Still taking it a day at a time

[may22]

I just want to add that when I read your post I sense your deep anger and hurt. I don't know about you, but for me, sometimes when he has been nice to some degree to me, I feel anger rise up. It's like I finally felt like it was safe enough to let it surface. I've realized that I still have hurt and anger to deal with, and I have to be careful to acknowledge it and see it so I don't take it out on others. It's so hard.

Jeez. I did think I had worked through a lot of the anger. I feel that I have. The burning rage has dissipated, quite a bit. (WF, thinking on whether I'm fooling myself and have just morphed into the icy stage... I don't *think* so but I want to take the time to really reflect on it and see). But the fact you can read the anger and hurt in this post makes me think I'm not as far along as I'd liked to believe... which makes sense too. I did have to go punch my punching bag later that night after that exchange, so the anger was there. The hurt is there too. it feels a bit more raw right now than it has, I think as the anger has ebbed away it rises to the surface. I know exactly what you mean about feeling safe to be angry. That has absolutely happened to me.

I would also be careful of expectations. Expectations are tricky things. Needs are better, and can actually be satisfied. I agree he needs to show he is working on himself, but I am not sure dictating which books to read are the correct way. The way you work on yourself and what touches your heart and mind are likely different than his.

Agreed. I am working continually on dropping expectations and I think I've made good progress here. I have not been communicating my needs to him lately because... I don't know. I don't think he is capable of meeting them, really, and I feel like I want to be able to deal with my own emotions and responses myself without expecting anything from him. Though in typing that out I feel like I should reexamine needs vs expectations and maybe I'm conflating them... at this point I kind of feel like I shouldn't need or expect anything of or from him. (And I had an assignment from LH to just chill, be in the moment, and enjoy Christmas, so that is what I was trying to do! )

On the books, I guess I feel like if it is too hard for him to acknowledge from me directly how much he hurt me, maybe understanding the process in a more abstract way will be helpful. And there are also parts about SSMs and how a SSM is a betrayal of your S also... things I've read and learned about the impact and hurt my actions had on him, which were hard to read but important. Of course, when he read parts of these books in the past he's totally keyed on those areas, and the parts about why people have affairs and how they feel in affairs. He has skipped the parts about the trauma response, the flashbacks, the needing to re-calibrate your memories and identity in the wake of learning your S had an affair. Those are the parts I want him to read.