My mom was pretty mean to my dad when i was growing up and i always felt bad for him until i found out that he had several affairs on my mom.

No wonder she was so mean to him. She did not want him to stay, she packed up his clothes and took them to the OW houses, but he always came back home.

I don't agree with this. While my H was having his A I was contemplating D. IN fact had look at apartments.

I think A's are just a cowards way out.

My grandparents divorced and married EACH OTHER three times. The last time, granddad remarried another woman. I never thought about it, but I wonder if this woman was in the picture all along. I'm going to ask my mother. Anyways, Granddad ended up getting hit by a truck in downtown Memphis and was never right in the head after that. Grandmother was a bitter old woman until the day she died. She HATED Granddad and his new wife.

I do agree that A are a cowards way out but I think for some people the reality is they would never leave the M unless they had AP waiting in the wings. I think people who get D without having a A are being truer to themselves and their S and probably are have more self esteem overall.

How's this for a twist?

There is a couple I know. The wife is mentally ill. She has developed this from diabetes, and has pretty much reverted back to a child-like state. She thinks and acts as a child does. After a few years of dealing with this, she had to be put in a home.

Now, the husband loves his wife with all of his heart, but has been left alone by his wife's illness. She is no longer able to function as an adult. She has been in the home for about 6 years now.

Is it okay for the husband to move on? His wife is no longer the woman he married, yet he feels an obligation to her as a husband would; only, she is more like his daughter now.

He has started to date casually. His children and family are very supportive of their father moving on with his life. His wife will never be the same person she was.

Thoughts? Opinions?

I just think that principles are only to be used when it is CONVENIENT and easy; not when it is hard. I think it is immoral to STEAL, but what if that is not so easy? What if I need something and have no money? Not stealing may not seem so easy and convenient then.

After all, I deserve to be happy, right? And being a thief or an adulterer will make me happy, right?

As my dad told my brother when he abandoned his wife and autistic son to make himself "happy" for his 21 year old ho, "son, ya just have to do what makes you happy." unfortunately, being BAD did not make him happy very long. The 21 yr bimbo dumped him and my brother is onto his next affair. But he is a miserable, broken man who has no self respect.

I wonder why he has never been happy being bad?

You asked awhile back "why didn't he just leave her" a long time ago if she was that bad, etc.

I look at folks from that age group and I think about the way they were raised. Divorce is different to them. It wasn't something they did. And changing their minds about the social view of divorce and the commitment of marriage is not an easy sell, either. The stats on the marriages in their age group are different, and if you look at the stats by age groups the divorce/length of marriages they really do change as our society as come to accept divorces over the years. It really only came to be "more" accepted in the later 60's and into the 70's. So if they are in their 80's, their views probably have come a long way to changing.

There's also the comfort factor. They have been married probably 50 years. That's a long time! After you've been married 30 years, it is very difficult to just throw your hands up and say, well, I'm done - she's mean and nasty and I'm leaving. You've invested 30 years of your life, then 35, then 40, and you work at the marriage and believe that the investment has value.

And finally the guy meets someone who meets the ENs that have long since been unmet, and is it really such a surprise that he wants to leave the wife who is mean and nasty, even by her own children's report?

Don't get me wrong, I do not condone the affair. I just understand the "why" he didn't leave her long ago, and why he is in the affair now.

SB

My bet is that the children of CPG have had affairs themselves and that is why they are sympathizing with Dad.

It's not as far-fetched as it sounds...FWH's father had an A, and out of his 4 kids, so far two of them have had affairs as well. It "runs" in families. I won't be surprised if the other two siblings have affairs at some point as well.

That's why they are all justifying it...it makese sense to them in their sicked-out minds. It also helps to ease their guilt.

And MF makes another excellent point as well.


SB

Hmm. Interesting thoughts. I do see how an A is a cowards way out, and how someone who leaves a difficult spouse honourably (i.e. straight up with no adultery) probably has greater self esteem. In fact, this is something I can respect. It is also in opposition to religious principals - wonder how Christians feel about this?

Regarding the disabled wife in a home - remember that woman that they took the feeding tube out of? I can't remember her name and I'm fuzzy on other details but if I recall, it was her exH who had pushed to have this done. Now - please don't turn this into a moral discussion regarding euthanasia - that's a whole n'other can of worms best left to another day. But in all interviews, he professed to be acting in her best interest and he certainly seemed to care deeply for - perhaps even still love - her. He just had this particular point of view. He was divorced from her and I believe remarried. Yet he didn't shirk his responsibilities to her either. Whether or not you agree with his pov, you couldn't help but admire his devotion to his former wife.

And as far as CPG and his brother and sister also being cheaters I have no idea. CPG doesn't seem like the type but who am I to judge - I didn't think wstbxH was the type either and I knew him much better. What got be thinking of this was the fact that my own mother was extremely difficult to live with - both for us kids and my father. If my father ever cheated, which I highly doubt, he took that secret to the grave. As much as I felt bad for him living the way he did, especially after us kids moved out, I can't imagine being happy that he was leaving for another woman. I probably could understand if he just left her - but I suspect he never would have even if he had lived into his retirement (that would have been the killer and he did resist retirement semi-successfully until he died).

Aw, Man, Tabby...don't EVEN get me started on THAT guy!!

%#%%%**&^&^%$%^^#$@@%$%^&%^&%&^%%$%#@#^%$&*%$^%#%$#%#$!!!

Put it aside Charlotte- he may have been wrong, he may have been crazy and he may have been a lot of things, but there was no requirement at all for him to even be in the picture at the time, yet he was.

Yeah. That's just it.

But I don't even want to discuss it. He disgusts me.

I still question what happened in that hallway.

Charlotte

If you are talking about Terry Schiavo, I believe they were still married, legally, and he was living with another woman and had maybe, had a few kids with her.

I don't think he qualifies for someone thinking in her best interest.

IIRC

I understand more intimately the scripture passage about the woman taken in adultery and cast down in front of Jesus for judgment with a sentence of stoning.

You could take any of a number of women here - some betrayed, some wayward, who are married to or were married to abusive men.

Let's just say that we could see as Jesus sees.

Let's say we see any 18 yr old young woman, idealistic - daddy's little girl with stars in her eyes - that's Trying's daughter's age - just so you have the perspective right.

She's married that sweet quiet guy who's never loud or show-offish, opens her door and has those oh-so-gorgeous blue eyes of her favorite movie star.

Her father wasn't real happy about the marriage - he could see things she couldn't but because she chose the boy over her father he's pretty much washed his hands of her.

Three weeks after the wedding, the first angry words come - unexpected and out of proportion for the conflict - ugly names too - then a hand slapping her on the face and she's told, when tearfully asking where her sweetheart went "Married people don't act that way."

She runs home to daddy - who sends her back to her husband - You made your bed. Lie in it!

She does. Two children - boys - come into their lives. She lives her life working side by side with her husband, and he sure knows how to work hard. But then, he comes in and the dishes aren't done - the food isn't cooked the way his mamma cooked it - oh yeah - doesn't acknowledge that this is all because the wife has been out there in the fields with him, working with the cows, feeding the calves, hauling the hay.

She takes on a job to supplement the income. In the 1940s and 1950s, farming was just as hard to make a living at as it is today and every farmer had an extra job during those days - and often the wives did too.

She feels like a machine. She's doing her duty. But she doesn't feel loved. She doesn't feel attractive. She feels abandoned by her father, and thus - her God. And it's all her fault. Because she disobeyed her father and married the boy he didn't approve of.

She stays because in those days, you don't leave. Where would you go? Back to Mom and Dad? asked and answered. NO. There were no shelters. No domestic violence laws. Police would laugh and slap the guy on the back if the little woman complained.

She feels worthless. Ugly. She gets raped on occasion but never loved. Never appreciated. Never admired.

This was once daddy's little girl. How far has she fallen from those beloved days?

There's a guy working a second job there - he works with her husband during the days while she's on the job most of the time, but once in a while he takes a day off because of this second job. He looks similar to her husband in coloring and build. But he's nice. The way her husband was before they got married.

He has his story too. But this daughter can't see through Jesus' eyes very well into him. There's too much anger at him and his behavior toward her mother and father for her to see it clearly.

See - I don't condone my mother's adultery. I know how much pain - spiritual pain it has caused her. But neither can I rise up and condemn her for it - because through three years of heart break and prayer I learned to see her suffering through Jesus' eyes.

I know the evil my father perpetrated on her - it wasn't her re-writing history. I experienced his violence and his verbal abuse. I heard him rape her through the thin wall separating my room from theirs. Repeatedly. Over years.

I cannot ever recall him once talking with a loving voice. I don't know what it's like to hear him speak affectionately.

This above all saddens me the most. Because now in what may be the last year of his life, the walls between us are walls he hasn't got a clue are there. He's never grown that kind of sensitivity to the daughter he wounded through vicarious abuse of her mother.

I love him. But I ache for what he has lost. And for what I have lost.

That, Tabby is what I make of this. We cannot know the true magnitude of pain in a marriage from the outside looking in. And we cannot judge a child who won't condemn a parent for his or her adultery in all cases.

The case with Terry Schiavo is a sick one and has NOTHING to do with this kind of sitch.

The media tried to slant this and he was NOT thinking of her best interests. It was all about Michael Schiavo and that is all.

This is a great discussion but Shiavo case should NOT be included, IMHO.

We can't??? And why not?

It's very clear and even biblical that adultery is WRONG. End of story.

No reason, excuse or justification will EVER prevent me from "judging" someone who has had an A.

They are scum and a coward. Period. If you are not happy in your marriage, then GET OUT.

It's a very simple concept. Be SINGLE before you engage in a relationship with someone else.

Otherwise you are in an affair, and that is wrong...with no way to pretty that up.

KaylaAndy, What edition of the bible did you get this from???

That there are situations that adultery is viewed differently through Jesus eyes???

I'm sure that the MALE version would go something like if she doesn't want to have sex, isn't admiring enough, puts on weight, has stretch marks, complains about him not making enough money, derides him constantly for not being more successful, hits the kids, mocks his going bald, complains about his looks, not a big enough house, or prestige, or power, etc. ad nauseum!!!

I don't think anyone here is going to say that the rejection, scarring, abuse and death to a soul caused by a wife like that is any different than the scars you described...

So living with a shrew for a wife would make Jesus see adultery differently???

That Jesus views it differently than regular old stinkin' adultery???

The penalty for an unrepentant adulterer is death in HeII.

As Christians we are called to HELP each other, NOT coddle one another on the way to HeII.

The child of a parent caught in adultery needs to stand up and tell them there is another way...

I know not everyone agrees, but you did mention Jesus...

In my church we have a saying...

If I'm not on my way to heaven would you please tell me.

God bless.

Jim

TA and Jim

The KJV John 8 discusses the example I shared from my personal life:


He's speaking to the very issue brought up on this thread. Some of you expect this son to stone the adulterer.

Personally I think it's wrong to celebrate the adultery. Adultery is a hideous thing. I know it hurt my father. And I know it hurt my mother. I wish with all my heart that my mother had been stronger and never entertained the idea of cheating on my father.

I wish she had had some place to go. Her own father sent her back to the abusive marriage, knowing his little girl was being abused.

I begged her to leave dad many times during my childhood; she couldn't see any options for taking care of five children - or even three since two were old enough and on their own during some of this abuse.

It was the culture of marriage back then. Law enforcement condoned violence within a marriage - there was a complicit culture that the little woman was property, therefore to be dealt with however the man would.

While I'm certainly not out celebrating my mother cheating on my father like Tabby's car pool buddy, don't underestimate a child's anger at a family history of abuse between parents and how that can warp the perspective of that child. And if that child as an adult is not strong in his own faith, who knows?

I have seen what my mother has gone through as a result of her own remorse and repentance for what she's done. Her sense of worth which dad had ground to the dust with ugly words and ugly fists over time, was gutted by her own actions. What made her feel loved and beautiful for a moment turned on her with a vengeance and gave "validity" to those ugly names he had called her for years before she became one.

I have never seen my father apologize for his abuse. Not even when he saw the bruises from the beating he gave her the night before in a drunken stupor. I have seen little by way of the lifetime remorse for his harm to the marriage, as I've seen from my mother for her harm to the marriage.

Hi KaylaAndy!

First of all, ....

Your family has been through so much, I have the deepest empathy for all of you...

HOWEVER, I believe you are doing something we probably have all done at one point or another...

That is you are reading more into the text than is written...

First of all, when Jesus said: Neither do I condemn thee, go and sin no more. He was granting her a stay on CAPITAL PUNISHMENT BY STONING from the PEOPLE, NOTHING MORE!!!

It says that He did not CONDEMN her, not that He FORGAVE her...

NOWHERE does it say that he FORGAVE her for her adultery as NOWHERE does it say she REPENTED or asked for forgiveness...

She was STILL acountable to God for her sin. If she did not repent then NOTHING changed and she would be judged for her adultery as we all will be judged...

Best wishes and God bless.

Jim