Mods - feel free to move this as I'm new and wasn't sure where to put this. I have pushed my marriage of 12 years to the brink by hiding the massive ($100k+) credit card and tax debts that I ran up over two years, then lying about it when caught, then lying even more after I was caught and lying about my efforts to change myself. I have come to realize that I'm a compulsive liar - I will lie about big things (although I no longer have that much of a chance to do that) and small things. I do it even when there is nothing to gain for lying, although I will certainly do it when I do have something to gain.

I want to change so that I can live a life with integrity and so that I can someday, over the rainbow, earn back my husband's trust. He feels stupid and betrayed, and has told me many times that he feels like I've gone out and cheated on him. It's the lying that really distresses him, more than even just having spent all the money.

I know that honesty is a huge part of the marriage builders program and I am also just looking for advice and support on living up to that kind of radical honesty about everything. I love my husband and unfortunately up until now I have been making excuses to myself about how time will heal the wounds I've created. I just hope it isn't too late.

Thanks -

hopestochange
New Jersey

Your husband "feels stupid and betrayed".

Your words.

I think this is interesting, don't you?

Let me introduce myself, hopestochange,

I am schoolbus.

IRL my world is words. I make a living thinking about thinking, and how words make us think.

Really, more exactly, I think about what YOU say, or write. Then, I think about exactly what you said or wrote, and what your brain did to get you there. And, what it meant, deep down inside of you.

It is a curse.

First, your name. "hopes to change".

I want to say that you "hope". Just so that you know, hope is an externalizing verb. It is placing an internal desire for an outcome on an external - and unknown entity or force - basically, you are looking to be rescued. The name you chose speaks volumes about how you are facing your situation regarding the change you seek.

At this point in time, you believe that there is "something" out there.....in the universe.....that will somehow land in your world that will somehow "change" you and that you will quit lying.


won't happen

Because the next issue is this: " I do it even when there is nothing to gain for lying, although I will certainly do it when I do have something to gain."


This is part of the problem. You are deceiving yourself regarding the lying.

The first part of the sentence is where you self-deceive. "I do it even when there is nothing to gain for lying".

There is always a gain for lying. The case is that you are LOOKING AWAY from the gain. Your denial of the gain is keeping you from STOPPING this behavior!

The fact is, if you can understand why you lie about the stupid little things, you could actually stop yourself from doing the big things.

Why?

Because it is the betrayal of people at the smallest level that opens the door for you to justify betraying them at larger levels.

Do you understand that?

If you can justify stealing one grape at the grocery store, then you can find a justification for stealing a box of cereal. Then, you can justify robbing the store. It creeps up. You become "entitled", and the grocery store "blameworthy".

Somehow, in the process of lying, it is okay for you to tell the little lies. It "doesn't hurt" the other person not to know the truth. That's what you tell yourself. Or,
"it's an unimportant detail", or, "they will never find out". And another one, "He/she probably deserves it, because he isn't so perfect himself/herself." So you justify your little lies. When the bigger lies occur, these smaller justifications are already ramped up. Ready for use, and you have them in place - and they WORK FOR YOU. You believe them, because you have used them before.

It is easy to blame someone else, especially if that other person has done something to make us angry, or if they have faults that are irritating to us. And what if that other person is someone who does things that we find not so great? It makes it that much easier to treat that other person poorly! That much easier to blame him or her, and that much easier to justify lying to that person, or treating him badly, having an affair on him, or cheating her out of money, etc.

Lying serves a purpose, always. You need to look at what that purpose IS>

makes you seem more important
allows you to stay in a conversation
puts you one-up in a conversation
makes you seem more interesting
makes your past seem more diverse or interesting
covers up mistakes or errors
covers up other lies
keeps you out of perceived possible trouble
reduces your anxiety about what people "think of you"
sets the stage for future behavior or crimes

You really need to think, and deeply, about what those lies that "don't really get you anything" really get for you.

Don't run away from what they get you.


Now. About the idea that your husband feels stupid and betrayed.


Your words.....



Why wouldn't he feel that way?


I want you to consider why he would feel any other way except stupid and betrayed.

Personally, I think he is feeling exactly the way he should be feeling, which is a normal reaction to what you have done to his life, and to him.


What is bothering you is that your wall of indifference has

for some reason

come crashing down.


And you finally CARE about the consequences of your lies. Your husband's words HURT YOU.

And you want to repair this.


For that, I am glad. I am glad you are here, because of all the places to be, this is the one place you can get help.


I would say that you need to read some books. Yours is a bit different, so you need to read His Needs/Her Needs (order on this site.

Then you need to read

Leadership and Self-Deception: Getting out of the box. By The Arbinger Institute. It will help you understand the moment you begin lying. And why you lie.


And you need professional counseling. Find someone asap.


I know this was long. I know I hit you hard, and perhaps below the belt. I mean to help you. I hope I did.

SB

SB - thank you so much for taking the time to write such a long response. I feel touched and blessed that a complete stranger took so much time to respond. I don't think that you said anything that was below the belt.

I wanted to clarify something - this isn't something new, this is something that has been going on for two years.

I'm going to respond to what you said:


Yes, I think that is absolutely right. And I realize that it won't happen. I've hoped that for two years - or, more to the point, I have hoped that I wouldn't get caught. I hope that things will happen which divests me of the need to take responsibility and change things. I need to change from "hoping" to change to bringing about change. And I need to do more than just write about that...

I think that my little lies are things that I use to avoid feeling uncomfortable about things. I have so much pride built up that it's just ridiculous. I also use the "little" lies to cover up mistakes or failures, I just think of them as "little" because they're about smaller things. I realize that even white lies just set the stage for making me feel comfortable with bigger lies.

I agree that my husband has every right to feel betrayed and stupid. I didn't let myself think about how he felt or dismissed his feelings for many years because I either felt that he didn't have the right to feel that way or because I couldn't face my own failures. I couldn't let my wall of indifference down because I couldn't face my own failure and the pain that I would feel then.

I have a huge ego. It gets in the way of making things right.

I am seeing a counselor, but I don't know if it is helping. It's more for marriage issues than the lying specifically. I am also on anti-anxiety drugs. I am even going to do inpatient work because I think that I am that screwed up about lying.

I need to stop this and stop it right now. You're right that I gain something from every lie from big to small - I need to realize that those gains aren't worth it, no matter how small the lie seems at the time. And I do lie to myself, all the time.

I hope that this has helped me. I have a long history of not following through on good advice. I'm going to order those books if DH lets me use his card to place the order or if I can get them locally or better yet at the library.

I have blown his trust to the point where last night he barely trusted me to drive 2 blocks to let the neighbor's dog out. He thought I would drive away in the car and not come back. It's shocking to hear him say that, when it didn't cross my mind, but it makes sense when I look at it from his point of view.

I really appreciate your advice, especially since I'm not quite sure I posted in the right place. I think that it feels to DH that I have cheated on him, which I have.

Hoping things will happen doesn't bring change about.

I hope to win the lottery. Fat chance. I'm in the company of lots of great folks, but the truth is that millions of us LOSE. All of us, except one.


You don't change because you choose to stay the same. Why?

laziness? there is likely an attitude of this in your nature. it is in all of us, to tell the truth.

fear of being judged by others? you want the truth about this? I will tell you the truth about this. People ALREADY KNOW YOU ARE A LIAR. The truth is that they already have talked about you behind your back, they have already caught you in your "little lies", and already do not trust you. They have already judged you, hfc. This part is already done, signed, sealed, and delivered. Especially because you have lied all of your life! You have trailing behind you a slime trail of lies that people already point to and say, "Yep, there it is, that's hfc's trail of slime!"

So don't fear being judged. You've crossed that bridge already, only YOU DIDN'T EVEN KNOW IT. The very sad part of this is that you have been so caught up in yourself, that your indifference to others and their feelings literally blinded you to their reactions to you. This blinded you to the fact that they JUDGED YOU NEGATIVELY because of your lies.

You will start seeing it, now that the indifference is falling down around you. Watch and see. You will start to .... care ..... because it hurts to be judged. Ouch.


do you not stop because there remains a payoff in lying? SURE!!!! You have continued to lie because the benefit for you has not gone away! So, why change? Oh, but now there has been a change. Perhaps the wall of indifference being crashed will now make that change for you. Let's hope. Of all things, that may make the difference.

In the past, you were immune to what anyone else thought, because you did not see how what you did affected them.

Now, you have this man you love. And you see your actions causing him pain. And in turn, you are hurting - you are experiencing the sense of guilt and also the sense of shame.

These are new to you.

They are useful tools.


Take them to an inpatient clinic.

Use them. My advice is for you to figure out why you believe other people's needs are not as important as your own.

There is a concept out there that everyone on the earth has needs. And we do - we all have needs.

I have no right to prioritize your needs, nor to weigh my needs as "more important" than yours. While my needs are different, I cannot come into a relationship with the attitude that my needs are always more important and outweighing yours, and therefore anything I do and any means I use to meet my needs is justified.

Your lying behavior is essentially just this. You believe that your own needs outweigh those of every other person on the earth - because each and every time you lie, you place your own personal agenda before the needs of the people you are lying to. You place your needs above all else - using any means necessary to achieve your own agenda.


I ask you to really dig deep here - and tell me why you believe your own needs outweigh mine, your husband's, or anyone else's. When you explain this, you will begin your recovery from lying.

Seriously - do the work to explain it. You know the answer. No matter how "stupid" this sounds, put it in writing. It will be worth it in the end. I will NOT tear you apart. This is worth every word for you. I am here as a fellow traveler on the earth. For this one time in your life - trust someone.


SB

OK you have taken the first step. You recognize your sin. Now what do you do with them? Consider Christ. Because, unless a man be born again he shall in no way enter in to the kingdom of heaven. Jesus died for your sins, before you told a single lie. Right now your father is satan, the father of all lies. Accept Christ as your savior and he will give you a new nature.

HTC, you hit the jackpot having schoolbus respond to you. She is very busy and often is not on the boards for long stretches of time.

Read and re-read her response to you. Everytime you read it you will glean a little more from it. You will get lots of help on this board but you have to do the work.

(((HTC)))

Why do I believe that my own needs outweigh everyone else's?

I feel that my husband owes me for things I've done for him. I feel that his expectations of honesty are unrealistic (they're not, really - this is just my selfish thinking).

I feel that I am smarter than everyone else. They don't need to know the truth because I will take care of the problem since I am so much better than them. They're just being unreasonable. I feel that my problems are unique and that I am also more sensitive than everyone else. I feel like "if only they were in my shoes then they would understand why it's OK for me to lie here." I feel like I understand things so much better than everyone else, and that's why I should be able to "get away" with lying. I know better than other people what is important and think I'm right more often than them.

I actually am much more honest with my friends than with my husband. He is the one who has felt the brunt of my lying. I think that might be because I feel like with him I have the most to lose if I am found out doing something wrong. I also feel like he is the one who confronts me about the most things - for whatever reason I just don't have a lot of close friends where I even have an opportunity to lie about things. But even there I realize that over time I think my friends find me much less reliable and see me as someone who looks to them for help when I'm in the middle of a bunch of drama rather than someone that they can rely on. But that's a side note.

I also feel like the version of relationships I saw growing up were full of lies, so I thought it was OK. I also saw very little of people putting someone else's needs ahead of theirs, so I thought that each person in a marriage should look out for themselves first. I thought that if a husband wanted his wife to change, it meant that he didn't really love her and I resented my husband for wanting me to change.

And yes, I am lazy but more to the point I think that deep down I still felt like what I was doing was for a good reason (because I was just so much smarter and therefore "knew best").

I have an appointment on Tuesday for an in-patient evaluation. I am afraid I could wind up losing my job over this, because of missing work. But, in the long run, this is something that I need to address for myself and for everyone else around me.

SB - keep the tough love coming. I am overjoyed that I have someone out there in the universe who will talk straight to me. My husband will, but I often have trouble accepting his advice because I feel like he's not "neutral" (yes, pretty stupid of me, since he gives out a lot of good advice).

THANK YOU THANK YOU.

and to the other poster, thanks for chiming in. I have often felt guilt in church and am considering becoming much more spiritual to help me find peace and honestiy.

Smiling woman - thanks for the info. I really feel thankful to have gotten spot-on, no-nonsense advice right away.

I also saw a counselor for a few months last year, a different one than the one I am seeing now. We weren't really addressing this issue because I hadn't admitted it yet. She wasn't too much help because in retrospect I feel like she was just kind of coddling me and encouraging a lot of bad behavior. I probably manipulated her with half truths and lies as well. One thing I learned from that experience is that I need straight talk even if I don't like it - I can manipulate people who don't keep it blunt, and that doesn't help me.

I know that I need to do the work. I'm glad to have people here giving their advice and I plan to keep coming back so that I can truly "stay honest."

I would think the lying needs to be dealt with as you work on your marriage. You won't get much encouragement here regarding marriage counselors....traditional ones have a dismal success rate. If you work on yourself with a counselor and work this marriage builders program you will see results.

Yes, I have read the negative reviews of marriage counselors. I do trust ours, and while she doesn't strictly follow the MB program, her priorities are aligned with theirs in a lot of ways. She really stresses honesty and accountability, which is important for me. I have mostly been doing individual work with her now, because she thinks that I need to fix myself up in order to give my husband what he needs.

Now the work begins. This will hurt. It will hit home. You will need time to process.


Do the work. My considerations of what you are thinking, and my comments, are in red. Your own words are in black.

You HAVE betrayed your husband. You have cheated on him, with yourself as your first love.





Why do I believe that my own needs outweigh everyone else's?

I feel that my husband owes me for things I've done for him.
In this case, my question is, do you believe that you owe him for anything he has done for you? Where is the tally book? Are there others in your life who also "owe" you? And are there people in your life who you owe a debt of gratitude - which is a debt that could never be repaid? Has anyone ever saved your life, for example? What then, is the debt that you might owe that person? How does one go through life keeping this kind of accounting -

as for me, I would owe so many people, and owe so much, I could never begin to repay them. As for those who have found themselves in debt to me, would I find it honorable to then treat them poorly because, for some circumstance, they were in need of my help?

"Miracles are provided BY those who temporarily have more, TO those who temporarily have less." Because someone might owe you something, then, you consider them less than you. Your idea is that you immediately have the "right" to treat them badly.

What you "have" - is the OBLIGATION to treat them BETTER, because it places that person in NEED, and you in the position to HELP.

Change - this is one way of thinking you have in error. Consider what I have posted, and think about what I have to say.


I feel that his expectations of honesty are unrealistic (they're not, really - this is just my selfish thinking). Your honesty here is good. You do see that the expectation of honesty is not an unrealistic one.

You expect it from others. This is true, isn't it....

Yet, you do not give it in your own relationships.

Because it maintains POWER AND CONTROL.

You say so yourself. Watch and see.

I feel that I am smarter than everyone else. They don't need to know the truth because I will take care of the problem since I am so much better than them. And here it is. Power - you are smarter, you are better, and so you have the control in the situation - you will take over, keep the information away from them, control it all, make all of the decisions FOR everyone else.

You decide. It keeps you in the driver's seat. That way, you believe you can control the outcome of your life.

How is this working for you? (I like to channel Dr. Phil sometimes )


They're just being unreasonable.
Oh, you hate it when other people have minds of their own. So, this is when NEW lies come into the picture. This is when you find yourself weaving more webs, and you get into trouble with friends. And why they pull away.


I feel that my problems are unique and that I am also more sensitive than everyone else. One of the important things we notice here on MB is that when affairs begin, the wayward spouses often state their case with "my affair is unique". You really are not special. You really are not more sensitive than anyone else. For proof, read my story, read the story of anyone else here whose name starts or includes "hope", read the story of herpapabear, the wonderings, or any betrayed spouse. Every person on earth bleeds. Every heart breaks. We all, believe it or not, have lied to cover our rear ends, to make others think better of us, and to make ourselves seem more important.


I feel like "if only they were in my shoes then they would understand why it's OK for me to lie here." This is a justification, plain and simple. When you tell yourself this, you know you are lying to yourself, and even you don't believe it. It sounds good, kind of like, "We should do lunch."

I feel like I understand things so much better than everyone else, and that's why I should be able to "get away" with lying. Read this again to yourself. Let's pretend you really ARE the world's best expert in all things.

Wow.

I, Schoolbus, am giving advice to the World's Best Expert in All Things.


Exactly what does that make me?



Now, put the reality cap back on every single time you have this thought, and have a belly laugh with me. Because the truth is, you and I both know neither one of us is the world's best expert in one darn thing. Except in what goes on in our own heads - and to tell you the truth, there are times when I can't for the life of me tell you what is going on in my own head.


I know better than other people what is important and think I'm right more often than them. This thought occurs to every single person on the face of the planet. We all believe this.

The difference is that the majority of us realize that it is a fallacy.


You are coming to understand this, and my hope is that it hits you REALLY HARD right between the eyes, soon enough to save your marriage, and the way you handle your family, friends, and job relationships for the rest of your life.

I actually am much more honest with my friends than with my husband.
Here is where I think you are probably deceiving yourself. My educated guess would be that you lie to your friends in a different way than you lie to your husband.

With your friends, your lies would consist of how you present your opinions; you tend to agree with them about things that you probably do not really find important and would disagree with if the discussion were more in-depth. You probably present yourself in a certain light, when the truth is your personality is not exactly as you show it with them. You likely present interests to them that would not be shown to others, which are shown to your husband and not to yet another group of people. Honesty means you are "the same" basic person, and one group of people would likely see "the same you", with slight variations, but not a significantly different you from what another group of people see.



He is the one who has felt the brunt of my lying. I think that might be because I feel like with him I have the most to lose if I am found out doing something wrong. He is the one who has seen the naked self, you have made the most "mistakes" around him. You are most exposed to him, and you know this. Plus, your wall of indifference is most vulnerable with your husband

because:

YOU ACTUALLY CARE HOW HE FEELS, AND YOU CARE THAT HE IS HURT BY YOUR OWN BEHAVIOR.


I also feel like he is the one who confronts me about the most things - for whatever reason I just don't have a lot of close friends where I even have an opportunity to lie about things.Because they cannot get close enough. Your indifference to others results in them choosing other people as friends, and they understand that you lie, which causes them to remain at a distance. Understand that your behavior is what makes for poor friendships - it is your own lack of investment IN others - your choice to try to control, decide for them, direct them, lie to them......do you see this?


But even there I realize that over time I think my friends find me much less reliable and see me as someone who looks to them for help when I'm in the middle of a bunch of drama rather than someone that they can rely on. But that's a side note. Not a side note at ALL! This is insightful!!! You say this, then run away from it. You are afraid of what you began, so you say it, then push it away as a side note.


Stay with this thought - because you are right on. They DO find you unreliable. You are right. You do create drama - why????????

Then, when they are needy, where are you?

Look to the first paragraph - when people "owe" you, what is your view of them?????? Think about this!!!!!!! That is exactly WHY your friends leave you.

I also feel like the version of relationships I saw growing up were full of lies, so I thought it was OK. I also saw very little of people putting someone else's needs ahead of theirs, so I thought that each person in a marriage should look out for themselves first. I thought that if a husband wanted his wife to change, it meant that he didn't really love her and I resented my husband for wanting me to change. You came to this toward the end for a reason. It is a sort of afterthought, and I would agree that it is dangling in your life. It is out there, kind of like a ghost that remains. It is not a "cause", but more of what you were used to a long time ago. You saw it, and it sort of stuck. I would say by the way you have worded this, you are ready to let it go. You have the true desire to see this go out of your way of life.

I believe you can make this change.

And yes, I am lazy but more to the point I think that deep down I still felt like what I was doing was for a good reason (because I was just so much smarter and therefore "knew best").You hold onto this.

Remember these words:


"hopesforchange will not die because she was wrong. The world will not come to an end, and the Error Police are NOT coming for her."

One of the issues I see with you is that you cling to the idea that you are smart. I don't see evidence to the contrary. What you need to understand in all of this is that being smart comes with responsibility - you have to also accept that you will make mistakes every single day you are alive. You have to accept that there are people in the world who are smarter than you are, and also people who are a lot less intelligent. Being smart doesn't put you in charge. (Although I would like to talk to whoever made this decision )

I think that being smart also makes you responsible for making the necessary changes for your life to be better. That would include becoming an ETHICAL person, don't you?

Why would being smart make it okay to lie?

I have an appointment on Tuesday for an in-patient evaluation. I am afraid I could wind up losing my job over this, because of missing work. But, in the long run, this is something that I need to address for myself and for everyone else around me.

SB - keep the tough love coming. I am overjoyed that I have someone out there in the universe who will talk straight to me. My husband will, but I often have trouble accepting his advice because I feel like he's not "neutral" (yes, pretty stupid of me, since he gives out a lot of good advice).
Your husband is not neutral. And it looks to me like you have been "neutral" for too long.


What you are currently looking at in the mirror is what is called "brokenness".

This is not a bad thing.


It is not the hits you take in life. It is how you rise from the ashes.
THANK YOU THANK YOU.

and to the other poster, thanks for chiming in. I have often felt guilt in church and am considering becoming much more spiritual to help me find peace and honestiy.


I hope this helps you. Give consideration to it. When you are in counseling, try not to focus on your past so much, but on looking deep within yourself and why you justify yourself and treating others as though you are entitled to lie and control them. Your answers were quite honest, and I appreciate that.

Go tell your husband that you found this website. Tell him that you want to work the program here, because your marriage can benefit from Radical Honesty, Openness and Honesty, and meeting each other's Emotional Needs.


He needs support, too.


This marriage is about him right now, and you did betray him. You have some very heavy lifting to do. There are some Plans here that can help. Get him here to read the Basic Concepts, so he can get some healing going, and you two can get some plans working.

Schoolbus

Since we are in the SAA forum, let me ask... Have you cheated on your husband as well?

CV

SB - WOW. You made me realize things about myself that I had never thought of. I cannot thank you enough. I *do* lie to my friends - in ways that until now I had not even thought of as lying. The biggest one I can think of is politics - I used to be quite liberal, but now am fairly conservative. Most of my friends are quite liberal, and this actually includes much of my family. When politics come up, I don't stand my ground or state my case. Even with people I've known for a long time, I just go silent or pretend to agree when I don't. Why? Because in this case I don't want to create conflict, which is probably just another version of me *not wanting to think I am wrong*. I don't know that I have actively lost friends, but I feel that I am more distant from some of my older friends and probably it is largely due to this. In fact, it's only recently that I've begun to acknowledge that the drama I've created has made me less fun to hang out with and that I've made people uncomfortable. I do try to be there for my friends when they need me, and especially with the friends who have given of themselves. But - when things get tough with friends or there are things I'd rather they not know, I tend to just pull back rather than go through anything difficult. I don't have the choice of pulling back with my husband, so we actually have to deal with my lying.

As for owing people - yes, that is a really selfish attitude. It is how I have looked at things for a lot of my life, and a way of thinking about the world that I need to change. I have seen romantic relationships in particular as sort of zero-sum games. If he got something, then I should get something.

About having one authentic self - that is also definitely true. I shade my personality depending on what group of people I am with (see above re: politics). I feel like I have a persona more than a personality, if that makes any sense. I'm not really showing them the authentic me, I've for many years shown them a version of me. If I want to get really philosphical, I feel like I need to work on having an "authentic me" that I use in all situations.

DH is actually the one who found this website, which says just TONS for my amount of intiative, right? I had lurked a few months ago and finally decided it was worth my while (there's more of that The World's Greatest attitude floating around, sarcasm intended) to sign up and actually GET some help if it were possible. I have always had a problem asking for help, which sounds really corny but is true. To get back to my point, DH has read the Basic Concepts and we've both read Suriving An Affair. DH ordered the other two books you suggested today.

There is a huge part of me in reading your email that (full disclosure and honesty here) just wants to say "Shut up already, I know I screwed up! Can't you just pat me on the head and tell me how great I am for even admitting this problem???" but oh yes, I know that's the selfish voice in my head again. I often think that if I admit I was wrong, then I shouldn't have to be confronted with the details. It's that I don't want to hear them - just get out of my face!

I'm glad you appreciated the honesty, and I thank you again for all the time you put into your reply. I know I haven't replied to everything, so I'm going to go back and re-read it and see what I've missed.

CV - nope, I have never cheated on him. I posted here because I wasn't exactly sure where to put it, and I figured that lying was obviously a common issue in affairs.

Also, I think that the underlying concept - deceitfulness - is similar, but obviously not the same. I don't want to seem like I am not respecting what others who have had a wandering spouse have been through, but I do think that my deceitfulness has something in common with wandering spouses.

SB - I am going to continue to process your message. I'm glad you think I can change - there are honestly a lot of times when I am not sure that I can, but I know I need to. Now I know that I *want* to as well and that all the hoping and wishing in the world won't do it.

Thanks for that. yes, there is a common thread of behavior. Lying, stealing... I would guess that this also creates a withholding of affections as well.

CV

You actually sound really similar to my WH. He was smarter than everyone else too, and therefore truths and opportunities to have input were not their business!

I think its great you and your h have caught this in time because lying is very painful to endure.

My h lied to me about debt, and his adultery with my friend. The images of him lying to me are more hurtful than picturing them together. Can you imagine that?

I would suggest you do Dr H's radical honesty questionnaire and vow to yourself that you will do it full throttle and not hold back. I like to think of myself as quite an honest person but when I took this questionnaire I had that illusion shattered. There were actually many instances of things where I had glossed facts and misled in my marriage to make myself look better.

When you have been hurt by lies as i have the only way to have it made up to you is to get a full, frank i-dont-care-how-i-look dose of hard truth from the person who lied to you.

If my h came back I would ask him for the worst truths about himself and about the worst details of the affair.

and a poly.

I would tell him 'the worse it is to hear, the more shameful for you, the more I will see it as unflinching honesty and the more I will like it'

So I would try that if you are serious about making amends to your husband.

hfc,

I think the one insight you had from what I said was sort of pulled away from, yet you stated it quite clearly.

Here it is:


You spoke about having a "persona" for each group you hang out with.


This is exactly what I was talking about. This is, in a nutshell, what lying is all about. You create for yourself "whatever works", and you "use" that to make your way through life.

Then, in that same little paragraph, you talk of wanting to develop an authentic "you", a personality to "use".....


Life isn't this way. You simply ARE, hfc. Deep down inside of yourself, THERE YOU ARE. You have dreams. You have feelings. You have beliefs. You have likes, dislikes, preferences, opinions, dreams, and yes, you have HOPES. We all have these.

What you are doing is trying to fit yours into every situation. Life doesn't work that way. You cannot possibly make it so that everyone will like you. It will never happen. Because they figure out your lie. They end up not liking you because they never got to know "you". What you showed them instead was a moving target - something pliable, something fake. You gave them

vapor

and they wanted substance.

What I mean to say is that "who we are" is not like a cloak we can put on and take off according to the fashion of the day, or the restaurant we are visiting. "Who we are" is more than this. We form ourselves through values, ethics, beliefs, views, learning, seeking of information and working to change poor habits into good ones...there is so much about what it is to be "who we are". To believe that this "who we are - ness" is static and unchangeable is, well, for lack of a better word, stupid. We are forming "who we are" every moment. We choose who we are, we choose to lie about it, or build ourselves into better people, or avoid ourselves, or put on airs...and every moment of our lives, until our last breath, we are growing and changing.


It is in that idea of change that we can hold out hope for humanity, and for ourselves, hfc.

You can change. You do change. You HAVE changed. Consider the hfc of age 14, 18, 22, 30, 34...you are not the same person today. Even yesterday, before this conversation, are you the same? No.

Because today, you understand that you cannot "hope" but must ACT for change. It is work to do, not a magical expectation and miracle that will land on your head.


On to my next thing: Sorry I have lots to say. I mean, I am not "sorry", but it is who I am. You can consider this your luck, or your doom. Whatever. The beauty for me is, I can type and you cannot stop me

I want to go back to the idea of "whatever works" for you. It is a very important thing for you to understand, because it goes to the very heart of your lies.


William James wrote a great deal on the concept of "What is Truth". Around his time, there was a great deal of discussion about the concept of "truth" in general. His approach to the idea of truth (boiled down - because to tell you the "truth", if you think *I* am long-winded, you should read William James!) was basically this:

"The truth is whatever works."

Think about this. Really think.

What this means is that the "truth" can actually CHANGE. Yep. Old Mr. James thought that the truth was malleable. You kind of think that way. The truth of who you are can change. The truth of what you say is "flexible" to the situation, because you allow yourself to lie, you make up justifications and rationalizations in your mind about why it is okay to do so.

Truth is whatever works.

So, if it works for "now" that you are a Republican, that's what you are. Then, if it works five minutes from now that you are Democrat, then you are. Did the ACTUAL "truth" change?

No.

Mr. James


was WRONG.


The truth is an entity that stands alone. The truth is not malleable. It simply exists - although there are conditions and situations under which you, I, or others may not ever know the complete truth - it DOES exist.


The fact is that you have operated most of your life under the concept that the truth is "whatever works" at the moment. This has caused you, and others, a great deal of drama and harm.

Furthermore, within yourself, you have developed an approach to your own person, that "whatever works" is the way to go. You speak of drama in your personal life. Do you see a connection there?


Somewhere you will find that the truth is a peaceful place. It is full of calmness, serenity, and honor.


You can find what you are looking for there.


It is the foundation for all things holy. All things right. All things good.

And, oddly enough,


it always seems to "work".


Schoolbus

SB, I read and re read your posts. Amazing stuff. I think HTC will find that if she can implement the Radical Honesty portion of MBs she will begin to overcome her compulsive lying.

HTC, a couple of years ago SC analyzed a letter that was written to me by my young cousin who had had an affair with my then husband. The post was lost in a big server crash soon after, but I had down loaded a copy. I re read it just the other day. I am still blown away by her analysis. SB hit dead on many details she would have no way of knowing. We are blessed to have her here helping us all.

Agreed - SB, thanks so much for your analysis. You have hit so many things right on the head. It explains a great deal: why I feel insecure about so many things, why I feel like a fraud, why I have felt very empty or like I "don't even exist." It's because at some level I don't - if you asked a whole bunch of different people questions about me you would get a whole bunch of different answers because there isn't one fixed thing.

Professionally I am in a job that basically values "winning" and isn't very high on valuing the type of absolute honesty that I need to learn. That's another source of this habit - I"m not trying to make an excuse here but just trying to explain where some of this comes from, both the needing to be right and the willingness to see the truth as malleable.

I need to read and re-read this and really digest it. Thank you so very very much. Not necessarily the easiest thing to read but I know it comes from a good place.

And I feel like I have so much to say but no time to say it right now!

Hello
This is very interesting.


Why should we believe this is true?
How easy would it be to make stuff up out of whole cloth on a discussion forum?


You are making an excuse to polish your image.
Therefore, it makes sense to doubt the veracity of your job description.
You think having a "winning" work environment gives you an out.
I think using your job to excuse your character flaws makes you look even weaker.



Your character has been formed internally.
Your character is not born of some recent external force, such as your job.
If you sold shoes for a living, you'd still have the same character you have now.
If I were to be hired by your company to take over your job, do you think I would start lying to people the way you do?


How exhausting.
How tedious.
How uncharitable.
What a heavy weight to carry around all the time.


The willingness to do harm to others.
Lying is one tool you use to harm others.
Yes, it is.
You do not mind causing others to suffer.
This makes you cruel.

QUESTIONS:

1. Under what ideological & ethical umbrella do you form your opinions of what is morally right vs morally wrong?

2. Are you your own God where you write your own ethical rules to suit yourself and alter those rules when it suits you?

What is the good news here?


What is the good news here?

Pep's point is the same as mine.

You are using your job as an excuse. It "works" right now (pardon the pun), because you think you can point to it as the "reason" for your behavior.

It doesn't explain why you lied when you were 14, does it?

Or when you were 18, 21, 23,,,,,,,,,,etc.


You said yourself, you have lied all of your life.

Lying is a way of life for you.

Because

the truth is something you do not see as a full and complete entity unto itself.


The truth.

It exists in, and of, itself.


You. Cannot. Change. It.


No matter what you say. No matter what you do. It is.

What you CAN change - is your approach to life.


Oh, and by the way, the simple fact is that you would probably succeed and make lots more money, be more productive, and be much more valuable to your employer

if you were honest, trustworthy, and had integrity.


And your clients would FLOCK to your door.


It's too bad you fail to see this.



SB

I have re-read SB's posts, and I am really thankful for the advice. I have not only read Dr. Harley's radical honesty stuff but also the book "Radical Honesty" (by Blanton). This has always been very important to my husband, and I've often paid it lip service but never when it would really affect me.

Tomorrow night I might see old friends whom I haven't seen in ages, and whom I generally get into the "go with the flow" mode. I am going to be honest with them, both about why I haven't seen them in ages (because of relationship issues with my husband, as well as conflicting commitments) and about my opinions about things.

I feel like I will be a lot calmer telling the truth - yes, there will be moments when things are more filled with conflict, but over all, more calm. And calm is really important to me.

Even today though I found myself thinking of ways to scheme! I thought I might have lost something of my husband's and was thinking of ways to replace it without him noticing. NOT a good idea, and I didn't do it, but it says a lot for how much I need to change that I even thought of it.

We went to see our marriage counselor today who agreed very much that I need to change, and that I need to want to change. She suggested not inpatient work but intensive outpatient therapy, group therapy, and possibly personal development seminars (my husband is skeptical on the last one, so we will see since he's in charge of the finances).

I feel like if I am honest it doesn't change that I screwed up something, but we get past it faster. I am going to have a LOT of hard work to do here, but it's time to get started. Tomorrow I have an appointment for an assessment at a psych facility, so I will have to see how that goes.


What I will do with these old friends is try - quite possibly for the first time - to be a person and not a persona. I usually find myself just babbling with them because I feel such a need to get the "persona" out there. It will be liberating to just be myself (even if we wind up in a political argument!)

And I actually like the idea of *not* being unique - of just being one of many people. It's relaxing somehow - less pressure? Maybe that's just me deluding myself.


Thanks for everything and keep the tough love coming. We should get the books in a few days and I am looking forward to reading them.

Pepper - I am not my own God. The whole reason I am here is because I realize that, and am changing my ways. I *know* that honesty is important. I am here to change and to live my life with complete honesty.

And you are right, there is no way for you to know what I do for a living. However, it is literally one where there is very often one side that wins, and another side that loses.

SB, to get back to something, for many years I have covered up things thinking that my husband owed me for all kinds of petty things. He didn't then, because marriage isn't really about that, and he surely owes me less than nothing right now considering how I have treated him and how I continue to.

One thing I tend to have trouble with in general is that when people ask me a reason for doing something, I will give it, and then get told "that's an excuse." To me, an excuse means that I don't think I should be held responsible for it, but a reason explains why I did something. I know that the only person responsible for my lies is me - they are coming out of my mouth, after all. There's not a *good* reason for doing what I have done and still do. There's no justification.

Thanks for all the feedback - I need to hear the things that I don't want to hear!

HTC,SB,Pep,SW, and others,

This is absolutly an astounding thread, my brain hurts..

HTC, be yourself, that is what is missing.

CP - well, certainly didn't mean to make your brain hurt.

Today I went for an assessment for an intensive outpatient psych program. I don't fit the criteria for inpatient treatment (which I am honestly happy about) but I do for the IOP. DH is upset that I haven't gotten more done on this - I only made the one appointment. He's right - I can do a lot more and I didn't want to because a) I was hoping he would change his mind and b) this is really awkward and c) I am really scared that I will lose my job because of the time commitment for this. Hopefully I'm being honest here. We met with our counselor last night who suggested group therapy, which this would be (9-12 hours/week).

I could feel myself trying to manipulate the assessor! One of my big worries with doing this program is that I think it would be really easy to manipulate it - but, then again, I won't do that if I really want to change. I will take it seriously and do the work.

As it turns out I'm not going to be able to see the old friends tonight - so I won't have that opportunity to work on this, but I am going out with DH and very good friends. Again - another place to be honest.

CP - I am trying to be myself but I feel like I have spent so much time lying that I don't really know who that is anymore! I am going to find that out through this process.

I still feel like it would just be so much easier to stop doing this, but it's not BETTER. I am realizing that for so much of my life I have just done what I "wanted" not what I needed to do or even what I should be. I think I've been lucky that what I've "wanted" most of the time hasn't been things that created major problems - but now it has, which I guess is just a matter of time. If you're constantly putting yourself first, then eventually things will go wrong (probably sooner rather than later).

Ugh, just found out that this would cost $2,500.00+ to do because of my insurance. I think that it's time to ask for Christmas gifts from Mom & the rest of the family ahead of time... Well, I think it needs to be done. The next scary thing is going to be telling work.

Question: what about keeping things private? In other words, if I'm going to be totally honest and myself, does that mean that I *have* to tell people about things if I'm not asked?

That's a dumb question, but probably shows how little I'm used to being honest with people.

Now I need to be honest and tell DH how much this is going to cost, and how I will pay for it.

Just for today I didn't lie about anything (yet). And that won't change.

I told DH how much it would cost, and his words were "we'll talk about it." Previously he had said "you'd better figure out how to pay for this on your own." I hope he appreciated the honesty - to be honest, I hope he does. It wasn't easy to tell him that (how sad is that? honesty really is hard for me to get used to.).

So that is where we are for today. Thanks for all your words.

Well, that would probably have been one of my shorter posts on this site, so you wouldn't have been talking about me anyways..

See how I manipulated you into wanting to explain and comfort me with that statement?

Sometimes, it is better to think about what you are saying, or going to say, and how it will effect everyone around you, and the person you are saying it too.

Sometimes, silence speaks volumes also.

Just an Idea, but maybe you can work on keeping your opinions and outlooks to yourself, instead of being a people pleaser, and wanting to be all things to all people?

I am reminded of Abe Lincolns statement..

"You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can never fool all of the people all of the time"

Also some wisdom from Samuel Clemens, "If you don't lie you never have to remember anything.."

What I meant by being yourself, is not being afraid to be wrong, out of touch, the fool, before others, and that thier opinion of you, is short sighted in the big scheme of things. Whatever judgements they can lay on you, are an extension of thier own insecurites, and thier own foggy perceptions, that they have developed.

And no you are not smarter than them, don't deserve more, as a matter of fact, getting things through manipulation, is not a gift at all, and can become that house of cards, that falls down, when the truth is revealed.

don't be afraid to be human, weak, and not know the answers, and study to be quiet, with your ears and eyes open, and your mouth shut sometimes, and make you words be few, and mean what you say.

Do you feel compelled to have all the answers? To have an opinion on every subject? To control the outcome of every conversation? Or situation that you find yourself in?

This is a by-product of fear, that you will lose control and become a victim, and you probably over compensate. The book about self-deception Sb suggested probably addresses that in a healthy way. (I want to read it myself).

Yes I can understand why you don't know who you are, so you find it hard to be yourself. But I can tell you that if you have been telling lies, and changing camps of thoughts to appease others, your problem is with fear of rejection, and the feeling that you are all alone, so lieing to protect yourself, and stealing money, is not far behind.

You are making your own self-fufilling prophecy, and the compulsion to lie and control will make you alone.

Praying for the best for you, and I hope that this therapy, allthough it will probably be painful and scary, will bring you to the other side. That we are all in this life together, and we do better with the truth.

Since you are not your own God, do you believe in some 'higher source' of wisdom or righteousness? From what source do you draw your values? For example, if you are a Christian, you might respond: "From the Bible", or "From the 10 Commandments".

Things I am coaxing you to think about:

1. Do you think the concept of RIGHT and WRONG are relative to each situation?
Are you a "there is no black and white, only shades of grey" kind of woman when it comes to right and wrong?

2. I am assuming you would like to think of yourself as a good woman/person. Not an immoral person who fails to adhere to moral standards. Right?
If you want to think of yourself as a moral woman, have you ever defined (for yourself) what those standards are? (see 'higher source' comment above)

3. You said that you "know honesty is important", what you did not say is that you know honesty is a moral value that will help you determine right from wrong. Do you ever think that your habitual lying,deceit, dishonesty are morally wrong?
If you do, WHY are those behaviors morally wrong?

4. Do you know the difference between what is true (factual accuracy) and what is honest (free of deceit) ? Can you walk away peacefully after being deliberately factually inaccurate with someone? Can you walk away peacefully when you deliberately deceive someone? I think the answer is "yes", you can, and you have.
The way you do this is to totally deny the humanity of others. You have buried your empathy (if empathy was ever in you) so effectively that your conscious has been entombed.

5. People in your life are not pawns on your chessboard. Especially those with whom you are the most intimate. When you use your intimate friends, family, husband as pawns to 'win' some game, you lose intimacy. You are choosing to self isolate and segregate yourself. No one really knows who you are. Because you let no one in.

You lose. At life. At relationships.
You think you are "winning" (Charlie Sheen comes to mind) but you are suffering from thousands of self inflicted wounds.
You are not a winner after all.
You need to break down and cry.
You need to be humble.
You need to grieve for what you have voluntarily sacrificed in this sick game you have been playing.




Are you an attorney? A trial lawyer?
Let the jokes loose now.

Maybe you're a professional poker player? LOL

I am impressed with the quality of advice appearing on this thread.

But, and there is not always a but � just this one at this moment in time � something important is being overlooked here.

What are you doing about this?

�I have pushed my marriage of 12 years to the brink by hiding the massive ($100k+) credit card and tax debts that I ran up over two years...�

After all, there are tangibles and then there are TANGIBLES.


�I am really scared that I will lose my job because of the time commitment for this..�

You ought to be scared you are going to lose your house.

Liar or no, this much debt makes you vulnerable to, well, blackmail in the kind of job you imply you have. If you worked where I work you would be let go immediately for having this much unsecured debt. You would lose all your clearances and be escorted off the property. You would not even be allowed to clean out your office.

What does your H think about being responsible for this much debt? It could affect his job too. Does he have to lie with you to hide this much debt?

eta: I don�t know which came first for you, but there is a strong connection between profligacy of any type and habitual lying. And the profligacy tends to come first in most cases.

Quick answers before I go pick DH up from the train: The debt, thanks to him, is under control. It's down to a manageable level and we can meet our monthly expenses. We actually are in better shape now than we have ever been because DH is in control of it. And the taxes are taken care of as well. So we got lucky on that. We didn't even miss a payment.

Pepper - I need more time than the 10 minutes I have to really answer your question.


CV - spot on! Not an excuse for how I've acted but I think that's at the root of it. I think that if I talk LESS I will be much better off. The less I open my mouth, the fewer lies I will tell.

I do this often - not everyday, but quite often. I absolutely do think that this is morally wrong. If I didn't, I would probably have kept it up and wondered what the big deal was. As for walking away peacefully - I have never walked away peacefully as much as I've walked away relieved that they didn't figure out what was really going on, feeling like I'd dodged a bullet, and immediately rationalizing to myself why what I had said was either technicallly accurate (self-delusion) or justifiable (ego).

More later - thanks again for all the great thoughts. This is a really great community.

HTC,

We are talking about some very deep concepts here. These are ideas that I discuss with colleagues, and we use them in our work. I want to tell you that Pep has hit on some very important ideas as well, which you need to include in your musings, because they are also definitely in the mix when we are talking about the entirety of your issue.

The book I recommended regarding self-deception will hit home for you. It has a follow-up, called "The Anatomy of Peace". You may find that book a simpler read, but it will describe some ideas of categories of issues that sort of define behaviors. You might see where you fit, which "box" you are inside of.

Pep's point about looking inside of yourself and understanding where your moral base resides should not be overlooked, or glossed over. This links directly to my point regarding your concept of "what is truth?". These ideas are quite important because they form the underlying foundation of how you view the most critical aspects of your own place in the world with regard to responsibility toward others.

If you have a foundation and understand of your own moral base, if you have a definition of what is "right" and what is "wrong", and where these spring from, and you can state what your understanding of what the truth is, then you can go forward from there.

You can state what YOU expect from others, because you should be able to see what YOU owe as a human responsibility TO others.

Which brings me to a point: In your "Liar's World", your approach would be that your own personal needs exceed those of anyone else. You have NO responsibility to any other human; other humans have to place their needs BELOW your needs, and in all hierarchies, your needs are listed FIRST. All means are acceptable to meet your needs, including lying and deceiving - regardless of the true nature of the need, no matter how large or small.

In the REAL world, every person has needs, and those needs would be considered equal. In some circumstances, there are critical needs (for example, emergency medical needs, starvation, caring for an infant) which would be considered by those present as immediate and recognized as "higher in importance" by anyone present; any human would bow to those needs and drop their own without hesitation. But for day to day negotiation purposes, we consider that we all have needs, we share those needs with one another, and we work in honest give-and-take communications to meet the needs of each other in mutually positive ways!

We do this because it is much easier NOT to run the red light, run over each other in the grocery store, wait our turn at the restaurant, or help each other on the job.

In our marriages, we do this because - it pleases us, our spouses, our families, and IT WORKS.

Recognizing the human needs of one another, of perfect strangers, is a natural part of everyday life.

Except that when people place their own needs ABOVE those of everyone else, bad things happen. These people are, for lack of a better word

criminals.

They are the liars, the scammers, the thieves, the adulterers, the car jackers, the shoplifters, etc.


They do not believe that their needs are equal. THEIR NEEDS are more important.


I want you to consider this. Are your needs more important than mine?

I vote...No.

Your husband votes....No.


This is the "justification" thing - you justify (excuse) why you can run over others' needs.

Why you are "technically" correct.

And why it is okay to do it.

While the whole time, you know it is NOT.


Inside, you have a moral issue with it, yet you cannot figure out what line you crossed.

I hope this helps.


SB

There is a very sick and twisted world out there in the intelligence community as well. The key is they hire only the most ethical, trustyworthy (full lifestyle polygraph), and moral only to move through life as

liars
cheaters
deceivers
bait/switchers!

Are you a spy?

I put myself first tonight over a stupid lie. DH wrung me out for it, calmly and thoroughly. I thought that I knew what was important; my typical egotistical behavior. I thought it wasn't that important of an issue (why I had bought a certain brand of bacon). It's amazing how deep my self-deception runs.

Right now I feel like I could tell my boss this and just let the chips fall where they may. I feel that disgusted with myself - or perhaps I'm just upset that I got caught. I'm really good at that second feeling.

SB - I just finished the first few pages of the Self-Deception book and I see myself in it. Tonight I plan to finish it, re-read this thread and really think about it, and clean up the house so that it is perfect for DH's best friend who is coming over tomorrow. I would RATHER just curl up in a ball, read Harry Potter, and go to sleep. That's what I *want*.

I also wanted to be crystal clear about something here: I got found out about the money two years ago, but for the past two years - even AFTER I got caught - I continued to lie to my husband about things. I lied about what I was feeling. I told him one thing and wrote others in a journal to my then-therapist. I lied about how much I wanted to change. I said what he wanted to hear, or what I thought he wanted to hear, about our relationship instead of what I was really feeling. That set us back and may have permanently destroyed us, depending on what happens now.

The pathetic thing is that DH told me this morning, for the first time in 1.5 years, that he loved me. ANd you know what, I just said deep down "well, then you ARE SPECIAL!"

I used to think that I was humble at one point in my life - but looking back I realize that what I was was self-pitying. I wanted attention because I was just so stressed, so alone, so much low self-esteem. I thought that made me special. Nope, that just made me ordinary, even common.

Keep the tough love coming. I am clearly not getting the message yet.

And to answer the question, spy no, trial lawyer yes.

To be honest when reading about putting yourself first in SB's thread my first gut reaction was "doesn't everyone put themselves first?" Which clearly shows just how wrapped up in myself I really am.

Back to work, then to reading.

That�s good then about the debt resolution.

But I am left with curiosity as to what else is going on here.

What does the big run-up in debt have to do with anything? Acquisitiveness? Hoarding stuff? Is it OCD?


Spy vs Spy

The run-up in debt has to do with acquisition of things to fill a need of some sort:

The belief that "things" show:

power
control
superiority over others (I have more things, better things, lots of things)
financial ability (I have financial ability, therefore I can have what I want)

Acquisition of things can mean many different things. It can be an outward show to others that a person "has" something. It can also be an attempt to gain attention via "having" - for example, "I have a new ______; isn't this cool?" This gets people to look, admire, and attend to the acquirer. Admiration need is met.

Another possible reason to acquire goods is to fill a sense of emptiness. Some people acquire things due to a sense of emptiness or loss, or because they are not connected to people - so they try to feel a connectedness, finding that through connection with objects/acquisitions. This lasts temporarily, though, only about as long as the purchase, getting it home, and when the "new" wears off. Once the admiring of it is over, they are seeking something else.

I have seen people buy things that don't even make any sense whatsoever, like a diabetic buying baked goods from television shopping channels. They cannot even eat them!

HTC,

Glad you are reading the book. I knew it would hit home for you.

I think attorneys have difficulty with lies because they purposely avoid the truth all day long. They avoid it because they are in the business of making the truth go away - because they want the truth to be

whatever works for their client.


Yet you know that the truth exists, don't you?



The bacon lie - it was not needed. Yet you lied, because you have allowed the truth to become a phantom.

You have decided that you are now the supreme controller of all things

even the truth

and you will decide for everyone.


What stress this must cause for you.


I wonder, how far will you fall, when you face a situation where you cannot control anything?

Where lies cannot help you? Where lies cannot save you? And where the truth is so cold and hard, no manipulation could possibly change it?

What would you do?


This will come to you, and you will not be able to face it. It will be as hard as a granite slab, and very cold against your heart.

To be unable to deal with even the slightest truth - the bacon truth - how will you face the biggest truth?

You are near that point in your life, today.

Today, you are at a crossroads. Somehow, you have been led to face this within yourself. For me, I believe that these things happen for a reason.

Perhaps you are being offered this opportunity to understand and change because you are to face the mountain soon.

This may be the small climb, HTC.


SB

Holy Moly !

Maybe. Could also be gambling,

When a hole in one�s psyche is the real problem the lies are just a tool. And they can become like a power tool out of control.

My wife became Liar during her VLTA. She became so good at it she started lying about everything. Nothing was believable. She lied as a normal matter of course. Big things. Little things. Inconsequential things. Anythings. She lied when the truth would serve her better.

She did it for so long she became what she was doing.

Both her adultery and her covering the adultery turned her.

So, look around you. What do you see?

If what you were doing and what you were covering up has turned you this may indeed be your one chance to turn back.

Aph,

Very true. Spending could be the result of an addiction - drugs, gambling.

I was thinking along the lines of acquisitions, spending to get stuff, out of control spending.

True regarding the gambling issue.


HTC has lied all of her life. It is a way of life for her, she grew up watching the truth be "changed" to suit the needs of those who also lied.

She lies about BACON. Because internally, she believes there is a world in which she knows better than others, controls things better than others, and also she has a great need to feel as though she is steering the ship the way SHE WANTS.


HTC,

Tell me about the bacon. It is important. You call it a little thing. It IS a little thing.

In this very small lie resides the self-betrayal that is fundamental to your larger problem. Do you see it - do you see yourself in the box? Why the lie?

What was the lie covering? What did you HAVE to control - and why was your husband deemed incompetent, at that very moment?

Why were you so much more competent at bacon?

SB

As to your question about everyone always putting themselves first:

Interesting question. Deeper than you think.

Pardon a long answer.

Freud would say that the Id is responsible for the basic need to put yourself first. We suppress that need, and without lots of explaining here, we have other mechanisms that basically make us do it. But if your Id is the "man in charge", you are the type of person who "wants what you want when you want it" - and you end up putting yourself first. Others be damned.

Such is the mindset of the wayward spouse. Freud's ideas for this kind of explain it well. Dr. Harley's work on Givers and Takers offers a framework for considering how to approach working within a relationship on issues such as these - so take a look at those articles, because you can see how to handle yourself in your marriage and make concrete changes in daily life.

We all do NOT put ourselves first. From many religious perspectives, and many non-religious mindsets, the approach simply flies in the face of workable human relationships.

What would the world be like, if all of us were "in it for ourselves"? We would not be able to trust that the guy coming the other way would stop for the red light. We would not know if our neighbor was trustworthy enough to make friends with, or if his plans were to raid our home the moment we left for work (I kind of think my neighbor has been eyeing my birdbath). How could we rely on teachers to not take our children? Could we trust bankers with our money, nurses with our blood and drugs, or even our parents with raising us and not throwing us out because we are such idiots when we are teenagers???

So we are not in it for ourselves. YOU are also not always in it for yourself, when you consider the big picture.

There are times when you give. Even when that giving brings you something.

Kahlil Gibran spoke about giving in his book, "The Prophet". Paraphrasing, he said that there were three kinds of givers. The first kind of person gives because he wants other people to see him giving, and wants people to think about him as a giver, to know that he gave. This is still giving - its a good thing, because giving is good. The second kind of giver does his giving because he gets something back; he feels good about the giving, there is something for him in giving. This is still good, it is giving.
The third kind of giver gives because giving is of his very nature. He doesn't have to think about giving. It is a part of him. He just gives.

If you are to be a giver, then give. Strive to be the third kind of giver.


What the point is, is that giving begins as one thing, and perhaps evolves into something else.


Dr. Harley's methods start you out with "working" at things. Ultimately you just "are" this way.


In the book you are reading that I recommended, you find that same concept.

You find that the root of the issue is within YOU. It is your own decision to deny that the other person has needs, that the other person's needs are EQUAL to your own. That it is your own betrayal of your own desire to do the right thing FOR THE OTHER PERSON that leads you to the wrong thing in the world.

And you find yourself exactly where you are:

blaming your husband for things he never did, and never was
lying about stupid, ordinary things to justify stupid decisions and stupid behavior
having bad relationships with people who could be and should be stellar friends

and cruising along, trying to control everything around you, while you continue to lie

telling yourself that if you keep doing that same stupid stuff you will eventually dig yourself out of this huge hole.


I'm here to tell you that what you will eventually dig


is the GRAND CANYON.


Which is the mountain you will face. You will be standing in the bottom of that hole, looking up.




You could, on the other hand, make a decision to do the right thing for the other person, every time.

The power and control you have over your own world will absolutely ASTOUND YOU.

SB

OK: Two days, nothing but honesty. I even told my boss that I was going to need to change my work schedule so that I could deal with a psychological issue. I had originally planned just to say it was medical, but I laid it out in much more detail. I felt much better being honest, and he responded with support. I should remember this the next time I am tempted to make something up.

I printed out the thread so that I could respond to things in more detail - so some of this is going back a ways, but I thought it was important to address this. This will probably also be quite an essay.

Pepperband - to go back to your post from a while ago. Things to think about:

1. Do I think that RIGHT and WRONG are relative to each situation?
In the past I have. I have often thought of things as being in "shades of grey" especially where emotions and relationships are involved. I am now seeing that things are much simpler than that.

2. Have I ever defined what my moral standards are?
Yes - they are largely based on what you might call Christian morality. Ironically I have always thought that honesty was very important, which is probably at least part of the reason why I went into such deep denial about this. I must admit that I have always thought that self-preservation was very important. I don't know where that comes from, except possibly from childhood.

3. I do think that my habitual lying and deceit are morally wrong. Until recently I hadn't honestly thought about why they are morally wrong. My thinking now is that they are morally wrong because they don't show respect for others. Deceiving others is disrespectful and doesn't treat another person with the respect they deserve.

4. Difference between truth and honesty: I think that I missed this distinction (truth = factual accuracy; honesty = free of deceit) for a long time or, probably more accurately, I exploited the difference. I would often be "truthful" (eg factually accurate) but not honest (I would be deceptive in how I painted the truth - when I told it, such as telling the truth after I'd "fixed" something or leaving out important facts). I think I said earlier that I rarely walked away from a lie feeling good - I would walk away relieved that I hadn't been caught and anxious that I would get caught the next time.

5. People not being pawns on a chessboard - yes, that is exactly how I thought of things. I felt like I would never really get what I needed in the long-term, so it was OK to manipulate things in the short run.

I'm going to make a separate post to address the other points.

SB - I just finished "Leadership and Self-Deception" which was tremendous. Thank you so much for the recommendation. I feel like it actually a) hit the nail on the head and b) gave methods for moving beyond lying and living with honesty that went beyond just "be honest." I think that so many of my issues - with lying and resentment - come from the self-betrayal that the book talks about.

So to analyze the bacon issue in the book's terms - deep down, I knew that I should have made a second trip to get bacon for DH. But I was in a hurry and resented having to make a second trip because I thought his standards for bacon were too fussy. I wanted things to be easy rather than running around. So - I engaged in self-betrayal and persuaded myself that DH was unreasonable about his bacon standards, so I was justified in what I did and then tried to cover it up. I was trying to blame him for a situation when really the problem was that I didn't want to take a second trip. I completely see how I was "in the box" about this.

And I do this with most of the things about which I lie. If I look deeply enough I can find some point at which I knew that I should have done something that I didn't, and then I try to pin the responsibility on someone else rather than focusing on my responsibility. In this case, I could have made the second trip, I could have planned better so I would have had more time, or I could have honestly said "I will get it later, you will have it when you need it."

Going back to something CP said - about this being a self-fulfilling prophecy. I think that's very true: at some level I either want to be alone, feel like I can't get time "to myself" without pushing others away (e.g., I can't just ask for it), or am afraid to connect too much with others. I don't think that's an excuse at all, but it definitely drives some of my behavior.

CP also asked if I feel like I need to be the expert, to control conversation - definitely true. I would be much better off if I were just willing to sit back and listen more of the time. I need to be less afraid to be wrong, and less afraid to be quiet.

More answers to Pepperband (post from 10/9): The good news with my character being formed internally is that *I* can change my character internally - it's within my control. That's the same reason it's good that my character isn't formed by some outside force - I can change my character. If I think back, I should know that this is true because I have obviously changed my own character for the worse. I made choices that brought me to where I am. I can make choices that will bring me to where I should be.

The "hard" part of that is that I can't rely on someone else to do that, and I can't rely on my husband being happy about other things in his life to solve our problems for us. I can't relax just because he is happy about other things. That's been a hard one for me - I tend to slack off when he is happy about other things and forget how much I owe him.



I think that by attributing self-serving behavior to everyone else I can avoid feeling responsibility for my own actions - I can justify my lies by thinking that everyone does it, and that people aren't worth of any special respect since everyone is just looking out for themselves.

I also felt like I was going to fix the solution anyway (which is the same kind of thinking that got me in trouble with the spending) before it mattered, so why should he care? More of me "knowing best."

Aph - no gambling either. To the extent that I can point out one thing that I spent it on, I spent an awful lot on my dogs and dog-related hobbies. I spent some on vacations (with the family), dinners out (again, with DH), and gifts. It was mostly all at expensive places, and DH had no idea that we had run up the debt. It was not as much about acquiring stuff (most of it was spent on things that I don't even have now) as it was on finding things to occupy myself/ourselves so that we wouldn't be "bored." I was trying, I think, to replace having had a job with having hobbies and finding a (shallow) identity that way instead of really focusing on my family and creating something there.

I used things/experiences to give myself an identity or to maintain an identity that I thought I had - I do "x" with the dogs, I go to baseball games, I go to fancy restaurants, I buy my friends and family elaborate gifts. A way to feel important, which ties in with the reasons for lying - thinking I am better than other people.

Need to run to the bathroom - have a few more posts to answer.

To respond to SB's last couple of posts:

Yes, I know that the truth exists. I don't know that I have decided what the truth is as much as that I try to decide how and when other people should know the truth. I felt like with the bacon, the question was "you don't need to know the truth right now, not before I fix it." Yes, this does cause me tremendous stress.

I have no idea what I would do with a situation where manipulation couldn't help me, honestly. I hope that the work I am doing now will make me more able to deal with situations that are beyond my control. At least I can confront them honestly rather than relying on deception.

To respond to the post about self-interest: The snarky side of me would say that the reason we can trust bankers with our money, teachers with our kids, etc., is because they have financial incentives to do so and that if they don't, they'll go to jail. I might also say that many times we can't trust those people to do the right thing. I guess that makes me sound really paranoid. I guess that the flip side of my being untrustworthy is that I don't trust others - probably because I think that they are acting the same way as I am.

But it's a better place to trust and be trusted. I need to become someone who trust and is trusted.

I think that I have faced the mountain - dealing with my marriage and with my relationship with my niece/daughter are the mountain. I'm facing that mountain right now.

For whatever it's worth, when I told my boss about what was going on (and yes, I do realize I didn't admit that I had a problem with honesty), I felt so much better having said that it was psychological rather than making up a cover story about an unspecified medical issue (which IMHO would have been technically accurate but deceptive). I called DH up and cried, telling him that being honest felt so much better than making something up.

I feel like the next big thing I should do is tell my parents about this. I want them to know what kind of a person I really am, and realize what DH has had to put up with.

I think that DH has accomplished amazing things in his life since he made a personal commitment to be 100% honest. I want what he has. He has some wonderful close friends, and a business that is just taking off. More than that, he has a sense of peace that I want. I also want to give him an honest wife that he can trust. He deserves that.

SB, thanks again for the book. It really, really hit home, like I said.

I'm sorry I didn't write sooner. I appreciate all of the words both stern and kind. I can't wait to really become the different person I need to be.

This key, and about perceptions to truth, and their relevance to your life.

Luke 11:34
The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thine eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light; but when thine eye is evil, thy body also is full of darkness.

What is it worth to have honesty with your husband? Isn't he the person you want to seek truth with?

Being your profession is bound to be full of people who like to shift around the truth and deal with gray areas, how much of your work have you been taking home with you?

Much of what I find valuable in the Bible, is the breaking down of the perceptions we have about the truth. Many times it is just another question, to that answer of the question. we can get tripped up in the words, and when we are done we still don't seem to have the perfect answer to lifes questions.

So we are forced to have faith, many times when all we want is to be loved, and accepted just as we are. Unconditional love, only God does that, the human race is conditional, allways has been, allways will be.

So the choice is yours, you can trust in the science of MB, much of it being based in the Omniscience,(Omni=all__Science=knowledge) of God for both your practical and spiritual healing for your marriage.

I think you have allready made that choice by being here, and taking a hard close look at yourself, and your motives for the lies you were willing to let come between you and Hubby, your friends, and even your business aquaitences.

I think you will be surprised, at the depth of your husband, when you share your fears with him in private, that his leadership really is sound. You can be a partaker of that also,and as he begins to trust you and sees your brokeness, you can build the safegaurds that will protect both of you, not just one.

It has to do a lot with your honest communication, and that is what you will have to monitor yourself with, as you go though this and change your habits. Don't be surprised or shocked, and definatly don't be intimidated because this has become a habit for you.

Glad your eyes are being opened

Oh, and BTW, MB principles work with all relationships, if you can find the time to apply them, and have willing participants.

But Charity begins at home, and with the one you share your life with, your soul, your very worth and all of lifes expereinces with.

Its also the place most likely to hide in, so it makes sense it would be the biggest challange also.

But you will overcome those challanges

HTC,

I figured that book would be one that made sense. Glad it is helping. I have read it a couple of times.

You said your husband has committed to the honest life. And, that his business has begun to take off. See the connection?


He wants you to follow him, because he wants you to be a part of that. He has benefitted from his change - he feels this internally, knows his own change of spirit, and wants it for you. He knows you will feel like a different person, and he wants to take you into the future with him as a better person. He wants you to share this kind of happiness!

Your experience with your boss: you felt a relief when you walked out. You said that you told him it was a psychological issue, and that you did not share the whole truth. That is fine, and I want to explain to you something here. We do not have to tell people all the gory details about ourselves. That doesn't mean we are lying. If I don't tell you that I will miss work because I am having a pelvic exam for a suspected STD because my husband cheated on me, but I tell you that I have a doctor's appointment - I did not lie to you. I have a doctor's appointment and I will miss work. The fact is that I am entitled to a measure of PRIVACY about certain aspects of my life.

YOU need to be very careful NOT to confuse being private about your personal life, though, and giving yourself permission to LIE.

What you did with your boss was to be confidential about details that your psychologist may or may not wish you to reveal. You are entitled to maintain your private issues about your psychological problems. You are NOT entitled to LIE to control others, make decisions for others, cover up problems or bad behavior on your part, etc.

Know the difference. And you DO. Right now, it will be hard for you to walk that line.

My advice for you is to discuss these things with your husband before you have such conversations, so that you are sure if you are lying, or maintaining privacy. He will be able to offer help to keep you in check. Sort of like being your "Liars Anonymous" Sponsor.

SB

HTC,

On another note, I want to tell you about something that happened to me with an attorney. My mom hired an attorney to handle a very simple settlement case. He was to finalize the paperwork, then handle opening a trust with the settlement for my mother with the money. Simple, right?

Yeah. Right up until the point when two years later we found out that he had been lying to us. He had settled the suit, forged my mom's name on the settlement check, deposited the money in his personal account, and spent it to remodel his own home.

We found out purely by accident - and in the process discovered his law license had also been suspended because he had done this to another client. He was practicing for about 6 months at that point, without a license. Long story short, I worked very hard with the Bar and got him disbarred; he is in jail now.

An unusual case for an attorney, from what I have heard. Also unusual, I managed to get the bank to pay us back - because they actually allowed this guy to deposit a check for a large sum, made out to two people, into his personal account, watched him stand there and sign it, did not get any ID, and KNEW he was an attorney, and it even said he was her attorney ON THE CHECK. Big no-no under the legal stuff in my state. The bank has to make him put it into escrow/trust....didn't do it. They didn't even question me when I went in and said, "Ummmm, this was not legally negotiated."

This lying can lead anywhere. I know one guy in jail, who lost everything.

Im sorry, but I must retract this statement, because it is misleading.

MB is for marriges, and all relationships do not share the intimacy that the marriage one does.

I guess I was caught up in the policy of radical honesty as an example, and because the most important person you should be honest with is, yourself, and your H is now part of you, and what you do effects him, just like it does you, lieing to him is like lieing to yourself.

Which you do understand BTW. As far as I can see, you understand the falseness.

Radical Honesty begins with ourselves, and should be practiced there first, and is revealed when we practice it with others, what we are really all about. Nowhere is it more apparant, than with the one most closest to us, and part of ourselves than with our spouse.

The MB principles, only apply to the marrige, because you can't be all things to all people.

Bill Cosby said, "I don't know what the meaning of success is, but trying to make everyone happy is a guaranteed failure"

Hope this helps

SB - thanks for clarifying that, it's a question that's been on my mind about honesty. I also appreciate your advice that I speak with my husband to make sure that I'm engaging in confidentiality vs. lying. I feel like there are large parts of my life that I would like to or need to keep confidential, but I also realize that I could very easily use that as an excuse for lying or concealing in a deceptive way. I actually did speak briefly (I think) with my husband about this. I know that I talked to him afterwards.

And yes, SB - I do see the connection between the honesty that my husband practices and the success he has seen grow from that. It was a very useful conversation to have with him to talk to him about how he decided to engage in such a high level of honesty and how he actually went about changing things. It made me not only appreciate the benefits of what this type of honesty can do for people but also it made me appreciate that it wasn't an easy thing for him. He told me some things that (I only realized that day) he was afraid to tell me.

Thanks also for the reminder about where lying can lead.

I hope he does want to take me into the future as a better person - I definitely know that if I don't become a better person, we don't have a future together. I also know that there is only so much time that he has (really no more time, if I'm being honest) where he can continue to put up with this behavior.

FWIW - no lies today, I think that makes four days. Total honesty for four days - don't know if it is a record, and I also don't know if this is just because nothing has come up where I think that I have felt any need to lie.

CP - thanks for the vote of confidence. I feel more and more confident that I really can change and will change.

More later or tomorrow... Please keep the good advice coming.

CP - much of what the Self-Deception book discusses is how we start by lying to ourselves, which we use to justify lying to others and treating them without respect. I definitely see myself in that. In this thread alone, I started out thinking that I didn't lie to my friends but I realized that I do.

My therapist has also told me that what I need to do is work on breaking down the ways that I am dishonest with myself. Right now, I am doing that but perhaps most importantly I need to stop lying to others (or else I will find myself single).

HTC,

It is hard to stop lying to yourself.

It means that you have to face the very scariest realities of life. You will have to openly admit that you are not the world's greatest expert on all things - the funniest part of this is that while YOU do not want to admit this, everyone else already knew it. Yet, you also knew it all along.

Tell me you haven't had this thought before:


I am afraid that if I let other people know the real me, they will find out the truth of me. They will figure out that I am not as smart or intelligent as they think I am, and they will certainly figure out that I am WAY less intelligent than I have been able to present myself as. I know that I have made mistakes. I know all of the little things I have gotten wrong, and the things I have been able to figure out just in time - if they knew the limitations I have, if they knew exactly what I DON'T KNOW - they would fire me, they would call me a charlatan, they would look at me as the fool I think I am. I really am the only one who knows exactly how much there is out there that I just lack........I am scared to death that someday someone will figure it out.

You've thought this way a time or two. Anyone with any intelligence has - because people who have half a brain realize that they do NOT know everything.

And they realize their own limitations. They fear their limitations.

They fear being found to be incompetent. Your lies go in this direction - you take control, you place yourself above everyone else, because you need to feel like you are protected in the power position. Nobody can figure out your limitations if you control it all.


The fact is that everyone is limited.

And everyone already knows your limitations.

What they do not know is your innermost thoughts. They cannot see inside of you, and they cannot connect with the real you. You have prevented that, by offering a moving target, via the lies and the chameleon personality behavior.

The change to honesty will be something you will find a bit unnerving - to yourself and to others. People will not know what to say at first, so do not be surprised if some people look quizzically at you and have little to say. These people may be a bit reticent at first. They are people who tend to be watchers, and will stay back to see if the change is real. Stay steady, and stay real. They will be the people who will be hardest to win over, but when you do they will be your better allies.



Another group will linger with you. They will sense the change in you. They will not say anything outright, but will be interested, drawn in by the change. These are the curious, those whose interests in others are piqued, and who want to understand. They probably have had conversations before with you, but now they will have longer ones with you. Watch for them. You can work with this group best, and as you bring them into your circle as closer relationships, you can then go to work on others as well.

It is hard work - and you have to understand that honesty begins by treating each and every person as having equal needs to yours. Respecting them, treating them as HUMANS, and not as pawns in your game.

It doesn't matter if you get something out of the interaction or not. Every interaction, in the end, is worthwhile, because you win through growing. Through living.




As far as breaking down the ways you are dishonest with yourself? Okay....that's fine. My instinct?

Stop it. Each and every time you are dishonest with yourself, look in the mirror and ask yourself what you just gained.


SB

I am looking forward with great anticipation to when you get to the most insidious and harmful lies of all: Lies Of Omission.

I'd like to add another book recommendation, The Speed of Trust. It's another business book much like Leadership, and goes into depth about the things that destroy trust, and how to build (or rebuild) it.

Oh, Aph,



I skipped them. But now that you mentioned them, here goes.



I was going to explain how lies of omission are actually revealed in our language use, but that is very much a distractor here.


First, what is a lie of omission?

A lie of omission occurs when the liar has information he fails to disclose to another person, when it is ethically or morally correct to reveal this information to the other person. This type of lie leaves the other person with a misconception about a situation; the other person is left with a belief that is incorrect, and the liar has purposely manipulated the information in order to cause the person to have this misconception.


Why do people use lies of omission? The same reasons as they use bald-faced lies, or any other type of lie. It seems to me thought that lies of omission afford the liar a bit more control over the other person, and are used in some different situations than other kinds of lies.

What makes lies of omission SEEM different?


These lies are insidious. They "feel" better to the liar, because they are based on the false belief of the teller that they told "the truth", and the person they lied to has a great deal of difficulty confronting the liar because on a technical level it is difficult to argue the point.

The liar can tell himself that TECHNICALLY the truth has been told. He can have an internal conversation that sounds very good - he can tell himself that it is okay, he did not "lie", he "just did not tell the entire story", or "did not have to let everyone know his whole business", or "the other person would be hurt or could not handle the entire truth". That internal dialogue sounds very nice to the liar, because it places the blame for the lie on the other person - it makes the other person seem responsible for their own lack of ability to handle the truth, or for the fact that they were not deserving of the entire truth.

Making the other person blameworthy feels okay.

Also, the liar knows that what he has said has a technical truth to it, and it is defendable, if he is ever confronted on what has been said.

This is what makes the liar feel he comes from a strong position. He now has two shields of armor: the first "justification" for failure to reveal the information (whatever that might have been), and then this idea that the "technical truth" has been told.


So the victim now is faced with this issue:

Do I confront? I know that I have been sold a bill of goods. This is a lie of omission, and his excuse will be that he technically told me the truth.

Many people will NOT confront a lie of omission, simply because they feel like they have no ammo!

They will, however, carry around a great deal of anger toward this kind of liar. This type of liar will be very likely to receive the same treatment - especially in the workplace. People will not be willing to give full information to this person when working on a team or committee, for example. They will feel wary, because they know this person holds back on them, and they will watch every word the person says for signs of lies or indications of deceptive language use (and believe it or not - you know it when you hear it, especially when you know this type of person). The thing about this kind of person is that you may often not "know" him to be a liar; you may just instinctively find yourself moving back from him because your internal radar begins to ping and you cannot explain what has happened. You distrust, but you cannot put your finger on anything specific, because the "truth" has been told, yet you find yourself saying, "I wonder why he didn't tell me that..." on occasion after occasion.




Lies of omission tend to keep the liar in control of the flow of information, and allow that person to manipulate situations to their liking.

Lies of omission can be used to color the view of another person as well. By omitting bad information on a resume, for example, you can make yourself appear better than you really are. Again, this is the "flow of information" issue.

The language used in lies of omission is interesting. Generally speaking, look for overuse of global terms, or the converse - overly specific language. When there is a mismatch between the question you ask and the response you get in terms of global language vs. specificity of language (say you ask a question in global terms and get a very specific response) you can begin to think "do I have a lie of omission here?".

While a lie of omission might feel better to the liar, it isn't any better. They still know they are lying.


A lie is a lie.


SB

Bingo - that is exactly the type of lie that I've used the most, and exactly the justification. Sets things up for manipulation.

DH pointed out tonight that there is a particular way I answer things when I'm lying - I rephrase the question. Similar to what SB said.

And yes, a lie is a lie. I used to treat lies of omission differently, but they aren't.

Thanks for the second book recommendation.

More tomorrow.

Start intensive therapy program on Thursday. Actually looking forward to it. Got good advice from my regular psychiatrist that I can't manipulate things in the group and (for instance) say things are going well when they're not and cover up my weaknesses (which goes to SB's first post from yesterday which was also - as usual - spot on).

Can you see how your job affects your life and other relationships?

Sounds like you are seperating it though, hats off to you!!

Its tough not to take work home with you, Blah!,especially if it is intense and the hours you must spend in it. You almost have to take off a mask I'll bet.

Ok enough pacification, lol, hoping for great marriage relationship for you, and that to be your strength and real reason for all you do.

HTC,

At first I was going to tell people exactly how our language usage reveals the lies of omission.

Then I decided against that. Why?

Because your situation would be ripe for using that information to the advantage of continuing your lies.


Your husband has cued into at least one indicator of your language behavior. He probably knows more, but can't put his finger on them.

Strangely enough, I could put his finger directly on them

Your job is to watch for that moment of self-betrayal. It is in that very moment when you decide not to do the right thing for the other person that you go wrong. That is when the lying begins - when you decide that the whole truth is not needed, when you need to control something, when you "want" something.


You have a need inside of you to be the one seen as the one in control.

I want you to consider that there are other people who have strengths, too. That there is not a single person on the earth who is the best at everything. In college, you must have figured out that you could not possibly read enough to know it all, and that everything was changing so rapidly that you could not possibly keep up with all of the newest information as it was coming in and news was being made in your field.

We all want to be "independent", HTC. I think that somewhere down the line this idea hit you that being independent meant that you had to be the only person in your life you could count on. That independence meant you were a complete island, that you were to control all things that you encountered.

Nothing is further from the truth! Being independent means that you pay your own way, and that you make the decisions about what you love, like, hate, feel good or bad about, what's right for you, etc. It means that you decide who to share your life with - and with that...

you recognize that you are, and must be....


INTER-DEPENDENT

by the very nature of LIVING LIFE.


Interdependence is how we succeed in life. We make successful marriages via interdependence; we have happy families and good working relationships on the job through interdependence. It is the nature of the world, if we are to be successful humans.

We understand that we DEPEND on others to be better at some things. I know I cannot fix my own car (or I don't want to, or I don't have time to). I depend on someone else for that. That person depends on me to pay him for his services.

You depend on other people, too, even though you do not like it very much. You have figured that out, if only very recently. The situation in your marriage has brought this to the fore, and now you are going into therapy to figure out what has happened. Your therapist says to be careful not to try to control or manipulate the group. Your risk here?


That you will view the others as being "less than you" - less intelligent, less strong, less creative, and less IMPORTANT.

Go into the group and understand that their needs are EQUAL to yours. And also that their experiences give you information that can lead you to your own answers.

Your interdependence begins now. You are being given a chance to have this with your husband, and with this group of people. They are going to open up to you - they will assume TRUST in this situation.


Think about that!

They will walk in, and already trust you. This will be a group who does not deserve to be lied to; and can offer you something you never had before.


What will you give them?


I don't expect an answer. I just want you to think before you give it to them.


SB

SB - honestly, because of the specific type of law I've practiced in the past, the "too specific/too general" thing is something that both DH and I are very aware of. He knows that I've used that, and honestly when I have I've been aware of just how clumsy it is. I hadn't realized the rephrasing thing until he pointed it out - and I intend to use it to check myself, because when I start rephrasing things it means that I am trying to control the question and therefore control my answer.

This morning I caught myself wanting to control various pieces of information I needed to give DH - but I did catch myself. In one case, I just immediately said what was true and in the second one, I had to check some numbers but when I did, I told him honestly what was going on.

Boss at work has laid out rules for going to the program, which are fine by me, although I am a bit concerned that he is going to hire "his own professional" to talk to the people at the program. I am not sure how to handle that. I honestly don't think that all the details about what I am working on are things that I morally feel that I need to share (and, frankly, I'm not sure that it's entirely legal because of privacy laws). But, I will cross that bridge when/if it comes up. I think that perhaps the most ethical path would be to talk to the program and discuss what they reveal and under what circumstances. PLEASE tell me if I am being deceptive here.

And yes, I hate being dependent on other people. I'm sure that at some level my spending started because I had no job of my own and was now completely financially dependent on my husband (not an excuse and certainly not the whole reason). I am trying to change how I look at that and see that it's a gift to have other people on whom I can depend and who trust me enough to depend on me for things.

I really need to find time to check in earlier... there's always more to think about than my sleepy brain can handle.

DH did a wonderful thing today and, without my really asking, bought me the sequel to Self-Deception and Leadership. That's tonight's bedtime reading.

Thanks again for all the thought-provoking truths.

As to give another perspective to SBs comment about "controlling" situations with people, and what they might think,

The proverb,"Fear of man is a snare" I think applys also

The one thing you should fear is your conscience, and whatever truth that you hold in your heart

Yes we are dependent on others, great post SB

Anatomy of Peace? I actually preferred that one; I was better able to relate to that than the workplace-based one.

HTC,

My thoughts are that your employer does need to know that you are seeking help for a problem, period. The employer may need verification of your attendance at a program, for purposes of paying you for your time off, and taking care of making arrangements for that at work. Their "need to know" should be limited to that, however.

They may be concerned that you have a drug or alcohol problem, or mental issue, and their concern could be the firm's legal entanglement if this is the case. You can imagine their concerns, so you should be able to offer them some assurance that this is not the situation so they can be a bit calmer in this arena. Otherwise, I would not be so keen on the idea that they know the exact nature of anything in my personal counseling or therapy. They do NOT have the right to know. HIPPA laws actually forbid your provider from even verifying that you are a patient with them - unless you specifically release your provider from liability, in writing, and grant the provider specific permission to release information to your employer (and within that you can limit the provider what information can and cannot be released).

You are not being deceptive. You have a right to your privacy.

You are not being secretive. I do not tell my employer about my health issues unless the employer is directly impacted (let's say they need to accommodate me - like they need to help me with lifting things, or not expect me to stand for a long time). They do not need to know if I am getting counseling for problems with overspending, that I have lied to my husband about it, or that I have difficulties with lying behavior that has impacted my personal relationships.


Not their business.

SB

SB - thanks for confirming what I was thinking. I still don't trust my own "truth-o-meter" enough to just go on my own judgment, although I am working on it. I can understand why he needs to know certain things, but just don't want to get too much into it.

Haven't read much more in Anatomy of Peace yet, as I've spent most of the past two days either at work or in bed with a nasty cold. AND that was a truth/honesty/interdependence lesson too - I didn't listen to DH when he encouraged me to take my temperature, because I didn't want to find out how bad it was. Almost wound up in the emergency room! So, another good lesson about trusting others' judgment and not going off on my own because "I know best."

Inter - dependence.

You are NOT an island.

And wonder of wonders, you do not know all.

Back here - can't believe it has been that long since I've posted. I managed to get a nasty case of strep throat, which interestingly enough also pointed out some honesty/disclosure issues: I didn't want to admit to myself how sick I was, so I pushed on with going to work, going out, and going to the program instead of taking a few days off, going to see the doctor, and getting better sooner.

This wound up creating another interesting honesty issue - something that I hadn't seen as honesty related but now I realize that it is and that it's yet another habit of mine I need to repair. I overpromised what I could do to get ready for a dinner party we had last weekend - instead of taking up DH's offer that we cut things back a little bit since I had been sick and was behind on the household stuff. We had a really serious argument about it, and DH pointed out that it's just as dishonest (and in many ways the same thing that I did with the money - hoped everything would somehow turn out OK) - and that he relied on me to be honest, even if it wasn't what he wanted to hear.

I thought or deluded myself that I was being helpful and trying to prove that I could go above and beyond - but instead I nearly wrecked our party. I admitted that I was wrong, and from now on I will both try to actually work harder when I can but also to be a lot more realistic about what I can actually get done.

I also got some stuff off my chest - that it bothers me how DH likes to throw elaborate parties where I feel like we're in over our heads and it just creates tension.

As it turned out, we had an amazing weekend, complete with candlelit dinner for six (because we had no power). I'm glad we hung in there, and I'm glad that I learned another way that I have to be more honest and trust others.

htc,

Glad you're feeling better.

One of the things I have learned as I have grown older is that I don't have to be
Superwoman to be a super woman.

I think that for a very long time I believed that doing everything by myself was important to me because it "proved" to everyone else that I was what I wanted them to believe I was.

Or...maybe it "proved" to them that I was everything that I wanted to believe I was?

Or...maybe I was trying to prove all of this to myself?

Or...was I trying to keep everyone from finding out that I was not as smart and great as they thought I was?



I want you to understand something about the human mind. It is important for you to understand this, because you believe you are very different from other people.

Here's what I can tell you. I study thinking. My work is thinking about thinking. I know, I am a nerd. The nerdiest, because my "hobby" is reading about the brain and neurology, memory, learning, and fun exciting juicy stuff like that. So day in and day out, I "do" brain stuff. What a deal.

Anyway.

What you need to know is that people who have a certain level of intellect often go about life with a fear of being "found out". They often think that other people are going to "know" that they are fallible - that they have intellectual weaknesses - and that they are not as smart as other "smart people" they know. It is a very common fear for well-educated and intelligent people to have this going on in their minds.

This is because people who "know" a lot realize that they really can only "know" so much about anything - that they are actually quite limited in what they know. That they have an intellectual ability, and that what they actually store in their heads is limited - what they actually have is the ability to store a foundation of information and to use the foundation as a springboard for researching to draw more information and make conclusions, etc. They "know" they don't "know everything".

The fool believes he is a wise man. The wise man knows himself to be a fool.

So what happens to you very often is you are caught in this cycle of trying to cover this "gap" - you perceive that you will be discovered, you fear this. When in fact, you ARE intelligent, you have no need to fear any of this. It isn't going to happen, nobody is going to find out that you are not smart. Nobody can see inside of you.

You over commit because you are trying to prove that which cannot be proven, and furthermore:

It simply does not need to be addressed at all.


Accept that you are simply okay. Nobody is expecting you to be something you are not.

To do otherwise is to set yourself up for failure, and to create conditions for lying.


Life is much better when you realize that you are not so different from other people. And you do depend on them to help.

You are not an island. Each time you find yourself believing you have to prove ANYTHING - stop and figure out who asked the question:


"Prove it to me"

Chances are....that was YOU.


SB

SB - again, very much spot on, although I think that I at least *perceive* that I am hearing "prove it to me" from my husband. I've also in the past felt that he expected me to be something I am not - I don't know that it is true anymore, but it's something I've *felt*.

I definitely feel the sense of "being found out" (which I definitely feel at my job, because I've been having trouble keeping up with things, and feel like I'm out of my depth. I am trying to ask for help there and be humble about my limitations.). I have often felt like I'm not *really* as smart as people think (I know, for instance, that I didn't really apply myself in law school but nevertheless it looks good on paper). But at the same time, I also feel like I'm more intelligent than a lot of other people. I know that's a paradox, but maybe that's my way of looking at what you said - that at a certain point you "know what you don't know."

I can live with being okay... at least that's what I need to be able to do. I need to work on humility in a major way.

Thanks again for the accurate analysis. I am truly thankful that you've kept it up, and look forward to anymore words.

Being intelligent carries with it some burdens and some responsibilities.


Let me open up a bit about my family. I have two daughters, who are both gifted. Raising them was interesting, to say the least.

Both of my daughters are gifted intellectually. One is pursuing a PhD, the other is a musician and artist. Both are quite accomplished in their chosen fields. Both of them consistently scored at or above the 97th percentile on IQ tests in various areas of the "G's".




Why am I telling you this?


Both of these girls struggled with the sense of "being found out". They thought that they were not smart enough. At one point, each of them nearly failed in school. The oldest daughter almost failed ninth grade. She became convinced that she was not as smart as she needed to be in order to be in the Pre-AP English class, because she actually had to "work".

Really.

The youngest one was upset in high school in AP English because she had to "look something up". This convinced her that she must not be "AP material", because she should have known this already, and therefore she was stupid.


What happens to people who have intelligence is that they learn quickly. They have the ability to learn the very first time that material is presented. They come to expect that when they run across information, it will go into the brain, be processed, and that it will STICK.

But!!!!! They reach a point where this doesn't happen as easily. There comes a class in school, or a level of material, where they actually have to apply a learning strategy. That old system of "read it and it will be learned" does not apply any longer. Or, "memorize it and you will pass the test" does not work for this subject.

The intelligent student can usually get through college anyway, and pass courses with the strategies in place. However, most of these people get out with a bachelor's degree and they will say, "If I had applied myself differently, I would have graduated with straight A's - AND I WOULD HAVE LEARNED A GREAT DEAL MORE." This is because they did not need to "learn" the material to "pass the courses".

That is what you are talking about when you say you feel like you are topped out at work. You are having to apply new techniques because what you have been used to in the past is just floating around in a world that comes to you easily. There has been no effort to learning - information comes in, it is processed, and it sticks.

Now, you are faced with this: you have to work to learn. The process is that information comes in. You must take time to understand what that information is, what you need to know from it, how you are going to get that information, what other resources you need to get it from, what you already know, who can help you, etc. You need "learning and organizational strategies".


You have a good learning ability. Use them to get yourself organized for work. That is what is lacking - it is NOT that you are not smart enough. I promise you that.


Been there. Taught that.


SB

PS...there is solid research on this topic to be found. This is not based on personal information......just so you know. You can find this phenomena in past issues of Brain and Behavior? or Learning and the Brain? circa 1989 or 90 ish........sorry I cannot quote you on the articles. I've slept since then. A team I was on researched this once for a project we were doing in neurobiological bases of reading disorders or something along those lines.

I must be getting old. LOL

SB - you are exactly exactly right again. DH has pointed this out to me as well - that I am not used to *working* to get what I need. I'm used to it coming easily and have sadly gotten into the habit of not *wanting* to work or telling myself that it's not worth it if it's too hard. And I think that's built up over the years.

I am hopefully learning that working pays off - that I can stretch my mind and learn new things.

SB - you are incredibly insightful, and so very helpful. I'm sorry I haven't been around more, and am going to commit myself to coming here every day and at least re-reading this thread and responding.

I also think that when you're smart you can get into a bad state (or at least I can) where it feels very threatening to be told you're wrong - again, there I am with my "I'm better!" mindset. I got into that last night with DH - not about honesty but about interrupting him when he was telling me something very meaningful. I was being impulsive and thinking that what *I* had to say was more important! Ugh!

I need humility, and wasn't really taught it very well growing up (not an excuse, just an observation). I honestly think that I heard how "special" I was so often that I didn't realize that even if you're "special" (which I'm really not! at least no more than everyone else is) you should still be humble and open to listening to others.

SB - thank you thank you thank you. Your career sounds fascinating!

HTC,

You are sounding like you are feeling better about yourself, and not so panicked. That's good.

It is very easy for people who are smart or who think very quickly to want to move fast to the next thing, or to just speak first and run over top of others with their own words and ideas.

One of the exercises I often have people do who are experiencing what they refer to as "communication problems" or "relationship problems" is for them to use the 15 second rule when they are having a conversation with other people. Try it with your husband. In your case, you will gain more insight into yourself than you might believe possible, and you will find this to be a strategy that wields some very strong negotiating power as well.

In your conversations with your husband, whenever he has the floor, do not respond or take over your side or your "turn" for 15 seconds after he has stopped talking. If you have to force yourself to do this, count to 15 in your head. This slows the pace of the conversation to a crawl, yes. But what it does is allows the other person this very empty gap in the conversation, and often they feel quite compelled to fill that silence. What you get in the silence is what they are thinking "next", or what their "afterthoughts" are - in other words, they will often fill that silence with insights and openness into themselves that you would not otherwise get, had you just jumped in there with your own agenda!

These afterthoughts are rich, and can be very rewarding in creating closeness and intimacy with a partner in a loving relationship. They often open the door to deeper feelings, because you allow that space for them. LEAVE THE SPACE. Your husband will use it.



In business relationships, it is very useful. Other people see you as more of a listener, and will run more ideas past you. They will begin to trust you more, and if you do not respond right away, will offer more information and ask more questions or give you more information regarding what their own stand is or their own personal position or desire for the outcome of a situation might be. This is quite useful in a negotiation, because if you want someone to give you something, silence in response to their offer can be quite a leverage, even though you may not be leaning one way or another! Your failure to immediately respond - with a neutral facial expression - may lead the other party to offer more information regarding their situation, and help you at the bargaining table.


That 15 seconds can be a golden ticket.

Additionally, you learn something about yourself. You start actually LISTENING to what other people are saying, because you KNOW you cannot respond anyway.

You are no longer spending your time waiting for the other person to just shut up so you can say what you have to say. You are listening - and actually INTERACTING.

Your agenda

becomes

a MUTUAL AGENDA

and YOU

become

an INTERACTIVE PERSON.



Wow. Now wouldn't that be an interesting change?



Try my 15 second rule. No matter how stupid this sounds to you, give it a try and see how people react to you. Watch the golden things they say, and how much calmer you become as you see people begin to open up to you. It is as though somehow the other person and you step into the same room.


SB

Awesome SB

Great advice as always, although I majorly screwed up tonight and not in (for once) an honesty way. I was checking stuff on my phone while we were at a concert for a band that DH adores. Now he is barely talking to me and won't go to our kid's teacher conference tomorrow.

He is absolutely right to be furious. I was impulsive, thoughtless, and ruined a wonderful night out that was really important to him.

Not honesty but caused by the same lack of perspective.

I am terrified by his silence.

Yeah music is a spiritual thing and men like to connect and share in it

I would be upset too, but I would eventually have to let her have her own tastes also

Do you like the band?

I guess this would be covered in RC as doing things together that you both enjoy.

Although there are times I suppose that couples endure for the other

Don't know how far you should go though, pretending to like them, the band, and appreciating your H admiration for them and honoring it, are two different things.

HTC,

My thoughts on your DH's reaction to your behavior?

1. He has a right to be angry with you.
2. His behavior in response is illogical. (I am one to operate on logic most of the time, so the Mr. Spock in me comes out here.) If my H were to say this:

"You were behaving badly at the concert and not paying appropriate attention to my needs. Therefore, I am going to react to this by failing to go to our child's educational conference and be a poor parent."

My response would be:

"Your reaction to MY bad behavior should be some sort of punishment toward me. Failing your child as a parent is punishing the child. How is it logical to be a bad parent in response to my being a bad wife? I can accept that I was rude and inconsiderate. We both can look at the situation and understand that our child should not suffer consequences for something between the two of us."




On another note.......

You need to apologize to your husband, you already know that.

Attending events with ANYONE else should be something you do WITH the other person.

Somewhere inside of you there needs to be a switch you find. That switch exists. It turns on and says to you that there are other people around you, and there is value in sharing their dreams and hopes, and what they love. There can be a joy in watching other people simply love what they are doing. You don't even have to like the activity at all.

Here is how to enjoy something you don't even like:

Let's say you are at a concert for a Country music band. You hate Country music. In fact, you listen only to Rap and Hip-Hop, and if anyone were to hear Country coming from the block you live on, you might be mortified.

Your husband loves Country, and he has been given two tickets to see Brad Paisley in concert. Front row - center tickets. His dream concert. These tickets are for the night of your anniversary, and you find yourself agreeing to go, even though you know in your heart your brain might just explode. So, you go.

There you are! Brad Paisley is pretty good-looking, and you can entertain yourself by just that alone at least for the first few minutes, and ignore the sounds he makes. LOL

How do you find true enjoyment in this situation, though? That is the question. How do you ever "connect" with your husband when you are not doing something YOU WANT to do?

Easy.

Look at your husband. Get into his mind while he watches the musicians. Get the perspective of your man, and open your heart to the human-ness of him. Here is a person, who loves what he is seeing, where he is, and what he is hearing and doing right at the moment. He is filled with pleasure. Feel that WITH him, enjoy that feeling and be happy FOR him - feel the love of humanity within you that there can be this much joy in a person, that you are contributing to happiness right now. Within this, find a sense of joining him, being a part of him.

Then, look at the musicians. These are people who are doing what they love for a living. They are enjoying an intertwining link with one another via music; then, they link with the people who are listening. An interchange of souls and minds playing out right there - for pleasure and happiness - and you can just stand there and watch and be happy for them as a bystander soaking it up as a human event, in its beauty as it occurs.

Look now at the crowd. Look at one person, or the entire group of people. You can see each person and breathe them in, taking in the essence of being human there from them. The excitement, the happiness, the joy of life. It is all around you.


That's how you enjoy something that you "don't like" or "isn't what you wanted to do".


You don't get that via texting somebody on the phone. What you get is DISTANCE from everyone who is PRESENT and WITH YOU when you are texting - and meanwhile the people who are right there want you to be a part of their lives!!! You check out, instead of check IN.

Next time, you could leave that phone in the car. In the event of a real emergency, the police will actually find you in the crowd. They did this in the days before cell phones. Tell the babysitter how to handle the kids, and to make decisions that are safe and logical. Pay the babysitter extra to do that - and screen them to understand EMERGENCY. Pay extra for a college student to babysit. It is worth it to have that cell phone go away, to love your husband, and

to join the human race.


SB

Yes, next time the phone goes away. Irony is I like the band - not my favorite but I do like them. And yes, what I love most is how much DH loves them. He really *does* connect with them. It's also kind of neat because I don't think there is anyone else that he'd go see them with (again why my behavior was extra stupid).

Today I felt really really manic all day. I am seriously thinking it might be time to talk to the psych people about my meds. Amazingly the kid calmed me right down (eventually).

I also made out a long list of all the ways that I have tuned out the world and how I disconnect. At least I got that exercise out of this latest mistake. It was about a page long. I think that I have spent most of my life trying to tune out the world instead of living in it. I was an introverted kid - playing quietly, stories in my head kind of thing - and that's grown into being a disconnected adult. I feel like things get overwhelming almost, like sensory overload. BUT - that is not what is going on when I'm out on a date with DH! Constant internet availability is not a good thing for someone with my tendencies, I'm realizing increasingly. Makes it easier to tune everything out.

Yes, he was inviting me in and I was stupid stupid stupidly pushing him away. Dumb. I do have the feeling that I recognize these situations now when in the past I was just so caught up in my own world that I didn't see it for days or ever - I realized immediately that I had done something wrong.

Thanks again.

And that is why it is good to talk at you, because without you realizing it, and telling us, we would never know.

Giving credit where credit is due

I think CV has said something important, HTC, which is that you are seeing things in yourself, and that is rewarding to us.

It helps us help you. Your own insights help us point you down the path, and then you move much faster in the right direction. It's kind of like a very active diary here, one that offers you feedback.

I will miss you when you no longer need this.



Have you read "The Prophet" by Kahlil Gibran?


I think you would benefit from it.



The other thing I want you to think about is your disconnecting from people. Your lying behavior and secretiveness about your life is related to this. Then, you have the behavior of texting other people while you are with someone.

What I'm seeing is that you are trying to be "somewhere else" all the time.




You do not live your life at all.

You are MISSING your OWN LIFE.



Sit with that for a bit.

You are not even living the moment you are living in!

How can you possibly expect to be happy?



If you eat a chocolate cake with cherry icing, and you only think of the eggs you will have tomorrow morning, and you text on the phone while you watch television....

Did you eat the cake
or
Did you text the person
or
Did you watch your show?


You did three things, sure.


But this I will guarantee:

You didn't taste and relish the taste and flavor of the cake, enjoying the creamy texture of the icing as it enhanced the richness of the chocolate of the cake. You didn't notice that the chef put that bit of cocoa between the layers of the cake, for the extra punch of power, and you missed the bits of cherry liqueur floating in the mix, too.

You didn't catch the sadness of the friend's message in that text, because your mind was wrapped up in the TV show at that moment. You texted back, but you missed out on that chance to patch up your friend's need to be closer to you, and you didn't get that empty feeling in your own heart filled either. You didn't pick up on the hint that she wanted you to invite her over, or to go do something together.

You didn't get the whole story out of the TV show, and you missed the chance to sit on the sofa and watch something with your DH who, BTW, had been wanting to have a moment to sit and cuddle with you....but he noticed you were eating, texting, and had the TV on something else already, and really weren't much interested in anything he had to say.................................anyway............







We can get a lot of "things" done.

And we can completely fail to live our own lives.

We don't plan to do this. It becomes a habit, though. We think that we are Superwoman because we "accomplish" so much. Meanwhile, we don't breathe in the evening air, notice the crunch of the snow beneath our feet, or that our own husbands long to just sit and hold our hands. We don't even care that our own lives are lived in solitude, completely disconnected from other human beings.

We tell ourselves that we do not "need" anyone else.

That, HTC, is the ultimate self-betrayal.




SB

I like what you said SB, and I saw three people the other day, walking down the street together, all texting to other people at the same time.

Less is more sometimes huh?

This is such an awesome thread. Really.

Thank you, hopestochange, for starting the thread, and thank you, schoolbus, for your wisdom and readiness to share it.

I have much to contemplate.


<just another superwoman sometimes falling apart>

Again - thanks. Yes, I do not realize what is going on around me enough of the time. I feel much calmer and able to cope with everything when I *am* connected to things. I also know exactly what you mean by "accomplishing" things but not really doing them - I always feel like I have a huge to-do list and am happy when I cross something off of it, but I don't feel a big sense of accomplishment.

Took a nice walk with the dogs tonight - no cell phone, yay. Nice and dark and distraction free. I am really trying to live in the moment and recognize what is going on around me. I just feel much less overwhelmed - which I think lowers my stress which also lessens any compulsion I have to lie or omit things. When I'm relaxed things just come easier - I disassociate less as well, so it's a nice positive feedback loop.

I think DH and I might have discovered a mutual hobby today - we went indoor rock climbing and both *really* enjoyed it. Very good for concentration and also for working through things. It's really a team sport, since one of us will be manning the rope and keeping the other one from falling while one climbs. Very trust developing! DH was impressed that I kept going on a tough wall, rather than giving up. I was honestly thinking about how my not giving up on the wall would show that I can push myself through hard spots - I know it's not the same as doing it emotionally, but I was thinking that I need to learn to exert more effort and push myself so why not start there?

We had a tough night Thursday - a fight which DH said for the first time a while didn't feel like a "normal married people fight." In a strange way while I am sorry that we had one of our "old fashioned dysfunctional fights" I am glad that lately he's felt like they were more "normal" fights.

I'm very glad to hear that others are finding good things in the thread - thanks SB, CP and everyone for your input.

Wow - rock climbing.

Takes me back many years! My H was once a rock climber and got himself into a very precarious position. He froze up there (free climbing). After working himself up the rock, he came down the safe side, which took many many hours. He was very late coming home.

He never went again, and since that point in time has had a fear of heights. He told me he had a moment where he almost lost his life up there. He could have died, and he realized that he almost lost everything in that moment. He was a wreck for about a week, worn out from the fear and the walk out of the forest back to the car.


I just asked him if he wanted to go rock climbing. He said, "He// no."

It was way back for him, in 1979. Stuck with him!


I would like to go again.......but this is something we have mutually agreed we would not do. I'm cool with it.



Read The Prophet. Gibran takes you into poetic place for living in the moment.

SB

Bad bad night. Relationship jeopardizing. I pushed him aside. He wanted to go on his computer (together); I wanted to make out (was wearing sexy lingerie even, which he had bought me). He confronted me about not getting a second job. He saw it as dishonest that I hadn't done it yet - making a commitment and not living up to it. He read this thread and thought that I wasn't being honest enough here, since I hadn't said that I hadn't gotten the second job yet. I guess that is dishonesty. I hadn't done it yet. I fully intended to. But I didn't. And I was pushing him out - I read a book, was talking to him about it, while he was online (he wanted me to join him in looking at the websites).

I told him I'd been slow in posting the ad looking for extra work. He asked why. I said (honestly) because I couldn't find the right time and because I felt foolish posting the ad.

He said that he has offered me up trust and love on a silver platter and I have spit on it. I know that's how he feels. I did it again, pushing him away. He took money from my allowance, sent me upstairs to sleep.

I want to shut the world out very badly right now. He's at work; don't know if he will be home tonight. I spent the night with our niece, which was nice. I also cleaned the kitchen floor, figuring I should keep up with things that I have promised to do (keep the house nice).

I keep sabotaging this. Something must be "more important" to me - probably my foolish independence and my fear of connecting. I think that if I go back to childhood, I didn't connect because I didn't want to get hurt. Stupid that it continues.

Ready for the tough love here...

He "took money" from your "allowance" and sent you to bed?

Sounds like he had a nice ol' fit when you didn't give into his demands to spend the evening the way he wanted.

Also sounds like the two of you do not use negotiation or POJA to come up with solutions that make you both happy.

Does he know about MB? Have ya'll tried using the program together?

BTW, you might click "notify" and ask the Mods to move your thread to MB101. You will get more attention and help with the MB program there.

Schoolbus, this is not MB advice. It goes against POJA and encourages sacrifice. Sacrifice only leads to the destruction of love, not to the building of it.

Moreover, going along and doing something with your spouse that you do not enjoy only ENCOURAGES dishonesty. Instead of being honest with your spouse about how you are not going to enjoy the activity, you let your spouse believe that you are enthusiastic and will enjoy it.


The Policy of Joint Agreement

More links for you to read, Hope:
Four Guidelines for Successful Negotiation
Emotional Honesty

schoolbus, the solution is to scratch country music from your recreational list entirely. Going to a concert you hate is a sure fire way to develop incompatibility because people will not do things they hate for long. People who make sacrifices KEEP SCORE. When the score is not even, they make demands to settle the score. That is a renters strategy, not a buyers strategy. A buyers strategy is to go to a concert you BOTH like so you both enjoy the evening. That is win/win versus win/lose.

I explained this in another post of mine about selecting restaurants. And I will add that this strategy has worked remarkably well for my H and I. We enjoy going out to dinner because we find restaurants that we BOTH enjoy. Neither of us wins at the others expense.

Found another good one on the practice of win/lose:

here

Things are calmer today. Prisca, this was in another forum and it got moved here. I've gotten tons of great advice, thankfully!

I am really going to be working on not checking out in my therapy sessions. I'm also going to be adding another medication, to see if depression is getting in my way (not that it's an excuse but it's an additional challenge if that's playing into it).

I really should remember how lucky I am - most men would have dumped me months if not years ago. I've gotten lucky because of circumstances and the true devotion of someone who hasn't gotten enough of it back.

I think that if I really work at living in the moment, engaging life, I will be calmer and happier. I won't always feel that I'm trying to escape something. I'll just "be". At least that's my goal.

hopestochange, another path is to remove the things in your life that cause you STRESS. I recognize what you are doing and I have only done that is if I were trying to escape something. I called it compartmentalizing. It was when other parts of my life made me so sick that I would force my mind to refocus on something else. Amazing I didn't have to do that when I cleaned up my life! Is that the kind of thing you mean?

She was at the concert - she loved the band - she was checked out because she was texting other people.


She is not connecting with other people.......she asked advice on how to connect.....the example I gave was not related necessarily on how to like what her husband liked - it was how to CONNECT to people.


How to enjoy things - in general. Perhaps a bad analogy.

HTC is having difficulty connecting to LIFE in general - to people. She needs to put one thing down, look at PEOPLE, see their HUMANITY, find that part of her that connects to them.

She has lost this in herself. She does not even see that she can enjoy what is happening right then and there - she disconnects with the very event that is occurring right under her nose.

The example of the concert wasn't meant to "go against MB advice". It was meant to direct her to SEE HER LIFE and look around. She doesn't do it.

She was happy at the concert in question - my point wasn't actually related to a concert, or POJA, or doing things you don't like to do, not at all.

It was related to connecting to your LIFE.


HTC got my point.

She is experiencing a great deal of difficulty with lying to her husband, being "with him" but not actually connecting with him (texting others, for example), lying to people for reasons that don't seem to make much sense (even to her!), and has in the past spent loads of money and lied to her husband about it.


He is very upset about all of this. She is in counseling now...she is learning fast.


She has read basics, he has only now read the forum, from what I can tell.



Have at it.

Color me gone.

SB

I agree. Schoolbus is my favorite poster on MB. I always learn something from her. I think she is amazing.

She is going to write a book----someday. I hope hope hope she lets me have a copy. Not sure how she would do that without revealing her identity.

But that's not what you said:


That pretty much goes against everything MB stands for.

I believe there is a program here that can help her with all that.

**edit**

A reminder to posters that the purpose of this forum is to learn and discuss Marriage Builder's principles. Please help this poster with the MB program and refrain from promoting personal philosophies. Board members should not be placed in a position to have to debate these concepts on the thread of a poster who is seeking help for her marriage.

We appreciate your cooperation and encourage you to email us with any questions.

Thank you, fireproof

SB, I hope that you stay in this thread - your advice has been tremendously helpful. In some ways I don't know if I would even still be married if you hadn't written what you have. You have given me tremendous insight into things that I have done for years, and done so in a way that was both direct and caring.

Prisca, the issue at the concert really was one of connection, not of "doing something I don't enjoy." Saying that we jointly agreed to go to the concert is an understatement - while I'm not as into the band as DH is, I really enjoy their music and they put on a great show. Plus, DH just lights up when he sees them, making the concert even more fun. DH is actually a big fan of the marriage builders program and referred me here in the first place, even though he didn't read this thread until recently.

We've also both read surviving an affair and his needs, her needs. We've also both read through this website, and generally practice the marriage builders program.

I think that SB's point was to show how to connect and really notice what your partner is doing and how they're feeling - something that I have a really destructive tendency not to do. At the gentlest level, it could be seen as "not picking up on hints" - in its fullest form it's just closing myself off and going into my own little world. I am working on really opening myself up to everyone. SB's advice on that and on honesty has been very eye opening.

I would love to read a book by SB.

With your problem in dishonesty, and your husband's Demands, DJs and AOs, I believe the book you need to be reading is Lovebusters. It will probably be more helpful to you than anything else at this point. You cannot fill a bucket that you are constantly punching holes in.

How does your UA time look? Getting 15-20 hours each week?

hopestochange, I skimmed through your thread and one of the biggest issues that stands out to me is the lack of negotiation in your marriage. This was also a huge problem in my marriage and kept my marriage out of balance for years. We were not EQUALS when it came to decision making. You tend to be a real independent person, like me, and I see that the inability to negotiate mutually enthusiastic decisions has had a big part in pushing you into a pattern of lying and making independent decisions. It was probably easier for you to just do what you pleased and hide it because it was too hard to make a successful negotiation. Learning how to negotiate changes all that. It will be a huge relief to you.

Oddly, those of us who are the best negotiators in our careers don't have that natural ability in our marriages. I know that is true with me. I negotiate for a living, but had to be trained by MB to do it in my marriage.

For example, whenever you agree to do things you don't like [and you seem to do this OFTEN] you often fail to follow through. When that happens, your husband gets angry at you and you feel like a failure. One example is your dinner parties and another is your agreement to get a second job. You weren't enthusiastic about either, which is leading to unhappiness and fights in your marriage.

A better solution is to STOP the practice of sacrifice. I see you doing this ALOT and this practice is at the heart of much of your trouble. People who make sacrifices tend to NOT follow through and when they do follow through, they develop resentments and they keep score. You seem to make promises you don't want to keep and then feel guilty when you don't keep them. The only thing worse than making a bad promise is keeping a bad promise.

And why did you spend all the money on the sly? Is it because you were not able to negotiate favorable decisions and finally gave up and did what you wanted? This is one thing I used to do. It was WRONG of me to do it but when my H dismissed my feelings enough times about something that was important to me, I finally started doing whatever I pleased. We learned though the policy of joint agreement to negotiate decisions about which we were both enthusiastic. This completely changed the dynamic in our marriage. I no longer felt like hiding and we were no longer frustrated with bad plans that were based on sacrifice.

I just think if you learned how to employ the POJA that you would see an amazing difference in your marriage. You will notice a big change in the level of tension you both feel.

But I would first focus on eliminating lovebusters and stopping the fighting. The fighting is terribly destructive to your marriage and will NEGATE any and all good you do in your marriage. So, get that under control FIRST.

And of course, none of this works without 15+ hours of UA time per week. That is the key to creating and maintaining romantic love. Eliminating lovebusters and focusing on the top 4 intimate emotional needs is the key to ensuring quality.

I am pretty sure we have 15+ hours of uninterrupted attention a week. I also think that we are actually pretty good about the POJA; I do think that I need to be more careful about what I agree to (since I think it leads to overcommitment on my part). I do think that I have to put in a certain amount of sacrifice given how I've acted in the past. I honestly feel like I owe DH quite a bit.

I think there is some truth in what you're saying MelodyLane, but I also think that we have worked past that to a large degree. I definitely used to go off on my own when I didn't think I would get my way, and I would manipulate things to make that happen (often by not explicitly making my plans clear until the last minute). I've stopped doing that; we've started making plans together which is working a lot better.

There are also a lot *fewer* lovebusters floating around than we've had in the past - I know that I can still improve on my end, however!

Hopes, which MB books do you have and have you read up on undivided attention? Specifically it means meeting the top 4 intimate emotional needs, while alone, for 15+ hours per week. It is critical to the success of the program.

And I agree you have engaged in sacrifice, which is why I mentioned it. It is poison to marriages and a strategy that creates incompatibility and resentment. You DON'T OWE him that at all. It is a renters strategy, and people who make sacrifices tend to keep score. When the score is not even, they resort to demands and fights ensue. The best way to make up for your past mistakes is not to make sacrifices, but to create a happy, romantic, stable marriage. Sacrifice creates instability and conflict because the person making the sacrifice eventually can't do it anymore.

One concern that I had was you getting a second job. What is the reason for that? Is that being done as a pennance because you ran up this debt?


Thats great!


Aren't you still fighting, though?

Where are you and your husband in the Marriage Builders books? Do you have a plan to turn your marriage around?

I'm agreeing a lot with Melody, here. I see a lot of sacrifices on your part, and very little negotiation and POJA.

Dr. Harley says sacrifice destroys marriages. He says that he loves Mrs. Harley so much that he will not let her sacrifice for him, and she does the same thing for him. It is damaging not only to the person doing the sacrificing, but to the marriage, and as a result it damages your spouse.

You don't owe your husband sacrifice. You owe him a wonderfully fulfilling marriage in which you are both happy. You can't get that by sacrificing.

I agree with MelodyLane...the reason you have not gotten a second job is that you did not POJA it... you were not enthusiastic.

I have not re-read everything but I would assume the reason you need a second job is that you need more money. You getting a second job is one solution to that, but clearly not one you are enthusiastic about.

But what exactly are you not enthusiastic about?

For example, I hate making calling for appointments for the doctor but I don't mind going to the appointments.

Is it APPLYING for the job you don't like or is actually having the job? Are you worried about the amount of time it will take from your home life? Are you worried about interviews and not getting chosen? Do not know what types of jobs to apply for? If it is just applying to the job that you don't like, perhaps your husband could help out. If it is having a second job at all, then....

Are there other solutions to the problem? Could you reduce your budget? Get a better "first" job? Could you figure out another way to make money like sell stuff on ebay or do chilccare?

Like everyone is saying, if you don't both truly enthusiastically agree about something, resentment occurs...for you because you don't want to do something and for him because you didn't do what you said.

I feel like this thread is getting a little off-track. The main issue that we have isn't the second job or earning more in my current job (an idea he had tonight that honestly hadn't occured to me), but honesty and connection. Those are the things that are really poisoning our marriage - or that have poisoned it in the past - and the help that I have gotten on this thread from SB and others was tremendously helpful in recognizing those issues and, better yet, giving me concrete ideas on how to improve in those areas.

I do enthusiastically agree that I need to bring in more money - I also see a lot of obstacles to it. WB - we have reduced our budget, I have sold things on eBay, and doing childcare isn't a possibility because I'm working outside of the house already. Giving back to the marriage financially is important to our happiness, and I agree with that. I would personally feel much better contributing more.

ML - I have read His Needs, Her Needs, and Surviving an Affair, along with the articles on the website. While we are still fighting, it is nowhere near what it used to be and, unlike a few months ago, he is committed to improving our marriage and going forward. I don't see this so much as sacrificing as giving back to someone who has given me so very very much.

And we do spend that time meeting each others' top emotional needs.

PS - just wanted to add that I do appreciate all the advice and the time that people have taken to give it. I can certainly use it and it's good to examine what we are doing and see what we can do better.

And Demands, Disrespect and Angry Outbursts.
And a lack of using the Policy of Joint Agreement.
And not following the Four Guidelines for Successful Negotiation.

You will really benefit from getting "Lovebusters" and reading through it several times. It not only deals with the dishonesty issue, but all these others that I've listed. You can get it for $5.24 on half.com. Or you can get it free by emailing the radio show with a question.

Your marriage is suffering from Lovebusters. That is why you are having trouble "connecting." You are still fighting.

hopes, I can relate to this very much because my independent behavior prevented us from having that connection. My independent behavior triggered his angry outbursts and prevented us from having an intimate marriage. Eliminating those lovebusters and learning how to use the policy of joint agreement reversed the feeling of detachment and created a feeling of intimacy in our marriage. If you follow those guidelines, as outlined by Prisca, it will eliminate your problems entirely. Using the POJA did more to make us feel like ONE than anything else we did. It forced us to consistently consider the feelings of the other and added a tenderness to our marriage.

But first, we had to eliminate the lovebusters. There is nothing that causes emotional detachment more than fighing. Fighting is horrible for marriages. So that is where I would start. STOP the fighting.

The program really is the answer to your problems. I know it is hard for you to see from your vantage point, but both Prisca and I have been where you ARE, and we now have happy, intimate romantic marriages. Cut out the fighting FIRST, my friend. It is a disaster to marriages.

ML, in my case I detach emotionally in many - potentially *all*- situations. It's not just a case of doing it in response to fighting with my husband - it's a much more general problem for me. Admittedly, stopping fighting would definitely help, and we fight far, far FAR less than we have in the past, especially since we've started reading the MB books. I realize that the focus of this site is on relationships - but in my case, the pulling away is really a cause of problems, not a result of other problems.

I (generally speaking) do think that the program will be the answer to most of our problems - but there are other things that I think that I need to work on so that I can be a better wife.

We actually POJA things regularly; he is utterly honest with me and I think that I have finally gotten there. We spend a lot of UA time together - my checking out of life/things is also something that gets in the way of UA time, so it's important for me to work on it for that reason as well. It's not (IMHO) UA time if I'm not paying attention or if I want to just go read messages on my phone, right?

Hopestochange, yes you are right that this program focuses on marriages. And what it does is help you to change your behavior so that you do not detach emotionally anymore. People who are not in love are naturally detached. When you are in love, you are emotionally ATTACHED, and that is what the program can resolve.

I would also strongly urge you to stop fighting. Fighting is a disaster to your marriage and is one of the main reasons you are emotionally detached. When my H and I fought, I would feel detached for a week. And that is in a good marriage. There is about nothing that causes a greater sense of detachment than fighting. Fighting less is not the goal, but eliminating it entirely.


Can you be more specific?


You are absolutely right. In fact, if you look at the UA time worksheet, any time that either of you are not paying attention should be deducted from your UA time. I have found, though, that the better my H and I get at conversation and affection, and the more IN LOVE we are, the easier it is to give each other our full attention. But when you are first doing this, it is easy for other competing things, like phone messages, to take your attention away. I now leave my phone in my purse and never take it out during out times together. I don't answer my phone when it rings because that is OUR TIME and we don't allow anything to interfere.

ML, the other things I have to work on are not detaching *in general* (in other words, not from DH but from other people around me) and being more honest (which admittedly is part of the program). In our case, the fights are more often *caused* by the detaching rather than the other way around - I actually think that I detach more when we're *not* fighting because I'm not as focused on him as when he's angry.

I would love it if we stopped fighting altogether, and that's our goal.

Yes, I put the phone away when I know it's "together time." We had a very nice long 2+ hour conversation last night about a whole bunch of different things. And I feel like the closer we get the easier it is to be honest with him about everything, even the things that I'm not happy about or that I would normally have been afraid to tell him.

I also think that my decsription of the fight we had a few weeks ago was somewhat one-sided. It was not as detailed as it should have been, and honestly I was writing it pretty much right in the middle of the fight. I exaggerated things and made DH out worse than he really is (which is something I'm often guilty of).

Can you be more specific? I am not sure I understand what this means.. Who do you want to be closer to and more importantly, WHY?


Here is an interesting thought: the more honest you are with him, the closer you will feel. In other words, feelings follow actions. So the more honest you are, the closer you will feel. Harley says this in his article about recovery and it is a very true point:


In other words, not being honest leads to a lack of intimacy that ruins romance.

That is excellent progress that you are telling him things that make you unhappy. That is the behavior of a BUYER and it does lead to intimacy in marriage.

What I mean is that I tend to check out emotionally from a lot of situations and people, not just from DH (there's a discussion of that earlier on in this thread).

Question: is there a distinction between fighting and being angry? Right now, DH is pretty angry at me (problem with what I bought for thanksgiving, plus I gave a weak apology where I - no surprise here! - wasn't paying total attention to him). But I don't know that we are *fighting*. I'm not fighting back, I guess is what I would say. It doesn't seem realistic to me to think that people won't ever get angry at each other, but perhaps in my mind I'm equating that with fighting? Ugh, I wish I had been more present and am hoping this doesn't wreck Thanksgiving!

Thanks for the advice - much appreciated, keep it coming.

Happy Thanksgiving, hopestochange!!

There is no distinction between fighting and anger in the sense that both are equally damaging to the love in a marriage. But then, so is independent behavior such as:


This what used to set my husband off with angry outbursts. I would engage in independent behavior and then he would get angry. The key was for him to STOP getting angry and for me to stop engaging in IB's. In your situation, it could have been avoided if you would have used the POJA to discuss your Thanksgiving purchases. The POJA subscribes that
Do you have the book, Lovebusters? [sorry if you have already answered that] I would be working on eliminating lovebusters, most especially your independent behavior and for him, anger. There are questionaires you can each complete online.

Did I already ask you this? Where are you and your husband in the lessons? Are you going through the books and actually doing the lessons?

If not, I would get these 2 books, Lovebusters and the workbook, Five Steps to Romantic Love. They sell both of them cheap on this website. Markos or Prisca can tell you which lessons to start on in LB that address anger. [I gave away my last copy of Lovebusters]

Seriously, hopes, it will make a huge difference if you take a methodical, organized approach to this program. This program avails very little if you cherry pick it, but it avails enormous dividends if you use it in its entirety.

We don't have all of the books, but I think they're going on my Christmas list. We had a very nice weekend, with some last-minute tension about how clean the house is - I tend to forget how important his need for a nice domestic house is when we are busy with recreation and socializing, so I need to balance that better. It might very well mean saying no to some social opportunities we get when it starts getting in the way of cleaning -as boring as that sounds, I think that I prefer meeting his needs for socializing and going out rather than doing the "less fun" meeting of the need for a nice house.

Interestingly, this sort of relates in my mind to working on boundaries as we've been discussing in my counseling group. I need to learn to prioritize what's really important, and have appropriate boundaries about picking those things.

I'm trying not to cherry pick - but I don't know that DH agrees with everything in MB, at least not word for word. We both generally follow its principles, and have gotten a lot closer as a result.

I guess that a big question I have is - what do I do when I have engaged in a "love buster"? What about when I start slipping, and not meeting his needs? Obviously I buckle down and focus on them, but how do I apologize in the mean time?

"Honey, it was wrong of me to plan the Thanksgiving meal without talking to you first and getting your input. I'm sorry. I am committed to never doing anything without your enthusiastic agreement in the future."

Then do it Consult him on everything you do. I was big in Independent Behavior and Dishonesty, too. And yes, they would often lead to AOs on Markos part.

This Thanksgiving was different, though. My family asked me to bake homemade rolls. I talked to Markos first, then agreed. When the time came to bake the rolls, I checked with him again to see if he was still enthusiastic about me spending the time away from him baking. He was thrilled that I showed him such consideration.

In the past, I would've seen the baking time as MY time, and I would've done it regardless of how Markos felt -- it needed to be done, anyway. we HAD TO HAVE ROLLS ON THE TABLE AT THANKSGIVING AFTERALL, so to hell with his feelings.

Commit to not being independent. Take his feelings into account in everything you do by following POJA. If you slip up, apologize by admitting you were wrong and that you should've planned with him.

When you find that you are not meeting his emotional needs, the best apology is probably to start meeting them again.

And keep in mind that this need can be met in other ways. For example, my DH and I both like a clean house. I do not like cleaning house so I hire someone to clean once a week. That way we are both comfortable with the state of our home. I do the minor day to day stuff and keep the house clean all week.


What part would he not agree with? There is very little I can think of that can be cut out. The PROBLEM with Marriage Builders is that it was designed by an engineer for precision, so the parts all work together like a great big wheel. The wheel does not work properly if all the cogs are not working. The program all works TOGETHER in a very precise manner.

My H and I fiddled around the edges for several years and never got the full effect of the program until we really implemented it in its entirety. There was ONE thing I glossed over and that was my independent behavior. I thought I could overlook that and turn out just fine even though that led to tension that led to occasional fights that led to angry outbursts. Angry outbursts, and the tension from my IB's prevented us from being truly intimate. That one little LB was like a domino that directly impacted so many other aspects of my marriage.

I should add that they uncovered that one "little lovebuster" on DAY ONE of our Marriage Builders seminar. So that was the first thing our MB coach addressed.

So, I don't which part you can effectively leave out and have any success. I am a corner cutter by nature. I have experimented with corner cutting in this program. Unlike most other programs, there are no corners to cut here because this program, unlike others, was designed by an engineer who believed in PRECISION with no wasted steps.

I realize that my independent behavior - which I see not as "independence" but as lack of respect, since that was really what it was not just independence - is a major lovebuster, and it's taken me a while to get rid of it. Really, I still fall back on it, and I still need to actively think "you need to include him in this conversation." It's become easier now that I don't have access to our finances - because in order to do most things, I have to let him know since almost everything involves $$!

We're not trying to cut corners - I think it's more that we haven't formally sat down and said "we are working through these steps." I see the value in that, and we'll discuss that.
Thanks!

I was indeed. Asking me the second time to see if I was still enthusiastic made massive love bank deposits, and I'm thrilled that my wife is so considerate of me!

You can start being this considerate, this thoughtful, by following the policies unilaterally, on your own.

Thanks Makos... I do try to do that on my own. I don't know if I was doing that 100% on thanksgiving, but I do know that in past years I would have been a lot more defensive, argumentative, and frustrated (e.g., engaging in disrespectful judgments). I certainly wasn't perfect, but I think that I did some things differently that helped out.

Thanks!

Can't believe it's been almost a week since I checked in. It feels like the thread has moved away from the original topic... perhaps I should start a new one?

Any thoughts on how to avoid lovebusting when I'm feeling anxious or nervous? I tend to lose track of things and my very worst lovebusting goes on there (it was a major trigger, at least in my excuse-laden brain, for lying, to keep with the original theme)?

Thoughts? I've gotten great advice so far, keep it coming!

Thanks!!!

Practice makes perfect! And if you can't get out of the habit of committing lovebusters, I would try an anger management course that focuses on relaxation techniques. This was one of my biggest problems and by just training myself to stop doing it, it comes easy now. When you don't it for a while, your brain develops other neural pathways. Do you have the newest Lovebusters book? Markos can correct me if I am wrong, but I believe the first 5 chapters do a good job of adddressing angry outbursts.

Thanks - I really need to practice relaxing more and not getting angry or out of control and self-pitying. I feel like I need to sort of separate myself from the situation (and even from DH's anger - I do think he's justified in his feelings, but if I let it get me anxious I respond in the worst possible ways). I will have to check out the newest version of Lovebusters (suspect I am getting it for Christmas one way or another).

Would it help to think of pausing? I find it hard, especially when I feel like I must answer or am being pressed for an answer immediately. I don't 'do my best work' in those situations.

Of course the best thing of all would be if I hadn't engaged in all this hurtful behavior to begin with, so that DH wouldn't feel the need to be upset so often! I've managed to create a situation where his nerves are just shot. I liked Mako's advice (not sure - perhaps it was someone else) about avoiding outbusts on one's own as a start.

ML - I often feel like it's "easier said than done" for me when the answer is "just trained myself to stop doing it." *How* did you train yourself?

One of the first things you should do when you feel frustrated is ... nothing. Learn to say or do nothing.

So, yes, if you are being pressed for an immediate answer and you feel your frustration mounting ... then that means you are becoming irrational, so by definition, anything you are thinking of to say or do is insane, and is best left undone.

Here is a broadcast from Dr. Harley about how to control anger:

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/radio_program/play_segment.cfm?sid=238

Listening to Dr. Harley's broadcast on a regular basis is a great way to pick up lots of information about controlling anger.

One serious issue I'm seeing is that your husband is having angry outbursts, too. What is he doing to address this?

Thanks for the advice. DH is trying to reduce the angry outbursts. He's spoken about going to see our counselor about this individually.

Question: how many of you felt kind of "fake" when you started being appropriately considerate of your partner's needs? I felt that way the other night, and felt guilty about it. Is it just a temporary feeling (I think it said as much in His Needs/Her Needs) and eventually it becomes natural and instinctive?

You got it! Learning new habits always feels very fake at first. Pretty soon it becomes second nature.

Honestly it doesn't even sound like it's my voice... I don't know if that's why I stop sometimes, because it just doesn't feel natural, and I think I've confused "natural" with "right."

That's very good advice. It's pretty much over, I think, but I found myself doing that this morning.

He wants a divorce, doesn't want to hear anything else.

A problem I have had is that I give in when I am feeling that pressure. I feel like he won't accept anything else. So I wind up saying dumb things, lying, agreeing to things that I can't or won't follow through on... because I feel so much pressure (don't know if I am right or wrong about the pressure being real but it feels that way to me).

I don't feel like I can stop or take a break. My tendency to avoid things doesn't help here, but I feel like I need to find a middle ground between giving in and running away.

Why? What happened?

A

What happened??

hopes2change,

I have been reading your thread, but I come at it from the perspective of your husband. I recently divorced my husband dut to his compulsive lying. The foundational trust for our marriage had so many stress cracks in it from his many lies that it (i.e., that I) had finally crumbled. My ex was not ready/willing to try to overcome his lying. However, even now, six month after the divorce, I still harbor hope. Hope for change within him.

Your situation differs in that you seem to want to do what it takes.

Okay...so your husband says he wants a divorce...This is where he is saying he needs more. Words or promises of change from you hold no standing. He needs action from you.

You need to step up your game. You need to take action and show him that you would move heaven and earth for him.

This means, find a counselor who specializes in impulse-control issues. Deal with the lying. This is not a marital problem at the root... it is a behavioral issue. Address the lying specifically. Taking action may also mean exposing yourself. Just as a wayward eexposes himself/herself anf the affair. It should be so for the compulsive liar. It releases the chains that Satan has on you and your marriage and allows God to work fully in your hears and minds.

I think you and your marriage have so much hope! I pray for God's healing as you and your husband walk this difficult road.

Action is what is going to establish a new foundation of trust. Please, don't give up!!!

breakingpoint, thanks for your feedback but MB *IS* a behavioral program. It does address and correct behavioral issues. Marriage Builders is a behavioral program that addresses and corrects dishonesty. It works because it corrects bad behaviors.

Melody-

I'm not saying that MB will not be useful for hopes2change. But Dr. Harley specifically addresses that addictions (he uses alcoholism as an example) need to be dealt with first. THEN he says the MB program can be used to recover the marriage.

Compulsive lying is an addiction (impulse-control, similar to gambling). That is what I was trying to tell hopes2change.

Unfortunately, compulsive lying is not merely a bad behavior.

Compulsive lying is a very typical problem that is resolved by this program. He doesn't tell people to seek outside help because this program resolves it. Dr Harley has several chapters and articles on lying. Her type of lying is very common and is addressed and resolved by this program. It is not something that is outside of this program. Dr Harley in no place classifies this as an "addiction" that needs outside help.

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi5016_qa.html

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this one Melody.

Perhaps I'm coming from a totally different situation the stems from narcissim. I just saw a lot of similar thought patterns in hope2change.

I will refrain from giving advice. My hurt is still so very raw. It hurts to even debate this point with you.

But you are disagreeing with Dr Harley, who is a licensed clinical psychologist with experience in treating compulsive lying. Successfully. Dr Harley is a behavioralist and a psychologist. So why would someone need to consult a counselor with LESS experience when this program works? Harley has been very upfront on what his program will or won't treat and compulsive lying is not one of them.

Please don't attack me because my therapist disagrees with Dr. Harley, if only for the aspect of compulsive lying. I was not trying to discredit Dr Harley and what I believe is a completely effective program he has built. I apologize for offending anyone. I'm sorry.

First off, I didn't attack you. And secondly, we are not here to discuss your therapist's philosophies, but Dr Harley's views. The purpose of the board is to help people resolve their problems using Dr Harley's program.

If you are going to come on his board and disagree with him, you should expect to be challenged.

A warning to posters to help this poster with Marriage Builders or kindly refrain from posting. The purpose of the forum is to help posters resolve their marriage problems, not to promote personal philosophies. Thank you for your cooperation. Any questions, please send me an email.

I agree very much that I am an "avoid trouble" liar, but I doubt very much that I would ever get an agreement that I could avoid being told what to do in exchange for being honest.

I haven't really even lied in a while, until this week when DH had already told me to leave the house. I told him I had emailed someone I hadn't - I was in a panic, responding to emails in the car, and shouldn't have in any case. Pure stupidity on my part.

He says that he is tired of waiting for me to change, and that I have turned him into a different person that he doesn't like. He doesn't see that I have changed at all in two years (I think I have, but I don't trust myself at this point).

I'm going over to the house (our house, at least it was) in about 45 minutes to talk - presumably about how we split everything up. Our/my counselor has told me to just be honest and let the chips fall where they do.

I feel like we are in a cycle where we are both making each other worse, and I feel like I can't change that cycle on my own.

Any advice in the next 45 minutes would be great...

Still in the house (or rather, I will be - spending tonight in a hotel). Current plan is to stick it out until the adoption of our niece is finalized in about 2 - 3 months.

So - should I "plan A" in abundance? He said that he was disappointed that he doesn't think my focus is on making things right to him, that he plans to divorce once the adoption is final, and that I should work until I am "sick" to show him that I am serious about changing things and changing our marriage (which he later amended to "when in doubt, keep working").

Any thoughts, as always, are welcome. He was quite calm, I was rather upset.

hopestochange, would you consider emailing Dr Harley on his radio show and getting his help? He might be able to pinpoint what you are doing wrong. And he might also be able to persuade your H to get on board here. You don't have to be on the show to get his help and it is FREE. Dr Harley is extremely effective at analyzing problems and coming up with good solutions.

For some reason your husband has lost hope. If you had a plan to turn this around, Dr Harley might be able to persuade him to give this more time.

I think what I am doing wrong is that I don't finish what I start, but I will email Dr. Harley. DH has lost hope because he has heard this all before.

In a sense I do have more time - I have the next couple of months. He was very clear that I should have no expectations that anything I do at this point will change his mind, however.

Hi hopestochange,

Your title caught my eye because my H and I were involved with financial infidelity (and medical infidelity) before he chose marital infidelity. (Yep, he lied by omission when he was taken to the ER from work and I found out months later, the same day I searched his truck looking for a secret phone but found his heart meds on D-Day 1.)

We thought he was a compulsive liar but through the MB book His Needs, Her Needs, we discovered he was a protective liar and avoid trouble liar as well as a self-aggrandizing liar (we learned from another MB book) and had been for all his life due to FOO (family of origin) issues. His parents taught him well.

In HNHN (or maybe it's in the book LoveBusters) Dr. Harley tells how you can know the difference in treatable dishonesty and NON-treatable dishonesty. Most truly compulsive born liars who will never change have a seared conscience and usually end up dead or in jail.

This (and other factors) gave my husband hope that he could change and I see that you have the main thing needed to change (desire to have different results) but need additional motivation. Maybe these ideas will help, maybe not.

1. I strongly suggest you call the MB radio show and get Dr. Harley�s personal help. That�s one of the first things that helped us (you might even be able to find our call in the archives �Lacey from Montana� on Wed. Jan. 31, 2007).

2. Find ways to visualize how good your life is and how much better it can be by reading on the �Surviving An Affair� forum and comparing your situation to stories there. You�ll probably discover that you have much for which to be grateful.

3. Jump into a virtual time machine and picture yourself in the future as a person of integrity who is self-assured that it�s more valuable to tell the truth and face the consequences with honor than to lie and deal with the ensuing guilt and shame.

4. Focus on changing YOU because you�re the only person you can control. Don�t change to impress your husband so he changes his mind. That may be a side effect but it it�s your main focus, you might be distracted by your setbacks and may give up prematurely.

5. Take an extra dose of �be patient� pills as your dishonesty has been ingrained in you for a long time and will take awhile to overcome. Follow Dr. Harley�s suggestions and use the support here when you get weak or discouraged.

My husband chose to change after our 4th D-Day when I gave up and did not challenge him to come back when he headed for the door �to go live in his truck.� It had been 6 months since his A started and 4 months since our first D-Day, but I had caved and given him another chance after the first 3 D-Days. We had been married for over 30 years and were both in our 50's at the time.

Now our foundation has two major stones:

A. Tell the truth. When you mess up, self-report. (This is for both of us BTW.)

B. Own, apologize and make amends with a good attitude and sincere heart when you mess up.

So far, five years later, those and many other aspects of the MB plans are helping us recover and we are both telling the truth after 30+ years of passive aggressive behaviors, gaslighting and habitual lying.

Based on what I�ve read on these last 2 pages of your thread, it seems like your H is giving up like I did. I hope you are successful in changing yourself for YOU and that if he chooses to work with you on this life-changing process, that it�s not too late.

Best wishes,

Ace

P.S. I had to learn that it was necessary for ME to make it safe for my H to tell the truth. You can't teach your H that, but Dr. Harley could and will when you contact him. I'll be praying for you.

hopestochange, Dr Harley can be a great influence on your husband. I think the basic problem is that your H has not created an environment where you feel SAFE telling the truth. If you will get in trouble because you forget to send an email, then you will a harder time changing your habits. Your H needs to help in this process as outlined in the article I posted about dishonesty. I am hopeful that Dr Harley can talk about the process on the radio and give your husband some hope. He will usually even offer to speak to the spouse.

My other great concern about your recovery is your notion of paying pennance. You cannot have a happy marriage if your past crimes are continually held over your head. Even with the crime of adultery, Dr Harley recommends never bringing it up again once it is fully discussed. Nor should past wrongdoing be used in the future to gain an unfair advantage over that spouse. Dr Harley calls that "secondary gain."

I don't know that my fear is realistic - it probably isn't. I get very worked up and don't think straight. I know that I am exaggerating what will happen if I admit the mistake in the first place (or at least I think I am overstating it). But the emotion *feels* real to me.

Jeez, I just sound crazy now.

You are not exaggerating if the threat of divorce hangs over your head if you make a mistake. That is a realistic fear.

Did you write Dr Harley?

Feelings alone are not truth, but your fear of some type of harm can be very realistic and valid. For example, if you are afraid your H will divorce you if you mess up, that is a very rational, valid fear. It is grounded in reality. If you are afraid there is a man in the moon who is going to swoop down and kill you, that would not be based on reality.

You have the ability to reality test your feelings using your logic. And if a feeling is not based in reality, you can reject it using your powers of reason.

Not yet. I'm going to either do it later tonight or during the day tomorrow. I have a tremendously hard time gathering my thoughts sometimes. Right now I am trying very, very hard to follow through on a promise I made to DH - to clean the house from top to bottom by this weekend. Right now I'm about 70% of the way through the kitchen (largest room in the house). I'm hopeful that if I work until 3 every morning, I should get this done in time.

It's kind of therapeutic to clean.

I feel like DH is constantly focused on what I have done wrong, and sees things very much in black and white. I can't explain why I do things that I do in a way that satisfies him - I feel like emotions aren't always black and white. He's asked me to think about whether or not my way of looking at things (shades of grey) has worked for me; I guess it hasn't.

Is there a reason why you agreed to do this if it keeps you up until 3am? Why did you make this promise? What if you said no? Or what if you change your mind and decide not to do it?

hopestochange, have you read the book, Lovebusters? Telling you that you are wrong is a disrespectful judgement. One of the greatest things about marriage is that it is a blending of two perspectives. He can greatly benefit from your perspective in many ways and should be taking it into account.

I do question the wisdom of cleaning house every night until 3am. That can't be good for your health. Are you sure you should agree to such a thing? Or perhaps there are other ways to get the house cleaned that would not interfere with your sleep. You could either hire a cleaning lady or split the cleaning with your husband.

Again - this is about sacrificing something and following through on something. It's not really about how clean the house is. His theory seems to be that since he sacrificed and went without when we were in the worst throes of the financial problems that I created, I should do the same now (or, rather, that I should have done so earlier).

Right now he wants to keep talking and talking so that he can "come to some kind of peace" so that when we get divorced he "doesn't hate" me anymore.

I think that he would say that he is justified in having a disrespectful judgment towards me as well as having anger towards me, because of the way I have treated him. He says that since it's been two years, there is no hope left (citing this site, actually). It's been two years since he found out about the money.

How would you suggest I start the email to Dr. Harley?

I gotcha. I would explain to him that sacrifice is bad for marriages and take a pass on his request to clean house all week. Tell him that is a sure fire way to set up resentments and you won't do that to your marriage. His own sacrifice has led to a renters mentality that seeks to settle the score. When the score is not even renters tend to make demands just like your husband is doing.

Don't sacrifice, hopesforchange. Extreme giving leads to extreme taking and it is very destructive.

At this point I kind of want to clean the house just to prove to *myself* that I can do it. There is something satisfying about seeing things clean up (and for the record the kitchen is now 85% done. Don't know if I will finish it tonight. Kitchen is the biggest part of the house, leaving aside the basement which will mostly just be throwing stuff out!).

I see your point, but I doubt very much that DH sees it that way. I have heard over and over again that if I had "done something big" early on - a big sacrifice, giving something up of my own accord - things would be different now. At this point I don't know that he'd even be interested in saving our marriage (although he made a point tonight of telling me how much potential he thought we would have had, if not for what I did).

There is no justification for a disrespectful judgement or anger and he can't cite anything from MB that justifies his behavior.

That's ok if he doesn't see it that way, though. Just because he believes in sacrifice doesn't mean you should comply. Sacrificing would "lessen" the potential because it is not good for marriages.

It sounds like he is very dictatorial and demanding. Is that correct?

Demanding, yes - he has very high standards. To his credit, he holds himself to them as well (he is as hard on himself as he is on those close to him). I wouldn't say he is dictatorial.

If he believes in sacrifice and I don't comply, then the marriage ends. He's still talking as if divorce is a foregone conclusion, and that we just need to talk through the logistics. It won't happen for a few months, because we need to finalize a pending adoption. His basic attitude is that if he gives me another chance, he will be "sucked in" and hurt again, so he actually wants to try as hard as he can not to change his mind (that's close to a quote).

What he cites from this site is that if the relationship isn't fixed within two years - if it isn't better than when the affair or other trauma took place - then the marriage isn't worth saving.

Sorry for the confusion.

Well, the marriage won't last anyway if you DO engage in sacrifice. It is just a set up for resentment. Your husband is engaging in selfish demands:

Selfish Demands

Why would you agree to be bullied, hopestochange?

But, he hasn't done anything to fix it. He won't fix it by making selfish demands and expecting you to make sacrifices. The problem is not that you are willing, you are very willing. The problem is he doesn't know how to fix a marriage and is apparently cherry picking the concepts in an abusive way to beat you down.

This is HopesToChange's husband. A few months ago, after reading some of Dr. Harley's materials, I suggested that she post here. (I also bought SAA and HNHN, which we've both read.) At this point, I've lost hope for our marriage of 12 years and told HTC that I plan to file for divorce.

I've been following this thread on and off, and really do appreciate all the time and effort all the posters have made to help her through a difficult time. But given some of the recent comments -- it's not easy being called out as "dictatorial," "abusive," and a "bully" and told that I�ve done nothing to �fix� the marriage I�ve been fighting for for two years -- I thought I'd share some of my side of this story. Maybe it'll be helpful for others going through situations like ours to see my perspective. If not, the mods should feel free to delete this post.

In December 2009, I learned that HTC -- who was the point person on our finances for most of our marriage -- had been systematically and seriously overspending and lying to me about money. This had been going on for well over a year when I discovered it. It turned out we had almost $100,000 in credit card debt that I didn't know about, mostly run up by her. She denied it when I confronted her, then minimized our problems, then trickle-truthed me for over a month afterward. After self-auditing all our finances, I learned that, in addition to the credit card debt, she'd secretly liquidated a retirement account and withdrawn tens of thousands of dollars from a bank account earmarked for our quarterly tax payments in order to pay her credit card bills and keep the house of cards from falling down. Overnight, I went from having a good salary and a comfortable (though not extravagant) middle-class life to facing the prospect of losing our house, being forced into bankruptcy, and facing tax evasion charges.

I was shellshocked, but decided I needed to do everything I could to get our finances back in order. We spent four to five nights a week for almost a month going through our bills and accounts to figure out where the bleeding was happening. We froze our credit cards, cut all unnecessary expenses, and put both of ourselves on tight cash allowances. HTC continued lying to me throughout this time, and often only admitted to expenses when I put the bills in front of her. She also dragged her feet on belt-tightening; for example, she refused to sell her car (which was a major expense) for over 6 weeks, even though I offered to let her use my own, older, car and take the train to work myself.

For the year that followed, I routinely worked 10-14 hour days (plus a 3-hour round trip train commute) in the hopes that I could qualify for a bonus that would help dig us out of this hole. I cut my own expenses to almost nothing; I went nine months without buying a new piece of clothing for myself, a book, or even a can of soda from the vending machine. During this time, I became physically ill � this actually happened right after a fight with HTC over money and her continued lying that left me sick and exhausted. I was diagnosed with severe sleep apnea in late July. My doctor told me that I basically hadn�t been getting any sleep for the past two months. I was, physically and mentally, a wreck, but I kept up the long hours because I wanted to put us back together financially. During this time, HTC made sacrifices as well � she got a part-time job and was on an allowance like I was (though she often overspent and asked for more money). But she also continued lying to me about money and other things, did little to meet my emotional needs when I was in a desperate state, and acted like she resented the fact that I had discovered her financial infidelity. She complained to her then-therapist about how �demanding� I was being, for things like asking her to pick me up from the train station after work (a 5-minute drive for her, a 20-minute uphill walk for me at a time that I was completely exhausted). Maybe I�m being unfair, but it felt to me like I was making tremendous sacrifices and efforts to fix a problem she�d created and receiving neglect and contempt in return.

Still, I loved her and wanted us to get back to where we�d been. I was also concerned about our niece, who�d been living with us since 2006 (we�d taken custody over her from her mother, who was a drug abuser and felon and was physically abusing and neglecting her). We started seeing a therapist together, I found and started reading sites like Marriage Builders, and I told myself that staying together and fixing our issues was best for both of us. I told HTC that I needed three things from her if our marriage was going to work: complete honesty; a commitment to work her hardest to make things right financially and emotionally between us; and a belief that she really cared about and loved me. I don�t think I was asking her for anything I hadn�t already been giving myself.

She promised, more than once, to do all these things. And each time, it didn�t happen. She continued lying�about small things and large (including money, when she had the opportunity). She was putting minimal effort into meeting my EN; even though I was working every day and often late into the night, I�d often come home to a house that was a mess, moldy food in the refrigerator, our kid�s homework not done, and HTC watching TV or playing computer games. She tuned me out when I tried to talk to her. This went on for months. I was exhausted, and felt like I was the only one making an effort to fix our marriage and get through the problems we were facing. I couldn�t understand why HTC could keep telling me how much she loved me and wanted to be with me, and doing so little to show it.

In December 2010, I decided I�d had enough. What pushed me over the edge was another lie about money from HTC. I told her that I wanted to end things. She literally begged me to give her another chance, promised she�d never lie to me again, and said she�d do anything she needed to make things right. I backed down. Things went well for about six weeks after that. Then the lies started again. And every time she lied to me, it triggered my memory of the big lies she�d told me a year before. I tried responding by controlling my outbursts and meeting her needs. Her response was to reduce her own efforts � as she later told me, when I acted nicer, it seemed to her like everything was o.k. again, and she thought she didn�t need to keep trying hard. We also tried negotiation; when finances got a little more under control, we POJA�ed giving her back control over some of her paycheck so that she could have some spending money for herself. Within a month, she�d started overspending and lying to me about money again�all in violation of what we�d negotiated and agreed to.

I kept asking her why she just couldn�t be consistently honest with me (we�d both read MB materials on honesty and the book �Radical Honesty� at this point). She alternated between telling me she didn�t have an answer, and blaming external forces that she couldn�t control � anxiety, her upbringing, etc. I was getting more and more confused about what her sticking point was, and angrier and angrier that the changes she�d promised me were never materializing.

Most of 2011 was a rollercoaster for us, but the pattern was predictable. I�d gotten most of our finances under control, so without the daily stress of that, we had some good times together again. We spent time together (typically more than 15 hours of UA/week) and there were times when I felt like I was on the verge of falling back in love with her. But then, without fail, it would happen again: she�d lie to me about something, I�d catch her in it, she�d deny it, I�d cross examine her, she�d finally admit it, I�d get angry � both because of the lie and because of her subsequent denial � she�d promise not to lie anymore, we�d have a couple of days or a week of relative peace, and then she�d lie again. Rinse and repeat. Every time this happened felt like a spit in the face, and made me feel less and less invested in our marriage.

We got to the point, late in 2011, where I could no longer believe a word she said. After over a year of individual and group therapy, after trying to work the MB program, after talking about it with me for literally dozens of hours, she still couldn�t tell my *why* she kept lying, much less make a realistic commitment to stop doing it. In fact, she�d say things like �well, doesn�t everybody lie when it�s in their interest?� and �why should I tell you the truth when you�ll just get angry?� This was exactly the mindset that led her to lie to me for over a year about her spending and our spiraling debt; I have no doubt that if she were in the position to do it, she�d lie to me about those same things again today.

At this point, I�m basically an emotional wreck. I feel like I�ve sacrificed a lot � my time, my health, my hobbies, my comfort � to get us back to financial health. And I feel like I�ve trusted in her so many times just to have that trust betrayed. Maybe from HTC�s viewpoint, I haven�t done anything to fix our problems. But that�s not what it feels like to me. If I�d left her the day after I�d found out that she�d wrecked our finances, leaving her with tens of thousands of dollars of credit cards bills in her own name that she couldn�t pay, I don�t think anyone could have faulted me. Instead, I�ve sacrificed and fought to make us whole for two years, and my reward has been a spouse who still routinely lies to me and seems unwilling to make any changes or more than minimal efforts to make things right.

MelodyLane, you said that I sounded �demanding,� �dictatorial,� and like a �bully�. Honestly, at this point, I can�t say that you�re wrong � though I don�t think I used to be that way, even after all this blew up. But after two years of this rollercoaster, I am so angry, and so frustrated, and so alone that I don�t know what else I can do. I�ve tried being supportive to HTC, avoiding LBs, and working the program *many* times over the past two years. *Every* time I�ve done that, she�s taken it as a license to slack off, reduce her own efforts, and start lying again, because when I treat her better, she figures the problem�s solved. (This is not my speculation; HTC�s *told* me this, more than once.) I engage in angry outbursts because anger has been the only thing that changes her behavior, even temporarily. I engage in disrespectful judgments because I have no respect for the way HTC has behaved and continues behaving. I feel like I�ve wasted two years of my life on someone who cares so little about me that she won't even stop lying to me. I don�t like the person I�ve become, but I�m afraid that for as long as I�m with her and she�s still behaving this way, that�s the only person I can be.

HTC lied to me at least three times in the past week: trivial lies, but blatant ones, made to my face in order to cover up her own lack of responsibility (I guess she was trying to �avoid trouble,� but if she doesn�t understand by now that her continued lies are the main source *of* trouble in our marriage, I don�t know what more I can say). Two of those lies came within hours of her promising to never lie to me again. I can�t take any more of this. The court finally scheduled an official adoption date for our niece in the next few months; I hope I can hold things together until it goes through, because I owe our niece at least that much. But after that, I cannot imagine continuing to live with the person HTC�s become, and plan to end it. I�ve been through this cycle too many times to give her �one more chance.� My tank is empty.

I apologize for this novel-length reply, but given the way the conversation�s turned, I thought I needed to add my perspective. This hasn�t been easy, and I would give everything to get back the HTC that I married, and loved for so many years. For two years, she�s been promising that, but the promises have been just words. I�m done.

Just so that you know, I agree with everything that DH said here.

I'm glad that he posted here so that you can hear his perspective. I think that he sees me better than I see myself a lot of the time.

I also feel like I probably have cherry picked what I've said here - I feel like it's hard to really get both perspectives in cyberspace.

Hopeisnotenough, thanks so much for signing up to give your perspective. It puts the story in quite a different light. I would be insane with frustration if my spouse had such a history of independent behavior. That seems to be the biggest problem here. She lies to conceal her independent behavior and her life has really not been set up to keep her IB in check. As a result, nothing really changes.

From my perspective, that is the trigger for her lies. She is addicted to her IB and then lies to cover it up. Do I have that right?

Here are some things that stand out to me - and I am STILL thinking this through so please be patient if I add on here later.


As a recovering alcoholic, [26 years] I don't put myself in a position where I would be tempted to drink. It seems that she should never be put in a position where she has access to any great amounts of money since she has all the characteristics of a spending addict. Like you said, within a month she was overspending and lying again. She was engaging in IB without getting enthusiastic agreement from you. And lying about it.

I am curious why you enthusiastically agreed to give her access to money again when you know she can't handle it? That doesn't make sense to me.

As far as the issue of sacrifice, you can see what that has done for you. It has created enormous resentment for YOU created an entitlement attitude in her. This is what Dr Harley calls a renters mentality, where sacrifices are made and scores are kept.["you owe me!] When the score is not even, demands and even abuse are typically employed. Sacrifice is a basic characteristic of unconditional love, which Dr Harley speaks of here:

here

Does that sound familiar?

In other words, you cared for her while she made marriage wrecking choices. Do you see how that has led to neglect and abuse from her? What would have happened if she had to pay all that money back on her own, though? Would she have been motivated to change her behavior? If SHE did not have you to bail her out? And what if she were given no access to money? She would have either learned to control her IB on her own or you would have been free of her...

It doesn't surprise me a bit that she doesn't demonstrate love to you. I would be surprised if she felt love for you because of your lovebusters. I would wager that the romantic love in this marriage is dead, wouldn't you? If her IB is triggering your anger, and other lovebusters, she naturally would not feel love. Her IB and your angry outbursts/disrespectful judgments has caused such hostility in your marriage, that it would be impossible to fall in love. The lovebank for her, too, is far in the red.

What if her life were set up in a way that she COULD not engage in IB? For example, if she spends too much, then she has no access to money. And if she doesn't spend, she has nothing to lie about. Pretty soon she would get out of the habit of spending.

I am still thinking and I also think this would be a good case for Dr Harley to look at.

I can only add that I think it is a HORRIBLE thing to adopt a child knowing you will break up her family immediately after you get her one.

And every time she does that, you take it as a license to slack off, reduce your efforts and start the Disrespectful Judgements (DJs) and Angry Outbursts (AOs) again.

Perhaps it's she who has wasted two years of her life with someone who cares so little for her that he will not protect her from his AOs and DJs. Which are abuse, btw. Lying is horrible, and a lovebuster. But AOs and DJs are emotional abuse.

Not true. You control you. Telling yourself that this is the only person you can be around her is giving yourself a way out of having to control yourself.

BTW, Hopeisnotenough, you might want to start your own thread so that people can advise you and your wife separately. We generally advise husbands and wives to keep to their own threads here.

MelodyLane,

Thanks for your response. I'd certainly be interested in hearing your further thoughts, though at this point I feel like there's not much that could change my mind. A few further thoughts of my own:


I guess that depends on how you define IB. If you mean "behavior she engages in without me there," that's never been a major trigger point. She has her friends, I have mine, we do lots of things together but also sometimes apart. Neither of us really has a problem with that. (Part of that might be because neither of us has ever suffered through an affair; we have plenty of problems, but that's not one of them.) Even the overspending wasn't mainly for "her" things; a lot of it was by her, but for (overly extravagant) gifts for family and friends, needless expenses on our dogs (it sounds silly, but this sucked up *thousands and thousands* of dollars -- who knew?!?), etc.

If you define IB to mean "self-centered behavior," then yes, I do think that's a major problem. I feel like a lot of the lying starts with the premise "I know best, and you don't need to know what's really going on, because I can handle it better." With the money, for example, HTC told me that she thought she'd somehow figure out a way to get it under control and -- because she was "better" with money than I am -- she didn't need to tell me about it. I feel like this kind of behavior is still continuing; this past week, she justified one of her little lies (about a window in our basement that she broke) by saying, "I was planning to fix it before you found out anyway, so why should I cause conflict by telling you about my screw-up?" This drove me crazy, because it sounded like *exactly* the kind of upside-down reasoning that got us $100k in debt.

I honestly think that I'd be ok with a decent bit of IB if she was just honest and upfront with me about it. The lies are what drive me nuts. To paraphrase what someone said about Watergate, it's not the IB, it's the cover-up.


This was an experiment we tried in 2011 after our finances had stabilized and I'd already paid off most of our debts (and all the back taxes).

HTC works part time and brings in about 20% of our income -- significant, but something we could have lived without at that point if we needed. We agreed to let her deposit her paycheck into a bank account (all debit, NO credit!), contribute her portion to shared expenses like the mortgage, school tuition, etc., and then use what was left for spending money in lieu of an "allowance." So, if she had something left over after groceries, etc., she could save it or use it to buy something she needed. I'd be able to check her accounts at any time.

I felt like that would give her a chance to show that she could be financially responsible (even in a limited sense), but our exposure would be capped because she wouldn't have enough money under her control to create a major problem. That's how I could enthusiastically agree to it, at least on a trial basis.

Like I said, within a month and a half, she'd overspent and asked her parents to send her money to "cover her losses" without telling me. I discovered this when I looked over the bank records, and that was the end of that experiment.

At this point, we've gone back to me having full control over the finances with HTC getting a cash allowance each week to cover household and personal expenses. I *hate* exercising this kind of control -- it makes me feel like a parent rather than a husband -- but it seems like the only sensible option at this point. We may need to open things up financially in anticipation of the divorce, but I worry what will happen when we do.


So this is something I have trouble grasping. The sacrifices I made to get our financial house in order weren't things that HTC *demanded* from me; I did them because: (1) someone needed to deal with the situation, and (2) I needed to protect my family.

I guess one of the things that bothers me is that, even after all that, I don't feel like HTC has any similar desire to sacrifice much on her end -- whether to make amends for what she did, to make my life easier during a really difficult time, or just because she wants to give something back to her husband (and child).

I agree that demanding sacrifice creates resentment. But I've been waiting two years for her to do *something* -- without a demand from me! -- that would really show me that she was sorry and that she cares for me. What I've seen her do (and yes, maybe I'm being unfair here) feels like the bare minimum she thinks she can get away with without me blowing up at her.

What's the point of being married to someone if they're never willing to put themselves out to protect you or make you happy? I've done that for her, and I feel like all I've gotten back is resentment. Why should I stay married if I'm doing all the giving? I guess neither of us could give, but then why be married at all? It'd be nice if there were a win-win solution to everything, but that's not always the case (which is one reason why I think that POJA, while an valuable exercise, isn't the cure-all that MB sometimes seems to make it out to be). Sometimes one side has to give, and I feel like I've done a lot of giving while getting little back in return.


This is what we've done with money, and yes, now HTC rarely lies about money -- because she has nothing to lie about. But what about the rest of her life? I want her to stop lying because she respects me enough to tell me the truth and because it's the right thing to do -- not because I've taken away so much freedom that she no longer has anything she can lie about. That really would be dictatorial, and I feel like sadly that's where we've been headed at times.

CMWI:


This comment really hit home, and it's one of the things that's been tearing me up inside. I agree that breaking up after the adoption is horrible, but (assuming divorce is going to happen), the only other options are:

1. My niece stays with me after divorce, and suffers all the trauma of a broken family, but without the legal permanence of adoption;

2. She gets sent back to her mother, who's still involved in drugs and crime and is now married to a career violent felon who the court's already barred from contact with my niece; or

3. She gets sent to foster care.

I think having some legal stability and being adopted by me (even without HTC as a fulltime parent) is better than any of those other options.

I guess I could just try and gut out a deeply, acutely unhappy marriage for *another* two years -- or a lifetime -- for my niece's sake. If I though that HTC *would* change, I'd do it; that's really why I've stayed around for as long as I have, and why I'm going to stay around till the adoption's final. But I don't think she will change, and I don't have the energy to keep trying. And my niece deserves better than two parents who can't stand each other.

HiNE:

Please do start your own thread and don't post on your wife's.

Would the two of you be willing to talk to Dr. Harley directly? You could find out what has been lacking as far as being able to get his Marriage Builders concepts working for the two of you.

Prisca,


Perhaps you're right, and I'm the bad guy and the abuser here. If you can read this thread and think that I've "cared so little" for HTC over the past two years, then I doubt I can say anything that will change your mind. Mea culpa. I don't want to be an abuser any more, and that's why I'm ending the marriage. We both deserve better.


I know this sounds dismissive, but I'm not really looking for advice at this point. I chimed in on this thread to provide my perspective and hopefully give some context for others in our situation who might read it. Take it for what it's worth -- I certainly don't claim to be an objective, unbiased observer.

I responded to MelodyLane and CMWI because they took the time and effort to share their thoughts and I wanted to acknowledge that. If someone else thinks these issues are important enough for their own thread, they should feel free to start one, and maybe I'll chime in again. But I'm not interested in starting that conversation.

Since it seems like I'm breaking an unwritten rule here, I'll stop posting in this thread.

Some Harley quotes on how bad sacrifice is for marriage. I would just point out the obvious and that is that sacrifice has not made you happy or made your marriage strong. It has greatly weakned your marriage. Same with this guy below, bluesman, who challenged Dr Harley on this point. I am still responding to your post but wanted you to read this for now:



Your sacrifice is unappreciated and is a sore spot with you. Just like Harley says. And since her appreciation is required, it is no longer sacrificial. And you are full of resentment.

From Dr Harley's book, Buyers, Renters, Freeloaders:

Freeloader is unwilling to put much effort into the care of his or her partner in a romantic relationship. He or she does only what comes naturally and expects only what comes naturally. It's like a person who tries to live in a house without paying rent or doing anything to improve it unless the person is in the mood to do so.

Renter is willing to provide limited care as long as it's in his or her best interest. The romantic relationship is considered tentative, so the care is viewed as short-term. It's like a person who rents a house and is willing to stay as long as the conditions seem fair, or until he or she finds something better. The person is willing to pay reasonable rent and keep the house clean but is not willing to make repairs or improvements. It's the landlord's job to keep the place attractive enough for the renter to stay and continue paying rent.

Buyer is willing to demonstrate an extraordinary sense of care by making permanent changes in his or her own behavior and lifestyle to make the romantic relationship mutually fulfilling. Solutions to problems are long-term solutions and must work well for both partners because the romantic relationship is viewed as exclusive and permanent. It's like a person who buys a house for life with a willingness to make repairs that accomodate changing needs, painting the walls, installing new carpet, replacing the roof, and even doing some remodeling so that it can be comfortable and useful.

Renters believe Our relationship is temporary. You may be right for me today and wrong for me tomorrow.

Buyers believe We are together for life.

Renters believe Our relationship should be fair. What I get should balance what I give.

Buyers believe We both contribute whatever it takes to make our relationship successful.

Renters believe As needs change, the relationship may end if needs are difficult to meet.

Buyers believe As needs change, we will make adjustments to meet new needs.

Renters believe Criticism may prompt me to change if it's worthwhile for me to do so.

Buyers believe Criticism indicates a need for change.

Renters believe Sacrifice is reasonable as long as it's fair.

Buyers believe Sacrifice is dangerous and to be avoided.

Renters believe Short-term fixes are fine.

Buyers believe long-term solutions are necessary.

Yes, this is what we call independent behavior.


And this is the crux of your problem, from my perspective. She does whatever she wants and then lies about it to avoid conflict. She is a conflict avoider liar. The dishonesty is her reaction to the IB. She is probably addicted to spending and addicts love their source so much that they lie about it.

Her spending is one of many independent behaviors.


Ok, it is not "demanded" sacrifice that causes resentment. It is making sacrifices that causes resentment. As anyone can see by reading your post. And as you have learned the hard way. Your post demonstrates EXACTLY why Dr Harley teaches NOT to sacrifice. You are resentful and angry about your sacrifice because you are keeping score. Renters keep score and they become very angry when the score is uneven. She "owes" you.

She does not make amends by making similar sacrifices, though. Amends would come by changing her behavior and doing things that would restore the love in your marriage. Making amends would come from protecting you from her lovebusters and her destructive behavior. Amends certainly will not be acheived by making sacrifices.

Has your sacrifice restored love to your marriage? No, it has made you resentful. And demanding. Be assured that her making sacrifices will have the same result.

It has prevented you from getting the love you want in your marriage.

Like Harley told bluesman:
]

As you can see,, doing this yourself has not made you happy. Making yourself miserable by making sacrifices has not brought you happiness. You got resentment.


The POJA is a very small part of the Marriage Builders program. It is not a cafeteria plan where its parts can be cherry picked. It does not work at all that way. The POJA cannot compensate for destructive marriage behaviors such as your lovebusters, her lovebusters and your practice of sacrifice. The POJA is a disaster in a marriage where the love has been eroded by such destructive behavior.


But don't you see that by her handing the money over to you, she GAINS freedom? She was not "free" when she had access to money, she was in a hell of her own making. Handing the money over to you has freed her from that. There is nothing "dictatorial" about that.

I am a recovering alcoholic who does not drink. Did my husband take some "freedom" from me by demanding I NEVER drink again 26 years ago? Hell no. I gained my freedom by not drinking.

Your wife is the same way. Her IB and her dishonesty has made her life hell. So anything you can do to help her fashion her life to avoid that is freeing to her.

I joined this board in 2001 after my H had an affair. When I came here, there wasn't much talk about Marriage Builders so I was a little slow on really understanding Marriage Builders.

I had been here for 6 years when I went to the Marriage Builders seminar. On the first day there, they identified a MAJOR problem in my marriage: my independent behavior. I scored at the very top of the limit on the personality test. Like your wife, I was used to doing what I wanted when I wanted and didn't feel like I needed to answer to anyone.

That is very much like your wife. Her issue is IB just like me. My H used to have angry outbursts and make demands just like you. And I couldnt' stand his [censored] for a week when he did that. But when I stopped my IB, he stopped having AO's and stopped making demands. This dynamic changed everything in our marriage. Suddenly the tension went away and we began to relax and enjoy each other. It has gotten better and better every year since.

It was getting professional guidance frmo the Harleys that changed every thing.

And that is what I am suggesting you do. This is the ONLY program whose goal is to restore the romantic love in your marriage. And it really does work.

Why don't you try that before you throw in the towel? When do-it-yourself doesn't work its time to get professional guidance. Your marriage very well could be saved if you used this program properly. I have seen them turn around couples that hated each other. And if your wife cannot change her behavior I guarantee you Dr Harley would tell you to divorce her.

I'm wondering about this. And I'm not sure if I can even word this correctly. Obviously your husband cannot stop you from driving to the bar. You choose not to drink. But the only way to keep the OP from spending is to physically only give her so much money, give her a preloaded spending card, etc. Do you think this would work before it became viewed as controlling? Don't get me wrong, I completely understand what you're saying about minimzing her chances and protecting her. But at what point should she not choose to engage in those behaviors just like you choose not to drink?

My dad is a recovering alcoholic and my mom is a recovering spendaholic. They both had to go a support group (dad went to AA, not sure about mom). In the end, the decision was that they had to choose not to drink/spend. Mom had to learn and force herself to stay on a budget.

I am completely confused by your question. You seem to be just repeating exactly what I said.

You're prob right. Like I said, I don't even know if putting it on 'paper' was going to come out right. I think I need more sleep. Full time teaching and then picking up a job as a personal trainer and then blogging for money...plus coaching. And working on my masters degree and training for the 10 mile obstacle course race challenge in Texas come April...I'm exhausted.

But getting in our 15 hours of UA time Who needs sleep when you have love.

No, I think I know what you mean. Of course, the choice is mine! And I do not feel controlled when my H insists I do not cross his boundaries when it comes to drinking. He is just saying I won't tolerate it. But again, i am controlled my choices. And if I make the choice to drink, he has the choice to send me packing!

Thanks for all of your comments - I have a lot to re-read and think through.

Hopeisnotenough:

I have not read everything on this thread, but I recommend that you read "Married to a Spendthrift" in my book, "Love Busters" (pp 214-218). There are many similarities. The solution to Joe and Shirley's problem was for Shirley to admit that she was addicted to shopping. Once that was revealed, she was willing to follow a program of recovery that prevented her from having access to family funds. He even worked out a legal arrangement where if she were to slip, he would not be responsible for her bills (it's not mentioned in the book, and not possible in some states). I treated it like being married to a drug addict. Granted, Shirley cooperated with the plan, which made it possible. If she had not been willing to cooperate, their marriage would probably have ended in divorce. Shirley's violations of the policy of radical honesty and the policy of joint agreement made their marriage insufferable for Joe. Read over that illustration and get back to me through our radio show. Write us at mbradio@marriagebuilders.com.

Best wishes,
Dr. Harley

Yes, you do both deserve better. But ending your marriage is not necessarily the answer. You both have very destructive habits that have been eating away at your marriage all these years. Dr. Harley's program can help both of you change those habits and have a wonderful marriage that fulfills.

I suggest you follow through with Dr. Harley's advice above. He doesn't post that often on these boards, and it's unusual for him to extend a personal invite here.

This isn't a hopeless situation.

You're not being singled out for "breaking an unwritten rule," btw. Every newcomer is asked to create their own thread when they arrive -- even I was, over a year ago two years ago.

Thank you so much for weighing in, Dr. Harley!

I gave away my last copy of Lovebusters!!

Emphasis mine.


Hi HopeIsNotEnough,

I for one think these issues are important enough so I've started the conversation but because you stated you were not posting on this thread, I can't ask for permission to quote you on it. I hope it's OK.

Best regards to you both,
Ace

A follow-up question: What should the betraying spouse do when the other spouse has already made huge sacrifices? That's basically what has gone on in our marriage - DH made huge sacrifices (some of which were out of financial necessity) and as you can see, it's greatly affected his thinking and the way he looks at our marriage.

I personally completely understand why sacrifice creates problems when you are starting from scratch (if nothing else, it is kind of in my own self-interest to agree with this, so I don't feel entirely comfortable with this). But what about our situation, where one spouse has already taken on what feels like a huge burden and feels that the other spouse should reciprocate to make things even or as a way of making amends for both the horrible behavior that created the problem in the first place, or to make amends for the sacrifices that the other spouse has already made?

I think that things feel uneven to DH, and that makes him feel terribly unhappy.

That is a wise question. The first thing you both do is stop sacrificing. STOP digging a hole. It created resentment for your husband and it will create resentment for you. Digging another hole will not make this better and it will not resolve his resentment. But, there is something that will make his resentment fade and that is to have a happy, safe marriage. You can give each other that if you both stop your lovebusters.

A better way is to give him just compensation. That is how you make amends. And by that, I mean you do things that will be GOOD for your marriage and make both of you happy and safe. That does not include suffering and pennance. It is critical that you both understand this. That will not help your marriage.

The way you make amends is to stop your spending addiction and stop lying. The first step comes from admitting you have an addiction and thereafter setting up your life in a way that will make it impossible for you to spend. Did you read the chapter Dr Harley outlined in his post to your husband? I haven't read it yet, because I gave away my last copy of Lovebusters. [I have ordered another one]

Dr Harley summarizes the concept of just compensation right here: Can't We Just Forgive and Forget?

Did your husband read Dr. Harley's post to him?

You have a spending addiction, don't you?

I have a copy of Lovebusters on hold and if work settles down enough I can pick it up today - so I haven't read it yet but would really like to (I'm actually going to check if they have it at a different store that I might actually be able to get to!).

I think that I definitely have major problems dealing with money. Oddly I didn't have them for most of our marriage - it was really something that developed in the past four years. I don't like admitting that I'm powerless over it, but I would have to say that I was addicted to debting (spending money I didn't have). Right now things are set up so that I can't overspend. That may change in the near future, because things seem so uncertain now. I have actually sporadically attended debtor's anonymous meetings and should probably get back into doing that more rigorously. I guess I associate "spending addiction" with someone spending all kinds of money on clothes and shoes, which isn't me, but I handled my money just as badly so long story YES (see the justificiation I can engage in!)

DH did read Dr. Harley's post. He (DH) urged me to write Dr. Harley, feeling that the invitation was directed at us both. DH hasn't replied to the other thread - he felt chased out of here by some of the comments (specifically Prsica's, and I would just note that schoolbus also left the thread shortly after Prisca chimed in). He also has a lot of other personal stuff going on that has just come up.

I use a metaphor when thinking about ways to nurture my husband. I think of him like a plant and I'm the water he needs to feel nourished. What small things can you do today to show kindness and care for this man, who looks totally exhausted, discouraged and out of gas?

Perhaps you don't need to do major stuff today to make amends. No need to stay up until 3 am every night to clean the house top to bottom (that sounded a little martyr-y to me, by the way). Clean a little, make home a cozy place to be and offer some reassuring touch.

Get back to your addiction group and do what you can make home an oasis for the both of you to rest and heal.

Water that plant!!

Great post, especially the bolded.

I think it be a great idea for you to accept that invitation. It sounds like your husband is enthusiastic about that!

**edit**

That is a spending addiction. Going into debt is the result. You have a spending addiction, don't you? You "handled money badly" because you were spending compulsively.


I agree you should contact Dr Harley, however, Prisca didn't chase Schoolbus off and she didn't chase off your husband. While SB was trying to be helpful, the focus was never on the necessary steps to save your marriage. I personally became alarmed when I saw that these steps weren't even being discussed because that is the solution to your problem. The steps that Prisca and I have been proposing are from Dr Harley. Both Prisca and I have been through the MB program. Dr H knows how to save marriages, Schoolbus does not.

I fully understand your husband's frustration, but he needs to also understand that a) WE ARE ON HIS SIDE!! and b) he is making some serious strategic mistakes that are doomed to failure. He has certain goals in his marriage and his strategy has not worked and will not work! We are trying to help him see this so he will adopt a more EFFECTIVE strategy. He has tried and tried to resolve this while enduring horrendous behavior for a long time. We are just trying to point out that there is a better way. There are no guarantees, but Dr Harley is pretty smart and he has saved thousands of marriages.

What we want is for your poor husband to have some PEACE and protection from your destructive behavior and for you BOTH to have a happy, romantic, passionate marriage. That is the GOAL.