 failed attempts to get him to pick them up - I packed them up and put him in his car when he was at work.

He ransacked my upstate house taking a $1000.00 Miele vacuum. 

I have a Miele... The good German Iam..lol.... I would have kicked his behind.. That is some fine piece of machinery...

[MyBrainIsBroken]

We had picture frames for both of our daughters that had their senior pictures in the middle with pictures from each of the other 12 years of school in a ring around the senior picture. My wife took those and an album filled with pictures of both of our daughters growing up. Those are the only pictures that I know she took with her.

She also has a clock in her office at work where the om also works that has a ring of small pictures around a central clock and I noticed at Christmas that a couple of the pictures in the ring were individual pictures of me. This was 6 months after BD, a week or so after she was in her lawyer's office filing for divorce, and a couple of weeks before I was served with the divorce papers.

[OldPilot]

I think that leaving the stuff gives them a tie to you that they can check to see if you are still connected.

I believe we did have a similar thread to this but I have not been able to find it, yet.

[Absolutely Fabulous]

When my kids asked about the pictures the day he was leaving ( after the custody hearing ), he told them that he was going to scan them and send them to us via computer. That was back in June, guess what he hasn't done?

[nah]

I made mine a photo album and sent it to him the Christmas after BD.

Wonder if he looks at it.