Dissociation from the Affair

I discovered that after the emotional upheaval of the D-Day anniversary, I am now dissociated from the affair. I don't feel emotionally connected to it. Whenever I try to get emotionally connected, I feel myself pull away.

My shrink explained that this is a time to process the events of the affairs (before, during and after) without the effects of emotions coming into play. It's an important part of my recovery. It's when I will be able to make some hard decisions for myself on how I will proceed.

 I came up with some interesting revelations in that session:

• In many ways, I don't forgive myself for allowing my husband to treat me and the kids the way he did for so long, especially during the affair.
• I often rely too much on making sure everyone else is happy and don't make sure I am happy, so what happens is that all of a sudden I am in a hole of unhappiness. 
• I don't know if I ever will be  able to forgive my husband and I learned that forgiveness doesn't lie with him. He can't do anything to make me forgive him....forgiveness comes within my healing. However, I don't know how to get to that point.

Therapy sure is helping me.... I just wish my husband would make it a priority as much as I have been making it mine.

The Power of I Forgive You...

Last week, we were in Virginia because my husband had training. Virginia is where my best friend lives (the one that wrote me that horrible letter a few months back that I posted - My Best Friend Turns Against Me). I decided to text her to meet for dinner because I kept thinking about it and since I was thinking about it, I figured it must mean something. 

I tried to act like nothing ever happened but she wouldn’t allow it. After we had dinner with both of our families, she asked if we could have lunch. Lunch started out the same way (acting as if nothing happened) but I kept getting this vibe from her. So finally I said, “Okay let’s do this” She said, “THANK YOU!”

We then discussed the letter…and of course, she has her side and I have mine. I could tell that she was really broken hearted by how she hurt me. It really touched my heart when she said that she has lost many people in her life through death and other ways but she has never cried as much as she has cried for me. I could tell she was genuine and she admitted that should have never sent the letter and she should have thought of me and my state of mind when she said what she said. 

After hearing her, I could feel myself release something…all of a sudden I said, “I forgive you…” And followed with, “I forgive you in my own definition of forgiveness. People tell me forgiveness is about accepting what happened and moving on even if you do hold on to what happened. But in my definition, forgiveness is forgetting what happened and not having any sort of hard feelings from it. It’s as if it never happened.” 

The surge I felt when I said those three words was amazing. I forgive you… powerful stuff.

As I left our lunch, I contemplated that feeling and then wondered if I could ever feel that way about my husband. Could I ever truly forgive him for what he did…. I just can’t see how. Many people believe I have forgiven him because I came back to him and we are working it out….but really, in my definition, I don’t think I ever will….

Forgiveness for Cheating Husband's Girlfriend

In a recent post over at the blog, Emotional Affair Journey, Linda discusses whether or not she forgives her husband's mistress. This got me thinking about my own ability to forgive.

I don't really think about forgiving her because I really have nothing to do with her. If she were a friend or someone I saw on a daily basis (OH THANK GOD I DON'T), I guess there would be a time when I would have to decide if I could forgive her. However, since I am blessed not to have to deal with that over everything else, I don't spend any brain power thinking about forgiving her.

What does it really matter anyway? And honestly, I blame my cheating husband more than I blame her. Of course, she sought out my husband so she does have a major role in the infidelity, but really, my husband should have resisted her advances.

Not to say that I don't have rage for her, because believe me, I hate her. She knew he was married and had two kids. What kind of person tries to break a marriage and take a father from his children? That's a pretty self absorbed person...

All I have to say is...Karma is a bitch.

Cheating Husband: Forgiveness

JOPHIELsmiles

I don't really understand what forgiveness is all about. I have always thought forgiveness is essentially saying that it's okay the person did something so horrible to you and you're willing to let it go.

Our marriage counselor explained forgiveness in a completely different way. She said that it's accepting what happened, not condoning it at all, but able to move past it.

I'm not sure if I agree with that and because of that, I don't think I will ever be able to say that I forgive my husband. In some people's definition (like the therapist's definition) I have forgiven my cheating husband, but according to mine, I cannot.

Forgiveness is just a word. The feelings you have are much more valuable than the power of a word. I'm sure my cheating husband would love to hear my say that I forgive him. I can't give him that power though...not when he took all my power away from me.