The sorrow of it all

[Dawgs]

Besides the Gal, how much of DR have you been doing in terms of understanding how the marriage fell apart? You still seemed to blame a lot of the shortcomings on her. Leads to a lot of resentment.

Hi 007 (had to do it :D) - thanks for stopping by!

I've done a good bit. I realize that we both contributed - after all, it takes two. However, with the circumstances in our situation are a fair bit different than normal, so-to-speak. With that said, she left out a huge chunk of her past...and knowing now how the abuse affected her and the way she handled things, I have no doubt that we wouldn't be in this place. Well, let me take that back a little - I'm not quite sure she was cut out for married life and all the tests/trials that go along with it. She has/had this image of how marriage should be based on her grandparent's marriage - which, by the way, was a fairytale (her grandmother told me that they made sure to portray one image in front of them - if you recall, their grandparents rescued them - because of what they had been through and that their "normal" marriage occurred behind closed doors. That led my ex to believe marriages are perfect and don't have problems.

It seems that she puts the men in her relationship life on a pedestal and compares them to her grandfather, who she thought was perfect (once again, what was shown in front of the kids was different than real life). Don't get me wrong, some of it was true but some was them putting their best foot forward and not a true representation of real life.

So, that's a major strike right off the bat. In a now deleted thread of mine, I spoke of how the ex admitted to leaving behind relationships as soon things didn't go her way.

And then there are the relationships tied to the abusive past. The bad boys who treated her like shite. She took in anyone and everyone out of what seems like desperation - the need to be "loved," or maybe given attention is a better word for it. In one of our sessions, my ex spoke of changing who she was to fit the current situation - which, I guess was a "survival" mechanism. My counselor - who was ours, too - talked of how women who were as abused as her (her case goes far, far beyond abuse and its a wonder that she functions as well as she does now) who would seek out those bad boys because they need that drama. I'm not a bad boy. But the guy she had the affair is and had a criminal record for - get this - abuse.

So you see, there was a lot left out that I had no idea happened. The ex had said that I should have known, but how could I? She doesn't accept her role in things - its all my fault, even the affair...according to her. And that is where the shortcomings you mentioned come into play.

Now, the question is that had I known ahead of time would I have still married her? That thought has popped in my head quite a bit. Given what I know now, and discovered recently just exactly what she has been doing over the years, I would say that if it weren't for the kids the answer is I don't know - however, I can't do hypotheticals because I have two wonderful children who are my entire world. The deck was stacked against me from the start - as I have said many times, had I known from the beginning things would be different.

She isn't a bad person but she has so many issues that not even she knows. Sure, I can accept my part but that comes with an asterisk due to her past.