A conversation between a woman who's husband cheated (NOT me, ya'll, although I can relate, obviously) and a most-insightful man whose wife cheated. Both couples are attempting to piece the marriage back together, and are having some success. The woman speaks first:
But something still feels wrong.
Yeah. I think it will for a long time. And I think that's a good sign. It means things are different. You don't recognize them, which means there's a level of openness and honesty there that exposes the void and the various destructive attitudes and behaviors both walk-away and left-behind spouses used to fill that void. It's really unpleasant but has to be dealt with. Which is why the "patience and time" mantra is so important despite how frustrating it is. There's nothing much to go back to, there's only forward, but the new stuff isn't there yet, and we only get it by building and doing good things right now.
I need to feel that my husband loves me and is happy that he decided to stay in our marriage.
No offense, but I think it's what you WANT. What you NEED is the truth no matter what. But once you've got the truth, you can better decide what you want and how to get it. And the way to get it is to give it, but give it only when you're strong, because the trick I think is to get strong (independent, detached) but then come back and love them out of our strength because we WANT to. The trick is not making this a test that they can't pass. I probably reacted to my situation 90% wrong and 10% right, and one of the things I did early on (first few days) was to realize that this wasn't about me losing my wife. I had already "lost" her. What I needed to do was "find" myself again, and what I wanted to do was get her back, get us back in a new way. Now, I'm a Christian so for me the only way to "find" myself is to put myself in a right relationship with God. And of course to do that I needed to seek forgiveness for my failures, for my past. In the end, this is really simply about deciding to turn our eyes to the future and walk together whether we always feel like it or not. It's interesting to me that we freak out over our walk-away spouse acting upon their feelings for another person despite their commitment to us...then when they come back, we likewise allow our feelings to dictate our behavior and ruin whatever progress is there. That's normal, I realize, and I think the first sign that our walk-away spouse is serious about things is that they forgive us for that, just as we are forgiving them for what they've done. But it can't go on like that indefinitely and expect the marriage to be healed and rebuilt, just like a marriage can't be healed while an affair is ongoing. That's why I think it's so necessary to let go of the past. Because of our history with our spouses we have all the expectations for reassurance, etc. But the walk-away spouse can't give that cause they don't have it. THEY BAILED ON US! Right or wrong, they may not have much to give anymore, but if they're WILLING to build something new, if we're willing to let go of the past once it's been sufficiently dealt with, then it's all about that. [Name deleted] rightly points out that in the end, assuming our walk-away spouse are willing to recommit 100% and do their part, it's going to be our game to lose. We either just get over it or we don't. There's a great scene from the movie "The Mission" with Robert DeNiro and Jeremy Irons where Irons is a Jesuit missionary in South America in the 1800s(?) and Robert DeNiro is a slave trader. Irons is there to educate and convert the natives and DeNiro is there to round them up and ship them out. DeNiro ends up being converted himself and taking vows. As penance for all the crimes he committed against the natives, they bind up all his armor and weapons in a sack and tie it to his waist, then make him climb a really steep rock mountain with all that weighing him down. It is, of course, an outward symbol of his repentance. He struggles toward the top and when he's finally there and can't seem to get any farther, when it almost seems like the bag of armor is going to make him fall to his death, a native draws his knife and cuts the rope binding the armor to DeNiro's waist. That's forgiveness. Sooner or later that's what we have to do for our walk-away spouses who are repentant and willing to climb back up the mountain with us. And the interesting thing is that by releasing them we're really releasing ourselves, too. In the end, that's what love really is. So far in my life, this is really the hardest thing I've ever had to do because I had to really change who I'd become, just like our walk-away spouses have to. Who I am is partially what got me in this mess, and it's so much easier not to change, just walk away, which I now understand is why so many people do just that only to find themselves in a similar mess later on down the road.
