They are fewer, but 3 months after finding out about Husband's infidelity thoughts of him with other women still persist. We were making love this morning and for some reason I couldn't get out of my head thinking about him with two women, which he did several times. It's one of those things I can't compete with. I will always be only one person. Maybe sex with me will never be quite as thrilling.
Another invasive thought that came into my head today was thinking about his choice of blond women, and his fan "crush" on a particular young blond actress from a favorite TV show. The fantasy blond, blue eyed cheerleader type is something else I'll never be. And though I know it's irrational based on everything he and I have talked about, my mind wonders if he's tired of my "type" and secretly wishes for something different.
I believe that these thoughts are irrational, and the fears they represent mostly unsubstantiated, but there they are. It feels childish to the point of being embarrassing, but I feel compelled to document this. After 19 years together I still worry that somehow I'm not enough. His issues have ignited my issues, and my issues are demanding to be dealt with. I think these fears and insecurities may never go away, so my peace and happiness lies in how I respond to them. Therein lies my choice and my power.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Thursday, August 30, 2007
I got asked out on a date
I went to see a friend's play tonight and got asked out on a date by a guy I was sitting next to after we chatted before the show and during intermission. I was by myself because Husband was at a support group meeting. It was funny to be asked out, and touching and nice that someone took a risk and made a bold move and asked out someone he'd just met at a play. I told him I was married and thanked him for the invitation.
On my drive home I told Husband about it. He seemed a little thrown for a split second, but not angry or jealous. Sometimes he expresses fear that I'm going to leave him, so I'm sure it touched that nerve. I debated whether or not to tell him, but I've always told him everything. It was a funny and oddly inspiring moment, and those are the kinds of things I've always shared with him. I also told him that I never would have dated this guy anyway, even if I was single. He was too introspectively morose for me (a standup comic, so that kind of says it all.)
But it was a gentle reminder that I do have options in this world. Though I'm still convinced there's nobody like Husband out there for me. I now understand that Husband has more shadow than I realized, but that doesn't change the good things. Fortunately or unfortunately...I don't know which.
I have to grow up. I have to accept the darkness along with the light. That is a mature relationship. What I had up to this point was fuled by delusion. Hopefully I'm up for the gritty reality of this next phase we're facing. I still want so badly to go back to what I thought I had. And I also know how silly that is, considering I didn't really have it anymore anyway. But I did for a while...I think. For about the first 5 of the last 19 years. That's something. And I still have a wonderful, flawed, complex man who loves me deeply. So many people don't even have a partner like that. But I still want to go back.
On my drive home I told Husband about it. He seemed a little thrown for a split second, but not angry or jealous. Sometimes he expresses fear that I'm going to leave him, so I'm sure it touched that nerve. I debated whether or not to tell him, but I've always told him everything. It was a funny and oddly inspiring moment, and those are the kinds of things I've always shared with him. I also told him that I never would have dated this guy anyway, even if I was single. He was too introspectively morose for me (a standup comic, so that kind of says it all.)
But it was a gentle reminder that I do have options in this world. Though I'm still convinced there's nobody like Husband out there for me. I now understand that Husband has more shadow than I realized, but that doesn't change the good things. Fortunately or unfortunately...I don't know which.
I have to grow up. I have to accept the darkness along with the light. That is a mature relationship. What I had up to this point was fuled by delusion. Hopefully I'm up for the gritty reality of this next phase we're facing. I still want so badly to go back to what I thought I had. And I also know how silly that is, considering I didn't really have it anymore anyway. But I did for a while...I think. For about the first 5 of the last 19 years. That's something. And I still have a wonderful, flawed, complex man who loves me deeply. So many people don't even have a partner like that. But I still want to go back.
How infidelity could be a good thing
I've been reading a lot about how difficulties can be forces for positive change in our lives. I'll post more about this later, but I just read this and think it has something for those of us trying to heal from infidelity and betrayal:
The article is from the blog Dumb Little Man: Tips for Life and it's called How to Win From a Loss.
The article is from the blog Dumb Little Man: Tips for Life and it's called How to Win From a Loss.
Getting past lies (or not)
Read an article in More magazine last night that talked about over-40 people getting married after previous marriages. It talked about the difference in marrying young when you're idealistic and relatively unscathed by heartbreak and disappointment, and about bringing what you've learned, the wisdom of experience, to the new marriage.
It made me sad as I reflected on what I've learned. I began to wonder if it will ever be possible for me to get past being deceived for my entire marriage, and for part of the 9 years we were together before we were married. How do you get over, past, through being lied to for years by the one person you loved and trusted most in the world?
And I thought about starting a new relationship, and how that might be easier than building something good on top of those years of lies and deception. I don't want a relationship with someone else, but I can't picture how to build the kind of connection I thought I had with someone who has betrayed me so deeply and for years. It feels like it would be easier in some ways to deal with the death of a spouse than to deal with trying to re-create a relationship after years of betrayal.
I can feel myself holding back, not trusting when he tells me he loves me (which he does frequently.) I feel like I'm hovering, waiting to see, but I don't know what I'm waiting for. I think I just have to come to terms with the fact that I'll never have what I thought I had with Husband - a relationship based on decades of love, trust, honesty and fidelity. It's like putting food coloring into water. The water will never be clear again. It might get clearer as you add more water over time, but that color will always be there forever more. Maybe in another 20 years I'll feel something approaching the same level of trust, but I don't know. Maybe it will take less time. He said last night that the irony is that I now have in him the man I thought I had before. That's a very good thing for both of us, and will be part of the foundation for anything good we build now. But the problem is, while I have the man I thought I had, I'm not the same person I was before and I don't have the relationship I thought I had before.
This is the part where I have to be willing to die again and again in order to have the life I want. It's scary.
It made me sad as I reflected on what I've learned. I began to wonder if it will ever be possible for me to get past being deceived for my entire marriage, and for part of the 9 years we were together before we were married. How do you get over, past, through being lied to for years by the one person you loved and trusted most in the world?
And I thought about starting a new relationship, and how that might be easier than building something good on top of those years of lies and deception. I don't want a relationship with someone else, but I can't picture how to build the kind of connection I thought I had with someone who has betrayed me so deeply and for years. It feels like it would be easier in some ways to deal with the death of a spouse than to deal with trying to re-create a relationship after years of betrayal.
I can feel myself holding back, not trusting when he tells me he loves me (which he does frequently.) I feel like I'm hovering, waiting to see, but I don't know what I'm waiting for. I think I just have to come to terms with the fact that I'll never have what I thought I had with Husband - a relationship based on decades of love, trust, honesty and fidelity. It's like putting food coloring into water. The water will never be clear again. It might get clearer as you add more water over time, but that color will always be there forever more. Maybe in another 20 years I'll feel something approaching the same level of trust, but I don't know. Maybe it will take less time. He said last night that the irony is that I now have in him the man I thought I had before. That's a very good thing for both of us, and will be part of the foundation for anything good we build now. But the problem is, while I have the man I thought I had, I'm not the same person I was before and I don't have the relationship I thought I had before.
This is the part where I have to be willing to die again and again in order to have the life I want. It's scary.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
A Wedding and An Existential Crisis
Went on vacation last week with Husband and Son. Mostly a nice time together. Husband is really doing his best to give me what I need and deal with his own issues at the same time.
He had conversations with his parents, neither of whom were very forthcoming with illuminating information about his childhood experiences. He did find out that his mother had an affair when he was young.
Attending the wedding reminded me of my own wedding, and how wonderful that weekend was, what it represented to me, and how I've held it in my life experience. Now that I know my husband had already begun keeping secrets from me before that wedding, I'll never be able to look back on those memories in the same way. For me, it was a Magnificent Beginning to the magnificent experience of being in a relationship with Husband. And I know it was something similar to him. He was present, he was not unhappy and harboring significant resentments and unexpressed feelings back then. But now it's something else - a happy day perhaps, on which two hopeful people made promises to each other that neither of them kept altogether.
I'm realizing more and more how much of my sense of self was based in my relationship with Husband. Yesterday I began to think about my life - what I've accomplished and what I haven't. I have never accomplished anything significant that was a true expression of myself. I haven't had amazing success at anything. The one area where I truly felt satisfied - like I had no regrets about any successes or failures because of what I'd created in this area - was my relationship. I was grateful for every experience, positive or negative, successful or not, because it had gotten me to where I was in my relationship with Husband. I thought we had created something strong and true, beautiful and completely authentic, a profound expression and experience of who we were in the world together and as individuals.
That no longer being the case, I'm having an existential crisis. Since I know my relationship is not the success I thought it was, the question that arises for me is what else have I accomplished with my life in areas that are important to me, that are an expression of who I am and what I bring to this world. I don't know...
My son is a joy I marvel at every day, but he's not an accomplishment. He's his own work of art, not mine. I have a good job, we have a house, I've done good work as an actor and have moved people with my performances on stage. But there is nothing exceptional that I've accomplished with all my time and energy. No summiting the Seven Sisters, no entrepreneurial successes, no lasting art.
I still have time. So what will it be? I don't know yet. I don't know.
I've been reading two great books on Buddhism which have been helping me a lot. One told me that to live you have to be willing to die again and again, and that one needs to do what one is doing as if it's the most important thing in that moment, even if it isn't really an important thing. Chop wood, carry water, right? So this is where I'll start I guess. It's a challenging task in the midst of a depressing existential crisis. But it's my path, so why resist?
He had conversations with his parents, neither of whom were very forthcoming with illuminating information about his childhood experiences. He did find out that his mother had an affair when he was young.
Attending the wedding reminded me of my own wedding, and how wonderful that weekend was, what it represented to me, and how I've held it in my life experience. Now that I know my husband had already begun keeping secrets from me before that wedding, I'll never be able to look back on those memories in the same way. For me, it was a Magnificent Beginning to the magnificent experience of being in a relationship with Husband. And I know it was something similar to him. He was present, he was not unhappy and harboring significant resentments and unexpressed feelings back then. But now it's something else - a happy day perhaps, on which two hopeful people made promises to each other that neither of them kept altogether.
I'm realizing more and more how much of my sense of self was based in my relationship with Husband. Yesterday I began to think about my life - what I've accomplished and what I haven't. I have never accomplished anything significant that was a true expression of myself. I haven't had amazing success at anything. The one area where I truly felt satisfied - like I had no regrets about any successes or failures because of what I'd created in this area - was my relationship. I was grateful for every experience, positive or negative, successful or not, because it had gotten me to where I was in my relationship with Husband. I thought we had created something strong and true, beautiful and completely authentic, a profound expression and experience of who we were in the world together and as individuals.
That no longer being the case, I'm having an existential crisis. Since I know my relationship is not the success I thought it was, the question that arises for me is what else have I accomplished with my life in areas that are important to me, that are an expression of who I am and what I bring to this world. I don't know...
My son is a joy I marvel at every day, but he's not an accomplishment. He's his own work of art, not mine. I have a good job, we have a house, I've done good work as an actor and have moved people with my performances on stage. But there is nothing exceptional that I've accomplished with all my time and energy. No summiting the Seven Sisters, no entrepreneurial successes, no lasting art.
I still have time. So what will it be? I don't know yet. I don't know.
I've been reading two great books on Buddhism which have been helping me a lot. One told me that to live you have to be willing to die again and again, and that one needs to do what one is doing as if it's the most important thing in that moment, even if it isn't really an important thing. Chop wood, carry water, right? So this is where I'll start I guess. It's a challenging task in the midst of a depressing existential crisis. But it's my path, so why resist?
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Insecurities flourishing
The way my crazy mind works never ceases to amaze me. I've been feeling a gnawing, non-specific sadness today. It perplexed me, given the good couples session we had Saturday and the dynamic between Husband and me over the past days. But there it was.
Husband left yesterday after therapy for an overnight retreat with with an arts group we founded about 10 years ago. The original plan was for all of us to go but son wanted to stay. His absence doesn't make me worry that he'll be unfaithful (no prostitutes available after all.)
Saturday night we went to a birthday party for Son's preschool classmate. Starting that night or this morning, I've been feeling this non-specific pain. Today Son and I spent the day together, first meeting a neighbor and her son at the pool and then going to a good-bye party for some teachers from Son's school. As the pain persisted, I tried to figure out why I was feeling this way. I worry that it's just self-indulgent wallowing, given that I understand intellectually what has happened.
But when I see all these women whose husbands haven't lied and been unfaithful, broken vows and explicit agreements, and hurt and betrayed them, like an automatic response I wonder what is it about me that I ended with a husband who did these things. I feel isolated and separate from the rest of the world to whom these things don't happen.
The intellectual response is that it had nothing to do with me. True in a very important sense. But in another sense it had a lot to do with me. No matter the finer distinctions, husband lied to me, betrayed to me, broke our vows and agreements, was physically intimate with dozens of other women who had exactly the characteristics I fear that I lack. My deepest insecurities are born out in the women he chose. How would he feel if for years I lied and betrayed him and had sex with men that confirmed his deepest insecurities???????
The thought that came into my head at one point was "I've always felt so loved in my life." That was when I realized that part of the source of this kind of lingering pain is that I feel unloved. He says he loves me and intellectually I understand, believe etc...but I FEEL unloved. Being lied to, betrayed, disrespected, disregarded, not considered, forced to share my intimate life with so many other women does not feel loving. Intellectually I understand, believe, and all of that. But there is a part of me that can't be put into words that will take time to heal no matter what plausible explanations are offered and how much intellectual understanding I have. There is an undefinable level at which I've been damaged or compromised or something like that, and no amount of intellectualizing will ease that pain, quell my fears or dis empower the reactivated insecurities. I think I just need time - weeks, months, years - to FEEL loved again.
Husband left yesterday after therapy for an overnight retreat with with an arts group we founded about 10 years ago. The original plan was for all of us to go but son wanted to stay. His absence doesn't make me worry that he'll be unfaithful (no prostitutes available after all.)
Saturday night we went to a birthday party for Son's preschool classmate. Starting that night or this morning, I've been feeling this non-specific pain. Today Son and I spent the day together, first meeting a neighbor and her son at the pool and then going to a good-bye party for some teachers from Son's school. As the pain persisted, I tried to figure out why I was feeling this way. I worry that it's just self-indulgent wallowing, given that I understand intellectually what has happened.
But when I see all these women whose husbands haven't lied and been unfaithful, broken vows and explicit agreements, and hurt and betrayed them, like an automatic response I wonder what is it about me that I ended with a husband who did these things. I feel isolated and separate from the rest of the world to whom these things don't happen.
The intellectual response is that it had nothing to do with me. True in a very important sense. But in another sense it had a lot to do with me. No matter the finer distinctions, husband lied to me, betrayed to me, broke our vows and agreements, was physically intimate with dozens of other women who had exactly the characteristics I fear that I lack. My deepest insecurities are born out in the women he chose. How would he feel if for years I lied and betrayed him and had sex with men that confirmed his deepest insecurities???????
The thought that came into my head at one point was "I've always felt so loved in my life." That was when I realized that part of the source of this kind of lingering pain is that I feel unloved. He says he loves me and intellectually I understand, believe etc...but I FEEL unloved. Being lied to, betrayed, disrespected, disregarded, not considered, forced to share my intimate life with so many other women does not feel loving. Intellectually I understand, believe, and all of that. But there is a part of me that can't be put into words that will take time to heal no matter what plausible explanations are offered and how much intellectual understanding I have. There is an undefinable level at which I've been damaged or compromised or something like that, and no amount of intellectualizing will ease that pain, quell my fears or dis empower the reactivated insecurities. I think I just need time - weeks, months, years - to FEEL loved again.
Friday, August 17, 2007
Better after therapy
Yesterday in our extra couples therapy session we talked about something that had been in the back of my mind. The person who has betrayed me is the person who has been there the whole time. The person I thought I was in a relationship was never there as I thought he was. I was having a relationship with this person, but I just didn't know certain things about him, for example that he was capable of betraying me in this way. I didn't know how much pain he carried around, how adversely he'd been affected by his childhood (he's always said he wasn't affected by his parents' divorce,) and how hard he found it to express himself. But this person, who seems so strange and scary now, is the person who treated me so lovingly and kindly, who was an amazing partner in raising our son for the last 5 1/2 years, who rubbed my feet, who brought me flowers, cast me in all his plays, encouraged me to live a life I love. In other words, the man I thought I was with and the man I'm with now are not two different people; rather I'm getting to know more about the man I married, and he's actually more vulnerable and authentic with me now that I see his darkness as well as his magnificence.
That doesn't excuse ANYTHING, and I still need to continue to establish BOUNDARIES, but it begins to help me reconcile my shattered reality. It gives some comfort.
So, aside from the white-noise level of general pain and anxiety I always feel now (invasive thoughts still invade regularly) today is better than the past few days.
More therapy on Saturday, and then a week off while we head to the east cost for a week to visit his family. It may be a difficult visit for him. My job will be to listen and bring love, but not fix or solve or suggest. I will practice listening so that he is heard.
That doesn't excuse ANYTHING, and I still need to continue to establish BOUNDARIES, but it begins to help me reconcile my shattered reality. It gives some comfort.
So, aside from the white-noise level of general pain and anxiety I always feel now (invasive thoughts still invade regularly) today is better than the past few days.
More therapy on Saturday, and then a week off while we head to the east cost for a week to visit his family. It may be a difficult visit for him. My job will be to listen and bring love, but not fix or solve or suggest. I will practice listening so that he is heard.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Feeling deeply lonely
I'm feeling deeply lonely because I'm having all these feelings of pain and fear and anxiety, and the person with whom I had the deepest connection in my life is gone. I feel like he's suddenly dead. And in his place, in my bed, in my life is this other person who I'm not sure I know or can trust. He looks and seems like the man who was here before, but he has a whole different, scary aspect to him that the other man didn't. He's lied and hurt me and I don't know how to know he won't do it again. I don't know the person who did this to me, because the person I knew before would never have done that. And this person has brought me this whole unwelcome history that I now have to carry with me for the rest of my life. A history that makes me sick and nauseous every time I think of it. I'm angry because I don't know if I'll ever be able to have a healthy relationship again. I'm afraid I'll never have deep trust or deep connection with another man, because if this relationship that seemed so true and so real and was built slowly over 2 decades has turned out this way, how can I ever hope to have anything good. I don't have another 20 years to fall in love and create a love and a life with someone else. But I don't understand how to expect or want anything else. Tonight I feel lonely and full of despair. It seems like my best chance at happiness is to learn to trust this man, because somewhere in there may really be the man I used to know. But I'm really afraid it may not be possible. I'm afraid there will always be something between us that prevents the deep connection I felt before. But, as I've said in earlier posts, perhaps all that was an illusion anyway, because I don't know if he felt that connected. Actually, I'm pretty sure he felt more connected to me than anyone else in his life. So he probably felt as connected to me as he possibly could given his conscious and unconscious beliefs about himself and the world.
I think I've been drinking too much. But sometimes it hurts so much I just want to stop the pain a bit. Today I had a couple shots of coffee flavored vodka and a glass of red wine. Last night, only a glass of wine. The night before about 3 shots of vodka. But the days before that probably not much, since we didn't have anything in the house. I've stopped buying scotch as that was definitely going too fast. The last thing I want to do to myself and my son is turn into an alcoholic.
Thank god we moved up couples therapy to tomorrow night. I'm freaking out a bit I think. Can't focus at work either, and the cracks are beginning to show there. I need some relief.
I think I've been drinking too much. But sometimes it hurts so much I just want to stop the pain a bit. Today I had a couple shots of coffee flavored vodka and a glass of red wine. Last night, only a glass of wine. The night before about 3 shots of vodka. But the days before that probably not much, since we didn't have anything in the house. I've stopped buying scotch as that was definitely going too fast. The last thing I want to do to myself and my son is turn into an alcoholic.
Thank god we moved up couples therapy to tomorrow night. I'm freaking out a bit I think. Can't focus at work either, and the cracks are beginning to show there. I need some relief.
Struggling today
I keep getting waves of sadness about the number of other people Husband has been intimate with. Intercourse with at least 25 prostitutes and lap dances, blow jobs and hand jobs with countless others. I feel like the intimate relationship between us has been so violated by these acts. Although I realize there are many sex addicts whose activites dwarf those of my husband, I'm finding it very hard to fit all of this into my understanding of my life.
Overwhelmed again by sadness
After my SAnon meeting last night I was feeling sad. Didn't know why. Went to see my friend Sophie as I often do on Tuesday nights. After I left I was overcome by sadness and that burning pain that feels like it's never going to go away when it settles in.
I still can't believe this is my life now. I thought I had this most beautiful, special, once-in-a-lifetime human connection with Husband, and now instead I have this painful history of Husband betraying my deepest trust by having secret sexual experiences with countless women, and I had nothing to do with creating this history but now it's mine forever and there's no way for me to get away from the pain it brings. I feel disconnected at a fundmental level from Husband, and I'm afriad that dispite everything we're both doing I'll never have such a deep connected feeling to him again, and that is a source of even deeper pain and grief.
I really felt as though I was getting past these moments of intense pain. I wonder how long these feelings will persist. I wish this was over, that we could go back in time and make it never happen so I could have the relationship I thought I had. I know that's fantasy, and doesn't address the pain and suffering Husband was going through while I was so blissful. But that's what my crazy mind wants.
I still can't believe this is my life now. I thought I had this most beautiful, special, once-in-a-lifetime human connection with Husband, and now instead I have this painful history of Husband betraying my deepest trust by having secret sexual experiences with countless women, and I had nothing to do with creating this history but now it's mine forever and there's no way for me to get away from the pain it brings. I feel disconnected at a fundmental level from Husband, and I'm afriad that dispite everything we're both doing I'll never have such a deep connected feeling to him again, and that is a source of even deeper pain and grief.
I really felt as though I was getting past these moments of intense pain. I wonder how long these feelings will persist. I wish this was over, that we could go back in time and make it never happen so I could have the relationship I thought I had. I know that's fantasy, and doesn't address the pain and suffering Husband was going through while I was so blissful. But that's what my crazy mind wants.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
