I laughed at the note in the card (yes, actually laughed out loud in front of him) and read it to him. He insisted that every word of it was true and still is today.
That's lovely and I'm sure that now, he genuinely remembers it that way. What he forgets is how "I'm not in love with you" and "I am IN LOVE with her" snuck in there on D-Day in June. If I was his love and best friend in February, how come by D-Day the only thing he could say was that the magic had been gone for years, that our marriage wasn't anything great, etc? I mean, really...YEARS? Were we in the same marriage?
The optimist in me believes that he's fundamentally a loving and decent human being who was emotionally broken and as a result made some horrifically bad choices. Still, there's another side of me that can only laugh (as it's better than crying) at how ridiculous the whole thing is when I remember the things he said when I first discovered the affair.
I never ceased to be amazed by how our minds can contort things!
That fog and compartmentalization are strong forces. Its good that you can look back with some sense of humor. I just shake my head at the "I always loved you" comments. They are so ridiculous but so true at the same time.
You sound like you're doing remarkably well so soon after Dday! Good for you. Keep laughing when you can. It's good for the soul!
Edited for typos
[This message edited by StillStanding1 at 6:50 AM, September 24th (Tuesday)]
We'd been marked coming up to 25 years at that time.
It might have been funny if our marriage and family was not being flushed.
Her: WW/57 Me: BS/63 24yrs M 3 great kids, now 22, 20, 17 b,b,g D-Day 8/14/08, D 1/13/11
Six weeks later was D-Day, and I put dates and places together. It's amazing the lies they tell to cover their backsides. She's barely written in a card since, because she knows how it affects me. We're still together and working every day, but it's just one of the things we've lost as a result of her affair.
me - husband A46 her - wife A42 Married 17 years D-Day August 2, 2009 3 kids 11, 13, and 15
It actually helped me to read about memory distortion and how common it is. Basically, memories change every time we recall them. When fWH was in the A, he was miserable, unstable and angry. So his mood alone was affecting his memories of our marriage.
It's like when you're really sick and you start remembering all the times you've been sick and it seems like you're always sick and you feel like life = suffering. Then, you get better and your outlook is suddenly bright. Or how all problems seem worse in the middle of the night. Or even how my lovely children suddenly become super annoying when I'm running late.
Of course, the reason WS's are unhappy in their marriage is because cheating liars don't tend to be blissful when confronted with their scumminess. But it seems easy for them to blame their unhappiness on us, in the present and eventually extending back through the past as they retrieve and doctor their memories.
fWH actually got to the point where he said to me, "I can't think of one good thing about this marriage." It was like he had brainwashed himself. You do have to laugh at the absurdity!
One good thing is that a remorseful WS can reverse the revisionist history. I read a suggestion for rebuilding couples to come up with a Top Ten highlights list together with marriage memories. In fact, I figure we should use the suggestibility of memory to our advantage. Exaggerate the good points. Make the stories as sweet as we want them to be.
