SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Zengirl - that's powerful!

He says he can't stand to hear the hatred in my voice for what they did cos he has felt similar and still hates the people who hurt him to this day.

His first gf cheated on him and it killed his feelings for her. He is still bitter all these years later.

He can't separate the person from their past actions, therefore he can't believe I can.

He thinks I should hate what he did but should hate him too by default because he did it. He can't believe I really love him.

What a mess.

A very confusing argument

"Adultery is crazy making shit."---first MC

This posts resonates with many of us because we have experienced similar trauma.

Prisons are full of people who have committed crimes of passion. Early on I had very real, very graphic images of me stomping other mans head with my boot until I felt earth under my heal. You are right.....you can't control the feelings that enter your head . You can control those actions. You ARE controlling your actions. Sometimes....."discussion creep" occurs. I have done this.....start a relatively productive healthy discussion.....that leads to an unhealthy area that we both wonder how we got to. For us, a common avenue to that unhealthy place is questions asked by the other . Seemingly innocent questions but they are not. "So, what you are saying is I ............ right?". These are not healthy clarification questions, these are defensive in nature and usually are a result of someone feeling like they have been judged.

Hate the sin, not the sinner. Judgement is against the sinner.

That is what a BS eventually does to get to the point of being able to offer R to the fWS. It is a process.

First, we have to determine that the "attack" has stopped.....until then the sin and sinner are one.

Then, we accept the "attack" is over and can stop defending ourselves from it.

We rest.....and this is when the shock starts to wain but obsessive thoughts really kick in. This is the time we try to tease the sin apart from the sinner....a tough, exhausting process.

IMHO....this is where you are kinda at. Closer to the end of that phase....but still have a foot there. KWIM?

Keep going. You are growing. This post has helped me put together some loose ends inside me. Thank you.

Peace.

[This message edited by blakesteele at 8:52 AM, April 5th (Saturday)]

Thanks Blakesteele - that makes a lot of sense.

I agree I am on track but not fully there yet. I just wish I could get him to understand the whole separating the sin from the sinner thing.

It's not something he recognises in himself. This time last year (in a few days) a made a serious suicide attempt and was unconscious hooked up to machines in hospital for 24 hours. I tried to use this as an example of something I did that he has every right to hate but that he doesn't hate me for making that terrible decision.

His response - that it was his fault I did it so how can he hate me for it. I tried to explain no one MADE me do it. He hurt and devastated me but he didn't make that choice for me. I did. I tried to take the easy escape he didn't feed me the pills.

Maybe it will get easier once I can FULLY separate the two myself. I can still love him and not hate him now for what he did but I haven't reached forgiveness and I still see what he did when I look at him. That can't help his view of things to be fair but I can't rush those steps and I have to be honest.

I am yet another who struggles with this. Some days it feels like I haven't really made a conscious decision to stay in this marriage, just that I haven't made a decision to leave it either. Not sure that makes sense. There are all sorts of reasons to stay - a lifetime together, children' grandchildren, property, financial security....... Then there are the less positive reasons - not wanting anyone else to know what he did, the shame I feel at staying when I always thought that if there was any infidelity I would be gone, and the reasons not to stay - how shattered I am, how much what he did (prostitutes and massage parlours for years) disgusts me, the fact that 16 months out I can't get thoughts of what he did out of my head, IC asked me who I feel about him. And I couldn't answer. I just don't know. He's not who I thought he was, our marriage isn't what I thought it was. He says he's sure he wants to stay. I'm not.

I am right there with you on the sexual being far more painful in my eyes. I think for me it is because the OW were not people he cared about or would have ever chose to spend his life with so all that's left to focus on is the physical side. It was the ego boosting, validation and sex - that's all there was to these 'relationships'...so how can I get hung up on the emotional when they were purely physical? I find the sexual images bring out my anger, once the mental movies start I'm not myself and I have to really keep my emotions in check because I do feel as well that there's something 'disgusting' about him crossing physical boundaries...I honestly believe I would have been able to handle EAs or online a lot easier than the physical contact, but I realize those would have been equally painful in their own ways...it makes me literally sick to my stomach.

I am finding it hard to separate the 'jerk you were' with the man who I always deserved from square one as well. I realize the man he is now is doing everything in his power to prove to me that he wanted out of this, but of course I feel sad that I didn't have that man from the start. I have started messing with the mind movies a little - making them less painful by manipulating them into non-realistic images...it seems to be helping slightly curb my anger, which helps me not feel the need to lash out. So for eg when I get a mind movie or image, I instantly force something ridiculously false into it (the eg I read was to imagine an alligator's head on the woman) and show my mind who's really in control. I don't know if it would help you too, but I do find it helps me most of the time to diffuse my anger. And when I can't diffuse it and I do say something I shouldn't I have asked him for patience...I know it's not easy on him either. I am finding a hard time getting the sexual images out of my head when we're involved sexually now - ironically when that occurs however I'm not filled with anger, I just tend to break down in tears after...it's more of a sadness and hurt thing, which sucks too!

Have you tried reminding him that you realize he's human and makes mistakes? I know that seemed to help for us. I try to explain that while I'm hurt and may not act like myself at times, my goal is still very much R. mine seems to feel anytime I show doubts or pain, I'm considering going out the door.

Olwen, I understand you. Completely. Totally. Unequivocally. And I've made the same decision--for love, for stability, for children, for future, and for love (again). I imagine what's to come will be better than what has passed.

t/j: And, blake, those were some powerful lines:

First, we have to determine that the "attack" has stopped.....until then the sin and sinner are one.

Then, we accept the "attack" is over and can stop defending ourselves from it.

That makes complete sense to me. Since my SLAWH has switched addictions but is not yet in recovery from his primary addiction, I'm still scared. I've spent a lot of time in IC, with books, at group therapy (S-Anon), and know I can't control him. But he doesn't seem to see what you just articulated and what I've not been able to explain to him. You've given me the perfect words. Thanks.

(((Olwen)))

Me, too. I am struggling with the same thing, and don't have any real answers.

I have the "seriously? You're not kicking him out? Fool! Where is your self-respect?" Inner voice going on . I choose R, so many good things are happening, but...it's like the price of R happening in the first place is in a way dependent on me compromising what I feel is " right." It takes a toll on me, on how I think of myself, and it is so unjust that after all the suffering I have been through from his actions, there is more suffering from my own inner emotions.

Maybe these thoughts are because I do not trust him, and my mind just can't conceive of him ever again being "safe." Or maybe they are a form of grief resolution for the self I lost, the self I thought I was, the one who would never choose to be with someone who betrayed me this way.

Maybe it would help to view these feelings as normal given the situation, and to just accept them and sit with them and observe them. They are what they are, and I don't think they speak to the impossibility of R or that they are the same as that screaming of the gut that says something isn't right. Maybe a lifetime thinking that you would never take a cheater back takes a while to adjust to the fact that you did. New reality, old ingrained patterns of thinking. Maybe, like the intense pain of finding out and the grief and mourning, once you allow yourself to feel the way you feel these thoughts will diminish.

Maybe the cure will be everyone's favorite old standby, time.

It's not something he recognises in himself. This time last year (in a few days) a made a serious suicide attempt and was unconscious hooked up to machines in hospital for 24 hours. I tried to use this as an example of something I did that he has every right to hate but that he doesn't hate me for making that terrible decision.

His response - that it was his fault I did it so how can he hate me for it. I tried to explain no one MADE me do it. He hurt and devastated me but he didn't make that choice for me. I did. I tried to take the easy escape he didn't feed me the pills.

These two paragraphs would not have come from the Olwen of. 4 months ago.

(((((((((Olwen)))))))))) I wish I knew a way to give an electronic high-five! That realization that you control yourself is empowering. With that power comes accountability, responsibility, and growth. I believe this is the type of thinking that kicks people up and away from lifelong coping mechs. Like when your boss noticed you can and are capable of doing more......you get promoted to do more . You are self-promoting in healthy ways!!!!

So much growth! So much hope coming with this growth!

Rippedsoul.....you're welcome. Couple simple sentences.....that took much work for me to own. Notice I say "own". Those words are not mine....they are words that have been written thousands of years ago. I just found a path to owning them as my own.

My wife still has the tendency to respond with "I don't know why." when u tell her I love her.

I will pray a prayer that your husband can accept what you are trying to convey to him. Really, this acceptance helped me....and the benefit to my wife is secondary . I have sinned in horrible ways in my life. Spent some time teasing that sin apart from the character that is blakesteele. I am free to love myself. KWIM?

God is with us all.

[This message edited by blakesteele at 5:52 AM, April 6th (Sunday)]

Thanks for that Blakesteeele.

Thanks everyone for sharing their stories and offering advice and support. I have got so much out of this thread and I am pleased to see it has helped others too.

It's not an easy decision we have made/are making and it's great we can all help each other.