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bingo, I know that feeling well. It took me about a year here to get to that humility. You're doing great! Me too Cat. Bingo, I've read your thread with my mouth hanging open. I often felt the vets were being too hard on you, but I've learned they almost always 'see' things I don't. Therefore I was silent and let them do their job. Loved the analogy of taking you around to the back door. Anyway, best to you and your wife. We do all make mistakes. We do all need to forgive and be forgiven every day.
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What I did do, and thank you for all of those that have pointed this out, is carry on the same behaviour into my second relationship as I had committed in my first marriage. I'm so glad you've awaken to this. Some people go through a life repeating the same pattern of behavior. We all have personal barriers that get in the way of us being objective and truthful about ourselves. Now that you know better you will do better. Gg
D-Day #1 Aug/2007.
D-Day #2 1/27/12
Legally Separated
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You were right to judge........we all need a dose of that occasionally. bingo! I KNEW you'd start getting it!  You've just driven your first crampon into the mountain. A's typically don't exist in a vacuum - while the BS is NEVER to blame for a WS's choice to indulge in the destructiveness of an A, there is usually some work to be done on the BS's part in the M. Working on yourself is only positive for the M. We've all got work to do. The most important part is realizing it. And then doing it. Bingo! 
D-Day 2-10-2009
Fully Recovered and Better Than Ever!
Thank you Marriage Builders!
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Bingo,
Do something different tonight.
Pray, together with your wife.
All blessings,
Jerry
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Bingo GETS IT!!! Good man, now f'n do something w/ this knowledge! DUDE
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Yes, Although angry with some posters, I have learned a great deal over the last few days.
Call it Karma, call it what you like, but I truly appreciate that what you cannot do in any relationship, good or bad, is just give up on improvement. I gave up on my first marriage for what I thought and still do think were very good reasons. That is not to say that it was right, but that is what happened. I deeply regret the way in which I met my CW because I didn't have a chance to grow personally enough to allow the new relationship to have a good start. Ironically, there has never been any jealousy from my CW, and as such she felt that she was truly getting into an honest relationship with a recently single man. That is not true, I was not single by any means, I was still legally married, I realise that now, and have never really thought about it that way until the last sleepless night that I have had.
What I did do, and thank you for all of those that have pointed this out, is carry on the same behaviour into my second relationship as I had committed in my first marriage. A great deal of that was taught to me by my father and mother who were unhappily married for as long as I can remember. Learned behaviour.
I suspect what I did was marry my first wife for the sake of the child as that is pretty much what my parents did even though my father was a jew and my mum a gentile. That created a very imbalanced view on marriage and as such I had not got a clue what I was doing as my own compass was with out a magnet.
I promise you all that I clung on in there, but when I divorced 10 years ago there were not the resources that there are now, and the therapy that we took was deeply uncomfortable and really only served to divide us further as we realised quite how far apart we were. Regrettable, but true.
When I met my CW I was a mess, as was she (she came from a terrible 3x broken home) and as such we had to write our own rules as we knew no better. What we did know is that for both of us we could not do anything but be in love. She was quiet and demure, spiritual (not religious) and sensitive. I was controlling, as I had to be in my first marriage, and as such even though we were, and still are deeply in love, I was trying to create everything I thought I wanted in a wife and she knew that I was everything she wanted in a husband and just waited for me to calm down and relax into what we had. I didn't, and if you sit on anyone long enough then eventually they wil wriggle, which is precisely what happened.
She made one silly drunken mistake, not an excuse, the truth. I paid the price for years of continued controlling behaviour. She deeply regrets what happened and although it was a 5 minute moment of selfishness knew at that point that she was in the right place with me, but things needed to change dramatically for US to work for the "ever" that she had hoped for.
I had made her so low and so unloved and so deeply wounded by my actions that for a moment she gave up the fight and rightly or wrongly made a drunken decision to make herself feel better. In fact it only served to hurt her heart and then the real hard work had to begin.
She didn't go, she didn't carry on with an affair, but she did let me know in uncertain terms that enough was enough. The fact that this happened (the ONS) is actually irrelevant and in many respects I should be grateful, because if it were not for that, we would have wound up with much more work to do and perhaps looking at a D at some stage in the future.
Sure, she lied to try not to cause any hurt as she felt that her threat to me of moving out was enough and as her eyes had been opened to my/our long term issues that was enough, but in the end the truth prevailed and she has done everything she can to prove that to me time and again.
My insecurities have been around for far longer than I have been married either times and looking back, I have treated women the same way since I was a young boy. Learned behaviour.
The last year has been an immense learning curve but one that I am truly grateful to have been able to have been given the opportunity to have been able to take on.
As I said earlier we both had compasses that were truly $%^&ed when we met and wrote rules that worked for us and did so for some time, al be it, in an imbalanced way. When DD came a year ago we realised that what we had written so far was wrong, or not working, and as such looked at our relationship with fresh eyes and started to write the rule book of our foundation again. Three months of day in day out talking got us to the point where we KNEW that we wanted the security and loveliness of marriage for both us and our kids and every day since we work to ensure that there is a balance in our marriage that means we work as a loving team and that there is no more controlling and we fulfil each and every one of each others personal needs both emotionally and in every other way.
What I missed in all of that, and I truly believe whether an affairage or not, we have a strong and wonderful marriage ahead of us, is that I had not repaired the broken bits of me enough to sustain that strength.
So where does that leave us. Well, I start with remorse, work backwards a bit to enable me to look forwards with a clear head and soul. I will do my best to ensure that any fortune I have takes care of not only US but my past as well. I ensure that my ex is never in trouble as it is my responsibility and I ensure that everything that I have done wrong in the past, whether I think it was right or not, is looked at with scrutiny and righted.
It is now far too late to CHANGE the past, but I can certainly go a long way to make those who I may have hurt feel better about why it happened and do everything in my power to ensure that they are taken care of.
What then has to happen is that I have to do a great deal of work on myself as well as my marriage to ensure that history does not repeat itself and that my CW, who has deserved better for the first 8 years of our relationship, never, ever feels so lonely again that she is put in a position of doubt about US or anything else for that matter.
My CW fought very , very hard for US and I did not for 8 years and took her and pretty much everything else, except my children, for granted. I have been spoiled, selfish and truly awful, but that is not where it has to end.
My mistakes have been a million times worse that my CW's and yet I dwell on her one and only moment of selfishness. Why, because that is the way a broken mind works.
That is not to say that I am in the wrong place, I truly having thought hard about even the most hurtful things that have been said here, KNOW I am in the right place however I got there.
BUT, to ensure peace for US and myself, I am going to have to did a little deeper and look back at history, make the puzzle again, look at it long and hard and learn from it.
I came here with all of my emotions in a very tightly strung bag. I came here thinking that all was OK except that I had a WW.
Nothing could be further from the truth. I don't have a WW I have someone who ran out of fight and for a moment thought there was an answer, but it wasn't where she thought it was. It was exactly where the fight was still occurring.
Everything is not OK, far from it. But that is not in my marriage, it is within me.
I need to spend time repenting and looking deeply at what makes me arrogant enough to think I have the answers. I also need to hear what my CW has said all along as in reality she had been proved to be right in our house continually and I have ignored it. I don't want a stepford wife, I want the person who is asleep right now with our child in her tummy to be who she was and has continued to be all along. I know what I said to her on the night of the ONS and in reality just from those hurtful words I do not deserve her. She loves me so much and I rejected that for so many years. That is not the case now, but that is not the end of the repair.
Mountain......yup, it's huge, but I will walk every step hand in hand with her, carry her if I have to, deal with pressure sickness if it comes and one day in the not too distant future feel the security that we did it together and that is never a journey I or she would wish to do with anyone else again.
I am blessed with all that I have and have not been thankful. We have all that we have because I have been smart, but not in the right areas an have neglected the very one thing that could really be the glue that sticks this whole thing together forever........myself.
I have never felt so humble and vulnerable in my life. But belief now, with much gratitude to those who took the time out to bang their heads against the wall that I had built around me, is that my life will change for the better for this and most importantly those of my children and wonderful patient and ever loving wife. They all deserve better.
Finally, I am truly grateful for everything that I have read here. I apologise wholeheartedly to those I have offended and would not wish this to be the last word, more the stepping stone to a greater and more fruitful life ahead for all of us.
You were right to judge........we all need a dose of that occasionally.
Love and Peace Bump
Widowed 11/10/12 after 35 years of marriage
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“In a sense now, I am homeless. For the home, the place of refuge, solitude, love-where my husband lived-no longer exists.” Joyce Carolyn Oates, A Widow's Story
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So different from this: Larry,
I do not know your history and have to admit to speed reading a great deal of what has been said here.
I was one of the unfortunates who came here to try to put some perspective on what turns out to be a minor blip in a very harmonious and happy marriage, only to be lambasted by virtually everyone who read my post because I had met my wife after I had filed for divorce from my ex.
Not only did the supposed help (from MB posters) create more of a problem in my marriage, it nearly finished it and I eventually, after being accused of everything from mental illness to basically being a sinner, gave up on the whole idea of MB. I took a course of traditional none bias, non faith based marital therapy and what was an issue, is no longer one.
I implore you not to get embroiled in any of this nonsense and try to look deeply at what you have and how lucky you can be. We all meet our spouses in different ways, and yes, sometimes when we least expect it or it is not ideal, but a current marriage is the one that counts.
I have not posted here for a very long time but occasionally peak at what is going on and have discovered that it is really the insecure making the less secure feel worse. In my case, and I am sure that this will be edited anyway, it was a total disaster ever bumping into this site.
I know that things can go wrong in any relationship for various reasons, but we cannot choose always who we fall in love with and why. All that matters is that we are as good a person as we can be and work hard to remain that way.
I suffered extremely badly exposing myself to some of the folks here and it created a great deal of crisis in my house. Luckily my wife and I made sense of our lives and got things in perfect condition.
We all make mistakes and we certainly are never far from creating problems if we so wish. Please though, do not think of yourself as a bad person because you fell in love. You didn't cause a problem and you certainly were not the catalyst to the end of a previous relationship.
I know people will accuse me of wayward thinking, as they have you, and to be quite frank I do not care. I also know that I am classed as an affariage and to be quite frank, that does not bother me either. If I am a threat to the paranoid or insecure then so be it, but it is not something after 10 years of being together with my now wife that I tried to create.
I don't take pride in the fact that I was part of a failed marriage 10 years ago, but I am certainly not going to beat myself up for the rest of my days for it and especially not ruin what happiness I have now found in my wife and our MARRIAGE.
Look deep inside yourself and if you are truly and completely satisfied with what you find then the rest is irrelevant. Don't ignore what you read here, just don't let it get you down. Some of it comes from a far worse place than you have ever been.
Larry, just be yourself and look elsewhere for a solution to your issues. Don't allow yourself to be beaten up by people who seem hell bent on condemning your relationship in whatever form it took.
Good luck and keep strong.
BW
Married 1989
His PA 2003-2006
2 kids.
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Widowed 11/10/12 after 35 years of marriage
*********************
“In a sense now, I am homeless. For the home, the place of refuge, solitude, love-where my husband lived-no longer exists.” Joyce Carolyn Oates, A Widow's Story
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bingo, you wrote, "look deeply at what you have and how lucky you can be".
Larry's marriage ended. To a large extent, that was the predictable result, based on its origins.
His XW wanted out of her first marriage and, aged about 25, became involved with a 60 year-old that she was chatting to online. He gave her "a safe place to land", in Larry's own words. About 5 years into the marriage, she has an affair with the closest relative he has.
The marriage started in the wrong way and the outcome was inevitable.
BW
Married 1989
His PA 2003-2006
2 kids.
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Whether Larry's marriage failed or not is not the issue to which I refer. I used the words "can be" to point out that, as with all relationships, some work and some don't. We are not, and should never be, the judge and jury when it comes to others.
I went away from this site having listened to all that people had said, a complete mess. I spent time with a psychiatrist to attend to the bi-polar that I don't have ( thanks to the Doctor on here.....you know who you are) and then to proper marriage guidance which, it turns out, was not about how my relationship started, more where it was at now and what one should do to ensure it stays in good condition.
I am lucky, but I can imagine that many here who have come for help but are then basically told that their marriage is a sham take that advice to heart and then approach their marriage in a very negative way.
The "it'll never work because..." school of thinking is not conducive to assisting the wounded. More sticking your respective fingers in the would and twisting.
I can only speak for myself, but there was more damage done to my relationship on this site than I can even begin to express. It put dangerous and unfounded thoughts into an already fragile mind and created merry hell at home.
Luckily I saw sense and did it properly, only to discover that there was really no need for the attention that the beginning of my relationship seemed to have created and certainly no need for the lambasting I got.
Each of us is different and on set of rules does not always fit all.
I wish all of you good luck with your relationships and advise anyone with an ounce of sense to seek professional advice and not waste hours and days getting swallowed up in the bitterness that this site offers. I'm sorry, but that is precisely what an eminent professional called the pages of "advice" i was given here.
I wish larry Luck. He deserves a little. I sincerely hope that he gets it right next time. I suspect, on reflection, that a 35 year age gap can present some issues of their own.
I really am done here. I am not getting embroiled in unhealthyness again.
Blessings to all.
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Just because you are bitter, does not mean the methods you find here are the cause. Bitterness must be dealt with, and yes, you will have to swallow that bitter pill, but as with most pills it will help you.
One year becomes two, two years becomes five, five becomes ten and before you know it, you've wasted your whole life on a problem you can't solve. That's one way to spend your life. -rwinger
I will not spend my life this way.
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Thank you karma.
I am not bitter in any way. I am appreciative of what I have, however I got there.
I have not wasted any time at all and yes, 10 years have passed and I thank my lucky stars that I have my lovely wife and children. That is precisely how I wish to spend my life.....with them.
I don't understand your analogy and perhaps don't need to. All it does is serve to create uncertainty where it is not required.
I am not blaming the methods here for anything really, merely pointing out that you cannot apply one rule to all.
There are many ways in which a relationship starts, and, if nothing else, each and every marriage should be respected for what it means to the individuals involved.
We each have our own agenda and whether right or wrong in the eyes of this site....that is all that matters.
Peace.
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What do you believe of affair marriages, then? Should they be respected and treated the same as a marriage with no infidelity involved?
The analogy is this.
Swallowing the bitter pill is akin to facing the unpleasant issues. You must face them, identify them, and deal with them despite how terrible it is to go through them. Like a BS dealing with a WS.
One year becomes two, two years becomes five, five becomes ten and before you know it, you've wasted your whole life on a problem you can't solve. That's one way to spend your life. -rwinger
I will not spend my life this way.
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I believe, very firmly, that it is today that is important. How things got started is not always relevant to that. If one contemplates ones naval for too long about a past that is truly just that then it does no good.
Sure look back at mistakes, but don't dwell. That is not good.
Affair marriages........I am not in a position to judge anyones relationship really.
What I do know is that I have ten years under my belt and am blissfully happy as is my wife, and dwelling on how we started has not, and never will help. We started and that is what matters. We hurt no-one and continued that way. The problems were not about the beginning, they were about neglect in the present.
I do not care how others start their relationships. Very few would leap from a loving marriage into another relationship without deeply looking at the consequences. I am not an advocate of affairs, obviously, but also know that sometimes, timing is not perfect. As I said, it is not one rule for all.
Peace
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"Living in the present" is what seems to cause an affair.
Looking back at mistakes, and dwelling (for a time) on them can be good for you because you will realize what you did wrong; you will rectify it, and make up for it. Then it can be put behind you.
A bad beginning begets a bad ending; that is why so many affair marriages fall flat.
Another way of saying it is, 'If they do it with you they will do it TO you.'
One year becomes two, two years becomes five, five becomes ten and before you know it, you've wasted your whole life on a problem you can't solve. That's one way to spend your life. -rwinger
I will not spend my life this way.
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Actually Karma, I agree with you on certain points.
Learn from yesterday, live and be thankful for today and plan for tomorrow are all things we need to bear in mind.
I cannot speak for all, but I had carried into my current relationship a great deal of what I had learned years and years ago, not just in my previous marriage, but stretching as far back as a young boy. Learned behaviour can be a critical to the issues found in any relationship. In my case I had a considerable problem with intimacy. Not in the sexual sense, just letting people get too close to me.
Now, after years of rejection and controlling behaviour my then partner (we were not married) finally gave up the fight and, after I had finished the relationship and told her that her bags were packed she got very drunk at a party(she is tee total normally) and kissed another man. He too was drunk and he tried and tried to have his way with a vunerable lady, luckily to no real avail. There was instant regret and then the truth came out and we both realized what a devastating thing we had done to our lives together.
Fortunately I have not had to deal with an affair as such and therefore cannot judge other peoples position on that. What I do know, however, is that the bitter pill had to be swallowed and what was a terrible situation all round came right in the most remarkable way.
On the subject of how my relationship started, it was not a �bad� beginning, quite the contrary. It was a beautiful thing between two damaged people that spent many years trying to deal with their pasts but ignoring the fact that their own relationship was not being nurtured in the correct way.
I have no idea what percentage of marriages fail in the US, but here in England it is almost 50%. Having been part of that statistic, I am never going there again and as such, how my relationship started is irrelevant so many years later.
I am not suggesting that it is perfect to start a relationship whilst in another. Far from it, but, in the words of Coldplay, �when you�ve tried your best but you don�t succeed�, things happen, and sometimes out of ones control.
I just felt that Larry was correct in that he had been lambasted for starting a relationship in the way that he did. Whether it lasted or not is a different matter entirely, but to lay the blame squarely on the fact that the lady in question was still technically married, has no bearing on whether they were suited.
I am a believer in fate and also realise that all relationship require dedicated attention at all times. But love is a great and wonderful thing and living in a relationship without it is futile for any period of time. Again, in the words of a great English songwriter, �I wake up and fall in love with you over again�. When that has gone, and gone for a long time, it�s time to move on.
A great friend of mine told me that when you walk away from a relationship and nothing hurts inside you, you have made the right decision. That�s how it was for me.
We are all different and none of us own our husbands/wives and certainly cannot control them. We all make catastrophic mistakes now and again and have to deal with the consequences. Just as I would not wish to meet someone in a night club, others feel that the way I met my wife, and Larry met his is inappropriate. All I will say is that I am here to tell the tale and blissfully happy to have had some hiccups along the way to focus the mind.
To dwell on a beginning as some here do only serves to try to predict, even wish for, an end.
Live and let live please.
Good luck to you Karma, you seem absolutely lovely.
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Sorry that this is long winded, but I need some help getting over this situation before it eats me up and ruins all that I have.
I have been with my wife for 8 � years and married just 9 months. We got together whilst I was divorcing and she was just out of a long term relationship. She was 23 at the time and I was 9 years her senior with two kids aged 10 & 7. Cutting a story short, I got custody of the children for just over half the time and after massive amounts of indecision (took me six months to commit to my now wife) we moved in together and she became step mum (fantastically) to my kids. We then had two of our own now aged 3 & 6 and are considering adding to our numbers.
For the vast majority of our time together I have battled depression combined with too much booze and in reality treated her like [censored]. She comes from a very broken home and wished for security, but even though we were engaged and lived together I never truly committed and used to end the relationship on a fairly regular basis and even though she is truly beautiful made her feel like dirt. We got over a close family suicide (my father) soon after we got together , births, step kids, moving several times and career changes. She was and always has been truly wonderful as a Mum and Step Mum as well as a loyal and forgiving partner. I have called her names beyond what anyone should tolerate and could not have made her feel more insecure if I tried. No joint bank account only my name on the house etc etc. On top of that I used to holiday alone a lot and spent a month in rehab did very little with her and the kids and rarely involved myself in her side of the family.
I appreciate that I sound like the worst human being ever, but I truly loved and still love her and know that it was my own insecurities that lead to the whole control issue. I was unbearably controlling and mistrusting and was pretty intolerable for a great deal of our time together. She stuck in there though and stayed quiet such was her love for me. bingo, your depression and drinking and other pressures seem to have created an unhappy relationship. You admit to having treated your partner really badly for most of the time you have been together. I doubt very much whether your encounter with posters here made your marriage into the near-wreck that you describe. It seems to have been in a terrible place already. I'm happy that you find that the lyrics of Coldplay and other songwriters give better marriage advice than does Dr Harley. Your marriage counselling seems to have created a blissfully happy marriage. Can you tell me what it involved? I live in the UK, and marriage counselling here seems to take a different approach from that of Dr Harley. Dr Harley has given reasons why affair marriages face difficulties. Your UK MC seems to think that the origins of the marriage make no difference to the behaviour within it. It appears that the counsellor read this thread and thought that the Harley-based advice we were giving was wrong. Did he or she show a good success rate with affair marriages?
BW
Married 1989
His PA 2003-2006
2 kids.
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Hi Sugar,
I was not implying that MB had wrecked my marriage, my marriage was not wrecked, my relationship was and I was obsessing about the minutia of a drunken reaction to my appalling bahaviour.
I am also not suggesting that song lyrics resolve problems that professionals should deal with. Please do not take every word so seriously.
What did happen is that I was made, by posters here, to doubt the integrity of my marriage and its chances of survival. That, let me tell you straight, was pure wrong !
I found a good counsellor quite local to me actually who didn't dwell on where we started, more that there was a huge amount of love that had endured nearly 10 years of togetherness and that we had buried our heads for a great deal of time, combined with my absolute neglect of my partner, we were bound to run aground.
My behaviour has changed now we are an us, I have to say. Being married is a terrific thing when all is well, but one has to keep working.
What my counsellor stated, and she has been at it (marriage therapy) for nearly 30 years is that it is true that affairs, however serious rarely last, and it is true also that marriages that come from affairs have different problems to deal with over time, but in her experience, they are no more likely to fail than a "traditional" single boy meets single girl marriage.
I am not saying that she is the worlds fines expert, but what was pointed out is that many marriages start whilst someone is still involved legally as the process, as you may well know over in the UK can take years to sort out. In my case I had been living away from the marital home for 6 months before I clapped eyes on my wife to be. It was well over a year before the divorce was finalised and as such I had actually spent quite a bit of time alone.
I know that doesn't count here and I am fully aware of what the belief system of MB wishes us all to adhere to.
I do not condone affairs, I truly don't, but I disagree with the premise that all, or most marriages that start in circumstances are doomed, that is just not the case.
Yes my marriage counsellor read my story and listened to it, obviously. It makes no difference after this amount of time where we started, the fact that we are happy is all that counts.
My behaviour, as I have often stated was just the same as it was since I started having relationships. Nothing to do with the way my current relationship started....nothing at all. Learned behaviour is what I was dealing with and a large dose of insecurity.
I am happy with my marriage and hope that with continued work it will remain as happy as it is today.
My experience here has been savage and it did indeed cause a tremendous amount of unwarranted pain in my home. I am so glad to have got some proper help.
If you wish to have the name of my counsellor, then do let me know.
peace
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Joined: Sep 2008
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Well, bingo, you did accuse the posters here of nearly wrecking your marriage, in the post you made to Larry's thread. You also painted a picture of a very harmonious and happy marriage until you brought your problem to this forum. You said, I was one of the unfortunates who came here to try to put some perspective on what turns out to be a minor blip in a very harmonious and happy marriage, only to be lambasted by virtually everyone who read my post because I had met my wife after I had filed for divorce from my ex.
Not only did the supposed help (from MB posters) create more of a problem in my marriage, it nearly finished it and I eventually, after being accused of everything from mental illness to basically being a sinner, gave up on the whole idea of MB. I took a course of traditional none bias, non faith based marital therapy and what was an issue, is no longer one. In your original post, you spoke of serious depression and hard drinking, enough to necessitate a stint in rehab. You spoke of treating your partner like "censored" for most of the 10 years. That does not sound like a relationship that was wrecked by this forum. I think that it was fair for posters to describe depression is a kind of mental illness. You wrote this week as if you had very few problems before your wife's infidelity. You wrote as if you had had a happy relationship before you brought a "minor blip" to this forum and were described as having serious problems, which you didn't have. You wrote that it was "a total disaster" ever bumping into this site. I'm challenging what you wrote earlier in this thread about your 10-year relationship against what you wrote recently. Your MC might not be aware of the failure rates of affair marriages, but they can be found. Her ignorance of them does not give me confidence in her abilities.
BW
Married 1989
His PA 2003-2006
2 kids.
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Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 337
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OP
Member
Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 337 |
Please don't be so silly. I admitted to depression and drinking and never once stated that my relationship was harmonious prior to my wife's (partner then) infidelity. I also stated that I had massive problems prior to that point. You have misread or mis interpreted my posts. sorry.
I have been happy since I was married 16 months ago. The only reason I came to this site in the first place was to try and calm some of the obsessivness of my thoughts surrounding the situation my wife got herself into and my part in all of that.
What I was saying is that having come here with a marriage that was happy but past issues that I was not coping with very well, I got the @�$% kicked out of me for how I met the lovely woman. That was unhelpful to the extreme and ceratinly not conducive to helping me along as it caused a great deal of angst in my house.
Sure my therapist who has specialised in marriage counselling for 30 years may not have a clue about statistics, but it seems unlikely to me really. With the amount of letters after her name, she has studied form. Your comments are unjustified and come from an uncomfortable place.
Do tell me where, not on this site, these statistics can be found ? I am curious, not because I don't believe you personally, but statistics are an ever changing thing just as what we should and shouldn't eat changes as science, or scientific opinion changes.
Also, yes I suffered depression because my Father and best friend killed himself leading me into a downward spiral of drink and sleeping pills that I dealt with in rehab. Something else to shoot me down with !? What I did not like was unqualified lawyers telling me that I had bi-polar only to be told, expensively, that I was actually suffering from post traumatic depression that seems to have died down to the occasional down day. I needed no prescriptive treatment and have been given a professional all clear.
I seem to be having to justify myself again.
I have a happier marriage that most I have come across. Partly because I am lucky and partly because we had to come to a point prior to marriage where a good hard look at what we were doing was necessary. We both made cataclysmic mistakes, me far more than my delicious wife and for that we paid in tears.
What I wont listen to any more, and is, in my opinion wrong, is waffling statistics and guess work.
My Grandfather smoked 60 cigarettes a day until he died of a stomach problem at 91. Sometimes statistics should not be blanket applied.
Good luck and peace.
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