Some days...not so grateful

When Husband and I were making love a few days ago I was so aware of being in my head. Not present in the moment with what we were doing, but imagining what he'd done in the past, wondering, wishing for a clear answer as to what he could possibly have been thinking. How did he feel as he entered another woman's body with his for the first time in 15 years? Did he think of me as he was betraying my trust, our vows, our years together? I can't imagine not thinking about him if I were to do such a thing. And what about the second, third, fourth time? How easy was it to forget about the gift of trust that I'd given him, the access to my most vulnerable self, so difficult for me to give after learning from my father not to trust men?

My mind has stayed distracted by thoughts and fears along these lines since that night, and I've felt more distant from him again. Will I ever be able to trust him? Will he find the strength to stop resisting life as it is, to throw off the addict, the narcissist who tells him he deserves a break, who justifies hurtful acts, who whispers to him that his self-righteous disdain for others is valid? He says "I love you" and I wonder how it's different now? It must be, but it sounds, feels, looks the way it did before. When I thought I knew him. When I felt so profoundly connected.

Husband has done nothing (as far as I know) but stay on the path of recovery. It's not him, but my own mind, my own fears, my own clinging to fantasy and the desire for security that drive me into downward spirals. Even now, with the clarity and peace I so often feel, I'm not free of these things.

I'm reading about maitri right now, "...The complete acceptances of ourselves as we are...a simple direct relationship with the way we are." So this is my opportunity to accept my fears and my clinging to what I wish for and my downward spirals with compassion. I often feel ashamed to have these feelings because there's an abundance of pain and suffering so much worse than mine. But maitri allows me to stop judging my feelings, my confusion, my stuckness. They don't have to be good or bad, valid or invalid, worthy or unworthy. They can just be.

Feeling peace

In couples therapy this weekend we talked a lot about my feelings of doubt. About my wish that there was some way to be sure I could count on somebody not to betray me. About my concern that I was returning to my old feelings about the untrustworthiness of men that I was left with after I found out that Dad was lying to us.

I was trying to get to the learning that is there for me. The lesson seems to be that no matter what, ultimately you can't trust anyone. But I don't see the growth in that lesson. And I do have girlfriends I can trust - who I feel like I "know" in the same deep way I was sure I knew Husband.

In our session I realized that I so reflexively take on responsibility for the way Husband feels that I don't have an instant to see what actually happened. And I'm such an absolutist that I judge myself a bad person when somebody important to me is upset because in my word view good people don't do things that make those they love angry or hurt. If somebody around me is mad in reaction to something I've done, I look at myself to see what went wrong, instead of letting them be responsible for their feelings and simply looking to see where I can take responsibility for my actions.

We learned the tool of checking with each other about our "paranoid fantasies," the often catastrophic things we make up that may be true, or may be completely off base.

We talked about whether or not I could accept people as flawed, as doing the best they could. And the fact that in Husband's addict mind what he was doing, although it impacted me, wasn't directed at me and wasn't really connected with me. Those are things I can get my mind around most of the time. But the self doubt is still there. The struggle with trusting myself, which didn't work out so well before.

I think the fact that I was able to share and have validated so much of what I have been feeling has given me a sense of peace this week. Husband heard me. He expressed the fear he feels when he hears me talk about considering what it would be like to leave, or to be with someone else. But, as I tell him, I don't really want those things...I just turn them over in my mind like stones to see if they feel like more appropriate paths...but they don't.

Maybe the growth is in compassion, forgiveness, letting go of the way I think things should be, wish they were. Letting go of that desire for a different past. In coming to terms with the unknowability of our existence. In accepting that Husband is human, and acknowledging that he was truly doing the best he could at the time with the tools and coping skills he had. And in being with him in the present where he is also doing the best he can, now in the clarity afforded him by his recovery work. I will lean toward these lessons, and away from fear and mistrust.

But even tonight as I was wrapping my arms around Husband, breathing in his scent as he played the piano, that cold sliver of fear passed through my heart for an instant. I wondered how many other times I'd breathed him in that deeply, filled myself with his presence, allowed myself to be intoxicated by my love for him, while he was lying and leading that secret life.

This will be the dance for a while, I guess. The dance between fear and forgiveness, between love and mistrust, between joy and anger. Until I can get free of the mindset of duality, and accept everything as existing at once and be at peace with that.