SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I am finding that as I do open up and experience anger rather than rage and hurt and pain I'm finding it's oddly reassuring

It is very different. Typically with anger I shut down as I was shown that that is not a good or positive thing to express. Now when BS is expressing anger/hurt/pain I just take it in and listen, but it is soooooooo uncomfortable its like standing there holding a big box and I don't know what to do with it.

Dealing with emotions are like learning Swahili. Anger is also something I don't know how to feel in that I try not to get angry as I feel I will get out of control. Problem with that is that it comes out in different ways like sarcasm which I have sometimes been known to express myself, inappropriately.

So as the begineer with hearing and speaking with emotion positively do you just sit with it at first and take it in, observe? Sounds stupid I'm sure, but once I do either I am just sitting there thinking "Now what?" like waiting for the sky to fall or to see a pig flying..

This is a very interesting thread.

UO. I can see how my love for my siblings would make me want them to be happy but in the case on my OP, I was jealous when she told me she was seeing someone after the A. ended.

I need to try to understand what it was about the A that made me feel so alive. The passion, the danger?

Why do I still harbour thoughts about OP? Is the fact that we work together an ongoing rejection which makes reconciliation with my BS harder?

Even seeing her makes withdrawal more intense.

I have a lot of work to do.

Bump... Because I need it

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uncertainone

such a great post.

Someone posted about how you changed their life with this post...you really did change my thought processes, as well as on various posts I have made.

Sometimes the amount of anger doesnt mean the amount of love, it really is JUST ANGER. I have to accept that and stop seeking some kind of hope in any statement. in fact, I need to stop seeking anything from BH. I need to focus on what I can control, ME.

I will admit alot of times I have wanted to quit, just say "fuck it" because whats the point? But the changes I have pushed through and made, really arent for BH, they are for me and my son and for my life.

I need to keep focus of that, and keep on moving along. Do I slip up? Yup! But I know I can be strong and do this, work on myself so that I can be a stronger, healthier me.

Saw this quote and it works perfectly:

It does not matter how slowly you go, so long as you do not stop.

~ Confucius

thanks uo.

edit

[This message edited by sosorryididthis at 1:51 AM, July 23rd (Tuesday)]

Glad to see this post again. I am still here.

This is a very "deep" post.

I have said to my BH for many years, that I am not a normal person. I am very poor at picking up clues and understanding emotions and relationships. I originally explained it as being almost autistic, in that I had something lacking in my perception.

There is a lot in this post and answers, that I do not fully understand. I understand that I can feel almost comfortable in being rejected, because I feel that is my role.

However, I do not understand this sentence

"If the spouse themselves has become linked to that feeling of rejection as an anchor emotion no matter how remorseful they may be just their presence triggers that feeling for the BS. That anchor emotion has to be identified and replaced. "

Can someone please explain it for me?

Cissie, you know how smells, tastes, songs can take you immediately back to a time or event? That's because they're anchored. It was a big enough trauma or joy that now has become anchored together. That song and that event.

Often I see here, and completely understand by the way, we become anchored. If waywards become anchored to that horrible trauma of rejection, rage and pain every day is a dday. Every walk through the door is a fresh affliction of pain and hurt.

Some have very successfully seperated their partner from their actions and while it will never be forgotten have anchored them to other things like the work they've done, the progress they make, the good things they're building.

Your husband hasn't and won't. His anchoring has worked for him. Please don't let it work for you.

" By George I think I've got it" Thank you.

So he sees my infidelity every time he looks at me and cannot (or will not) replace it with something else.

I, on the other hand, must not allow myself to become fixed in this position and should concentrate on the work I have done and the improvements I have made.

Rejection from the AP when the A ends, followed by rejection from the BS when its a deal breaker. This explains why I feel like Im dying inside. My neurotransmitters are desperately seeking some homeostasis that they can't find. This explains why i pick fights with BS/WH and am so devastated by the multi RAs hes had and decision to D....its rejction upon rejection. Ugh.

UO

Great thought provoking post. I keep discovering “Onions in mirror are larger than they appear.” I may have peeled another layer as a result of your post.

I think the fear of being alone, aka fear of abandonment, aka autophobia, was a great factor in the decision making for myself during initial reconciliation, and for my wife during her affair, and for both of us during our entire marriage prior to DD. Yes, I think we were plagued with it.

Prior to DD, I had never seriously thought about being alone, and I had never experienced it. There wasn't much divorce or death in my family tree growing up. I became instantly terrified of the notion of being divorce and being alone due to its unknowns and lack of considering it. The choice to reconcile enabled both my wife and I to avoid the pain of being alone, at least temporarily.

It wasn’t until after SI, MC, and IC when I started seriously considering that "being alone" was still on the table, but at the same time, SI, MC, and IC gave me the additional strength and confidence I needed to properly deal with it and process the pain. For my wife, it wasn’t until after 8 months of IC and daily discussions with me about her affair before she was willing to tell me the whole truth of her affair, and accept responsibility and the possibility that I could leave, in fact, she expected it. Accepting being alone was still possible and processing the pain from it was the end to our suffering from it. I suppose for some that are unable to process the pain, they could be left possibly believing, and even become fixated on a belief, that their only path to happiness is through reconciliation, and when failing due to the shallowness of it, could become angry, bitter, and even vindictive towards each other. As for the brain chemistry and irrational decisions, sure I suppose, during the traumatic periods.

As for my wife, it gets very complicated. I know that if I spent 24/7 attempting to understand her, I would fail. I try only for the purposes of adding clarity to my picture. My quick research netted a discussion on autophobia (http://www.buzzle.com/articles/fear-of-abandonment.html) My wife's personality was strongly extroverted prior to DD. This article describes her almost to a tee before DD, except she is passive, not assertive, passive aggressive. I originally thought her onion center was low self-esteem but this article seems to paint a clearer picture for us. My WW lost her mother in a car accident, 6 older siblings one at a time as they flew the coop, rendering her alone with a nasty father and step mother. This step mom was my wife's father's AP which he married within two months of my wife's mother's death, and the AP, turned step mom, was a classic evil step mother who degraded my wife on a daily basis during her adolescent years. Having experienced this during her childhood, upon DD, my wife stated that she thought she had lost me. But it was two kids in travel soccer, greater responsibilities at work, longer hours, greater chores, drinking, smoking, hobbies, -but in reality, they were only lowering my attention, not my love. And for me, attention, affirmation, communication, -these were Greek to me as love languages and unnecessary.

Enough rambling. Great post UO.

I'm very late to this thread, but it really helped with an issue I've been having lately, thanks UO! If the reaction one has from rejection can be so easily mistaken for love, how is it possible to know if either spouse really wants R or if they both just fear rejection? I guess I've been wondering lately whether my WH and I really love each other anymore or if both of us just so desperately don't want to be the one rejected. How can you tell the difference?

great posts..rejection and fear of abandonment..i fear rejection and i'll do anything to prevent it but at the same time I'm used to it as something I've known all my life.. not something coming fron M but since childhood..maybe knowing not to be worthy of real love.. when i changed my mind, got stronger and told WH to leave, rejected him, he lost his assurance, was his turn to fear rejection and begged me to let him stay..he said he didn't think this would never happen, our roles were fixed, me the rejected, him the boss...sometimes I think marriages, not only mine, are a fight.. my H needs to think he's the leader, maybe not to face his frailties and fears..as long as I'm frail he may see himself as strong.. if I change the roles what will happen to him? When I rejected him I shook the basis of his life, of the way he saw himself as someone who dictated the rules.. he could reject others (OW too) but not viceversa.

Do we really love each other or we are simply trying to cope with our old deep fears? Can't say now.. have to think about it

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This is it. This was the post you made that made me realize it was all about chemicals. The same dynamic for rejection, is the same dynamic we can learn to understand and overcome in order to give ourselves permission to fall out of love with someone who hurts us.

Thank you, UO. Here, yours is the post that helped change my life.

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Amazing post. Whoever bumped it is my guardian angel for the day. Thanks...needed that. Badly...