Let me see..from this WS's point of view..and from some of the things which I said..I am not saying all of your WS's were dealing w/ the same issues I was..but, some of them may be..FOO dysfunctions.and what they learned as a child..are the beliefs of themselves they brought into the marriage of themselves and what relationships were based on..<p>I never loved you--<p>I can in all honesty say I didn't love my stbxh when I married him..some of you may never understand this..and thats okay..yes I cared about him..I cared more about not hurting his feelings but,I didn't love him..I cared about pleasing everyone but myself..I knew before I walked down the isle that I was making a huge mistake and should have ran to the nearest exit..but I didn't..I looked out at all the work everyone else had done to put this wedding together in a very short time..and thought "how would it look to them?" this is not HIS fault I felt this way.. but it's how I felt..and I was so afraid of hurting someone else..and felt..well..I can do this..I can suffer so that he and everyone else can be happy..<p>I did this my entire childhood..I didn't tell my mom my dad was abusing me..I kept my mouth shut..why?? so as not to hurt her..she loved this man..and it would devastate her to know the man she loved would sexually abuse her child..so I suffered in silence..I also didn't tell because it would destroy my dad..his career, his life..and I as a child couldn't face being responsible for that..I was protecting my siblings..from being w/out a father there all the time..from knowing our father was a criminal..so I choose to suffer alone..and I went into my marriage with those same thoughts..which was WRONG on my part..<p>I am not saying all of your WS's have been where I have or have felt as I have..but for me..this was a truth..and one in which was very painful to realize and accept..that I hurt him (something I didn't want to do)..and my children even more by not speaking up years ago..I felt responsible for their happiness at the expense of my own..which wasn't fair to me, or them..<p>-I never knew what love was--<p>I really didn't understand what love was..Love is not sacrificing yourself to please everyone else..I did not
love myself..based on what I felt and thought about myself inside..so I could not truly love anyone else..or accept that anyone else could love me..<p>
I need my independence-<p>Another way of saying..I am an adult..and I want to be treated as such..with due respect as you also want--
I am not a piece of property to be owned..I am a seperate individual from you..just because we are married does not mean I am just a "wife/husband" but I have many other aspects that make me who I am..just as
you have many other aspects that make you who you are..
I am a wife, mother, friend, child of God, employee, student, sister, cousin, grandchild, niece..ect ect..<p>You just don't get it- you don't understand-<p>and they are probably correct..you don't truly understand what they are 'feeling' inside themselves and why..you know what you are feeling inside.<p>
He's just a friend-<p>someone who treated me with respect as a person, who actually listened to me when I talked and didn't turn
a deaf ear because what was being said has been said over and over and being completely ignored as if I never said anything at all. and sounding like I was nagging to get you to understand what I was feeling inside..<p>I felt like I was dead-<p>I did feel as if I was dead inside..the more I denied how I truly felt..I was killing off the feelings God gave me to feel..I was not living a full life..<p>
This has nothing to do with you-<p>In reality it has alot to do with how the WS feels inside about themselves..and things they may be dealing with..and the only thing it really has to do w/ the BS isn't anything personal..it's just have not meet WS's needs..for whatever reason..<p>
They may have been meeting all of your needs...but, apparently you weren't meeting theirs, and they went about letting you know the wrong way because nothing else seemed to working..and it's this lack of your needs being met now that you are maybe for the first time seeing how the WS has felt inside for many years..and either never told you..or you ignored what they were saying..so maybe it's NOT just the WS's living in the fog..but also the BS that is living and has lived in the fog for so long..and the fog is just now being lifted on both sides???

I love this thread - so much material I've got!<p>"Why don't you tell your family that we just 'grew apart'?" (In one discussion where she was trying to convince me to do this so that a possible future reconciliation would be easier for her - recall she wants to "try OM out" for a while and come back if he's not her type after all - gag.)<p>"I know I could be happy with you - I really do. I just don't know if I want to spend the rest of my life with you." (Pardon? Someone send in a fogese translator!!)<p>"I know if I leave you'll take it as rejection, but it isn't that at all." (Again, she wants to keep it friendly so she can come waltzing back to her friendly neighbourhood doormat - me - or at least the old me.)<p>As for "I need my independence" - I've heard this one too - ThornedRose, your comments are correct, but one mustn't read too much into these words - if a WS is using them to jusify a different relationship, one has to ask how they expect to get independence after falling into the OP's arms - trading stability for instability in my W's case.<p>As for "He's just a friend" - certainly the OP is a friend, but a friend at the expense of another friend in my W's case - she admits we're best friends even. So who cares about their friendship now - it was irreversably put in jeapordy by the decisions made by both parties - how I can I feel sympathy about that?<p>As for "This has nothing to do with you" - Bwa Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha. Sorry. This is one I can't buy. The feelings that the WS are feeling are indeed their own - but saying that it's nothing personal is saying to me that the whole thing, being internalized in the other party, must be all about selfishness on some level. Or it would seem to be a way to justify the pain inflicted on the BS - to accept blame themselves and hope to heck that it will reduce their rightful guilt. Truly the highest form of fogese as far as I can tell.

Re-reading my last post, it was insensitive to comments made by ThornedRose - I do apologize. Today's been a good day between WS and I, but pent-up frustration has to release somewhere, I guess. If I keep it out of my M, maybe I'll have some hope.

TR,<p>I hear what you have said, and I believe that the situation is 100% true for you and certain other WS. Such childhood experiences have a crippling effect on people's ability to form healthy relationships. What happens to the innocent child carries over into adulthood with awful consequences. <p>In fact, my DIL comes from a similar background, and I feel very sad for her past experiences and for the suffering she is feeling now as she is trying to deal with the consequences of her choices. We always knew her behavior (pre- and during the affair) was a result of her problems and weaknesses (many of which were NOT her own doing) and love her anyway. She still feels that she has to earn her own mother's love and approval, the same mother who overlooked her abuse as a little girl.<p>In fact, an A is not the healthy way to deal with marital dissatisfaction. I suggest that having an A is a clue to WS, BS, and family that something is amiss in the emotional health of the WS. And I hasten to state that the roots of the problems may have been out of the WS's control. I also acknowledge that some BS are abusive, addictive, sociopathic personalities themselves, and that's a huge issue where the BS has dangerous, major mental health problems. <p>However, an A only makes problems worse, not better. Having justifiable reasons to want unmet ENs to be met is not the same as having excuses to have an A.<p>How I wish my DIL had dealt with her emotional problems BEFORE she instigated an A and devastated my son and grandson and caused permanent harm to the whole family, including herself. My son had been loving her as she was, messed up emotionally, accepting that living with her mood swings was just part of loving her.<p>Only after months of reflection, thousands of pages read, and much prayer, has our family reached the point that we can LAUGH at the statements on this thread. For so long, we cried, as many of the BS here have cried. We have to see some humor here to replace the despair. <p>Isn't it so sadly ironic that we've all "been there, heard that" - dozens of us, dozens of different circumstances - same words.<p>I hope that you are learning to accept that you are, and have always been, lovable simply because you are a valuable human being. As you really come to believe that, you can build the kinds of relationships you deserve. <p>Best wishes, Estes

You folks are a hoot! I couldn't have asked for more on this thread.<p>As for YOU, TR, this is supposed to be a FUN POST (as I think that, I have a crooked smirk on my face and my tone is playful....none of which can come across in the text- it's just a joke). I agree that if there are serious issues, such as yours, that pretty much ALL of these "scripted quips" may well be true and valid. But a vast majority of the WS out there have not suffered as you have. Please don't take the light hearted nature of some of these posts as invalidating your feelings. I truly CAN see what your saying in light of your past, and it really makes sense to me.<p>JR-
<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> "I know I could be happy with you - I really do. I just don't know if I want to spend the rest of my life with you." <hr></blockquote><p>Yeah, that one has boggled my mind since it was uttered. I was absolutely dumbfounded, and for the first time in a VERY long time, I was speechless. WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT?!?!??<p>Kev

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, LOL!!!!!!<p>kev, STOPPIT! You're making me laugh my a** off here! <p>I got most of the same lines.<p>"She's just a friend." (Uh, sure ... I always have sex with *my* friends.)<p>After telling her everything about me, our marriage, our problems, forwarding my email to H: "You have no right to delve into her private business!" (Okay. Do I have a guarantee of reciprocity on that - ??)<p>"She offered to gracefully bow out." (Sort of like she "gracefully" bowed in, eh?)<p>And, totally inapropos of nothing, as to why we couldn't stay together: "If we had kids, you'd let them run around in filthy diapers!" (Wow. I am a cat breeder, and I somehow manage to keep the litter boxes clean and the rest of the house in relatively decent order. Hm ... where did *this* come from?)<p>"One of the things that attracted me to her was that she got her cats from a no-kill shelter." (Definitely a reason for sainthood if I've ever heard one.)<p>"If you and I hadn't been married, we might have stayed together." (Wow. You made this decision in a period of what, a week after you met her?)<p>And of course, my favorite, "I never had an affair!" and "I did NOT cheat on you." AND ... "I did not have a relationshio with (THAT WOMAN) her."<p>And of course, when I mention all of these things that he said, he tells me, huffily, "I NEVER said that!"<p>belld, ROTFLMAO!!!!!

BellD-
<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> "I did not have a relationship with (THAT WOMAN) her." <hr></blockquote><p>HOLY COW!!!! The (ex)president was in the FOG! It's all clear to me now, I KNEW there was a reason I didn't vote for him..... [img]images/icons/grin.gif" border="0[/img] [img]images/icons/grin.gif" border="0[/img] <p>ALSO ROTFLMAO!
K

Thought I'd add in what a good friend of mine heard when he was dumped by his fiancees (happened twice) for OM. Keep in mind my friend is very attractive, smart, successful, fun etc. "He is nothing like you and I'm not sure why I'm attracted, but I can't stay away. He drinks too much, possibly has a drug problem, doesn't have a job and sometimes doesn't shower for days. I feel we have a karmic connection." Fiancee #2 "I don't like the kind of music you listen to in the car."
My best friend is a very repentant former WS and a staunch believer in FOG. She asked me "How could you sit there and listen to the c**p I was spewing? Why didn't you smack me in the head and tell me I sounded like a mental patient?" The answer was simple. She never woudl have believed me. She even had herself firmly entrenched in revisionist history that I knew not to be true, because I was there lol.

Here is a helpful hint for understanding "fogese" that I got from a very good therapist. It takes some practice, but you can do it. What you do is to take what the fogese speaker is saying and either a) use it's opposite literal meaning; or b) interpret it as a reflection of how the WS is feeling about themselves. <p>E.G., "It has nothing to do with out marriage," really means "It has everything to do with what's going on in our marriage." "It's none of your business" becomes "This IS your business."<p>For an example of a WS reflecting upon themselves (this is particularly true when they are criticizing the spouse), you might translate the following, e.g. "You never have time for us," really means, "I don't put enough time into our marriage." "You're the most selfish person I've ever met" means "I'm the most selfish person in the world right now."<p>Try it - it *does* work!<p>belld

Ok, let's expand on Bell's theory/fact. In my case when the WS babbled I said ok, yea me too. <p>WS: BS is at fault for the A. If I knew you loved me that much, I would have never left. <p>BS: Yea, me too.<p>*************<p>WS: I can't pay my bills and live out on my own.<p>BS: Yes, me too.<p>*************<p>WS: I need my own space. I need time alone. You are always calling me. <p>BS: Yea, me too.<p>*************<p>WS: Why are you always saying, yea me too?<p>BS: I don't know. <p>*************<p>WS: You don't understand me. <p>BS: Yea, me too.<p>*************<p>WS: You sure sound stupid being soo agreeable and
saying 'yea, me too'. <p>BS: Yes, you do. <p>************<p>Note: I was in plan B when these type of discussions (if you could call it that) took place. Most of what is here happened and then some. <p>
L.<p>[ November 12, 2001: Message edited by: Orchid ]</p>

"HOLY COW!!!! The (ex)president was in the FOG! It's all clear to me now, I KNEW there was a reason I didn't vote for him..... "<p>Kevco, your statement reminded me of something my WH emailed me the other day. It was in relationship to our pending divorce. He said "We are not the Rockefellers" meaning don't take all his money. I feel like responding "Yeah, were more like the Clintons or Kennedy's" LOL

Sorta building on belld's post just above, and seriously now, I believe we BSs CAN take some comfort when the fog horn sounds these alien gems. (Maybe we should think of them as a malfunction in the alien's universal translator.)<p>What I mean is that whenever we hear this blather, we can rest assured that the Mothership is still in control. It's very hard to adopt this mindset when we're hurting so badly, but it gets easier over time and can actually be quite therapeutic - at least it is for me now.<p>OK, just ONE more quote:<p>"I've only lied to you once."<p>WAT