PLUS, isn't talking about our A stories on HERE talking about it? That has been nothing but helpful and therapeutic for me. I don't know this seems a lot like the good ol days when people were told to just put traumatic experiences in the vault in their head and 'move on' and never talk about it again. I just feel like that is far more damaging than TALKING about it is. I actually read on some website while doing research on 'getting over affairs' or some such thing that you could not tell someone you would forgive them unless you were willing to NEVER talk about their A again. Never. Although I can imagine forgiveness (not quite there yet, clearly), I cannot imagine never referencing the most traumatic event in my life again.

But he doesn't need to know, that is my point. Radical honesty does not mean that you need to voice every passing thought. All that does is escalate the trigger. The affair should never be brought up again once you have all the facts. Constantly bringing it up keeps you triggered and only serves as a lovebuster to you both.

You don't use radical honesty to harm your marriage, it should be used to HELP your marriage.

(I really did read all the posts from my last offering, and didn't just jump to the final line in your most recent one!)

Although I can imagine forgiveness (not quite there yet, clearly), I cannot imagine never referencing the most traumatic event in my life again.

Imagine you have a huge, ugly, suppurating wound, now bandaged. Every day, because it was such a traumatic event in your life, you insist on peeling off the bandage, concurrently pulling the scab off the just-beginning-to-close wound. EVERY day! For YEARS! Would you express surprise that the wound never QUITE seems to heal?

There are several BHs on this board whose path you seem intent on following. Approximately every few months they each go into their version of "How could she have done this to me?" And we here patiently put them back on the recovery track. It has been going on so long, we almost have a code worked out:

Alpha - Yes, she failed (in the past) to honor your marriage and her vows.
Beta - She has been faithfully trying to heal your pain, and has acted in good faith as a proper spouse since your crisis.
Gamma - Nothing she can do now can eradicate what she did in the past.
Delta - Your bringing it up AGAIN is keeping the bad old times alive in your marriage.

Replace "she" with "he" in the above, and take that to heart.

No, it is not therapeutic at all to wallow in misery. That is how people stay STUCK and sick. People who have been through tragedies do much better emotionally [in studies] when they don't talk about it than those who do. What you should be talking about here are SOLUTIONS, not about the affair.

Talking about tragedies of the past keeps people sick and enmeshed in their pain. Instead, stop talking about it and start focusing on ways to make the present and future GREAT.

You need to do more than imagine it, you need to stop it!! IT is harmful to you and your marriage. I personally dragged out the recovery of my marriage by bringing it up continually. That made me SAD and made my H feel terrible. Bringing up mistakes of the past is a LOVEBUSTER and you can't hide behind RH to commit lovebusters.


If you want to recover, commit to never mentioning it again.

UW,

Please heed what Mel and NG are saying...it is gospel.

Trust me -- follow their lead...

There is no better advice than what was just written above.

The only way that vicious cycle of asking about the affair to anger to yelling to fighting is end is to stop asking about it. What we want is for the story to change, that it never really happened. Well it did.

So now the thing to do is drop the past (it sucked anyway) and make today and tomorrow great.

It sounds good when i say it. And its better when i actually do it.

OK. Maybe what I am doing is venting here. OF COURSE in the grand scheme of things bringing up anything painful is...painful, and doesn't make life fun and grand. But the reality is those painful feelings are there whether you discuss them or not, is it better to just let them fester? So the WS does the cheating, which is devastatingly harmful to the BS and M. Say in the perfect world, they have one conversation about the A and get all the relavant information out there. Then, the BS is supposed to just say ok whats done is done and I see it was because I was not meeting your needs, so lets learn what our needs are and we will do better to meet those needs from now on. And from that moment forward just jumps in to try and make their BS, who hurt them DEARLY, as happy as a clam so they won't stray again. Ya you are all hearing the resentment festering here, that sounds great on paper but emotionally sounds really, really unfair. Almost like positive reainforcement for a really really negative and damaging behavior. You cheated. You did all this harm and damage. And now, you get to confess and then the very next day NEVER HAVE TO HEAR ABOUT IT AGAIN, and instead, your hurt and betrayed spouse goes above and beyond trying to meet your needs in a way they have never done before. If all of you were ready to do that the day you got all the information, then you are better people than me because that makes me feel just a little bit like WH got away with highway robbery with practically no reprecussion except that at the end he gets a much better marriage than he had before. Frankly, anything I am willing to do now I would have been willing to do at ANY TIME during our marriage, it did not require an affair. I know I am just venting here about the injustice of it all. This is how I felt for a very long time, and I don't think I would have been ready to do the MB program before I was ready to be done with it. I've never thought of myself as one who wanted to carry a grudge, but apparently I am.

RH seems to be used only in certain circumstances, IMO. Yes tell about affairs you've had, even if your spouse will never know about them and they don't particularly bother you, turning your marriage upside down. But no don't talk about emotions that may be painful if they make things uncomfortable...just my opinion. I do agree with RH but I think it should apply to your feelings and emotions too.

You are missing the entire point of forgiveness and the MB way to recovery, UW.

(Here's where I traditionally get into BIG trouble, because I can give full vent to my positions when discussing with males, but come across as "overbearing" when a female is the target on my exposition.)

YOU have to do the heavy lifting here. It IS unfair. It can seem like the cheater is getting the lighter burden. All that said.....who CARES?

This is not a board-game you're playing. This is the rest of your life in the balance. This is where you "man-up" and get to work. Remember I entered this thread by cajoling you into not trying to attempt recovery via "MB-Lite". You quoted me chapter and verse of the books, on-line programs, and counselling you've engaged in. Interesting, but irrelevant, because you haven't "bought in" to the need to work hard, maybe even struggle, to supplant your innate need for...restitution? equivalent WH suffering?...with a commitment to doing what is best done NOW.

Back to the ocean-liner...."Get in a tiny lifeboat? I should say NOT! Someone else had better fix the hole in this ship! I spent a small fortune on a 1st-class stateroom, and I'll be damned if I'll crawl into that little wooden rowboat instead of...(glub, glub, glub)"

?????


http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3900_honesty.html


Don't use "honesty" as a justification to beat your husband with a cheater stick.


Well... I mean, you can... good luck with the divorce though.

'Round these parts, folks to marriage building and recovery, not perpetual beatings of a spouse with the affair stick.

GREAT post, NG.

Thank you!!!

NG you crack me up! I can take it like a man so overbear away.

OK, lets take your open wound analogy. Say you are in a bad, bad car accident. One where you almost lose your life. You have a scar that will be with you forever. Yet, as it is healing, even after it is healed, you are to NEVER SPEAK OF THE CAR ACCIDENT. Nope, can't think about, refer to, or discuss it...too painful. That, to me, is ridiculous thinking. Stuffing it into a vault and pretending it didn't happen, wasn't a part of your life, and you have no more feelings about it, which is exactly what I feel like this advice is, makes absolutely no sense.

And for the record, I am NOT missing the point. I vent to you with residual feelings that I have had and to some extent wallow in yes, but I am here in the last couple months because I am ready to give all that resentment up once and for all. I am ready to let go of the ... need for restitution, equivalant WH suffering, JUSTICE... and just move forward on recovery. And be the driver of the boat, which is exactly what I have been. Fair? No. I have given up on fairness already. Ask my H, who I have, in the last two months, been primarily happy and positive, even hopeful to, in a way that he has commented on multiple times. Vs the negative and resentful hopeless attitude I have been wallowing in for the last couple yrs. I know to have the marriage I want I have to let the fairness of it all go, eventually forgive and yes, jump into recovery with two feet. Just took me awhile to get there (and still working on it, but doing much better...).

OK I'll admit calling me a taker because I don't keep the house clean was a little hurtful...but I got over it. I actually took that to heart, and have committed to doing much better at this whole housewifey thing.

Oh great one, although I love your posts and respect your opinion greatly, I would love the details on these studies. I really don't buy it.

You can go find these exact sentiments in my original thread way back on the SAA forum.

We all have these exact thoughts.

I once referred to it as a the Poop Sandwich we get to eat for ever. You can choose NOT to eat it by taking one route. Or belly up to the bar and chow down. Hint: It gets less distasteful in very short time.

Sorry for the crass, very unNG-like in my description.

But, what I have found is when I practice MB techniques full-on, not half-a$$ed, but full on I do not get the 'she got away with murder' thoughts. Im able to see into her eyes and know that she KNOWS what she did and is in way worse shape than me.

And its because I learned what she was missing and she learned what I was missing. We agreed to improve on those things. I set up a method by which Im protected from it happening again. She went ahead and did a 100 things to ensure my safety.

Marriage Builders gives you dignity as the Betrayed at a time when you may not have much left.

(On a separate note and I fully understand your passion, better believe I do. Can you write in paragraphs going forward?

Much easier to read. But dont lose that passion.)

OK I get the 'don't beat your WH with a cheater stick.' I understand how that can not go on, and on, and on. But discussions can take many forms, and this is only one of them. The advice I am getting is to NEVER speak of it again. Never. Not in any form. I disagree with that advice.

And...how does 'but once you get all the relevant details this does not apply' work in regards to this? Then, based on advice, I should NOT reveal my emotional reactions...to my spouse's behavior.

Thanks for your compassion and understanding of my position MSS...and I will work on my paragraphs. (They are paragraphs, just really big longggg paragraphs.)

I am choosing now to not sit and chow down, just trying to say this is where I've been for a good long time and this is how I'm coming in the door. Know what I mean. I know I need to 'man up' as NG says, leave the resentment behind and just work the program. Get in the lifeboat. I know I know...

OK I get the 'don't beat your WH with a cheater stick.' I understand how that can not go on, and on, and on. But discussions can take many forms, and this is only one of them. The advice I am getting is to NEVER speak of it again. Never. Not in any form. I disagree with that advice.


To what end will you get if you continually ask about?

Different forms? Like in Spanish? Can anyone translate, "did you screw her in our car?" for UW.

Its the same answer: si or yes.

You see? You already know that which you want to know. Now, if you havent gotten all 'need to knows' immediately after ddday, thats a horse of a different color.

Id need MB clarity on this, but I believe you'd advise your husband that you have unanswered questions and you cannot to put this thing behind you except for them. Id tell him you have 6, 10, or 22 questions (whichever). give him the option of an oral exam or in writing.

Cleary you things eating at you that you cannot ignore.

THEN YOU ARE NEVER, EVER TO BRING UP ANYTHING PRE-DDAY AGAIN.

Thought the same thing...NEVER speak of it again? (read my thread. I've had Marital all over me for this, and rightfully so).

Yup.

All it does it keep alive the very thing I'm trying to move away from.

Irony: my W is more attentive to it than I am -- she can either just see it in my eyes, or all I have to say is that I'm having a moment.

Then, we move forward.