Hello darkness, my old friend
I’ve come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence

I have lived many months suffering the effects of my Unfaithful’s silence. He has built a stonewall between us to protect himself from feeling the shame and guilt of his betrayals. “This is sadly normal”, I am told again and again by those who make their profession in helping marriages recover from the atrocity of infidelity.

I reached the end of my rope in June. I told my unfaithful that I could not go on living under the same roof with him if he were not to talk to me daily. I need to hear that he is processing. That he is working on recognizing his thinking patterns that led him to betray me, his family and everything he professes to love. “Without this,” I said, “I have no way to rebuild safety. I have no way of knowing if you are unraveling the stories you have told yourself all these years, that have enabled your justification.”

I need this.

There is no moving forward in relationship without.

Beginning the day after communicating this to him, he has daily filled out the tool recommended in “Worthy of Her Trust” by Jason Martinkus and Stephen Arterburn. This tool is wonderful, but any tool requires investment and practice to make profitable to the cause in which it was created.

And my UH stumbled. In spite of all the work we have done in the Retrovaille program with emotions, and his individual counseling, he has trouble stating feelings. He still tends to lean on creating newspaper headlines with no story to follow. He makes statements.

That said, he has kept at it. He is moving ever closer to demonstrating actual feelings. The hard shell of his defenses has some cracks. His voice cracks every now and again as he reads his own words. He still has an easier time empathizing with sad news stories or television commercials, but he is trying.

Why has it taken four years four months for him to do this, even though I have clearly stated it as a need? Fear. He is afraid of facing these feelings–mine and his. He is afraid of plunging into the depths of grief. Actually not an unreasonable fear, yet it has been so overblown in his mind as to become paralyzing.

And paralysis does no one any good.

I think he may actually be seeing this. Through his working the program(s), he is seeing that he does not perish with the acknowledgement of costs and pain. He has slid back down the slippery slope into making it about him and his shame a couple times. But he recognizes it now and is willing to come back and try again.

What caused this change, you ask? I believe it was my willingness to move on alone. And he knew it. I was dead serious.

How sad that it took coming to walking out on a forty three year relationship for him to realize what he was about to lose. Too many addicts have to reach their bottom. Some even go further into the pit than my UH has. They end up in the streets, penniless, sick and broken.

I am still reticent to trust. Reticent to believe this is permanent change toward willingness to communicate. It simply has not been long enough for me to feel safe.

We are beginning a class through Bloom for Women and Path for Men “Rebuilding Trust, Rebuilding Your Relationship”. Online, 12 weeks. So many other attempts have been made at therapy, workshops, groups, classes. So many failures as he was so limited in his investment. Doing the bare minimum is not the stuff of relational healing. Even when both partners are all in, this path is difficult with no guartenees of success for the relationship.

I will heal. I am well on my way to personal healing. Most of my days are good. My self care is top notch. I revel in the joy of my home, garden, dogs, reading, learning, painting, baking. I am me again. More me than I have been in many years of struggling in a relationship without full investment from my ‘partner’. I have struggled too long. I am tired. I will struggle no longer. I want to be me. I like me.

I choose to enjoy my life regardless of how this class or our relationship turns out. I hope we can be friends. I hope we can grow close. I hope he turns over a new leaf of proactiveness, responsibility and reliability. I am not holding my breath or counting on it. Not anymore.

I will be okay on my own. I am okay on my own. *Pat myself on the back* Well done Christine.

“Fools, ” said I, “You do not know
Silence, like a cancer, grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you”
But my words, like silent raindrops fell
And echoed in the wells, of silence

Silence kills authentic intimacy. When silence feels safer, intimacy dies. Authentic relationship dies.

There has been too much silence.