Okay, peeps. There was much emotion in the comments of my Dealbreakers post. While I love and appreciate ya'll getting my back about the bedtime and intimacy issues, not everything is so black and white. I plan to address all those comments in a post tonight or tomorrow, but for now let's enjoy some more insight from the same man in this post whose life post-his wife's affair has really been amazing. Read, grab a little hope, discuss. News at eleven.
It seems to me that failure to succeed in saving a marriage can usually come in two flavors. First, that the walk-away spouse is already too far gone/committed to leaving the marriage. The second, and from my perspective, by far the most common, is the fact that the left-behind spouse is as much a walk-away as the walk-away spouse is...let me explain.
So many times we see people decrying what their spouses did to them and how they just can't seem to get past it, to forgive them their trespasses. They keep saying "But she broke her vows. She f--ked another man" as if that somehow gives then exclusive dominion over the choice to leave the marriage. It's almost like the walk-away spouse flipped a switch, starting an inevitable process that ends in divorce, or at least that's how many left-behind spouses seem to portray their feelings about the situation. They feel that things are irreparable when in fact they are not.
The simple, inescapable fact is that for most, and I stress MOST walk-away spouses, the end of the marriage is at least as justified (and thus the affair) or MORE justified due to the months/years of "broken" vows THEY feel WE broke. Remember, the one about sleeping with another man/woman is not the only vow exchanged although many of us would like to think it is, or at least the most important of them. Many left-behind spouses think it is the most important but when you stack two or three of them together, say loving, honoring, cherishing, in good times and bad, etc. then that one about forsaking all others seems to be out-gunned from the perspective of the walk-away spouse. All of a sudden, for the walk-away spouse, forsaking doesn't seem so bad when you feel unloved, un-cherished and not honored in the least, let alone respected.
Sure, there are your cheaters who cheat just because they can, and for the left-behind spouses of those exceptions to the rule, I doubt anything will be of much help. For the rest, the marriage saving techniques we talk about and try to practice COULD be the difference between two walk-away spouses walking away from each other (because when a left-behind spouse gives up on the marriage, in essence not living up to that vow of "for better or worse", they become a walk-away too) and two people, having made mistakes working toward saving something that was once worth everything in the world to each of them.
I thought of all this when I was shooting a wedding over the weekend and for the 7-8th time in the last two months, I witnessed two people exchanging vows. I heard how each vow seemed to carry weight, and how as each one was said, the bride cried more and more, the groom smiled more and more. Each vow was a piece in their marital puzzle and I sincerely think they meant all of them, not just that one we talk most about here. I saw them ACT like they meant each one as the day went on, as he opened doors for her, as she held him and loved his embrace, as they fed each other at the reception and dedicated songs to one another. I saw such love, honor, cherishing and dedication from each of them that I realized that take any of those components away and it would be noticed by at least one of them, if not both. Something has been taken away in our marriages. We were hurt beyond our ability to express but we CANNOT forget that our spouses were hurt too, probably long before we were and whether we agree or not, they fully believe our transgressions of the pact of marriage, in the form of broken vows, gives them as much right to vacate the marriage as we think their infidelity does us. We are not right any more than they are, nor are we necessarily in more pain than they are. We are simply on the receiving end of the broken vow with the highest visibility and worst PR spin. Bottom line is that you either want to save your marriage or not. You can't control whether your spouse does or not. Obviously they cheated on you, or at least had an emotional affair at this point so they are leaning the other way. You either want to nudge them back your way or the other, it's your choice but please realize that at some point, it IS your choice to make. You HAVE to decide one way or the other because to make no decision, to commit to doing nothing is the worst affront to yourself you can make.
Lastly, and maybe most offensively, that part about them sleeping with another women/man being the deal breaker...sorry to be so rude/crude/heartless but I have never seen so many virgin brides/husbands in my life than those gathered here. Come on people, they slept with people before you and as long as they come back clean (as [name deleted] and others will tell you, get that part confirmed if you can), there really is no difference other than they promised they wouldn't do that after they married you...what did YOU promise them?
I can't say in the end if your efforts will be successful if you do all this stuff, but what I can say is that if you don't decide you want to save your marriage, and commit to doing whatever you can to achieve that goal, you won't be successful in doing so. Just remember this last thing; by choosing to save your marriage, you are really choosing to save yourself first.
