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Okay I was watching some DVD’s from the library so I’m catching up now.
NAP I don’t remember you chewing me out. Honestly. I just remember all the love I’ve received from you on the days when I was a total fuck up.I think like others have pointed out, some days we are little more raw than others and some posts just seem to poke the wound (and sometimes we just read them wrong). It is really upsetting to me if I think I’ve hurt someone—and I suspect all of you are the same. But it happens and I just hope I get a chance to apologize and clarify what I really meant. POsting on threads is an imperfect thing, but on the whole I think we do okay here, and try to clear the air ASAP. But it also takes courage to hang in there and choose to believe in the goodness that people here intend and to consider the “misses” as, dare I say it, a lapse! We all have bad days, goddesses though WE ALL are.
And yes March’s journey in the wilderness nearly killed me too. But she got out—she may have got out angry—but she got out alive….and still shining.
As far as hoping for a marriage saved, I do hope for the women who see progress in their partners. I always hope that they will be the exception. It makes me cry every time I hear hope in changes a sister sees or feels in her partner. And I cry for myself, because I loved my husband too and I wanted to stay with him all my life until it ended. I never wanted anyone else. Just him. So I cry when I hear hope because I will always sad that there is no hope for the dreams I had.
Yes, I love someone new now, and it has been healing and joy. But I still lost the dream of my life and what it meant. And there are not 32 years ahead of me to build another dream like that. I haven’t got it in me anyways and he doesn’t either (and he’s 9 years older than me too) So I am learning to live day by day, with love that comes. No more dreams to build together. Just love, day by day.
The capacity for love is still in me, and that was a great discovery. But the capacity of my life to create a history of living in that love is diminished. Run the numbers. It is what it is. Perhaps that’s why I hope younger sisters wont’ waste anymore of their life on men who will never choose them first. That’s a simple thing I believe a partner in life should be able to expect, not worry about. But I recognize that we all must make our choice and live as graciously as we can with the results.
But anger is a tricky topic, for sure!
Fuck! I know I have to make serious changes when I get home because after 2 years of “recovery” I’m worse off than day one.
Teneil,
That is an important realization. I am guessing that Minwalla’s intensive is bringing this out?
I think I understand where Catherine is coming from and how we are all at different points in the process. With new discoveries of the SA – it is a lot to process and it is almsot impossible to think there is no possible good outcome other than divorce. (At least in the beginning) I can understand how someone years into this sees a different picture and has a clearer understanding.
I felt like I was punched in the stomach when I created my post of Afraid to stay too long. I guess I still have a pair of rose colored glasses on and it forced me to take them off. I appreciated the comment…
“You will only stay long enough for it to be crystal clear that it’s time to end things, there’s no hope left and you’ll move on.
That’s everybody’s timetable. We stay until its time to go.
I printed this and I carry it in my purse and I read it over often.
Unfortunately, we stay well past time to go. The time to go is when we find out that our entire marriages were a lie, that we’ve been the victims of a despicable fraud. That discovery knocks us so low, is so incredibly unthinkable, that we don’t have the strength to move forward and away from it. Instead, we waste more years trying to (and I repeat myself) accept what’s unacceptable. I used to get very annoyed with silver lining’s relentless refrain to get out, that they don’t change, that life will be better without them. But I knew all along she was right. Knew it deep inside. And still…
March, that optimism that kept you hoping and working and trying will serve you well now that you have redirected it! Maybe they do change. maybe there are some that get it – but the truth of whether they do or don’t is almost irrelevant. we are forever changed by what has happened to us.
My perception of him as a person has forever changed and I will be looking at him through different lenses and experience. That double edged sword of truth is forever different – I have to acknowledge that too. I cannot go back to seeing things as they were – I’ve stepped through a looking glass – and the problem is – the person he wants me to see is tainted by things as they were and I don’t think he can fully acknowledge my truth as it paints him as a bit of a monster / wife abuser / sexual bully. It’ll take some doing for him to consistently acknowledge that and I can understand why he wouldn’t want to or be able to.
I know I held out hope that a two year separation would enable him to reach a point – I was looking to JoAnn as an example of best practice. I’m very glad that I can learn from JoAnn’s experience without having to undergo that pain, although I wish to God JoAnn didn’t have to experience it. I have to hold that out as a truth. I cannot control this – this isn’t mine to control and quite frankly God has bigger and better plans for me than to worry if my husband has or hasn’t indulged in penis activities today.
And that is the ultimate truth. I’m 41. I don’t want to spend the rest of my very short time on earth worrying about that. Quite frankly I have other things I want to focus on, and looking over my shoulder second guessing, minimising, taking the blame, moving the boundaries, accepting a second rate marriage is not an option.
I do understand that desire to believe its a one off horrid fluke but ya know what – FUCK THAT!Wonderful topic. I have always believed in and felt comfortable with my anger. Any man that couldn’t handle my anger wasn’t worth a smidgen of my time. That said, I never experienced the depth of anger that came with the awareness of my soul mate’s sexually-maladaptive behavior. I was very, very, very blessed to find a counselor for my husband and a counselor for me who believed in the importance of my anger around my husband’s maladaptive, extremely sick behavior. My husband would go into his counselor and tell him how angry I was and his counselor would say, “Good for her!” My counselor encouraged my anger with gusto.
Now, I watch on as my daughter begins the process of expressing her anger toward her father. She is very different from me, uncomfortable with confrontation, a peacemaker. I try to explain, you cannot have any relationship with your father without A LOT of anger expressed first. It’s not just that she has to express the anger, the feelings, the thoughts, her father has to respond properly and genuinely to her anger, her feelings and her thoughts.
Even now, as things are improving by leaps and bounds, I in no way try to tone down my anger about his appalling past behavior, but I find my anger dissipating as my husband heals himself and helps me to heal. My husband gets the abuse he has done, gets the bullying he has done. He feels the pain he has created in this world for bizarre, selfish gain. He was a good man who went very bad for five years and he wants to make this bad behavior up to the world for the rest of his life. This is what heals my anger: his genuine empathy for what he has done to me, our children, himself and the prostitutes (I pushed him to take that part in).
One of the things I love about SOS is seeing women comfortable with their anger. It would be wonderful if we could figure out a way to get our message out about how the world should respond to women who’ve encountered the abuse of “sexually addicted” men, boyfriends, and husbands.
Penny, I think the world just doesn’t want to hear it. Just look how any minority angry about oppression is treated. We will just be angry bitches who can’t get over it. Maybe when women rule the world but that ain’t any time soon.
I am glad you found a counselor who gets it, though.
NAP, I like the branding idea to get the word out. Leaves them a walking testimony to our cause. Woodchipper would get more press initially, though.
A friend of mine sent this yesterday. The iPad (all i have at home) won’t let me start a new topic, so I’m pasting here. Don’t know if mr. H actually believes his own words or if he is simply smart enough to get what will butter his bread in the future, but the words are true, nonetheless.
http://www.cornerstoneprofessional.net/why-sex-addiction-professionals-hate-marriage/
Good article but I figure he is drumming up business. When I ask him the hard questions he allowed his wife to jump in and lecture me. When I responded, I received an email from her that she had deleted my post because she can’t allow “addict hating” speak on her site etc…
It doesn’t matter, the words are true and I hope some therapists read it and husbands too.
It’s a good article. I wish like hell he wouldn’t plaster his picture on everything. He creeps me out. Having to look at him makes it much harder to believe what he’s saying.
it is a good article. it sends the right message. even if he is trying to make money with this stance, it’s still good to put it out there. might have saved my marriage (might) if DW would have heard much more of this kind of message. i’ll start a new thread with the link… thanks SL
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