- This topic has 89 replies, 24 voices, and was last updated 10 years, 11 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
Jo,
I am disappointed that I wont get to meet you in person but I am happy that you have increased clarity and a path forward!
Wishing you tons of strength!“Marriage isn’t supposed to be a 24/7 challenge to the resources of your humanity. It just isn’t.”
“As far as forgiveness goes, I really found that place of forgiveness in the fake recovery phase. It took a long time. It wasn’t a switch that was flipped. It was a slow uncoiling of fear and mistrust. I believed that he was there for me, that he had earned my forgiveness, and, of course, that made the fake recovery all the more devastating, and made a mockery of my forgiveness.”
You have both taken my thoughts out of my head, and put them so eloquently into words. Jo, I am relating with your posts SO much recently. I am now questioning my h returning to ISH for the 9 day in Nov. He has been out to Minwalla, once with me, and once for 3 days alone. I haven’t seen any real noticeable effort to change on his part, although he says he has not visited any inappropriate sites since Dday. He is still not expressing feelings or emotions or even his thoughts to me. He continues to see the CSAT psychologist who is working with him on SA and FOO. I am not angry (I have bouts of it), I have tremendous pity for him. I see how it all (sex) got started when he was a child trying to cope with a suicidal mom and an unemotional, detached dad. It makes sense. It was a way to feel better and it became the only real coping mechanism he had, because no one showed him a better way. He has made horrible choices. No doubt. I know he has self loathing, but I do believe he has love for me and I am sure he loves his kids and all of us as a family. He has told me that his suppressed rage has never been my fault, but that I have suffered for it, because I was closest and he did not recognize the rage for what it was. Therapy has helped to name that for him. It was always about getting a release. A numbing. I believe that. I see him as sick and damaged and I find it heart breaking. I do not think he is evil. During 30 years of marriage we had a lot of wonderful times and we laughed a lot. We have 4 great kids and we built a nice life together. I really do believe that there is a split in a lot of these guys brains, that allow them to truly love their wives, kids and families and also shut that off to pursue the sexual release. It is a huge cluster fuck in our minds, but at least in my h’s case he really did not see an over lap. He did not realize that his behaviors toward me and the kids were changing. I can only see it now in hind sight. It began as survival as a kid and I do believe he never meant to hurt us. He is damaged. Can he fundamentally change who he is? No. I do not think so. But, could he change his behaviors, learn to trust ME with his feelings and live a healthier, honest SA free life? I think he can. He just has to show me that he really chooses the change. I will watch from a distance and continue to heal myself. I love Tim. There is so much good in him. I just wish my love would have been enough. But it wasn’t. That is the sad reality. With some good therapy, and some real work on his part to understand how he got to this place and how he can get out of it, I would contemplate working on our marriage. Patience is not my strong point, and I know it will take years. Leaving home was the best thing for me. I do not know what is the best thing for him. God, I wish I did.
I really just hijacked this. I’m sorry. It just got me really thinking about “what” I feel and not just “how” I feel. If that makes any sense.Jo and Trish, thank you both for your posts. Remember that old song “Killing Me Softly” with the lyrics “Strumming my pain with his fingers, singing my life with his song…” That is what your posts felt like to me but in a good way. Trish, where you said “in my h’s case he really did not see an over lap. He did not realize that his behaviors towards me and the kids were changing.” I got that too and attribute it to the breakdown of the compartments my H tried to divide his life into. The porn and strippers were, in his mind, in one tiny compartment that never bled over into the Daisy compartment or the kids compartment or the family compartment but of course it did because you can’t really live your life with separate pieces of it locked away.
I had a horrible night with the puppies, and I’m exhausted. I wish I wasn’t so tired because there’s some really good stuff in this thread that I’d really like to chew on but my brain is functioning at about 30% right now. Anyway, I just wanted to say how much your posts resonated with me.
Love you all,
DaisyTrish ,that was such a good post. I need to read it again and again. Thanks for sharing those thoughts and feelings. It helps to know that we aren’t crazy and all these things run thru our heads and it’s okay.
Sometimes I truly believe that life is just what it is. Our burdens are just that. Our grief and pain are just ours. The only thing to do is accept the facts and move along as best we can. There is no right or wrong way. It just is. The more we fight it, analyze it, cuss at it, bargain with it, and in general deny the reality of it then the worse it gets. I think that is what forgiveness ( not reconciliation) looks like to me………….Just acknowledging that it is what it is and knowing I am not the cause nor the cure. Some things just aren’t as complicated as they appear. Because we THINK we have the answers ( or at least have the questions), the options, the choices, and can affect the outcome we make it more complicated in our own heads. Some sister ( sorry, I can’t remember who) posted about ‘living too much in their heads’ …..It makes sense to me. We should try to put it down whenever we can and focus on being able to put it down more often than we pick it up. As Diane says, “Something happened to me..”. Yes, something happened. It’s time to accept that and let it go or run the risk of spending the rest of whatever life you have turning it six ways from Sunday 🙂
Trish…..amazing post. The first sentence and the last sentence was a huge bell ringer. It summed up most of my crap in that last paragraph and sentence.
“………that made the fake recovery all the more devastating, and made a mockery of my forgiveness.”
Very powerful words, so true.
I agree. I think that is what made the betrayal so painful, was that I forgave and was supportive only to have him con me over and over again. I think I can forgive him, but to trust him with my heart and soul? I think I would be very,very foolish indeed to do that. Not to take anything away from anyone else who can. Maybe they have more inner strength than I am capable of. Not to ask for pity, but my whole life has been like that Bruce Springsteen song. “the first kick I took was when I hit the ground.”
I’ve often said I don’t think I can move on and forgive him.
That’s because I’ve never seen true, sincere recovery, and I never will.
I think it is pure madness to put your heart and soul back on the table. I could not do it. Once is enough for me.
That is NOT judgmental about the sisters that have truly tried and been slammed again. I do understand why you would try. I thought about truly trying until I found myself in the hood and got myself educated 🙂
Trish, I connect with your story, too, and felt your pain during your disclosure and poly ordeal.
“I really do believe that there is a split in a lot of these guys brains, that allow them to truly love their wives, kids and families and also shut that off to pursue the sexual release. It is a huge cluster fuck in our minds, but at least in my h’s case he really did not see an over lap. He did not realize that his behaviors toward me and the kids were changing. I can only see it now in hind sight. It began as survival as a kid and I do believe he never meant to hurt us.” Trish, I could have written this. My h really convinced himself that his acting out sexual behavior did not bleed over into our everyday lives. But at the height of his addiction, they did, and he didn’t know it- that’s how much denial and delusion he had. (probably should use present tense here).
You also mentioned him learing to TRUST YOU. That does seem key here. My h appeared to be connected to me and our kids, but truth was he was always a lone ranger who never trusted anyone but himself. That was how he survived his crazy ass family. No excuse, just explanation, and when I think about what he experienced growing up with a sociopathic raging sex addict father and a passive, dependent mother, it is indeed heartbreaking. All kinds of memories surfaced for my h during the intensive- being thrown in the deep end of the pool to learn how to swim alone, teaching himself to ride a bike at age 4 but not knowing how to brake, so riding arround and around the block, and yelling HELP every time he passed his house, hoping someone would hear him and teach him how to stop, being locked out of the house at 7 pm in his pajamas so his parents could have sex uninterrupted, being in a car accident at age 2 and in a full body cast for a month in the hospital at a time when parents could visit for ONE HOUR A WEEK- he was virtually left alone there, his father hitting his siblings (not my h, who was the “good boy”)and his mother dripping tears while watching but doing nothing, on and on. Nothing that would call attention to the authorities, but enough to make him not trust that anyone would ever really be there for him. His false self is what he created to survive, and his authentic self is almost totally undeveloped. That false self allowed him to deny and delude and convince himself he was still being a good husband and father while he was behaving in the most hideous ways. And yes, all that sex, from an early age, to numb out against the hurt and the anger and the lonliness. So, I guess I totally understand your dilemma between compassion and self-protection, and the easiest answer, seems to me to be for us to run for our lives. As I told Catherine, it’s really hard to hold hope and caution at the same time, but I think it is possible. I don’t know. Honestly, I’m probably the poster child for hoping even when it is not reasonable to hope. (actually, that’s what my h told me in a recent note… he thanked me for caring for him even when he couldn’t care for himself, and for holding hope for him even when it wasn’t reasonable to do that…probably more “words”, but they struck me as true, nonethess).This thread of sisters experiences with Dr M gives me pause as H is to go to 9 day intensive in February…..
I will start a new thread on it though.The intensive with Minwalla was the best thing I ever demanded from my H.
No matter whether his recovery is fake or real or somewhere in between…. He acts like a human. He signed all papers to protect me financially. He is truly interacting with the children on a good level.
I posted before…. At this time, HE is not the problem. I am the problem.
I need to clarify….. I am the problem as far as wanting to invest fully ( heart and soul) into the marriage. I just don’t so I just won’t.
Maybe forgiveness comes but even if I totally forgive him, I would never marry him again ….nor will I ever truly love him again.
Anyone that can do what these men did for YEARS and never once try to get help ( until they get caught) and then try to blame their wives is just a bad bet …IMO.
My H was such a good liar ( obviously) that he could have taken me to MC, had me totally convinced that it was working and we were just peachy, and gone to Minwalla on his own and I would have never known…. He could have spared me all this trauma and pain…he didn’t love me enough to even do that.
“If you give your trust to a person who does not deserve it, you actually give him the power to destroy you.” ~ Khaled Saad
- The forum ‘Sex Addiction Treatment Center And Counselor Reviews’ is closed to new topics and replies.