well, all hell broke loose, it is over and done

[LoginName]

Hi, can't help but add a little. This may not be the right time to say this - you may need your anger and indignation now, but...

"to treat you like sh!t and live this life on his terms. ---------------------------------------------------"
I really don't think he wanted to treat you like sh!t. I really think it has nothing to do with you. Is that even harder to hear? Is it easier to think he is doing things to you than to think you're not even part of the picture? It's all in his head, it's all about him and his issues.

I'm saying this for the future. How are you going to rebuild with him (or with someone else) if you feel that he, or anybody, owes you.


" I want HIM to do things right for me this time around, not the other way, "
I hope that in the future you don't expect HIM to do anything to make you happy. I hope that you'll move on to where you realize there is nothing he can do to make it up to you. You have made yourself happy, healthy and whole. You won't try to do things for him to make him happy either. That'll be his job. I hope that any new R you may have, you won't be expecting that person to make you happy either.

Detaching means giving up what you can't control, letting go, of the anger eventually too. It's the greiving process. Anger is part of it. But it has to go eventually too.

so use your anger now, if you need it for strength, if it has to be expressed. Embrase it and feel it, but know that you'll have to let it go eventually.

And just like BI said, and you realize, it's still not about the OW. It's a waste of energy to think about her at all -what they did or said, or anything else about her.

[Aud31]

Cat,

I'm in agreement with everyone else that your H needs space to get himself figured out asap. More than that, you need space to get your focus put on you and what you can do for your own health.

Having a C in the room for you R talks would be nice--it's easier to hold the line when you have the backup of a professional...but in reality, you've been to a lot of counseling in the last while, had a lot of heart-to-heart R talks, and your H is still spinning in his personal hurricane. He knows he's in the wrong--horribly so, and that hasn't been enough to spark a change. You can't expect that to change overnight. (Much as I wish it would.)

What are you doing for you? I know you're clinging to your faith with everything you have, and that is definitely the most important thing you can do. But maybe it's also time to get a clear list of activities you can use to distract your attention while you back off, stay pleasant but disengaged from H, and give yourself the validation you so desperately need. Activities with the kids, service to your neighbors, join a book club or find some community education classes, exercising...just get busy and stop trying to save him.

((hugs)) and prayers

[cat03]

I really think it has nothing to do with you.
===============================================
I was just reading "after the affair", and it said something about the unfaithful spouse clinging to the feelings the op awakes in them...not really the op themselves, but the "high" of being in that sitch. I bet it felt good to be the good guy in her eyes and hear adulation, he knows all that crap he said about me was nothing but lies but he prob just made them up to be the knight in shining armour.

My self steem did take a nose dive because I felt a failure as a wife, not good enough to keep him not pretty enough, not having this or that, constantly comparing myself to other women and hoping he would make me feel good about myself, that I was worthy of being wanted and desired. I'm working on that now, on being happy with who and what I am.

LN, thanks for your words, I am aware that only I am in charge of my happiness, what I tried to say is that in the future, if there is still an R, I dont' want to be the only one working on the M, it has to be mutual--H did recogniced that during the past year he didn't really tried, mostly coasted along.

Aud, I guess I wanted the C to be witness, he who has heard H's lies (I clearly remember a session 2wks ago, how the C stressed the the ow had to be out of the pict for us to work, kept talking about it and even I was tempted to say "she is, she is, just move along now"). Also to keep things in check or to help us reframe our convo if it was going the wrong way.
We might just end up talking alone, have not heard from the C and it is unlikely he'll take one more appt on Sat, he is all booked. H is off on Sunday and I'll be damned if I have to act as if nothign wrong during his day off, holding out for yet one more day to talk about our sitch.

My house is very inviting, mostly because H never agreed to invest in decent furniture, so I dont' have people over. Regardless, I thought about inviting friends for dinner, my neighbor who just lost her H last week and will now lives alone, my other friend/neighbor who is battling breast cancer and with whom I don't see much anymore since she became unable to babysit for me. I've never invited them over during the week just because, so I'll start doing that, will cook something, have them over and have a great time. I will also be teaching my d4 bible class in church and have been looking forward to come up with projects for them.
Last but not least, I will take the crappy wallpaper, a project that H and I were supposed for about a few yrs, it is a time consuming project which should get me off the couch after kids to go bed.

Finding my footing slowly but surely.

[DiDi]

Last but not least, I will take the crappy wallpaper, a project that H and I were supposed for about a few yrs, it is a time consuming project which should get me off the couch after kids to go bed.

OOOh, that'll keep you out of trouble!

You sound good.

[BeingMe]

Cat, I am so sorry you are going through all this. Perhaps its' time to leave your unstable H, so he can see that he can leave an unstable OW. Just a thought! Maybe you should initiate the separation, and tell him you want a formal S, so that you can get on with your life. OW is nutso! To insinuate that you had a knife when you were at her apartment is crazy, 'cause if you did then your H is a total coward to jump out the back leaving her alone with a 'psycho W weilding a knife'. So, I wouldn't worry about anything this ditzy OW says, or what your H is saying to her about you ... unless they say it in court. I would keep a journal of things said to you, dates, lies being told about your character (you could end up suing OW for defamation of character if she is spreading these rumours around about you, especially the ones about you abusing your children ... just another thought) so that you can refer back if you ever needed to. But, once written down then try and forget it.

Also, the thought that this OW has designs on getting your kids is freaky. Time to protect them, and get yourself and them out of this mess, ASAP. Your H has made his choice ... he's just too much of a coward to truly be open and honest with you, and doesn't want to come off looking like the bad person. Go see a lawyer, and get things started. Let the lawyer speak for you re any SA, and get as much money as you can (for the sake of your children).

Anger can get you through the initial letting go, but I agree that you have to let go of it as soon as you are clear of the sitch. Good for you with the GAL activities. It will do you good to have people around you, and be able to speak and think about other things.

So, IMHO, you should let your H go free, let him go, don't hang onto him in the hopes of his changing now. Stop hoping he will do as you feel he should ... this sickness inside him will run it's course according to it's own timetable. Once he is free to do as he pleases, then maybe one day he will come back to you, whole and healthy. You don't want him as he is now, anyway, surely. It's only when I got to this point in my sitch, when I felt true relief and peace, and my H returned to the M of his own free will (although, I do think I let him in sooner than I should've, but that's another story).

My heart really goes out to you, Cat! Thinking of you. Take care of yourself and those kids, and let God do the rest.

[believing_isaiah43]

everyone here is right, and actually Login is right as well in where he contradicted me (see what happens when I don't edit!): your H wasn't (isn't) trying to treat you like sh!t; he wasn't (isn't) thinking of you at ALL.

- same with my H, and with all spouses who have an A, i think. we are the last thing on their minds, and that's almost worse in a way.

anyway, everyone here is brilliant and insightful and dead on.

cat, i really don't see anything moving like it needs to while you still are under the same roof. i could be wrong, i often am, but this situation is toxic, IMO, and you need clean air to breathe for now.

again, i may be wrong, but i vote for separation of some sort here.

{{{{cat}}}}

[cat03]

H is having another breakdown tonight, txting me back and forth, we had a rule of not talking R during his job, he must really be feeling crushed right now. I'm txtng him, but I'm not talking him into doing anything, no more of that. He is feeling totally hopeless, still doesn't want to think about anything and wants to run away from it all, says he could never own up to ow because she is nuts (havent' I heard that one before?). I'm hearing him out but not taking his burden upon myself.

I have come to the realization that I can't trust half of what he said to me that day I found out about the phone. Even then, I actually do believe what he's told me tonight, she's mad he found her whore job and in an unrelated fit H thought she was going to kill them both as she was driving and went off, that she now knows he knows what she is all about... it really sounds like she's lost her damsel in distress disguise.

He had try that day to tell me 2x he wants time by himself and I wasn't ready to hear that, I think I am now.

[BeingMe]

I think you need the space more than he does, Cat! I still sense that you are, in some way, making excuses for him. I don't even think you should be listening to all his spew. You can't help him. He needs a professional C. Gosh! I hope it all works out, but he isn't ready to re-commit ... not by the sounds of it, anyway.

[Aud31]

I have come to the realization that I can't trust half of what he said to me

I struggle with this too Cat--I haven't put my finger on exactly what it is that makes it so hard for me to remember that H could possibly lie to me. Even now, after so many lies, I just want to believe that the dishonesty is over and going forward he would never say anything untrue to me, that the lies are finished and everything he says here and now is the TRUTH. Of course I realize just how naive that is, but still I have a hard time with it.

Anyway, just so you know you're not alone in that dept...sometimes I think that if I allow him to lie to me that somehow I'm responsible for his mistreatment of me. But I know that's not true. It's *his* problem to work out. And it's *my* choice how to react, what to do, and every sitch is different.

Just keep following your faith. You'll never end up in the wrong place if you put your trust there.

That said, know that no matter what he says, he'll keep swinging back and forth until he figures himself out. And for you, and your kids, you have to step back out of his path and let him finish this on his own.

((hugs))

[cat03]

we will talk tomorrow, I will bring up S. I've been thinking of how we'll afford it and been trying to have some sort of plan together, this time around this S will be on my terms too.

We had the chaplain of the senate as the guest speaker during service today, and oh! what a wonderful message. What really struck me was his bringing up Galatians 6:9 "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up." About Elijah, who after having his prayer answered by God (fire from heaven on the wet altar) hid and was so fearful and discouraged that he asked God to take his life... and he ended up being one of 3 people in this whole earth who never saw death, he's up there, looking at Jesus' face.

How Jesus had such a mismatch group as disciples, who had so many faults and weaknesses and pride... and turn them into messengers who turned the whole world upside down.

Things will happen in due time. I expect things to get rough before they get better, I also know that I will falter and be weak, but I fully understand this S is so necesary. And even right now, I don't even trust him leaving the house early for xyz reason. At the time I truly believed I could get past it, but he has violated every ounce of trust I ever had in him, this time, I can't just act as if.

I have some fears, what if he falls in lov w/someone else, what if he believes all the craziness in his head about how intense his R was w/her thus it was genuine and doesn't think he could love me ever..things like that. I know they are irrational, I just have to put them out there in the open so they can die and also to be prepared for anything.