I would like to start off by saying that all of us are experiencing different degrees of pain. I am in no way saying that mine is geater. What I do want to say is that if I can forgive after what I have gone through, I believe there is hope for most to forgive.

I posted a question about lengthy affairs more than a week ago. Thank you to everyone who responded. Of course there is more to my situation than I was able to write. I will keep it brief.

1. Suspicious of affair from the very beginning. I even saw it coming. Crazy me, I trusted my husband.

2. Expressed concerns to husband, whom of course denied everything and said I was crazy. He even
suggested that I needed to see a shrink! This was of course him being defensive.

3. Husband lost job. I had to support the family.

4. My work was stressful. I was being sexually harrassed. I filed charges. My boss quit.

5. Work situation never improved. I was left with many angry people who didn't like my course of action against my boss.

6. I dealt with a scare of melanoma. One week later I had several lumps removed from my breast. They were not cancerous.

7. My father was very ill through all of this.

8. My father eventually took his own life. It was very tragic. What I remember most is picking up pieces of his brain from the floor. I still cannot get that out of my mind.

9. I started to have panic attacks which nearly destroyed me.

10. I had to quit my job because of them, a job I had for twenty years.

11. On top of the panic attacks I suffered from depression. They seem to be related.

12. After a year of therapy to help with my panic attacks, my father's suicide and an abusive childhood, I begin to feel strong again.

THROUGH ALL OF THIS, MY HUSBAND WAS SLEEPING WITH ANOTHER WOMAN. AMAZING!

13.Then, just when I'm ready to move on with my life, I find out about my husband's affair on New Year's Eve.

You can only imagine what this did to me. The man I loved with my whole heart, the man I thought was by my side just didn't exist. I asked myself,how could he have slept with her while I was dealing with all of this? What a selfish, egocentric pig I was married to. Oh, I forgot to mention the double life included a post office address and secret credit card accounts. I am now
left to pick up the pieces and figure a way to get rid of a debt enough to purchase a small home!

You may think I am crazy, but I can forgive my husband. We all make mistakes, some bigger than others. The way I see it is that if you are truly sorry for what you have done, then you should be forgiven. I don't know what will happen to my marriage. I am still working on that. I do know that I can be at peace knowing I am able to forgive my husband for what he has done. Life is too short to stay angry. You never know what tomorrow will bring. You may never get a chance to go back and make peace with someone you have hurt or with someone who has hurt you. I know this for a fact. I will never be able to tell my father I forgive him for all the troubled times of my childhood.

I have to live with that for the rest of my life. How I wish I could get one more chance to say "Dad I love you and I know you didn't mean to hurt me".