Bustorama-Thread 1

[bustorama]

Hi Bustingout,

I will go take a look at your thread (did you start a new thread? Can you link me to it?).

Re: why I wasn't appropriately remorseful, it was various shortcoming of my own.

First, I "couldn't" initially really own how much I had violated our marital boundaries, my own boundaries and the hurt I had caused my W. I selfishly rationalized it all in my head because seeing it for what it was was too painful, demeaning, embarrassing, and humiliating. To see it for how awful it really was and how much *I* had hurt and betrayed her, takes yourself WAY down to admit how terrible the behavior was (I thought stuff like "it wasn't REALLY an A, I never even saw the women or spoke to them on the phone so it didn't mean anything, it was "just" online cyberchatting, it was "just" interactive porn, if I don't see it as an A, then it is not an A, etc, if my W isn't meeting my emotional needs, then is it really so bad to have some of them met through a virtual ("unreal/fantasy") setting ). My guess (below) is this may be what's going on with your WAS since it sounds like he is still engaged in A behavior.

Second, there also, I think, was an aspect of residual anger and hurt that I had at my W for ways she had treated me earlier in the marriage. Instead of talking to her about these issues, I had acted out immaturely through the EA, but the EA still didn't address the residual anger/hurt, which lingered on, and I subconsciously used that to justify my previous bad behavior.

Then, a third thing going on was that I was depressed and obsessive, largely about the state of our relationship. So I kept engaging in avoidant behaviors (like playing online computer games) instead of communicating directly about and addressing the pain and dysfunction in my R with my W.

Don't know if any of these issues are at play with your H. It sounds like from what you wrote above that he may have never fully divorced himself from the OW, so that may the simplest explanation in your sitch. The EA never really ended for him, but rather, has escalated. If it is ongoing, he won't be genuinely remorseful for it because there is too much cognitive dissonance to see the A for how terrible it is if you are still participating in it. I think it takes not only the A to end, but time from the A to pass for the betraying spouse to be able to emotionally accept what damage they've caused to their spouse, their own sense of self, and their M. It's too much of a blow to your sense of being a good person at your core to admit it while the A is ongoing or recent.