I see another "betrayer" is being shown the way/walked to the guillotine. Be aware, only those who have survived the "betrayer" firing squad are left here to give you this total honesty advice. Except maybe for me and one or two others who really know what consequences you are likely to face... You don't deserve to be punished. Your husband has no more right to "decide" what to do with your marriage than you do, especially after what he has done directly to you. Sitting in front of a counselor when you tell him will not guarantee your safety. He could decide to punish you later. You bear only 50% responsibility for the state of your marriage. Telling your H will only give him one more reason to abuse you or worse.

I think I am going to sit down and write H a letter. I will have this put away in an EXTREMELY safe place. It will confess all and be totally honest about everything. BUT.... I am not going to give it to him unless I absolutely have to. Until that day, I will keep a daily journal of my progress and thoughts. The love I feel for H and the things I am doing to keep our marriage working and what I am doing to make it stronger. I will write all my feelings for him to read, so that when the day comes, if it comes, I can give him all of it. I think this is the best I can do right now. At least it is something until I feel comfortable with things. Thanks all again, for your advice.

Lacee,<BR>I think your last suggestion sounds very wise, and safe. Doing what you can to work on yourself and your marriage first, I think, is always a good idea. Another mistake I made was to tell my ex-H before I had forgiven myself and fully processed why "it" happened. Because I had not forgiven myself, I mistakenly believed I deserved his abuse and put up with it far more than I should have. Right now, it is not my divorce that I'm having the hardest time recovering from, it is the fact that I let him continue to hurt me and also remembering and internalizing so many of the awful things he said and did after my confession. This is why I tell people not to make what I see as a knee-jerk decision to confess. It may be the best thing in many,many circumstances, but certainly not *all*. My prayers go out to you during these hard times.

Thank you for your prayers and I agree with you that I cannot move on unless I have forgiven myself. Afterall, what on earth would I do if I couldn't live with myself after telling H? There is the possiblity that I will end up alone, if only for a while. But I will have to have some kind of strength to be able to move forward. So, like I said, I have begun the long letter of explanation and wow is it ever going to take time to get it into words and get it right. I have to pull away from it at times because it starts to make me crazy! I have however, been keeping a daily journal and will continue to do so. I am putting all my thoughts and feelings into it, including the things H does that are bothering me, that way, he will understand what it is he does that hurts my feelings or makes me feel bad. Hopefully, this will help him to understand when the time comes. What do you think? Is this a waste of time? Does anyone think this is going to help?

Lacee, it will help you, I'm sure... will your H read it before you get a chance to put all your thoughts into that letter of yours? <P>Be careful.<P>My H, who never touched my journals (I kept them for 5 yrs.) went through a phase of reading them while I was at work. There was nothing that he didn't know, but he took the times that I was angry or hurt and rolled them up into a ball of hatred for him, which wasn't true. There were many times I said how much I loved him, but he didn't want to see that, he wanted to wallow in the "hate".<P>Just be careful.<P>By the way, there are many, many here who believe in TOTAL HONESTY and that your marriage has no place in it for journals or anything private. I am not one of those people. You need to do what you know is safe and best in your situation. Remember that!<P>~Sheryl

Up for Unforgiven..