brian -- Sounds like you guys are doing stuff "that works". The social and physical connection that h. and I have has been instrumental in us rebuilding our m. Seems like a similar sitch for you...good stuff.
Quoting eskb: But while good Brian wants to forgive and move on, evil Brian wants to keep that arrow handy in the quiver, to pull out and use in some future argument. Anyway, it's something I'll continue to think about. Brian
So...I think it's good that you're thinking about this and appreciating the duality of the way that you feel. I think I've been cramming forgiveness down my own throat (and there are certainly folks who wonder how they ever can and are adamant that they can't) which has actually led to me sabotaging my own sitch. In other words, I think I was convincing myself that either I had forgiven totally or that I ought to have by now or .... and because I hadn't allowed myself the space to contemplate it all honestly, well, I find myself acting out instead of being upfront with myself that it's a continuous decision to forgive, etc.
Not sure that made ANY sense.
Sage
Relax. Appreciate. Be calm. Laugh. Enjoy. Be secure. Be loving. Be loved. Don't personalize. Don't ASSume. Accept. Be grateful.
"I had said that it was "very annoying" when my W said that it was hard to hurt someone that she cared about so much. Let me amend that. It was actually much more than very annoying. I felt a white-hot flash of anger (which I quickkly suppressed, and said nothing about). I cannot begin to count all of the many times over these last few months when she has said or done things that hurt me so much. "
I can relate. My H has said on more than one occasion, how he feels bad for pushing away the people he cares about the most. This statement was made originally the first time he told me that he had ended the A with OW and that she was really hurt by this. He lumped me in with her. So each time that he says that, I feel the knife plunging a little deeper.
The last time that happened, I just looked at him and thought, "how insensitive" and a moment later he seemed to awaken to this subtle but hurtful slap to my face. He quickly followed up with, "I've pushed you away for years, and I'm sorry for that".
I hope that your W awakens before you have to hear those painful words again. Until then, I think that you are handling it right by not responding. It's as though our Ses have a blind spot and we are standing in it. As their vision shifts, perhaps they will become more aware of the hurt they are causing by saying things like that.
Hey, we live in the same area -- probably went to the same movie the other night!! We have a boat and go out to the "lake" waterskiing -- maybe we've been there at the same time -- seems odd, huh?
I know very well what you're going through with your W and her feelings about breaking it off with the OM. I went through the same thing last summer. My story is way too long and complicated to post here on your thread.
The jist is that I had to listen to my H tell me about his feelings for the OW and that it might take some time for him to get over her. It's devastating to here those words, but I was prepared to give him time to "grieve" not matter how torturous it was for me.
Oddly, enough, my H never really seemed to be grieving for this person. To me, he actually seemed relieved to be done with it. We did go away for about 10 days on a previously scheduled vacation. I wanted to ensure there was no contact in order to break the addition.
He has since been in counseling and was diagnosed as clinically depressed, went on medication, and has emerged incredibly happy and ready to spend the rest of his life "making up" to me for what he put me through.
We've had a few discussions about those times. He said his feelings for the OW started to go away almost immediately. He realized that whatever "feelings" he had for her was not love. He came to realize that she was not even a friend.
Last night I asked him again if it had been really difficult to give her up. He said, no, not at all. He told me he thinks the reason it was not difficult was because of the way I treated him during that time. See, all he really wanted was to be loved. Somewhere during the past 19 years he came to believe that I didn't love him anymore -- or even like him.
But because of the fact that I treated him with love and compassion, he finally realized that I was really the only one who did love him unconditionally, the real him.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that right now this really sucks, but once your W has a little time to really reflect on what she's done, the ramifications of her actions, and how incredibly loving and supportive you've been for her, she will start to see the OM and her involvement with him as her deepest humiliation.
Quote: ...instead of being upfront with myself that it's a continuous decision to forgive
OK, Sage, I'm going to go nerd on you here, since I know you are an engineer, as am I. I tend to think of forgiveness as a discrete function, a step function. A "0" or a "1". You start out unforgiving (toward your S), you make a conscious decision to forgive, you forgive, and then forever afterward, you live with that. You can't take it back, depending on circumstances or new developments. Your S lives in a state of being forgiven. Forgiveness, in that sense, is a commitment a bit like a marriage vow. Once made, never to be retracted. That doesn't mean that you forgive for future acts - those have to be dealt with as they come along - but it does mean that you quit thinking about the question of whether to forgive the past infidelity, in all its different parts.
The problem that I have, given that I'm using this understanding of forgiveness, is that I don't want to forgive, and don't want to tell her that I have forgiven, until I'm ready to forgive forever (not allowing myself to revisit the decision).
What you referred to seems to be more of an "analog" type of forgiveness, where it can be given and retracted incrementally. I'm not sure that I've interpreted your thinking correctly here, can you explain your thinking a little more? As always, Sage, I'd love to read more of your erudite thoughts on this stuff.
Let me go a bit further into this. I do not think that in forgiving we are giving up our right to normal responses, such as feeling terrible about what was done to us, to feel untrusting, etc. What we are giving up is the right to exact a punishment on our S's - to hold it over their heads, to cause guilt, to use their betrayal against them to win arguments or to justify our own misdeeds.
Hey, it's great to talk to someone close by. I was beginning to think that I was the only one on these boards east of the Mississippi. Seems most the people I talk to and whose threads I follow are east-coasters. If you went to Hollywood Homicide on Tuesday in Valencia, then yes, I probably saw you there. We were 2 of, what, 20 people total in that theater?
I'd like to read up on your story. Do you have links to your threads?
I hope my W doesn't grieve too long. She mostly tries not to show it, so it's a little hard to tell how she's feeling inside. Last night I thought she seemed a little distant again, even though outwardly everything seemed OK. We had dinner together, took a dip in the Jacuzzi, and I gave her a backrub before hitting the hay. Everything was fine, and I might be reading too much into it, but the conversation was a little stilted somehow. Anyway, the definition of what constitutes a "normal" evening continues to improve, so I'm not complaining.
Quote: I guess what I'm trying to say is that right now this really sucks, but once your W has a little time to really reflect on what she's done, the ramifications of her actions, and how incredibly loving and supportive you've been for her, she will start to see the OM and her involvement with him as her deepest humiliation.
A little selfish, perhaps, but this is what I want, exactly.
I've been pondering a little just what it is that is the hardest to forgive. Here's my top 10 list, rank ordered as best I could, #1 being the hardest to forgive. I realize that some of these are intertwined with others, but it's the best I can do:
1. The fact that she didn't give me a chance to fix what she perceived as wrong with me, with our M, before betraying me. That is, her initial decision to be unfaithful. I really struggle with this one. I hate it when I read some book that suggests that the betrayal was a good thing, that the M could not have been turned around otherwise. Bullsh!t!!! When she came to me and said that she didn't think she loved me anymore (but months before the betrayal came to light), I responded to that, got DB, and starting working on myself. It did NOT require a betrayal in order to get me to wake up. How much of this excruciating pain could have been avoided if she had just spoken her unhappiness.
2. The impact her betrayal had on my self-respect, my loss of self. Those feelings of worthlessness, unloveableness, and undesirability are life-stoppers. I don't think I became clinically depressed, but this would be the reason if I had.
3. Her being intimate with someone else. I wrestled a lot with this on my 1st thread. The fact that it's still so high on my list means that it's still an issue I grapple with. The words of those discovered intimate emails still haunt me occassionally. An EA would have been much easier for me to handle.
4. The fact that I can't trust her now. I used to trust her without thinking twice about it. I hate the thoughts that constantly enter my mind now, that make me wonder what she's doing when I'm not around. I hate the anxiety, I hate how I feel about her when those thoughts come, I hate that the thoughts come even when I know better.
5. Her falling in love with someone else. Yeah, I know that for others, this one would be higher than #3. It's not that this one isn't bad, it's just that the sex thing haunts me more, and is therefore harder to forgive. What I hate most about her falling in love with someone else is how expressive she could be with him (as gleaned from the emails and from what she's told me). It became easy for her to tell him anything, to share herself in a way that she has not shared with me in many years. And apparently she listened to him and was interested in him, again in a way that she has not with me in many years.
6. Her complete insensitivity to my pain as it all unfolded. I guess we've all marveled at the way our S's could inflict hurt so easily, causing excruciating pain even when the benefit to them was slight. She still hasn't expressed much sorrow over what I've gone through. That pisses me off.
7. The impact her betrayal had on my respect for her. I've tried very hard to understand what she was going through when she made her decision to betray, and my contribution to the problems we had. But ultimately, I think she allowed herself to take the easy way. She was weak. She should have been strong enough to resist temptation, she should have had enough gumption to try to fix what was wrong, instead of just choosing the fun way. I don't respect that, and it's going to take time for me to again respect her fundamental character, the basic part of who she is.
8. The untold numbers of lies. How many lies did she tell me over the course of the last few months, 1000? 5000? It might be easy to forgive individual lies, but the totality makes it more difficult, because it again speaks to her basic character. Is she a liar, is that just who she is, or was it just a temporary thing that she can and will overcome.
9. Her selfishness. Not pretty. At one point, she thought she was ready to give up everything, and wreak utter devastation upon everyone else, including her kids, to be with this OG.
10. The financial cost of her betrayal. OK, this is a little thing, relatively speaking, but it's still annoying to be paying off these infidelity-based cellphone and other bills. While I was off working, she was off "playing".
So there it is. The next question: Should I work towards forgiving everything all at once, or should I start at #10, and work my way up from there?
I would advise you to forgice them all at once. They are all interrelated. Clean the slate completely. It isn't fair, in fact, it stinks but you came here to save your M and to feel better and that is what it is going to take. Being up to it everyday is a challenge but you can handle it. You are scareing me with the similarities of our feelings. I am struggling with these same issues a and my sitch is far older. My good friends helped me with a few wise words. Look around this board, what your W did is common. I didn't believe that a year ago but I do now. Love is a choice and so is forgiveness. If you want your M to "recover" and prosper don't go backwards, just don't. It is hard, real hard, especially when the "anger" phase hits. I struggle the most with respecting her after she showed her "true colors". I think that takes longer than trust or forgiveness. I have forgiven people before that I don't respect very much. That is easy because we don't expect much from them, right? You are on a tough path, man. I am only a little further down the path than you are. All ten of the items you listed are valid but if you want her to truly love and cherish you in the future forget about them all. Compassion and understanding is very, very attractive. Judgement, resentment, and contempt are just plain ugly.
On the deceit issue. Don't ever forget "If you trust too much you may deceived, but if you trust too little you will be tormented". Gets me through a lot of days. One thing the "anger" phase did for me was to trust her. It got easier because if she betrayed me in anyway I was all done with her. That is my "zero tolerance policy".
Your feelings will ebb and flow. When you have good days there is no other woman you will want to be with and on bad days you will wonder why you are still married to her. Enjoy the good days and get distracted on the bad ones. Find any distraction possible but get away from what doesn't work (anger, resentment, disrespect) when those feelings hit. I prefer lifting weights to Metallica really loud. Whatever works, right?
Have a great weekend with your family focus on the present.
Quoting eskb: OK, Sage, I'm going to go nerd on you here, since I know you are an engineer, as am I. I tend to think of forgiveness as a discrete function, a step function. A "0" or a "1". You start out unforgiving (toward your S), you make a conscious decision to forgive, you forgive, and then forever afterward, you live with that. You can't take it back, depending on circumstances or new developments. Your S lives in a state of being forgiven. Forgiveness, in that sense, is a commitment a bit like a marriage vow. Once made, never to be retracted. That doesn't mean that you forgive for future acts - those have to be dealt with as they come along - but it does mean that you quit thinking about the question of whether to forgive the past infidelity, in all its different parts.
The problem that I have, given that I'm using this understanding of forgiveness, is that I don't want to forgive, and don't want to tell her that I have forgiven, until I'm ready to forgive forever (not allowing myself to revisit the decision).
brian -- I think I didn't express myself too well -- I too think that forgiveness is a vow, is binary, isn't circumstancial once given...what I was trying to articulate is that I'm not there yet. Thus the "continuous decision" (analog world) is to try to forgive....maybe that makes more sense.
Partly my point is that I found myself really resisting some hard and conflicting feelings that I was having because I've been telling myself "well, I've forgiven him so you can't feel that way". I had to come to grips with the idea that I'm still processing it...I know I will get there....I'm just not there yet.
I like tbone's post to you.
Sage
Relax. Appreciate. Be calm. Laugh. Enjoy. Be secure. Be loving. Be loved. Don't personalize. Don't ASSume. Accept. Be grateful.
I guess we are thinking about this the same way after all.
I want to quickly get to the point of being able to forgive. I don't know how long it'll take. Hence my thinking that maybe I could start small and go from there. Tbone may be right, though, maybe it's impossible to break it into pieces.
I like your list and the way you're able to identify so clearly what you need to forgive instead of having one huge nebulous resentment.
To me, forgiveness doesn't mean that you are no longer angry, or have to live in denial or excuse the unexusable. To me it means you relinquish your right to take retribution or stand in judgement of someone who wronged you.
I can relate to you're evil Brian who wants to retain the right to pull out the infidelity to beat your wife over the head with in an arguement. That's one thing I swore to my H that I wouldn't do (and vowed to myself I would never do) when I committed to working on our R.
I agree with you and Sage that forgiveness is more of a binary, yes or no thing and definately a continuous choice.
There's a lot of things that H and I used to resent each other for before, and I think he's more prone to still hold resentments. I'm trying very hard to say, "I don't want to resent you for such and such anymore, I want to let go of that resentment, so what can we do differently from now on"?
I agree with you that it would be wrongminded to say that a marraige going sideways requires an affair to shake it up. I've never seen any books that actually say that, but I have seen the sentiment, many times that something like what we're going through is an opportunity to rebuild an M in a way that is healthier and stronger than before.
