If you believe in god the read Shattered Dreams by Larry Cobb. It will put your situation in perspective. You will come out stronger for it and may even survive it with your spouse by your side.
I have been reading some of your posts on others threads. I would like to read your history and will drop by your thread. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for your post. I have printed out and intend to read it every night.
I thought I was well on the way to forgiving H. But I realise now that I have sooo much anger inside me over this. I also seem to want to be right more than have what I want which is a loving H and my M.
I was going to post saying that i want to forgive H "but"...
The truth is you are right I don't want to forgive him. I want to punish him. I think knowing this will help me shift from this attitude to one of forgiveness. It is an act of will. Only when I have peace of mind over this can I be peaceful in the M. I think forgiving is the only way to have peace of mind.
I was reading your thread over in staying solution focused just this am. It helped me realise that I certainly have not been staying solution focused. Reading my most recent posts what I see is H wanting me to trust him without explanations.
This is very hard for me. I even think it is unfair of H. But it is what it is. I am beginning to think nothing is really going on and he is feeling angry at my lack of trust. I think my lack of trust is completely understandable.
But H has had a problem with accepting responsibility for his actions. He is quite spoilt. This does not mean that the state of our M was all his fault. I need to own my part in it as well.I realise I must work on forgiveness and I really must ACT AS IF big time if I am to succeed.
I think I need to emblazon that on my forehead. If I had taken the high road and acted as if this sitch would not be where it now is. I still hope to salvage it.
I know that you are right and that if something is going on I will find out about it. This makes even more sense as it will allow me to keep Dbing and give a greater chance to save the M. Now after the fact I am calm and see the sense. Then I just felt hit in the gut and reacted.
If I only focuse on the positives...hmmm. I have always been a pessimist and have often felt that focusing on the positive is another word for being in denial. I always felt that the pessimistic or negative view was "the true picture" of how things were. Lately I have been trying to focus on the positives (not much success huh?).
I have to change that and put my faith in the positives. And there are a lot of those. I get so afraid of believing in them though. So afraid H will hurt me. Accepting that I love him and am willing to take the chance to be hurt again is giving me a kind of peace.
Focusing on the negative will only guarantee failure. So I really have nothing to lose and everything to gain by focusing on the positives. I need to find a way to remember that.
Thanks for your straightforward advice. It helps a lot.
Okay, okay, I will go to Vegas and have a good time! You know, I don't think I threatened to make H declare undying love. I think I did it to hurt, to lash out. To punish. And that is sooo unforgiving of me.
I know that my H is hungry to be loved unconditionally. He has even said that to me. I have in the past taken his comments as another way of saying "let me do whatever I want". But now I do think he wants acceptance from me and I have not been giving it to him.
I realise I wnat H to beg for my forgiveness and say how sorry he is that he hurt me and that he will never do it again. I think by taking my abuse and staying still he has said he loves me. In the early days after the a. although H would not admit to an a. he did say he was sorry and that he never wanted to hurt me and that it would never happen again. I suppose I also want admission. I don't think I will ever get that.
I was talking to close GF today and said that part of reason I wnated H to admit was to find out why it happened, what was lacking in our M, in what I was giving him to make him go there.
ANd she said "But he has told you many times". And she is right. H has told me I am negative, I only see the hole and not the donut, that I made and make everything a problem. And I did in the past. I feel I have made many changes that are unappreciated by H.
But I think i have kept beating him over the head with the a and the whole drama stuff. GF says I give him stress and she would have left long ago. I need to find a way to not be agressive and constantly think H is trying to take advantage of me. Thank you for the support I needed it.
Thanks for the tip. I do believe in God and I believe he brought H into my life. Right now i am reading "All you need is love and other lies about M" by John Jacobs. I haven't got far but its an interesting read.
It's hard to stay solution-focused when our feelings keep getting in the way. If you read one of my latest posts on my thread you will see that I'm not doing a very good job of it lately. I'm letting my feelings get the best of me.
However, I think of it this way. I have made a decision to love my H unconditionally, to forgive and to begin to trust him again. These feelings didn't just happen -- I'm working at developing them.
=======Sometimes, instead of loving H unconditionally, I find myself thinking, why should I love him? He isn't giving me what I need out of a relationship. I'm still last on his list of priorities. He's still in an EA (at the least). So I cry, come here and vent, make mistakes and say the wrong things to my H, etc. Then I remember that I have made the decision to stick this through and love him unconditionally and I push those feelings away.
======Sometimes the anger and hurt comes rushing back to me and I'm not feeling very forgiving. Again, once I'm beginning to think a little more rationally, I remember that I made a decision to forgive him. I have often asked God for help with this. That is the only explanation that I can give for how I am learning to forgive him.
=======I am finding myself trusting him again. This I haven't really been trying to do. I've just noticed that I've been trusting him a little more than I did. But I do have to say, I think my H has helped me with this. He has lied about lots of things in the last several months, but he has admitted and told me the truth after the fact. So this may be alot harder to achieve w/your H. Your right, you can't be expected to just blindly trust him again. All you can do is take him at his word until you have substantial evidence otherwise.
All I can do is give H every benefit of the doubt and if something is going on I will find out eventually.
I went to my T today. She basically says the same thing. She talked about being true to myself. To who I am. She says I should not feel ashamed of choosing to stay with H.
Things I want to note:
I have been negative.
I crave constant attention from H all the time. To the point I think of smothering him. I resent his friendships, his mom, his family, because I feel they are taking away from his time with me. I act as if there is not enough love to go around.
Even my mother says I am demanding and not easy to live with.
I have not taken responsibility for my own life and have blamed H when things go wrong or are difficult. This includes making H responsible for my happiness.
I have not taken steps to GAL.
I focus on H's negative points.
I fought with H over everything. I did not pick my battles but made our M a battlefield.
I have listed what I see as situations in our M where I need to do a 180. I think listing them will help me to start thinking about appropriate 180s.
I think I do need to ask God to help me with the forgiveness issue. Forgiving is the only way I will move forward. Otherwise I will stay stuck here.
I see that it is a choice but you are so right its hard to do when your emotions get in the way. For now I will try to trust my H and give him the benefit of the doubt. If I can't do that why stay at all? I should leave if I can't go that.
And, if he is up to anything, not only will it be revealed but I will know in my heart that I did all that I could to save my M and in the process make myself a better person.
This BB is a lifesaver for me too. I am glad I can talk to people like you and Bruce and Mollie and all the others who keep in touch.
Wow, you could have been describing me in this post. I did all the same things.
I crave constant attention from H all the time. To the point I think of smothering him. I resent his friendships, his mom, his family, because I feel they are taking away from his time with me. I act as if there is not enough love to go around.
This was so true for me too. I just wanted to be with him and have his attention all of the time. All I succeeded in doing was smothering him. I am finding out that small portions of good quality time together really goes along way. I'm also figuring out that I have alot of control over how nice or how awful our time together is. When I'm being negative and difficult to be with, our time together is awful. But if I'm positive and easygoing, our time together is generally very good.
Even my mother says I am demanding and not easy to live with.
My mother has said the same thing about me. Wish I would have listened a long time ago.
I have not taken responsibility for my own life and have blamed H when things go wrong or are difficult. This includes making H responsible for my happiness.
I used to do this too. I expected him to make me happy. In the month or so before H left, he said one thing to me several times -- "I can't give you what you need." Of course he couldn't, I was expecting him to make me happy and satisfied with my life.
I focus on H's negative points.
Yeah, did that too. One thing I have tried is to take all of the things that I considered negative and turn them around to be positive. Sometimes it takes some creativity but it has helped me.
I fought with H over everything. I did not pick my battles but made our M a battlefield.
I was right there with you. There is definately something to be said for picking the battles and letting everything go except those that are of absolute importance.
I went to my T today. She basically says the same thing. She talked about being true to myself. To who I am. She says I should not feel ashamed of choosing to stay with H.
There is no reason to be ashamed of choosing to stay w/your H. If that is what you want to do, then don't be ashamed of it. No one can live your life but you. You need to do what is right for you. I made the choice that I wanted to be with my H and I would be patient and wait for him to return. I have not let anyone talk me out of it. I have stuck to my decision regardless of what anyone elses opinions are. I do get discouraged sometimes and I get emotionally tired as well as physically tired. But I vent it here and get a little rest and then I'm ready to stick to my resolve to wait it out until he comes back.
No one can say whether your H or my H will have another A. But if we can take a good look at ourselves and make those needed improvements to build a strong, solid, happy marriage -- then maybe we can prevent them from wanting to wander as they will be happy at home. This is what I am hoping for............
Your doing a really good job at looking at yourself and your contributions to the problem. Just don't take all the blame. I did that for awhile and it made me feel pretty low. We can't fix it all, but we can start the motion of change.
Slowly