train, how are you?

[Train]

If you don't get a harness and saddle on that resentment and break it, quickly, it will devour you and everything you hold dear.
Jefe, thank you. And you are right. "Resentment," I believe, is the KEY word. It's absolutely key. I think it's one of the things I'm struggling with most.

I read a FB status by MWD not too long ago. I don't know if I posted about it here, but I did mention it in an email correspondence with my MIL, who is using her experiences in her 50-year marriage with FIL to really identify with and help me/us. Anyway, MWD said something to the effect of: All Ms have ups and downs. But it's COMMITMENT that holds it together during the down times.

And eureka. That's when it hit me: H has not been "committed." He hasn't been loyal. We've been M for 11 years. He has cheated twice.

I didn't realize until he came back this time that he had cheated on the girlfriend he had right before meeting me - a girlfriend he kept for 3 years. He told me all of this once he came back home. You would have NEVER been able to convince me, in the 18 months we dated before M, that he had cheated on someone. He never shared that, and I would not have believed it because he is such a doting, loving man who shows love better - and seemingly more genuinely - than any man I've ever known.

But he cheated on her. And he has cheated on me. There's nothing loyal about that. There's nothing committed about that. So what do we have in "down" times? THAT is where I'm worried. That's where I'm stuck. It's easy enough to say: "Well, don't have down times." But c'mon, ya know? Everybody has down times. Every marriage has down times. I'm worried about my H's commitment during those times, and I'm raging against that very thing. It makes it really hard to let go and "trust."

So, yeah, I have resentments I need to let go of. But I have worries moving forward, too. And they're pretty d@mn justified.