Chapter 4 - Web of Lies - Updated April 23, 2026
The Real Jeannine Price
Web of Lies
After March 11, 2019, I spent several weeks to myself. I had to allow my objective mind time to overpower the subjectivity of my heart. Jeannine texted me a few times throughout those weeks - I didn’t take her calls. I was angry - and I knew that I couldn’t be wholly angry at her. Even though I learned, right there in her living room, the truth of a promiscuous past she hid from me, I rightfully suspected it all along and was therefore responsible, in some part, for entertaining this relationship with her. I chose, however, not to confront her until I had a foundational reason to do so.
I don’t believe in talking shit behind peoples’ backs and if I do, it’s something I’ll gladly tell them to their faces. I likewise refuse to verbally indict anyone without good reason. That type of bullshit - rhetoric, rumor and innuendo - marinates perfectly, though, within social media platforms such as FaceBook.
Like, for instance, when an alcoholic, 46-year-old woman who admits to never maintaining a romantic relationship lasting more than a year wherein the failures of all those relationships are invariably not in any way her fault, takes to Facebook to post a meme depicting herself as a child in a bar falling off a barstool saying, “My Friends Keep Telling Me to Stop Falling for Toxic Men.” A self-posted meme that ironically underscores herself to be the sloppy drunk she is; the absent mother she was; and toxicity hyper-defined will undoubtedly land dozens of those thumbs up and LOL emojis - especially from all the cheerleaders that same 46-year-old woman has recruited through the years. You know, the cheerleaders that were trained through years of indoctrination by that 46-year-old woman to see her only as the pitiful and forever victim. Seems like the perfect emoji-searching match for Pee-Wee. Two vermin of a kind. But, I digress.
So, there I was trying to figure out how I didn’t see Jeannine for whom she was right off the bat. Yet, in my time removed from her after March 11, 2019, my subjective heart did rationalize many things to my objective mind. I had to accept the fact that I recognized somewhere well beneath the surface of a horrifically checkered past and a dependence issue that caused her to become erratic and violent, Jeannine was genuinely a good person. I had to also recognize she, just like every one of us has done at some time or another, presented herself in the light most favorable to her. Yep - we’ve all done that when meeting someone new. I even did it to Jeannine. It’s not like her lies were the only foundational lies told. Self-reflection is hard, but an all-too-often overlooked necessity.
Jeannine and I were both married when we met. I told her I was still married on August 2, 2018 - the day after we first met. She told me she, too, was married. Her reply was, “Let’s roll with it.”
Now, it would be unfair to say we were both in happily-married settings. That was not the case. She was estranged from her husband and I had been living with friends and family at the time. I can’t speak for Jeannine’s marriage - other than it lasted less than a year just like her first marriage. The rest of how her second marriage ended was, like her first, only what Jeannine asserted - and now after having acquired the knowledge of how craftily she spins false narratives within which she will always present herself as the victim, I doubt many of her indictments against him. Like Jeannine’s first husband, I do not know her second either but will forever know the disparaging way she, her family and friends speak about both of them. More on that later.
As for me, I had been married for 17 years and although having serious marital issues when I first met Jeannine, I was in no position to pursue any other relationship. My marriage failed because of me. I chose to give up on someone who gave everything to me - someone who taught me everything about unconditional love. My ex-wife wanted to take problems head on, together, while I chose to maintain the ‘ahhhhh - it’ll all work itself out’ attitude. Nope. Marital and even partnership problems don’t just ‘work themselves out.’ My ex-wife, one of the greatest women on earth, knows how to partner and how to relationship. She was right - marital problems, simple or complex, are bulls that must be taken by the horns.
To make matters even worse, I lied. I lied to my ex-wife and I lied to Jeannine. My ex-wife came to learn about Jeannine not long after I met Jeannine. I, of course, told my ex-wife it was not a serious relationship. While it may not have been serious on face value, I knew my relationship with Jeannine was becoming very serious - I felt it. But, I was too much a coward to deliver to my ex-wife the truth about my feelings for Jeannine and find the most agreeable way possible to finally dissolve our marriage. I was likewise too much a coward to admit to Jeannine my fear of divorce and dishonestly embellished my desire to finalize my marriage.
When the divorce proceedings did manifest, I voiced to Jeannine my concerns over the conditions of the divorce, but I refused to speak about my ex-wife with contempt. I am the one who, in spirit and mind, left the marriage even when my ex-wife, knowing about Jeannine, believed the unbroken could again be rebuilt. I unfairly played along with my ex-wife’s positive attitude and when I learned about Jeannine’s past, I found the perfect opportunity to pursue repairing the marriage - I knew I wanted no part of Jeannine’s past and ever-present drama.
Although I told Jeannine I “just needed some time and space” the night I left her house on March 11, 2019, I had no intention of returning. I found my way to at least try to repair my marriage - and never intended “time and space” were the things I needed. I told my ex-wife I was done with my fleeting interest in Jeannine and wanted to try to repair the damage to our marriage even though weeks later I was again talking with Jeannine. Every minute away from Jeannine was a minute spent thinking of her. But, I tried to remain objective and steadfast on forgetting all about her - at least until one day when I found myself talking with the pastor of the church my ex-wife and I once attended.
“So - she believes your marriage can be repaired - even though it’s been a difficult couple of years,” he said to me.
I found myself seated in the Lord’s House and even though I could minimize, embellish and outwardly lie to my ex-wife, and Jeannine for that matter, elsewhere, I couldn’t lie here. I didn’t want to lie anymore at all. It was time to confess. As he continued to speak to me, I gazed outside through the large panel windows behind him at the cloudless, blue sky and several crape myrtle trees that decorated the grassy medians throughout the parking lot. The branches were bending in a heavy, late-summer breeze amidst an approaching storm. I watched the pink and white blossoms violently tumble downward and across the asphalt until they were no longer visible through the windows.
“She’s better than me. I’m the one who chose this. Yes - it has been a difficult few years but that is no excuse for what I’ve done. I lied to her and to Jeannine.”
“She mentioned Jeannine to me.”
“I’m afraid. Afraid of losing my kids. Afraid of losing what we once had. But I am happy with Jeannine - and I shouldn’t be - I am in love with Jeannine. I have done wrong. I minimized Jeannine to her. I lied and the marriage is not worthy of my presence in it. I don’t want to live like this anymore.”
“Son. We are all worthy of redemption - but your ability to be redeemed starts with you.”
In that moment, I knew what I had to do. I knew it was going to be very difficult. I simply didn’t want to hurt anyone; yet, I knew what I had to admit to my ex-wife was going to be painful to her and our children.
That evening, I asked my wife and youngest daughter, Nikki, to go to dinner with me. Before dinner, though, I telephoned Jeannine.
“I’m calling to apologize. I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For being a hypocrite. I have no right to judge you and you’re past when I lied to both you and her. I have told her you meant nothing to me. I have told you my marriage to her is over. I’ve realized these past several weeks … months how much you do mean to me and how much I love you. I don’t want to be without you. This is so fucking hard. I’m so fucking afraid - my kids are everything to me and I didn’t know how to let go of a life I’ve known for so long. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay - it’s okay. It’s not like I didn’t suspect it all along. This sucks. This fucking sucks. I’ve been a fucking wreck about everything, too.”
I realized that just like the lies I suspected Jeannine told to me well over a year before, the lies I told to her were similarly suspected by her. I found myself suddenly now seated on the bench made in the wood workshop class - in roles appropriately and precisely reversed.
“I want you to know I’m going to dinner with her and Nikki tonight. I don’t know where your head is right now, but I am going to right the wrongs and ask for my forgiveness. If you are where I think you are, we can do this. I’m prepared to do the rest of life with you and work hard to find the best way possible through divorce. I’m prepared to tell her and Nikki the truth - the truth about me and you, how much I love you and that I want to be with you. I am prepared to offer you forgiveness - hoping you can forgive me.”
“I am where you think I am. I want to spend my life with no one else. We have things to talk about but do whatever you need to do for now. I’ll be right here. We can get through this together.”
“After dinner, I’m heading back. We can talk more when I get there. I owe you an apology - not over-the-phone but in person.”
In Northern Virginia, a Longhorn steakhouse was usually nearby and was a years-long favorite of ours. Me, my ex-wife and Nikki were quickly seated at a booth in a by-and-large empty weeknight dining room. Before dinner was served there was uncomfortable small talk about the next school year and how our days were. I went through the motions but the anxiety I felt was unmistakeable. I was about to have the most difficult conversation of my life. I decided I would begin the conversation about Jeannine once dinner was served. The moment soon arrived.
“So I know you guys know about Jeannine.”
My wife had known about Jeannine and at some point told Nikki. For some time before I met Jeannine and throughout 2018 and 2019, I was visiting home in Northern Virginia on weekends often staying nearby in hotels. I’d find time to visit with the kids and find some sort of family activity for us to do. I had projected the false hope that I’d one day come home for good.
“I want you both to know I’ve been less than truthful about her. She wasn’t a random event. I have very strong feelings for her - I do love her very much. I know this is difficult to hear but I owe you both an apology for which I don’t expect to ever be forgiven. Nikki, I love your mom and I always will. No matter how bad things got the past couple of years between me and your mom, your mother was the one who was constant. I was not. I found someone else and had no right to step outside your mother’s and my marriage. I can no longer live like this and I must offer truth to both of you. Your brother is much younger and I hope one day he will understand - but I needed to tell this to you and your mother. I intend to be with Jeannine and I can only pray one day you forgive me.”
Nikki rightfully lashed out at me. She was a heartbroken 16-year-old girl - heartbroken by her own father. I felt a pain in me that still hurts today. I hurt her - badly. Nikki and I were very close. I have never seen through daddy-goggles and each of my children are gifted in different ways.
Nikki was always a good student and even more so musically inclined; yet gifted with little to no athletic coordination whatsoever. My son, the youngest, was not the most applied academic student and really didn’t care much for school - but God gave him an unparalleled athletic ability. He stood out especially on a baseball diamond all while being humble and quiet - outperforming other kids his age without saying a word. My oldest, Yvonne, was, well, a free spirit who wore her heart on her sleeve. She vigorously protected her younger sister and brother; never filtered her thoughts and feelings; and was, as best described in a movie on my personal top-10-greatest-movies-ever list, Goodwill Hunting, wicked smaaaat. Yvonne came to me when she was a senior in high school for ideas about her AP Physics paper - one of three AP courses she took her senior year in high school. Yeah. Being me, the one who believes baseball is the greatest game ever, suggested she examine and write about how a dude named Aroldis Chapman could hurl a fastball at 106 miles-per-hour. Although a joke at the time, the paper, some several weeks later, earned an A+ … just like every other paper she wrote.
Nikki and I would make music together sometimes all night until the sun came up. I’d play guitar while she would tab through the lyrics of the song - singing with a melodic alto voice and an occasional, powerful bravado. Her musical inclination was noticed early and we sometimes went to open mic nights to perform. In high school, she was selected to all-county select choir appearing both with the choir and at other solo acts performing, among other things, the National Anthem at Washington Wizzards games and at other events throughout Northern Virginia.
We made together our first cover when she was about seven. Nikki insisted I learn the chords to Rolling in the Deep. I still have the video and watch it often - it takes me back to those good times when I lived life with certainty and purpose. My poor choices took the peacefulness of certainty and purpose away and would forever change the direction of my relationship with my children.
I looked at my ex-wife after taking what I deserved from Nikki. She appeared more exhausted and disappointed than angry. She had willingly offered me redemption long ago and believed I was worthy of it. I was not - and I was not worthy of her. I felt awful - and I should have. This was a talk I should have had with her long ago and well before I ever entertained any other relationship - regardless of the state of our marriage.
A light rain began sometime while we were at dinner. Enveloped within a deafening silence pierced only by a random heavier patch of rain through which we drove, we headed back to the house. As soon as I pulled into the driveway, Nikki burst out of the back door and ran inside. I knew my relationship with her was forever charted on a different course.
I sat in the driver’s seat - my ex-wife seated in the passenger’s. The light rain slowly trickled down the front windshield and I looked out into the night toward the front door where the front stoop light was on. My vision through the rain-covered front windshield appeared as vision through that of a kaleidoscope - blurry and unclear. I looked to my ex-wife. The front of her face was subtly illuminated by the ambient front stoop light. Her face under her eyes was swollen from crying. She stared straight forward not appearing to be looking at anything at all and yelled to me one question, “What does she have that I don’t?!” I could feel her suffering in my bones - pain that I caused. That question exemplified self-doubt that I also caused. The question drove a stake through my heart. I didn’t want her to hurt - yet I was solely responsible for all her pain.
I didn’t offer to her an answer - because there was no honest reply. She waited for one, though. My lack of any reply whatsoever should have been telling - if not to her, to me. She slowly got out and walked toward the house, disappearing through the front door. It slowly closed behind her and the front stoop light went out. I still loved her. She was so much better without me. I had betrayed her and her trust in me - irrevocable damage of which I am forever ashamed.
I sat alone in the driveway realizing everything in my life was about to change. I began to reflect on the choices I had made the previous couple of years. I hated everything I had allowed myself to become. I was once a good father. I was once a good husband. I was once a good man. As awful as I felt and as poorly as I felt about myself - I did find some peace in my admissions of the truth to those whom deserved to hear it. As I left Northern Virginia, I stopped at the church where I sat earlier in the day with the pastor. There, sitting in the parking lot, I asked for more forgiveness and the help to become the man I wanted to be - that I once was.
My absence and eventual estrangement from my ex-wife and children could have been blamed on my career. However, it was true that even when I was physically present with my family, I was, as my ex-wife said for so many years, “emotionally vacant.” She was right - I was always preoccupied with other things, primarily my career, that always caused my family to become second-most-important. In Washington, I allowed work to consume me - and did not properly prioritize the most important things in my life. As good as I once had been, I eventually failed - myself, my ex-wife and my children.
Nearly a year later - by the summer in 2020 - life had gotten better - even if marginally. Although difficulties, especially with the kids, came and went, my wife and I were on as good as possible terms and marching to the constant beat of divorce’s drum. I didn’t contest anything and fully accepted that I would be financially responsible for the kids’ healthcare; a formula-determined monthly child support sum; and half my federal and state retirements. It felt like an honor to give that to her. It was the very least she earned. She was the rock and foundation of the marriage, raised our children when I spent most of the years traveling with my job; and even chose to forgo her own professional ambitions so I could pursue mine. She was the embodiment of self-sacrifice, the most wonderful mother and child could have and the one who taught me all about unconditional love. As I wrote in the Forward of The Real Jeannine Price, I will forever know what unconditional love means because of her - even though I will never offer it again to anyone.
By that summer, 2020, Jeannine and I had also taken many steps forward in our relationship. We got through some very difficult times the previous couple of years - and had to find redemption in one another. The lies we told one another seemed to offer natural forgiveness. We both, in the end anyway, had lied to one another only to be with one another. Although we both agreed marriage was an overrated, customary tradition, we agreed time would present us the right opportunity to quietly exchange our vows to one another. We wore matching bands - our outward commitment to one another until that time came.
However, Jeannine’s drinking and the resulting domestic violence slowly worsened throughout 2020 and it seemed that, although we had shared our forgiveness of one another, alcohol fueled in Jeannine a contempt for me over that which was once forgiven. I never thought much of her alcohol-fueled rage because it was, after all, just the alcohol, right? And, more significantly, every day after her drunk-rage and violent fits, she would apologize. Not a texted apology … not some quick, “Hey, by the way, sorry about last night” phone call. She would make a point the next day to meet with me personally, usually at home, look into my eyes and apologize - from her heart. Every time she apologized then and through the years to come, I excused her actions because of her alcoholism. I had forgiven her before she apologized - every time.
In the midst of the balance of 2020, Jeannine had become an integral part of an amateur baseball team on which I played for over a decade. By 2020, I had become the player-manager and she had somehow become, I suppose the only way to describe it, Team Mom and Official Scorebook Keeper. The guys loved Jeannine - like everyone does, especially when she’s drinking. Every weekend from summer to fall, we loaded up and traveled from Virginia Beach to Northern Virginia or DC for my Saturday games. We never took vacations through the years, but our weekend baseball trips were better than any vacation we could have ever taken.
On the way to one of those weekend baseball trips, Jeannine became preoccupied with some local guy who was “missing.” Jeannine told me he was an ex-boyfriend, Chris, whom she had dated sometime in 2017. Jeannine was worried about him and showed me a Facebook photo of his “Missing Person” page. Chris’ wife had posted or commented on the page and Jeannine stated she felt badly for his wife and kids. Jeannine described him as a “pill-popper” and heroin addict.
“So he ended up getting married after you guys broke up?” I asked.
“No, that’s his wife - they’ve been married a long time.”
“Wait. I thought you said you dated him in 2017.”
Jeannine got that look. The one referred to as the deer-in-the-headlights look.
“Yeah. He was married. We didn’t date long.”
Yep - we’ve already established the fact that you don’t date people for very long.
“Was he living with his wife or separately when you dated him?”
“He lived at home. Yeah, you’re right! He lived at home with his wife while we were fucking dating! His wife knew we were fucking dating! We didn’t spend time at his house! He always came over to my house!”
Remember Jeannine’s best defense is an overpowering offense. She took to it immediately, knowing where I was going in the conversation about Chris. Not to mention, Jeannine was drinking on the ride up to Northern Virginia that evening.
I remembered one of Jeannine’s friends had a collection of pictures of Chris and Jeannine on her Facebook page. I quickly pulled them up finding one of Jeannine standing in a kitchen with Chris. It was evident, based on family pictures in the background, the photos of Jeannine and Chris were taken at Chris’ house. I showed Jeannine.
“And these photos weren’t taken when you were with Chris at his house?”
“Yeah! Fuck! Okay - I went to his house. So fucking what?”
“I’m just saying you didn’t exclusively stay at your house. And my next question is obvious, right?”
“Yeah. His fucking wife lived there! His wife was there when I was there!”
Stop the fucking press, again - just like on March 11, 2018.
“Okay, so you’re seeing this guy and staying at his house - with his wife and kids right there with you guys?”
“His wife was sick.”
What the ever-loving fuck was this demented arrangement?
“Wait a minute, so his wife was sick, and you would stay with her husband, right under their roof? You carried on a relationship with this guy right under his sick wife’s nose?”
“It’s a long fucking story! You wouldn’t understand!”
Apparently not.
“Look. Whatever the fuck you did, you did it under his roof with his wife right there, sick in bed - in another room. You don’t see the fucked-upness of that, obviously. But, you know what, it’s part of your past. I accept you for who you are. Just stop lying about it … OVER AND OVER.”
“Fuck you. You wouldn’t understand.”
Nope.
“Regardless of how you lived with Chris under his roof with his sick wife in another room, I do have a concern that does affect me.”
“And what the fuck is that?”
“Was this guy using heroin when you were together?”
“I don’t fucking know. I only saw him popping pills. He stole a bunch of pills from my house I had there for years. Pain pills I got after having a C-section. He started stealing things from my house. Then he stole money from me - out of my purse. I had to break it off with him.”
“Heroin can be pretty clean and pure and snorted up the nose - but it’s safe to presume a guy with this kind of addiction has used intravenously. I’m not trying to make you upset here - but, you told me last year you never had any STDs. Have you honestly had any sort of an STD test since you dated this guy, Chris?”
“No. We never had sex, anyway. Plus, I do fucking bloodwork every year when I go for my annual exam at my gynecologist.”
Yes - another one of Jeannine Price’s false narratives in the making. Trying, for whatever fucked up reason, to sell the lie that she and Chris never had sex, knowing she admitted to a life of sleeping around with over a hundred dudes, was mind boggling. But that’s what she did - created this bullshit fantasy land thinking everybody buys what she’s selling.
“Sure. They take blood every year, but are they doing a blood panel specifically for STDs? And, uhh, you never had sex?”
“We never had sex because his dick couldn’t get hard. Probably all the fucking drugs. I mean we hooked up in other ways. I don’t fucking know. And the STDs … one guy gave me some funk once and I did bloodwork and the doctor gave me a prescription that took care of it.”
“Okay - so you are leading me to believe you never had sex with this heroin addict … but occasionally went down on each other … and funk given to you but by some other dude?! I thought since everything that happened last year, we agreed to be honest and open. Some guy gave you funk? The fuck is funk? You told me you never had an STD - and you’ve had a year to correct any lies you told me about that. That’s something I’m fucking entitled to know about.”
“I don’t know what the fuck it was. It was some conjunctivitis shit or something - some fucking infection. I got the prescription and it took care of it.”
“So - you’re telling me you had a bacterial STI that was treatable with simple antibiotics?”
“Yeah. I guess fucking so.”
“And you’re also telling me you have not, to your knowledge, had a complete STD or STI blood test since you were with this guy, Chris, knowing him to be an opioid and heroin addict - because you never had sex?! Listen to what you’re saying!”
“You’re abssssssssolutely fucking right.”
Although we were already in Woodbridge, Virginia heading north to Fairfax, the weekend was obviously ruined. I drove back to Virginia Beach. Once again, I left Virginia Beach telling Jeannine she was great but that I was devastated all over again - and legitimately worried about my own health. By the time we got back to Virginia Beach that night, she was good and sauced from the roadies she packed before we left. By that time, I was, of course, “a fukkkking muuuuther fukkkkkin peeeeeece uv shit … a fuuuuuggghhhking asssssshole,” and, over and over again, of course, “abbbbbsoluuuuutely fuggghkkkin right.” I left - avoiding the physical confrontation that she would undoubtedly begin soon.
Three days later, Jeannine called me.
“Hey. I wanted you to know the truth.”
“I’d like to know the truth, actually.”
“I have a viral STD. I have vaginal herpes.”
“Okay. I have to do some more thinking.”
“I understand. I’m truly sorry.”
I arrived at my doctor’s office within a few days of learning I had unknowingly been exposed for over a year to a viral STD and God knows what else.
“Don’t know what I got myself into,” I said to Dr. Green.
“It happens. Look - I’ll do a full blood draw and complete a full panel. It’ll take a couple of days and I’ll personally call you back.”
“Thanks, doc. So, you’ll see everything, right? You’ll be able to see anything? I want you to test me for everything known to man.”
“Yes. Once I get the results back, you’ll know everything. Any good news - any bad news.”
Once again, I found myself right where I was only a year before: devastated that I found myself unconditionally in love with someone I didn’t even know. Again, it would continue to get worse.