sometimes i can deal with it, sometimes i just can't.

i don't believe there really is anything different that i can do to help the situation. i think for the most part he is happy who i am now. but who i am now does not change the past and he does not know how to get past that. he cannot see how any marriage could get past this.

this is from our conversation last night: the way he sees it, i have cheated on him 60-70 times, by that he means this is the amount of times i was physically with another person. he has asked me many times for the number of specific times i was with another person in any way and this is the number he ends up with. 12 of them are with one person while we were engaged, 3 was from the co-worker back in 1991. the rest was post july 2001.

he realizes he can look at this in 3 seperate pieces or as our entire marraige has been full of infidelity. he chooses to look at it the latter way. and with that view, he just does not see any reason to conclude anything other than we have no marriage, and yet he does not want to divorce....

i've been looking at wedding bands, i want to get him a new one and i was kinda hoping he would accept it by our anniversary. after our talk last night i'm going to have to accept that i cannot do that at this time. he told me before, buying him a new one will only put pressure on him to wear it, and i don't want to put pressure on him. i was just kinda hoping he would be wanting to wear a ring again at some point and i was kinda hoping we were getting closer to that point but we just are not.

are there other FWSs in my situation? how do you cope on days that are harder?

He's still there by his own free will .... same as you.

2 people struggling.

Which one can you control?

only me.

but that does not mean it does not hurt!!

FL, I am very sorry you're having a rough time. I am not in your position but wanted to tell you what an inspiration you have been to me during my time here. I used to look at your situation as well as JenBrown's and think, boy I wish my W was half this remorseful. You have done everything you can. Now maybe a little more time is needed. From your H's point of view I would agree that he doesn't need to feel pressured. Honestly the ring will mean a lot more to you when its HIS idea to pursue it. That day will come.

Just keep being the best person you can be and leave the rest to God.

WOE (WalkingOnEggs)

His forgiving will come when he is ready.

Did you know you can choose to live well in the meantime ? KEWL

Everyday you can open your eyes and decide that whatever good things are put before you ... you will partake and enjoy.

Everyday you can decide to welcome new challenges as opportunities for growing into someone stronger and more resilient.

Frankly, if all were a bed of roses for you right now ... you would miss some opportunities to get bigger inside. You might be lazier when it comes to owning your own feelings.

you are doing just GREAT !

I remember you when .... you were not as self loving.

<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

Happy for you and how far you've come.

Glass half empty or half full type of girl ?

hi woe, thank you for your kind words. i know having patience is key and i 100% agree with you about the ring. i don't want him to feel any pressure and i certainly DON"T want him wearing it just to "make me happy". the thing is, i don't want him to wear his ring, i want him to want to wear his ring. he does not know i have been shopping and i will not tell him.

i know these feelings cannot kill me, but they really really s*ck!!! my heart physically hurts today. i took my bike into work today, i take it on the train and then ride the 2.5 miles from the station to work. i'm debating riding all the way home today (about 20 miles!). i'm using map quest to find a safe route. if i cannot go all the way home on my bike, i can at least increase the 2.5 mile bike ride by going to a farther away station.

i know i need to console myself right now, i'm trying but i fear as soon as i get home i'm going to burst into tears and that is just not acceptable. but not going home is not very acceptable either...

ya know, part of me really believe that is a true stmt. in fact more of me belives it will happen than not. but today, i can take any comfort in that idea.

each day that goes by cannot be taken back. know what i mean?

i guess i just have to accept today is: if i can survive today, if i can go home with a smile on my face and enjoy the evening with my family even with this sadness in my heart, i will have accomplished something i was not able to accomplish before.

i don't quite share your enthusiasm right now though pep. guess i'm being a glass half empty right now.

in fact, the truth is, you are reminding me of a friend i spoke with on the phone at the hospital the day my second D was born (the one born pre-mature that died). her and her H was enthusiastically congratulating me on the birth our our daugther, even though she was fighting for her life. and i wanted to be able to express the fear and sadness i was feeling. at the time of the call, she had already been moved to a different hospital, one with very good neo-natal care (the best really, Loyola). and my H was with her and i was still at the hospital where she was born. i didn't understand their reaction. joyfully congratulating us??? less than 5 hrs later she died.

isn't it ok to sometimes not be full of joy and grateful to be alive???

ok, that actually does sound like a stupid question but seriously, i just cannot have a glass half full attitude all the time pep. maybe i should be able to, i really don't know. but i'm very sad right now and fighting off the urge to be mad. i have no energy left for a smile.

FL-T2M.

I hummed and ahhed about posting this but I decided its right that you get to see your H as not being aberrant or unreasonable.

I also feel Squid betrayed me once every time she screwed OM.
I can completely understand your H feeling like he you say he does. The magnitude and repeat nature of the betrayals must overwhelm him when he considers them. He has been second in your consideration SO MANY Times its no wonder he may wonder if its real this time, that you have truly chosen him, not settled for him.

Your betrayal wasn't an aberration, FL, it appears to have been a lifestyle choice.

I feel your H is hanging onto 'being married' by instinct and by his fingernails. I feel for him.

You have a hard job FL. So does he.

Have you counselled with the Harleys? I think REAL expertise is called for.

* edited to ask FL - if it were ME I 'd need to know WHY in some consodered detail. WHY you felt the need to be so repeatedly unfaithful. Why I was beneath your consideration so many times.

You can answer that honestly it may help your H rediscover his self worth.

All blessings.

FLT2M, I think a gift that shows him you want to understand him, or shows you look at him with eyes of compassion (I didn't say pity), would be better.

Glad you posted this. You usually hide 'em in other people's threads. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

GC

bob, i wanted to let you know i saw this and i would like to respond in detail but cannot until tommorow, i don't want to delay my departure for home. you obviously relate to what he is feeling/thinking.

and yet you have forgiven squid, isn't it understandable for me to say, how come i can't be forgiven???

and the other part big part of it is, all that occured from 1991 - 1993 was not the behavior of a healthy person, how can he not see that?? shouldn't that help him know it was more about me self-destructing than me rejecting him?? he acts like i was just having a grand old time when he knows for a FACT that is not true. i completely fell apart in april of 2001 when my dad died, had to take off a month from work for "mental health" treatment. i was not any healtier when i was thrown back to work, and he was of no help at that point either. and so i went spirallying back down, but this time instead of wanting to kill myself, i decided to kill the marriage instead.

ok, i said i would not respond to it now cuz i don't want to be late!! besides i am starting to feel worked up now.

but i would like to try to continue this tommorow.

hi gc, i will definitely not be getting him a ring. i realize it is not what would be good for him. historically we have never gotten each other gifts anyway.

FL

I don't know how I could forgive Squid and your H evidently is struggling to forgive you. Forgiveness is not a logical deduction IME but a compulsion when conditions are right.

Squid had one affair at a crisis time of her life, and screwed OM less than ten times. Maybe only twice if I believe OM ( I don't). One OM, over a period of two months.

She claims life overwhelmed her when she comments now.

She could not claim that for 70 liasons over the duration of our marriage.

I had to forgive terrible wifehood and a single affair with a few consummations. That was/is hard enough.

Your H has to forgive an entirely different se of insults.

If he knows he was not the help to you that you needed during your crisis, perhaps he also has guilt and attibution issues to deal with ?

all that occured from 1991 - 1993 was not the behavior of a healthy person, how can he not see that??

How can he know that your behaviours were because you were unhealthy rather than because you rejected his husbandry?

How can he possibly know that? It may just look like like lots of affairs to him.

but this time instead of wanting to kill myself, i decided to kill the marriage instead.

A divorce would have sent that message. Lots of affairs just sends a message that your H isn't cutting it IMO.

Men are defined at a primal level by our ability to provide for our families, procreate and keep our woman happy. It hurts us on a VISCERAL level when any of those are threatened.

Squid almost killed me with 1X10 insult. I can only imagine how your H feels.

I don;t want this to be negative, FL, I just wanted to point out that I don't think youe H is behaving irrationally. I would feel the same.

Its a horrible sit, FL. I pray you move forward together.

Hi, FL.

Quote:
==========================================
and the other part big part of it is, all that occured from 1991 - 1993 was not the behavior of a healthy person, how can he not see that?? shouldn't that help him know it was more about me self-destructing than me rejecting him?? he acts like i was just having a grand old time when he knows for a FACT that is not true. i completely fell apart in april of 2001 when my dad died, had to take off a month from work for "mental health" treatment. i was not any healtier when i was thrown back to work, and he was of no help at that point either. and so i went spirallying back down, but this time instead of wanting to kill myself, i decided to kill the marriage instead.
==========================================

I can understand that you want your husband to understand 'where you where' during the infidelities. The real issue, however, is one of responsibility.

In my life, FL, I finally learned to take responsibility for my actions and how they affected others - all my actions.

Your mental state at the time you did something may be a contributing factor, but it was YOU that took the action, you can't blame anyone or any circumstance for choices that you made.

I have many more 'liaisons' under my belt than you, and I have a marriage of almost 30 years now. Everything I did, I did. Regardless of the reasons at the time, or my state of mind or lack of it, I did all those things. I can't take them back. I can't fix the broken lives I left behind. What I can do, is to squarely face all of it head on, and take responsibility for it.

I think that as your husband sees you take responsibility for your actions, all of it, that he may find an easier place from which he can build trust with you.

I believe that you have turned away from your past mistakes. You do need to understand why you did what you did, but most importantly, you need to own your own actions. They are yours, and nobody's fault but yours.

I love a line from a Nina Simone song. "If I die and my soul be lost, well it's nobody's fault but mine."

God bless,
Gimble

Dear FL,
(((FL)))
I do understand where you are. I don't think H has forgiven me either. Sometimes I dwell on it, wonder why he can't, convince myself I deserve to be, get self-righteous and self-pitying....

Actually none of that is useful. I have a really good life most of the time. I am using my time, working on myself, growing, learning, enjoying myself....Whenever I focus too much on him I know its time to stop. I can't change him.

The other week, H and I were having an A discussion. I was telling him some of the things I had discovered about myself, the ways that I had changed. He listened, and said he can see the changes in me. He prefers the 'new' me to the old 'me'. Our R is better now in lots of ways than it used to be.

Then we moved on to talking about him. He said that for him, there has been no positive benefit of the A. For him the whole experience has meant only pain. He thinks that he has not grown or developed. He has difficulty feeling love.

It was a sobering moment.

There is still some way to go before H can heal. I have to face the possibility that he may never forgive me. What do I do then? I always have the choice. I don't have to live forever without being fully accepted and having my needs met.

I see signs of progress in that it is easier to talk about the A now. Even though it is still painful for both of us to talk about the A, we recover quicker after the discussion and can go on to do other, fun things with the day, as opposed to getting stuck in horrible guilt or pain for hours. We do a lot of 'fun' things - as often as we can.

I am hopeful. I hope you are too!

But Bob, it was NOT 70 over the duration of our marriage!!!!! that seems so unfair to say, that is putting it under the worst light. It was 3 with one OM over the course of 15 years of marriage!!! And it was 12 (i'm not really sure that is right but i guess that is now the number that will as good as fact in H's eyes now) while engaged. and it is very unfair of me to try to discount that due to the fact that we were not yet married. I can conceed that.

but then i reformed for a very long time. and i wanted to go to MC back then, H would not. maybe i would of come clean back then. i suppose that does not matter cuz the bottom line is i did not. instead i sweeped it under the rug. and then we got pregnant with our D and then i totally buried it.

ok, so if i look deep, i'm not fully owning my actions. i'm probably only at 85%. but i'll never agree to the stmt that i cheated on him 70 times over the course of our marriage. that is just not an accurate representation of the facts.

smur, you hit the nail on the head so perfectly. i am trying to say i deserve his forgiveness, i am being self-rightous and even having a bit of self-pity here.

so when you find yourself in the spot i am now you say you know it is time to stop. what exactly do you do to get yourself to stop. i really am trying to stop. i swear i am. but i hurt so much right now. i don't know how to stop that. i rode my bike the majority of the way home, it had to be at least 10 miles, maybe even more. i expect i will sleep good tonight. and i got my haircut and ate very good today. i even did the exercise that i was given for my back as well as some sit ups.

i'm trying to do good things to take care of myself.

but you guys are trying to force me to have my eyes open too much. that 15% i talked about up there, allows me to not hate myself. without it, well how can i not end up concluding exactly as my H is?? he should not forgive me. i was so horrible.

it is very true. I hated him back in 2001, I hated him and i was in so much pain and i hated him for not helping me not be in pain. and i hated him for not easily going along with my desire to divorce. he made it so much harder on me. of course now i am grateful beyone words, but then i totally hated him. why should he believe that might not happen again.

i have to figure, it is fear that if he forgives and then trusts me again, i will hurt him again. and who could blame him for that.

and all i am doing is spinning in circles again right now.

what do i do???? i just don't know what to do. i see how much pain he has, i see his pain and i want to make it go away, so i figure helping him understand it was not all about him, me rejecting him. i was just so messed up. i hurt so bad cuz of my dad, but my dad was dead. i hurt so bad cuz of not understanding how what occured when i was younger impacted me. i hurt so bad because the hole in my heart was gaping and raw and i turned on my H instead.

how can i possible make it up to him <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

well crying certainly wont' do it so i am going to give him a back rub instead.

thank you to all who posted to me.

FL, what can I say, but, soldier on. Every day, you swallow consequences and fight for redemption. See if you can't find a way for that to be your source of happiness.

GC

FL - on a positive note - you're post has given me hope.

Two nights ago WW told me "THIS MARRIAGE WILL NEVER WORK!"

She does not know that it is a line from her sript.

But it might not.

But yours is moving forward. You hated him, but now you want him to forgive and love you.

You have given a hopeless man hope tonite. Sounds like maybe a couple of hopeless men.

Thank you.

I will pray for you tonight.

Soldier on. If he ain't walking, then he sees hope. And that means it can survive.

far

but i'll never agree to the stmt that i cheated on him 70 times over the course of our marriage. that is just not an accurate representation of the facts.

Facts are facts. Inarguable. You want to say you took a gun to your H only a few times while he wants to count every bullet.

Is that so surprising ?

FL, I thnk Smur & Gimble are right - you simply must take responsibility for your actions. ALL of them. Take ownership of your affairs.

Search for that thread by KYEllow from a while back that talk about taking ownership of your affair and how liberating it can be.

Only then perhaps can your H start to take ownership of HIS contributions to manuring the soil of your relationship to ready it for affairs.

** And Smur, I agree with yoru H. Not one thing has come out of this affair experience positive for e thatin any way mitigates the existential pain and suffering and lifelong hurt.

Like Hemidart said once


Nothing is worth the pain to a BS like me. NOTHING.

Hello again,
The pain can be very bad, I know about that. You said:



So I thikn you do know about takign care of yourself. Good for you!!

There is something I have been thinking a little bit about lately. If I am havign trouble keeping the focus away from how H 'should' be, and then I get into the 'poor me' type thinking, I think about this.

I try to remember when I was single (and I don't mean looking for a mate!!, just remembering how I acted when I was truly single). At that time, if I was hurt or upset, or I had a big problem, I had to look after myself. I sought comfort from friends, talked to counsellors or others who understood, and trusted that I could look after myself and would get better. I remember those times, and to be honest I can't say that when I was single I was in pain much more often than after I met H. I don't know how it was for you?

Now, I imagine that H is a much respected, cared for and welcome friend who shares my home. Someone whose company I greatly enjoy. Someone who is staying long-term, and so has responsibilities too. I try to interact with him with this in mind - opening up and sharing myself and my life with him as I would to a good friend, enquiring after him and how he is, treating him generally with great consideration, trying to resolve problems and differences quickly and fairly, asking for what I need (ie ENs!), and being understanding if he can't provide it at that time for some reason.

If I think of things in this way, I find that I have fewer expectations of how he 'should' be acting towards me, whether he 'should' be dealing with things differently, and just generally who and how he 'should' be. Then I feel less self-pity. I can find a much better way to live and let live, while still being myself and still getting my needs met as much as possible.

About accepting responsibility... I agree with Bob etc. I think when you quibble about details, its more than likely that all he hears is " it wasn't really that bad, its not really my fault, you have no reason to hurt so much..."

The fact is, he is very, very hurt. You caused that. (just as I did!).

Both you and I caused enormous damage. It doesn't mean that we intended to. It doesn't mean that we were in our right minds at the time. It doesn't mean that we weren't hurt ourselves for other reasons.
All of that is irrelevant. Our Hs are very, very hurt and we need to face that.

The 'number of betrayals' thing? Well, if I worked on that basis I'd be in a hospital bed, staring into space...

My H developed an addiction to prostitutes, shortly into the marriage. Ten years in, he started 'the emotional stuff'. He went through four PAs, but was still hooked on prostitutes, had call-girls to his room on business trips, etc.

Fifteen years of prostitute addiction, seven years of affairs. How many times has my H ejaculated into a woman who wasn't his wife over the years? I think it must be numbered in the thousands. Thousands of times when he's taken his clothes off and performed the act of intimacy with some other woman.

If I think about this too long, my head starts to explode.

To me, each one of those ejaculations was a decision he made. Each one of those was a separate, unique betrayal.

But to him, it's not quite like that. To him, there was a flawed decision-making mechanism, and each 'decision' was essentially the same one. Having developed a warped process in the first place, all acts of infidelity were essentially the same one, repeated over and over.

To him, it's like taking one wrong turning, and driving on and on for miles under the impression you're on the right road.

I DO see that each betrayal - each mile further down the wrong road, stubbornly refusing to admit this is not the right road - reduces the ability to use the conscience as a guide. I think that the conscience disengages pretty quickly after the first act of betrayal, so that the insult to the betrayed spouse registers less and less. All human beings have the capacity to desensitise themselves to horror; that's why people manage to work in abattoirs and animal-research labs and concentration camps, and don't go insane.

To know that your spouse can desensitise themselves to your pain is not comforting. But it does at least reduce the sense of the enormity of the betrayal.

Smur, this is one of the wisest posts I have read. I wish I had this sort of knowledge long, long ago. This is exactly how I should have treated me H over the years but instead I focused so, so long the "he shoulds". I actually called him this morning and read it to him over the phone. I hope your H knows what a repentant, wise, loving W you are.

FL, hope you are doing better today.