SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Sometimes reading my own posts makes me see my own sutuation with more clarity - and I realize how gullible I've been and I feel 10x stupid for considering staying with someone who could do something so horrible to his own wife. And I feel like an idiot because in my heart I know I haven't been strong enough.

It's a very common feeling. I think when we are just thinking through things, we think of one at a time, then move on. When we post, we think of one, how to post it succinctly, then move on to the next, and when it is all done things are summed up nicely so that we can see several all at the same time, and we have an emotional reaction to each of them at the same time.

Yes. Oh yes! But you know what? I've used my writings as inspiration to stay the course in divorcing him as well as motivation to rid myself of my dysfunctional belief system and work on becoming healthy & strong.

I look back at what I posted during false R and think that the long-time posters at the time must have thought I was an idiot. The red flags were not only waving everywhere, they were damn near hitting me on the head.

And I knew at the time if I went to IC or MC that any competent counselor would seriously question why I wanted to stay in the marriage.

But writing it out here and on my blog, post after post, is really what helped me process everything. There's something about the act of writing that's cathartic for me. Sometimes I think I was a bit of an idiot for taking so long to decide it was false R, but over all I know I did what I needed to do, and how I needed to do it, to get through the shitstorm that got dumped on me.

This is the reason I stopped posting for a while after I joined. Everyone could clearly see what I was blatantly ignoring, but I knew I had to let it play out my way.

Feel like this almost every time I write a post. I backspace a lot when writing, can't believe I was THAT much of an idiot :(

((Hugs to everyone))

*gasp* Me? Never!!!

[This message edited by gonnabe2016 at 10:04 PM, July 7th (Sunday)]

Yup! I can't believe I was in such deep denial. It didn't last very long thankfully but I think that is only because God led me here to a place that was telling me to do the exact OPPOSITE of what I had been doing up until that point.

I'm also shocked I didn't do anything that was a federal offense. That was only by the grace of God.

Absolutely! You're definitely not alone. I look at the last four years and think "Exactly WHY did I talk myself into staying?"

Yup! Sometimes I read my own post and think other people are gonna think you are a completley blind idiot. It does help though and makes the advice and comments that follow easier to understand.

Yes, every time I come here.

I think I give good advice but I am not very good at taking the good advice I have been given here.

Some days I wish I could bitch slap myself.

Yeah, I'm and idiot for staying, it's not much of a marriage/relationship/life but right now I gotta do what I gotta do.

Anytime I re-tell my story to a newbie IRL I wonder why I decided to R. I feel like a big doormat.

Same, same, same.

If I just ascribe a mathematical value to each occurrence, stripped down of the emotional context, then look at where I'm standing, it's completely unbelievable that I think this can ever add up to a positive outcome.

Short story reads: "The Old Man and the Sea."

Long story: "Life, the Universe, and Everything."

Freaking Hemingway. I'll take Douglas Adams for a bit, thanks.

Yes, many times. I am embarrassed about some of the stuff I have posted. Sound so stupid. If someone else posted what I have, I would think...oh you poor girl, you don't have a clue.

I don't think any of us should feel stupid.

Every situation, even though the basic story is always the same and the WS usually runs the typical "textbook" plays, still has its own little quirks.

Some people should get out. Some should have gotten out years ago.

There are lots of reasons why people stay. Financial. Many so-called good years vs just a few bad.

With so many different people on this board, so many other people-relatives, friends, etc, jobs=there are still a lot of variables.

What about the people who have made a herculean effort to live authentically with personality disordered individuals? It's hard to wrap your head around that kind of crazy.

There are so many other things that figure into it sometimes...

Infidelity by itself is more than enough to deal with, but when you add NPD, general abusive nature, rewriting history, sex addiction, blended families, multiple personality disordered friends and relatives and FOO issues...

Whew!

Deep breath here

That is a truckload of shit to process.

None of us are stupid.

Many of us have been supremely mindfucked into an alternate reality because we want to believe in what's right and true.

I never think any of us are stupid.

Most of us are just stumbling around here trying to make sense of it all and deal with it.

There's nothing stupid about wanting to know the truth or trying to learn to deal with the truth you know.

Or how to cope if you've been stumbling around in the dark for decades.

Anyone who thinks we're stupid is probably just another broken person who isn't above deceptive behaviour themselves.

I have a pet peeve about life in general - I hate dealing with stupid people. I hate it at work. I hate it in my personal life.

Unfortunately, when I look in the mirror, I see a stupid person. Someone who was so stupid that she didn't see what was going on in her own life for 6 years and thru 4 OW.

After the old love letter to OW3 I found on July 4th, I also see someone who might be stupid to reconcile with my wayward.

I had this very conversation Friday night when we discussed the love letter. He needs to be very glad that I found out this stuff After he moved back home. Had I known before, we would be divorced by now. Unfortunately for me, I'm in love with him again - and he isn't doing anything now to make me doubt him now. I just keep finding old shit to get upset about.

Yes, I feel stupid. That is the biggest hurdle I think I will have to jump in our reconciliation. I hate feeling stupid...

Oh yes.

With a capital S. >.<

Oh, yes! I cringe, now that I see the almost willful blindness I suffered in my marriage. I was so naive and gullible. Worse, I was so very different from who I believed myself to really be--and who I wanted to be. I still am nowhere near where I want to be, in terms of self-acceptance, but I now recognize my power to change my own thoughts and feelings. It's difficult, but it's empowering.

Really, the hardest aspect of healing, for me, has been dealing with anger at myself. It's been a tightrope walk, because my natural inclination-- which was hugely exploited by my husband--is to accept responsibility for things that are not mine to claim.

I want the second half of my adulthood to be free of the dysfunction that characterized fir so long. Part of that involves forgiving myself, accepting that, like most of us, I did the best I could with the tools I had at the time. Part of it involves being very discriminating about who I invite into my world; it was a pretty stunning realization that I do not have to accept others or absorb their dysfunction.

Would I do things differently now? Of course! But now, I have the benefit of information and skills I did not have before. I very much wish I had. But wishing changes nothing, and self-blame just adds another layer of insult and pain to a life already more than amply tarnished by negativity.

Once upon a time, I was an optimist. I believed I could get through anything. Self-recrimination exiled that woman. I'm trying to convince her to come back.

And I knew at the time if I went to IC or MC that any competent counselor would seriously question why I wanted to stay in the marriage.

The very reason many don't go!

Denial is a river we BS's all float on one time or another. Thats why SI is so wonderful in helping open our eyes to how very stupid we all were in the beginning.

I so remember thinking I was way smarter then all these people. And they just did not know MY situation.....

Until it all started looking way too similar story after story after story.

Not so unique anymore.