Wow. What else can I say. I guess there IS that position too. Piper, I guess it's pretty clear that there is a WIDE range of reactions to affairs. The point is that while it would be nice if everyone just forgave each other and the healing began on day one, it often takes a LOT longer. I think that's one of the main reasons why reconciliation fails in a lot of cases, because remember, the cheater had one foot out the door already and this "stubborn" hanging onto the affair by the LBS causes them to rethink their decision to come back, just as you are now.
Going back to our knife wound (Which keening did such a "saving private ryan"-esque graphic description of) analogy, while it's entirely possible to recover from that wound in time, the first thing that happens is the knife is removed and a new pain replaces the pain that the knife itself was causing. It's the pain of the void. It's the pain of loss of blood (love/trust) and the pain of rebuilding that part of the body.
THEN after the wound has closed up, any touching of it, or God forbid, knocking it against something, may re-open it and require more stitches, more pain, more recovery time added to an already long process.
Once it's all healed up, do you think the fear of knives ever goes away?
Not to belabor the point, but all I am saying is that I don't agree, you are NOT an evil, vile person as possibly suggested by keening. You committed a vile act but your actions, while raising the ire of most people, do not make you evil.
You do need to understand though, that ANY attempt to make his pain seem somehow on par with what you suffered leading up to the affair, TO HIM, is probably going to be met with anger, resentment and renewed focus on the affair.
It is a $hitty process, one, as keening said, I would not recommend. Where I DO differ with her though is the idea that I would go back and undo it. I would not. I am not alone in that feeling either. There are several people who have expressed a similar feeling, and it doesn't seem to depend on where they are in their sitches, although admittedly, it is easier to think this way if things turn out for the better. My reasoning for that is I didn't realize how unhappy I was and how much I was not living my life the way I wanted to. Does it suck to have to get this wake up call? Sure does, but since my W DID really try to tell me before this (and in NO way am I condoning her actions) it took her affair to really get my attention. Of course, in hindsight, I think there were ways my W could have gotten my attention other than that, but that's not my reality and now that I have my eyes open, I don't want to close them again.
