To everyone:

I was wondering what your insight was about this.

I know that Jesus says forgive 7x77 times which basically means keep forgiving, but it is hard to keep forgiving when the WS is basically still sinning against you every minute of the day buy their decision to leave the marriage and in some cases continue with the OP.

By still being married and carrying on with the OP and even getting married, they are not acting in a Christian way towards their kids, their family, their friends, or us who are all heartbroken and hurt by their decision to act against every moral and Christian teaching that there is.

Now, I agree that at a certain point we need to accept their choices, and just accept that they are chosing this wrong path. So, what do we do, forgive them each and every day and just forget about it?

Am I answering my own question here?

I want to move on, but it's hard to pretend like their life is normal and acceptable and like their life choices are ok like all WS's want us to do. How do we move on without condoning their behavior? And how do we forgive?

K

<small>[ August 22, 2002, 08:36 AM: Message edited by: God is in Control ]</small>

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by God is in Control:
<strong>So, what do we do, forgive them each and every day and just forget about it? </strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Yes and no. We must give to the Lord, that which we cannot control. I pray for my X and her boy toy daily. Even as we go through rough times where her decisions and behavior has a negative influence on my girls.

But without forgiveness, I would never be able to move on.

But I do not forget. I will never forget the pain and struggles in hopes that I will not allow that into my life again.......

God be with you!!!!!!!!!!!

K: I am struggling with forgiveness also. I am working on letting go right now, and, in a way, I think that is a form of forgiveness.

Also, I think that forgiveness, when and if it finally happens, will be a release for me, not my stbxh. He will have no idea that I have forgiven him as we have no contact. So forgiveness will be for me alone, and will have nothing to do with him. I am trying to remember that.

Forgiving... the question we all ask ourselves. It doesn't mean that we "forget"... it means we have the courage to forgive *them* as humans, but not the actions that they choose.

When I first started going through all this, my sister told me: "Forgiveness is not saying "it's OK", it's about making sure it doesn't happen again."

My ex continues to hurt, betray, abuse. It's not my problem... I can't control what he does. Does he hurt our children? Yes...emotionally, mentally. I can't stop him. The courts can't stop him and I have to continually turn the other cheek.

I used to think that if you forgave someone they *stopped* their behavior that caused the pain. It doesn't happen that way. Forgiveness is not for THEM...it's for YOU. I *forgive* him all the time. It's the way he is. I look at him like he is mentally ill. After all he doesn't know any different, it's the way he's been all his life. I've turned him over to God. I'm letting Him work on my ex, and in the meantime I ask God to give me the strength and courage to keep forgiving and keep working steering me in the right direction.

Here is what I am going to do:

I am going to forgive WW and my ex-friend for their actions, because I do really believe that if they knew what they were doing, they would not be doing it. I cannot even begin to get inside my stbxw's head and know what she is going through and how the world looks to her. Whatever it looks like, it cannot be a good place in many ways or she would not be behaving as she is.
As for my ex-friend, he is extremely limited in social and personal ways. I was his only real male friend, his only friend, period, until my wife 'befriended' him. Can you imagine being 28 or 29 years old and having NO coterie of friends or comrades at all? Come to think of it, stbxw was not much different. Aside from college pals, with whom she kept up only the most tenuous relationship, she had no friends either, save for the ones I brought to the marriage.
My point is that these two people are limited in the extreme and I believe that they are reacting to inner demons (as I guess we all are to one degree or another) and not really to me or anything that I did or did not do. This is not to imply that I did not make mistakes, have not acknowledged my mistakes and vowed to never repeat them, but rather only to suggest that those mistakes were not the source of her dissatisfaction, at least not enough of a source to make her leave me.
All of that having been said, I am no longer an f'ing doormat and while I can forgive her, I cannot forget. I do not want to be doomed to repeat the past.
One last thing; to not forgive a person is to chain one's self to that person and I want nothing to do with her or her new family.

very tired,
very physically sore(bad back),
hoping all is well with you, GIIC,
c++_guy

forgiveness

This is a subject that I struggle with as well. I have heard that forgiveness is giving up my right to revenge. It doesn't mean that you approve of what happened just accepting that it did.

The only one who truley gets hurt when I don't forgive someone is me. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="images/icons/frown.gif" /> It is like carrying around 1000 lb weights on each shoulder. Revenge is the same way. When ever I have thoughts of revenge, I have to remind myself that it only hurts me and may interfear into God's plan for the situation. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" />

I asked our Priest the same question, and he recommended this book How to Forgive by John Monbourquette

God Bless,

D.

GIIC,
I know what you are saying as far as how we are suppose to forgive.
It is difficult to forgive someone when they continue to inflict the pain, by their continued actions.
I have forgiven my STBXW for the things she has done, but then she turns around and does something else... over and over again.
I haven't forgiven her for the additional items that she has done.
I will in time, but I'm not past that point yet.
Correct me if I'm wrong... don't we have to ask for God's forgiveness and repent for our sins before we can be forgiven?
Funny... I don't remember my STBXW asking for forgiveness, or repenting for that matter.
It's just a thought.
Stay Strong!
Wallace

<small>[ August 22, 2002, 02:03 PM: Message edited by: Wallace ]</small>

What helps me is understanding that forgiving does not mean the other person does not still face the consiquences of their actions, or that I should do something to cause their actions to not have consiquences - including the loss or lessor relationship with me.

It also does not mean we should not protect ourselves from current/future actions, blindly act as if they will behave differently now or next time.

It is the forgiving of the past, even immediate past, but can still allow, even insist, consiquences are faced, and realistically protect ourselves from further harm or being taken advantage of.

I do agree that forgiveness is firstly for our own benifit, to release the anger and negitive feelings that can be so damaging to carry around.

hope that helps.

Juanita

Please - how does one work up to the "forgive" stage??

Thanks all!

It seems as if forgiveness is one of the steps on the road to healing.

And kind of like acceptance, you don't know you've done it until you've actually done it. (Does that make any sense?)

I'll probably be reading up on the subject to see if there is any other insights I can gather.

I don't think I'm holding on to any internal anger and baggage toward my ExH as far as his actions toward me, but I'm not sure if I've totally forgive him yet either, especially when it comes to what he's doing to the kids.

I've also heard that forgiveness is different than reconciling, because when you reconcile the injurer does something to make amends to the injured, and ExH has definitely not tried to make amends.

Thanks for all of the input. It really does help sort things out.

And so c++ - does this mean you've changed your mind about taking your WW back? I'm possibly seeing some growth over there. You haven't said that much in awhile. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" />

K

No, fact is what they're doing isn't "normal" or "right", but God has given them free will to choose to be selfish or not...they've chosen to be selfish; they've chosen the low road. They have chosen to live in the dirt. And if they haven't paid the consequences, yet, they're in for a real treat, I guarantee you.

We can hate their behavior, but we have to forgive the people. Why? For ourselves. HERE IS FORGIVENESS DEFINED AS CLEARLY AS I COULD FIND IT:

"Forgiveness doesn't mean that what happened to us was okay. It simply means that we are no longer willing to allow that experience to adversely affect our lives. Forgiveness is something we do, ultimately for ourselves."

This quote from "Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom", finally helped me understand what forgiveness really is.

God bless. --Suzy

I am with Wallace on this one at least for the time being. I have not had enough time to really let the anger about her actions go. I will start to think about forgiving her after I confront her with her last lie to me. Then and only then can I ever feel that at least she knows WHAT I would be letting go. Right now, she thinks she is very sly and keeping things under wrap.

I still wonder about whether I should tell her friends and family. I just hate the fact that they think this is all because of me. I respect them and how they view me, maybe even more than I care about her.

I will let this go. I don't know whether it will be forgiveness or just time. I was really working on forgiving the first time, when she pulled the second, so this might take a while. I still let it bother me. It almost feels good to feel so bad and feel so justified at the same time. I am just not ready to let this go. But I know that I will eventually. Another thing that really bothers me is the fact that I know that whatever pain she is feeling, if any, is nothing compared to what I feel. She has a salve to soothe her when ever she feels bad, in the other man. I refuse to start looking, even though I long desparately to have someone to love me again.

Wow, that is a dangerous place to live. The day I finally took my ring off I took my boys to the bookstore and was approached by a very beautiful woman. We talked for about 5 minutes and I know that I could have taken it much farther had I been ready. But I also knew that I was so vulnerable that I wouldn't know any reality of a relationship at this time. Besides, I am still married. Regardless of whether she feels like she is or not. Everyone I know is trying to set me up. I keep telling them that I am not ready and am still married. Many of them say that all I need is a fling with a "hottie". I tell them that is the last thing I need.

Truthfully, I feel like I want to hand out a questionaire at the beginning of every date and have them fill it out. If you say no to any of the above questions, then thank you for your time, but we don't need to go any further, kind of thing.

If you are not ready to forgive, then don't. In order to forgive, you need to "feel it through". Anger, resentment, etc, until it's time. Re: " Forgiveness; Healing the hurts we don't Deserve" by Louis Smedes.

You have been violated, your boundaries trampled.Forgiveness is valuable,to me, and not to be freely distributed or readily discounted by easy access.

Yes, I know it's supposed to be for me. Whatever.

GIIC, have you looked at Evans "Verbally Abusive Relationship" or Cloud and Townsend's "Boundaries"?

BTW, they aren't hurting everone with their actions.They are serving their own interests, they, in large part are not suffering..

<small>[ August 23, 2002, 07:42 PM: Message edited by: Family Man ]</small>

Hey Family Man!

You and I read the same kinda books <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" /> ....sorry that you had to find support here though! <img border="0" alt="[Teary]" title="" src="graemlins/teary.gif" />

artchick - great definition!

Formerly Confused - it really is hard to forgive and not forget

Family Man - I have Evan's book right here - I just finished reading it today and it describes my ExH to a T. It was never really the name calling so much as everything else that she mentions. I wish it said more about what to do about it.

ExH keeps wondering why I can't just pick up the phone and discuss the kid issues with him - duh?! He just wants a chance to exert control over me. I have also read Boundaries, but it looks like I may need to get it out again.

K

Forgiveness is tough sometimes. Life isn't always fair it seems.
Marriage reminds me of selling real estate. A client would state that they had to have an older, charming,two story with gleaming hardwood floors-then fall for the stark white, contemporary!
Basically none of us know for certain that our spouses will be with us through life,we could end up homeless with a few bad business deals-O.K., I'm sounding too doom and gloom here! Just wanted to share my real estate comparison.

GIIC, me stbx also employs " bids for control" using children's issues to get my attention. I find feeling my anger helps me to define some boundaries.

Now, when she's angry, she may start with "Hey [censored].." . Not the type of expression of anger I'm referring to.

I think forgiving them and forgetting about it leads to classic codependant stuff. I think acknowledging the damage,but not focusing on it, will help us define what we will or will not accept.

Like your ex looking in or coming in the house to see if you were ok while he's recieving emails from you..your borders don't seem important to him.

The statement of the wayward spouse doesn't see the hurt he has caused the family is true. When they finally say they are sorry, and are truly remorseful and guilty about what they have done, can you finally move on. That is why I am having a hard time moving on. My stbxh doesn't see the betrayal and hurt he has caused me and the kids. Our kids are older 16-23yrs (4). The trust in the kids is so low, except for one. He buys her everything, and is paying for her rent in apartment, and truck payment. But he doesn't want to give me money for food for the 4 of us living here, or dog food money or cat food money or bird food. We have 4 dogs, 2 cats, and 1 blue front amazon bird.

The wayward spouse seems to want to use the kids, or buy them off. The BS is unable to do anything with the kids, like myself, I don't have a job, and am unable to do anything with the kids except provide them with a roof over the house, clean house, clean clothes, and food.

My stbxh is hurting his mother daily, and the anger he shows so quickly to all of us shows that he is a mental case, with selfishness overload <img border="0" title="" alt="[Mad]" src="images/icons/mad.gif" /> <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" /> <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="images/icons/frown.gif" /> . Seems they would see the damage they have caused and want to mend some of it, baby steps by baby steps. My stbxh is still lieing to this day. My lawyers caught him in a big lie in the interrogation done 2 weeks ago. He lied to me over the phone, and now am keeping a journal of lies.

My question is why does God let these people go on and on? Doesn't God show them that they are really screwing their lives up, and hurting those that they love? <img border="0" title="" alt="[Confused]" src="images/icons/confused.gif" />

Patricia Evans has a new book out called "Controlling People". It has some ideas on how to deal with people like that. I just have to keep dealing with mine because he's the father of my children. Makes it extremely difficult at times.

GIIC,

...wrote you a reply and it posted wayyyyy back on page one! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" /> Patricia Evans has a new book out called "Controlling People". It tells you what they *are like*, but I really didn't get any ideas really on how to handle them other than what I'm doing right now: no verbal communication (brief if anything), mostly emails about the kids. The Boundaries book is excellent. There's a workbook that goes along with it (I actually went to a class where you watched a video with Townsend/Cloud, discussed and then did small group work). That helps in establishing really healthy boundaries (not that I'm there yet! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Razz]" src="images/icons/tongue.gif" /> but I'm working on it!).

The one book that is absolutely amazing me right now is called "Divorce Poison" that was recommended on the thead about nasty x's. That, if anything through the years, has given me incredible hope that the controlling will be done and over with.

Hope everything is going right in your world today! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />