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On several occasions throughout this journey I have wished that someone could say something to my husband that would help him to “see the light”.
I had tried so many way of expressing myself. Perhaps if I said it this way, or framed it that way, or wrote it down, or etc. etc. etc… I was looking for just the right angle to help him to understand what I so desperately wanted for not only myself, but for him too.
I was not able to communicate these things to him, so my next hope was that someone else would be able to find the right words. I wanted someone to shake him and slap him across the face to help him to see what needed to happen before it was to late. I found that I was getting more and more unnerved and frustrated by the lack of support that was coming from people that I thought could help us. I was crying out for help, I was showing my friends and family how distraught I am. I was doing everything in my power to educate them so that they could understand what was happening and perhaps they could get through the barrier that was preventing him from recovery.
In my grief, I could actually get paranoid that not only was I not getting through to my husband, but I was also not getting through to people that I thought could help. This would throw me into another spiral of self doubt wondering if I was expecting to much. After trying to engage with him regarding what the situation is, they would come back to me suggesting that he feels like he has done everything that he could possibly do. I would feel irritated that they did not dig deeper into the situation and question what he is doing. It seemed to me if they could walk away from the conversation with him, and not be confrontational regarding what they thought of his actions, that they were in a sense, condoning his behavior and suggesting that it was me who was “off my rocker”. Again, this left me spiraling into the depths of questioning myself.
Sometimes it takes just the right moment for someone to say something to you that brings clarity to an agonizing situation that I have created for myself. My sweet daughter-in-law flew in yesterday for a visit. (Her and my son married and moved to WV last year. She is on break from her first year of Med School and taking the time to visit family and friends. ) I was privileged to be her first over night stay on her itinerary. We had a nice visit that included laughs and fun, but of course, because of my emotional state, tears are never far for me. Even though they are adults, I shared how worried I am that she and my son are having to cope with what is happening with their parents. She told me that they were holding up and processing everything slowly but surely. Then she told me something that gave me a whole different perspective on the expectations that I was giving to others in regards to helping my STBXH “see the light”.
She indicated that my Son has tried on numerous occasions to speak to his Dad about the situation. She told me that my STBXH has such rehearsed and canned answers to the questions that it shuts down any further communication.
OMG, there it was!!!!! That is exactly what was happening. This is what others have been trying to tell me in their own way. I just was not able to hear it until now. Of course, that is what it is!!!! How could I have not known this????? What made me think that others could communicate with him, when I could not???? I have basically been working every day for the last three years trying to see through the muddy waters, what makes me think that someone else can figure out his manipulations? He is not communicating with anyone. He is doling out his canned responses that others do not know how to respond to. They are walking away probably just as frustrated as I am, but don’t know what else to do about it.
In my insecurity over everything that has happened, I have foolishly been thinking that these people who have tried hard to support me, were content with his responses and therefore do not oppose what he is doing. I did this to myself!!!!! How could I have not know that he was giving the same kind of responses to others that he was giving to me? What made me think that someone else would be able to find a way through his maze of “mindfuck” when I could not?
A lesson once again on self doubt!!!!! There was nothing wrong with me hoping that someone else might be able to get through to him. That part was OK. Turning it around on myself when they couldn’t was me turning on myself.
WOW, another day of self awareness.
Cindy,
Wow. ‘maze of “mindfuck”‘ what a perfect way to describe the spiral that is communicating with an SA–and trying to make them UNDERSTAND. Be easy on yourself, we often hope beyond hope. I would apply the same logic in them not being able to communicate as the thought of “would they do it to the next person”? Answer is yes, if they did it to us, they would do to another. Same goes with communication.
Here’s to epiphanies and self awareness.
Hugs, AM
Dear Cindy,
My husband comes from a family highly skilled at ignoring the elephant in the livingroom. After we parted ways( and when I was pretty sure I would gte no more than I had…the very first thing I did is make sure his family got a copy of his partial disclosure. Patially out of spite BUT more because I KNEW they would NEVER believe what I said. After getting his own words one of his sisters asked him why he was having sex with prostitutes. He replied ” Because I want to.” That was the end of the conversation.I have determined and told my H in the last week…I cannot make him tell me anything BUT I also have the option to not have any conversatiosn with him at all.If he prefers to play his BS mind games….then I prefer not to talk. EVER! Karen xx
Yea! That pretty much sums it up.
“Because I want to.”
Need we ask any more questions?
HHHHAAAAAA …… highly skilled at ignoring the elephant in the room……. That struck me sooooooo funny. Calling this a skill, this is perfection!!!!!!!!
Karen, did I read your response correctly? Did you have a conversation with your H in the last weeK? I did not think you were talking to him at all. It is hard for me to keep everyones story straight. But I love that you gave them all a copy of his partial disclosure…..
Hugs, Cindy
Dear Cindy. yes you hraed me right. I don’t live with my husband and I don’t see him often at all BUT i am with him in Singapore this week. I am here fro a brweast cancer check up. Turns out he needs heart surgery= not too mnay resourses in african whwrre he works. Why we get our healthcare in Singapore….that is another story. Anyway…he kind of intricated his way into my life with the death of both my parents. I knew what he was doing BUT I was completley worn out. So fo course he does what they all do? Tries to act like everything is the same and sweep all his activities under the carpet.I am goodat playing along except lately I find I don’t wnat to- even for the money…..which I need? I find he bores me and irritates me and i want out. i don’t feel like being involved in his headfucks and bullshit. I just want my fair share and no hassles. i am now talking to him about getting that without having to put up with him. I wish he would run off with a young hooker and just provide me with financial security.I have been leading him down this path for 2 years. we will see if he takles the bait,,,,I am so over his crap and feel like I will lose my mind if I have to hear one more time how much he loves and appreciates me? CLAERLY we have a completely different idea what that means!! I mean the man needs heart surgery and i don’t care. I don’t wish him any ill and advised him as best i could BUT is as if it was someone else’s husband having it and NOT mine. I just remember what he was doing in my bed 10 days after my boy almost died on an operatin g table and I think whatever.Get one of your whores to come sit with you because I sure as hell don’t want to! Karen xx
Cindy, it is validating to realize that it really is *them.* That they’re nutzoid. My son told me that when he used to come home on weekends..long before discovery day.. that even though he and my h (not his bio dad) got along fine, that he’d always feel better if when he drove up, h’s car wasn’t in the driveway. He used to say there was a strange atmostphere in the house that he couldn’t put his finger in, and that h always seemed ‘checked out.’ Would that I would have listened to son’s gut, since mama’s gut apparently was constipated all those years. xoxo
Dear Bev, I DID hope he would die for a LONG time but you eventually get over those intense feelings…even the ones of rage and a burning desire for retribution. Eventually you just don’t really care…but in a benign sort of way? Eventually you REALLY absorb what they did to you…and bit by bit you stop loving them. You accept they are not who you thought they were, accept that they are NOT who they continue to try to sell you on, accept that they wasted years of your life and accept that it cannot be fixed…no matter how hard you try or they try.It is impossible to keep loving someone who doesn’t love you back? There is nothing to feed the growth of your love so eventually it withers and dies leaving you with a LONG history with the person, children with them, and a whole lot of shared memories that were only authentic to you? Once all this sinks in…it sort of takes on a life of its own and your feelings change…even if you didn’t want them to? No one can keep loving someone who just hurts and manipulates them and eventually u see all their lies, minimizations, rationalizations, promises and the sweet talk they bring to the table after discovery as just not real.A marriage based on their drama is just not sustainable or fulfilling. This has been my experience in dealing with this life quake. No one can live permanently in the state of heightened emotional chaos that these guys bring into your life.When you stop loving them you stop hating them too. You develop indifference and become like them. You just don’t care very much about them one way or the other. Karen xx
Karen xx
Good point.Makes sense..
Normally all of his texts would have tugged at my heart but I saw my kids at the beach w/out their father. I saw my mother stand by me like I was an invalid that she had to watch every second. I saw the pained expression on my father`s face as he tried to be with me. I saw my brother sit each night with me with a beer and discuss all my options and how I was feeling…..
I felt nothing for the pain that dummy was going thru.
You are right Bev. they certainly do not only hurt us? They hurt EVERYONE who believed for years, that they were they were what they said…”a nice guy.” It is always shocking to find out we were duped by someone we cared for and trusted and that applies to the entire family and most of their good friends.They hurt alot of people. My husband broke my parent’s hearts and devastated my children.
So true, Karen. Mine has hurt my parents, who’ve treated him like their own son. He hasn’t spoken to his father, whom he despises, for over two years. Yet he can’t see that he’s become the same porn-addicted, cheating, womanizing liar that his father is. It’s why his parents divorced, and I know it breaks his mom’s heart. I told her about his dirty little secret two months ago. Prior to that, he had her convinced that I was “crazy” enough to snap and kill him . . . as if! Now, she at least has some sympathy for me.
I hate that my elderly parents are worried sick about me because of what he’s done and continues to do.
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