I am titanium

[Raine]

Hey oh uR and Wonka! Thanks for your posts. They mean so much to me. Yup, I know I should not have taken that conversation to the point of commenting on his FB friends. And this is all part of the stuff I've been keeping inside, venting about here, but he doesn't get to see that. But every once in awhile something creeps out. I need to figure out how to deal with that better. In seven hours of talking, that was my one low point. Everything else was about as good as I get. The cheating and OW were there, like an elephant in the room. Just never mentioned directly or specifically.

I had to stop writing that post yesterday. It gets intense. I had no idea it could be so intense. When reading rH's back in December, I could not relate. I could just see the positives of it. I couldn't relate to how hard this is to hold back for the greater good.

I think I did a pretty good job of letting him know that I didn't judge him and that I'm not perfect. Wrong is wrong. Sin is sin. I'm just as guilty as he is. To judge him would be to judge myself. He has told me multiple times that he knows I am not judging him. I don't think he would be talking to me so much if that weren't true. But I don't know. It could be a bunch of testing too.

More stuff from these convos...

He told me something that happened on his way to work the other day. He said he looked in his rear view mirror and there was a woman in an SUV, attractive, our age, and when he looked back again, and she was crying, uncontrollably. He wanted to get out of his car and comfort her and tell her it's going to be okay. That she will get through this. That makes me emotional because that could have been me. That has been me. But he was never there. It's really difficult to hear him talking about other people and now even strangers that he wants to be there for but he doesn't seem to know or remember or want to know what I was going through when he left. I held it together and validated.

At one point I said "I like me. I like this person I have become." And he said, "everyone likes you. Everyone likes who you are."

I don't think I've talked about this on here, but there is something that has happened that is very minor, but I feel he doesn't like and is jealous about. There is an acquaintance of H who I met, and then this guy friended me on FB. This guy is good looking, very smart and well educated, and single. It's very friendly, but H has now brought this guy in relation to me up several times. At one point in the car H said, "Raine you know you are so pretty. There is a reason (this guy) friended you on FB." And I said, "Whatever. He just thinks I'm smart and wants to talk to me about stuff." And H said, "Yeah that's it. He wants to f'ing cuddle your smartness." This guy came over with some other friends a few days later and gave me a hug when he got here and when he left. It's totally innocent, but now since H has said stuff like this three times about him, I feel awkward around this guy. I think this guy really likes what my H has. I think he would switch him places in a heartbeat. He adores the kids and the family dynamic.

One thing that has helped in talking with H is that we have friends who are recently D, but they have been dealing with MLC horribly for over two years. The W is still in the place I was for two months. Obsessing, listening to his spew, just doing everything wrong. Other husband has completely blown his life apart. Put a check mark next to everything someone in MLC could do to destroy his life and family and he did it. So both H and I can look at that and think, wow we are doing really good. H can look and no he never destructed to the degree this other guy did. And I never let it reach the point where it affected the kids and everyone else.

H said the best thing I ever did was become so strong and do it so fast. He said it was the best thing for me, for the kids, and for him too. He said that I kept him grounded. That if not for me, it would have been so much worse than what it was. He would have self destructed even further. TBH I don't think he remembers much of what I mess I was at the beginning. But yes, I think I got strong super quick. I had to. I told him this actually. I said it wasn't doing anyone any good for me to live in that place. I had to make a choice to get strong for me and for the kids.

So anyway being able to talk about this couple really helps being able to talk about him and what is going on. I said, you know that there is a lot of stuff in this other husband's past that he is trying to cope with and there are things he never dealt with. My H said, "Oh I know. Believe me I know." I said to H that he was light years ahead of this other husband because he realizes that. H said he felt like this OH was trying to get back the glory time in his life and relive it. Not that he missed out on anything, but misses that time in his life. We talked about this OH's GF. I told him that the other wife has been obsessing about it, but I told her that there is a reason the other husband goes for her, because she will accept anything from him. Other husband can be a crappy boyfriend. No responsibilities, treat her like trash. Other husband is with her because she is not other wife. My H was agreeing every time I said something, "yup, yup, yup." And then he said other husband was with this girlfriend to boost his own ego.

So lots and lots of talking last weekend, but this week we've been pretty quite, keeping to ourselves more. He has been going out or keeping to himself while home. He has noticed something up with me, which is different for him to notice. It didn't have anything to do with him, and he said he knew for once that it didn't. I ended up talking to him about it. It was about a friend of mine, but he had a pretty non-emotional response to it, like c'est la vie and was sorry I was having to deal with it. I think it was a combination of several things that have been affecting me, but I could pin it all there and take him out of the equation. He said to let him know if he could help out more. I'm not sure on how to approach that. I just wish he would help more. Why do I need to ask?

He told my parents he was in C, which surprised me. He said it when they asked how long before his parents got here, and he gave it in terms of how many C sessions he had setup before they arrive. I thought that was interesting. He was using that as a way of counting down the time as opposed to days.

He doesn't seem to like going out as much as he did before. He complains about it a lot. Complains about the people he is with. He told me he could stay home if I needed him to. I said "nope, I'm good. Do what you want." I feel like he uses me as a scapegoat a lot and always has. He doesn't want to hurt feelings. Too much of that wanting to tell people what they want to hear stuff.


I need help getting over these negative feelings I am having, and I just don't know how best to do it. I feel I do a really good job not showing him any hurt and resentment. Even talking about the EAs on FB, it was done very calm, matter of fact and he even said no big deal.

Sometimes it's not a big deal. It's like he did all this before I even met him. And then sometimes I'm really disturbed by it. And it's not so much the cheating, it's that I feel like he has been there for other people when he wasn't there for me. That he abandoned me emotionally and physically at my darkest more difficult moment. I didn't have as hard of a time with him going and seeing OW1 that same morning for a booty call. Him having lunch with her is what was the worse thing. Him leaving me and the kids there in the parking lot to go and make sure she was okay, that he had lunch with her, that he got her back to work.

At the same time, I don't feel like my hurt is attached to him. Know what I mean? It's mine. Not that I'm blaming him or judging him or keeping score, but it's still there and I have to bury it, because it has a relation to him. Because what I'm feeling would make him feel bad.

I don't know how to get over it other than to just make a choice to get over it. I can rationalize the actions, not excuse them, but understand the why. But at the same time void the feelings that comes with it too...that's difficult. I haven't mastered that. And I'm not an expert at keeping them hidden either.