I know this seems crazy, but my H finally told me tonight that he was in this process WITH ME.

I thought that would make me feel elated, but all it did was make me feel more guilty. I'm just not good enough for him. He is such a wonderful giving person, and I have torn his heart out and stomped on it. Why should he want me?!

I'm drowning in my guilt and its starting to scare me. I have 2 wonderful children that need me but I feel like I have nothing to give.

How am I ever going to get through this? I'm at the bottom of a deep whole and I don't know if there is anything I can do to get myself out. I feel like it is hopeless.

Any advise?

Boss,
Look at my post to Recovering H. You really need to go see a doctor and discuss the depression.

Keep telling yourself it's your H's choice as to whether he stays or not. It's not yours. You have a great H who with his own freewill wants to stay married to the W he loves. Yes you made a mistake but don't compound it by pushing him away bc of your guilt.

I need to go. I'll check in late 2nite PST.

Baby steps is your motto.

Mac

Ditto what cw said! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Razz]" src="images/icons/tongue.gif" />

Boss---

I know how you feel. I was in your situation 2 years ago. I didn't want my husband to know about my A so I kept it from him. I knew that if he found out our marriage would be over. Well, he found out, and it wasn't a pretty sight---and was conducted long distance to boot. Short end of the story, we are still together and will celebrate our 20th anniversary this year.

I often wondered why my husband would still want me after what I did to him. Some days I still wonder, but he shows me every day that he loves me and wants to remain married to ME (go figure). I too, had big issues with forgiveness. I didn't think what I did was forgiveable. Some days I can't believe that he forgave me, and I still have unforgiving moments for myself.

If you are committed to your husband and your marriage, then do all you can to show your husband. Be repentant, have NC with your OP, or if your OP contacts you, tell him to go away, then call your husband and let him know about it. Read here about Plan A and Recovery after an affair. Post here when you have questions. I don't logon often here, but I saw your post tonite and it reminded me of where I was 2 years ago. I don't want to go there again, and I hope I can help someone else out of that pit of despair also. There are other WS's and FWS's who are/have been in the same shoes you are wearing. They have excellent advice.

Most of all, be thankful for the gift you have been given--your husband's forgiveness. Cherish that gift.

Please, please, forgive yourself. If you are terribly depressed, get some anti-depressants. You can get through this.

It does no good for you to feel so shamed. Your husband wants you, so get moving, you can have a better marriage than ever.

Thank you for all your wonderful words of advise, but I am already on AD's. I can't imagine what this would be like if I wasn't. I just don't know how I can forgive myself. See, my mother did this when I was younger and I have never forgiven her because she broke my Dad's heart and their M failed.

I swore to myself I would never do the same thing and then I did. How can I get over that?

bosstenor - AAARRRRGGGGG! How can I get through to you WW's???????? It is so disturbing. You must forgive yourselves, and get on with your lives. It does no good to be so down.

Please, please promise that you will move on your marriage.

Believer,

I know you are right, but I just don't know how to make it happen. I'm so lost in myself. I know I need to find myself but it doesn't help when my H says he doesnh't know me anymore and feels like he has nothing in common with me.

How can I argue with that? I don't even know myself know.

I don't know if I have the strength to get through this. It just seems so big, how do I get hold of it?

Boss -

You get through this by realizing that you are human, and humans make mistakes. But we don't beat ourselves up about them. We move on. You hear me? We move on. We resolve to be the best person we can be, and we give ourselves the grace of forgiveness.

I am the BS. But I have made terrible choices in my life. But I have moved on and forgiven myself.

And Boss, my choices have been much worse than yours.

Believer,

How do I even begin to forgive myself? This is the worst thing I could have possibly done. I love my H deeply and i have ripped his heart out.

I have no desire to be with the OM at all. If anything, I am trying to redirect my anger and anxiety at him for getting me into this mess (even though I am the only person that should be held accountable).

I just want so desperately for everything to be OK. I wantk? it so bad I can't stand it. I yearn for it and at the same time get discouraged by it.

I have ruined the beauty of our relationship. How do I get that back? We were so good together,and now we are just going through the motions. It's just so empty.

Boss,

I learned something important about love about 8 years ago. I learned something about commitment. You know my story. You know how I feel about my wife (RAP). And you are really asking why I should bother, why YOUR husband should bother, after what you did to us.

Here is a piece of my story to help you. After I came to know the Lord, my walk with Him got stronger and stronger. A little bit at first – willing to go to church on Sunday, etc. Typical “religious” drill. Check the box. But at time went on, my walk with God grew. Yeah, I had ups and downs. Questions. Does he really care? Is he really there? A lot of “how comes.” A lot of “how do I know.” Part of me was glad to accept his love, his acceptance of me. It was nice. It was something that became REAL to me over time. And I kept him in my life. Prominent. Spoke or prayed to him every day. He became comfortable. He became something I knew I needed. With that closeness, he also became familiar.

Sounds like a husband, right?

It does because it is. We are all, down here on this earth, considered “brides of Christ.” You should do a study on what that means, if you don’t know.

But the point is, like your husband became familiar to you. Like I became to RAP. I got “used” to God’s presence. And in some ways, my awe, my reverential fear of Him diminished. He became more like a person to me. The comfort that comes from a long term relationship. In ways, I guess I took Him for granted. He was there for me every day. Don’t get me wrong, I was thankful, contrite, etc. All the things you SHOULD be. I am trying to convey my sense of “comfort” with Him.

Then one day something happened that really rattled me. I still have nightmares from it. I still get teary eyed over it. One of those earth changing events, a real perspective changer. I don’t really feel comfortable going into the details about it, but will give you the gist. It essentially involved me and many other people. Some close friends, some acquaintances. It also involved an angry individual with a gun. This individual decided through some rationale I still don’t understand that a group of individuals were responsible for all his pain. And he paid them out. Four people died, nine others were seriously wounded. I saw and heard them die. Their cries. Their agony. Many of us escaped that horrible afternoon and it changed us for the rest of our lives. We were someplace safe and what happened should not have. Confusion. Hatred. Sorrow. That was my world for a time.

I escaped with my life, but feel that God was watching over me through this traumatic time. Without his watchful eye and arm around me, I feel certain I would have died. I NARROWLY escaped it. And about a week later, something came to me.

This event took several hours to unfold before me. And I was replaying my nightmare again and realized that the ENTIRE TIME I did not cry out to God to save me. Not once. I felt shame. Strange, huh? But I was close to the Big Guy, remember? I felt shame and guilt for NOT crying out to the person who could SAVE ME above all others when I needed Him most. Some Christian I thought. All this prayer. This relationship I was building. All flew out the window when the chips went down.

But you know what I realized? IT DIDN’T. I had a RELATIONSHIP with God. It was built on years of closeness. It was built on time. Quality time. Respect. Honor. Commitment. And when I really needed Him, He was there for me. I didn’t have to ask. I had done all that work up front, with that long term relationship. He cared enough to be there for me when I needed Him. I did not have to cry out to Him for salvation. He gave it freely.

Know what? Ever since then, I have taken my relationship with Him VERY seriously. I know he is up there. The awe, the respect, for what He means to my life is STRONG because of what I faced. And it hasn’t faded.

I would ask you, how is that different from you and your husband? You two have built a relationship that has GREAT VALUE to one another. So you hit a stumbling block and feel you have stomped on your husband’s heart. You feel that you are not worthy of your husband.

Boss, it is not YOU that is wrong, it is ONLY what you did. Why can’t you have the fairy tale? The happy ending? Tell me one good reason why you can’t? You might not, it may not work out, you may not be able to handle your own emotions, whatever. But tell me why you CANNOT? All you have to do is reach out and accept it from your husband.

I am willing to bet that your husband is looking past the wrong and drawing on the strength of the relationship. Drawing on what you had before. And I bet he knows it was good. You may not see it now, but that is one of the beautiful things about having a partner. You can rest and let them shoulder the burden for a while.

You are at a crossroads. You HAVE broken a commitment. You HAVE stomped the life out of someone’s heart. That person sounds willing to FORGIVE you. Forget will take time, and frankly there are things you should never forget. Just like me. I’ll NEVER forget what I went through. And yet, I am a better person now for it. Kinda funny what pain can do. You should remember this and take your commitment VERY seriously. Take the health of your marriage VERY seriously. Honor your husband and receive his honor. Don’t ask questions about “deserve.” That is the enemy talking.

Look at it this way. A hypothetical situation. Say you’re Wilma and you are married to Fred. And you have an affair and it crushes Fred and he leaves you. You understand the pain you caused. You learn the value of the commitment. You truly change your heart and understand and vow you will never put someone through that again. But your husband, Fred, is now gone. Along comes Barney. You meet him after all this and his wife Betty ALSO had an affair and she ran away with the OM. So Barney has been on the receiving end of all this pain and he understands the value of commitment. The value of communication. The value of honoring a wife such that the conditions (not the cause, but the conditions) of such an act arise. So you and Barney fall in love with your newfound wisdom painfully gained with experience and have a wonderful marriage for the rest of your lives. Answer me this – how is that different from where you are at now?

I know what you are thinking, it is different because Wilma and Barney remarried other people. OK. Point taken. But you have fallen into my trap. Answer me this – are you and your husband the SAME after experiencing a life changing event of this magnitude? I would say no. And praise God for hope.

You have a great gift presented to you on the table. It is forgiveness. I guarantee that if your H is giving that to you, he KNOWS his part in all this. I guarantee that if you guys don’t make it, your H WILL be a GREAT H to the next person he chooses to commit to. You can’t go through this, no, you can’t SURVIVE something like this and NOT come out as a wiser and better person. Not if you are realistic about the situation. Not if you look to learn and grow from it. So why would you NOT want him for a husband? Considering all that HE has learned.

“But I don’t deserve it,” you say. Why not? Maybe it is because of what you did. Let me tell you this, you do have the rest of your life to deserve it. To earn it. So you got the reward first. Is that so strange? Look at your own life. You get to LIVE it and pay God back a little here and a little there as you go. But you get the reward FIRST. Your own parents raised you, fed you, etc. to some degree. What did they get out of the deal? The hope that you might do better for your own than they did for you. The hope that in the eve of their lives they will have loving children to look out for them. Clearly a reward first deal. See the parallel. The people who REALLY love you don’t mind giving the reward first. Usually it is freely given. That is where the commitment comes in. That is where your honor comes in.

So take the forgiveness, you’d be crazy not to. You have the rest of your life to pay him back. All you have to do is keep the servant’s heart, and everything will turn out OK. It is as simple as it sounds.

Many blessings to you,

NCWalker

NC Walker,

Thank you!!! Your words speek volumes. You have helped me immensly.

Boss

"forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us"......

Does this phrase live inside you?

Repeat it over and over to yourself..... live with this phrase inside your head and heart.

Everytime you feel hopeless... repeat the phrase over and over.... until you feel it is real. Until it becomes a part of you.Like your breathing.

Pep

Boss,
You and I had similar childhoods. My mother did the same thing although I never consciously focused on the facts. It was always guesses and inuendo. Subconsciously I've never forgiven her for the affair. Lots of embarrassment for a shy teenage kid.

It had another negative result. After trying to be there for a few years my Dad gave up and ran away. Now that I'm in my Dad's shoes I can actually see why he ran, but a preteen doesn't understand why his Dad abandons him.

I actually had to fight the urdge to run myself. I didn't want to be my Dad and have my girls hate me.

So my W's A brought out all these feelings. Feelings that she's not responsible for. Thes are feelings that I needed to deal with and ones that you need to deal with.

Mac

Boss,
How you doin'?

You feelin' better.

Mac