Shame researcher, Brené Brown, hits the nail on the head: “When the people we love or with whom we have a deep connection stop caring, stop paying attention, stop investing and fighting for the relationship, trust begins to slip away and hurt starts seeping in.”
For many of us who have suffered the insufferable intimate betrayal of our partner; the days, weeks and months following the revelation of that betrayal may be even worse than the initial blow. “How could you” becomes “how come you aren’t…”
Why aren’t you doing everything in your power to help heal this unfair, caustic choice? Why are you placing your comfort and escape of the consequences of your behavior over the horrendous harm you have caused the person you claim to love?
One might expect there to be a season of shock, even on the part of the betrayer. There is a certain expectation that it will take time (and effort) on the part of the betrayer to learn his ‘why’, to absorb the human consequences to his partner’s sense of safety, lovability and worth and to practice the vital salve of empathy.
When there is not growth in this direction. When the betraying partner continues to avoid the work, avoid intimate engagement with his hurt partner, avoid listening to the pain his choice(s) has heaped upon her head; the worst form of betrayal ensues.
The betrayal of disengagement.
What can make this covert betrayal so much more dangerous than the original infraction of an affair, is that we can’t point specifically to the source of our pain — there’s no event, no obvious evidence of brokenness, no moment in time when the world falls apart. It is an insidious drip, drip, drip of emotional abandonment.
This abandonment can look like his consistent attendance at 12 step meetings, exercise, tv watching, without equal or greater investment in you and your relationship.The activities of relational abandonment do not have to be of anything objectionable. They may, and often are, the stuff of accolade. Who can object to 12 step attendance, or the self care of exercise? A bit of relaxation in front of the tv is balm to a long day.
The hurt seeps in when these activities blot out the sun of relational repair and caring.
“But I’m doing so much. Nothing I do is ever enough for you.”
Such complaints from the betrayer open the floodgates to partner shame and the self doubt such proclamations cause.Are we unreasonable to want, nay expect, caring and relational repair in equal and great quantities? Why aren’t we worth the time and dedication? Are we being unreasonable or are we just hurt?
If the betrayer would have inflicted bodily harm in an auto accident caused by his drinking or carelessness, would we not expect triage to demand our wounds be tended to before the deeper work as to why he was drinking or careless?
Of course. Everyday humanity prioritizes the most severely wounded. Why can’t or doesn’t our betraying spouse run to our aid with every minute and hour of their day until we are stabilized and then in generous measure for the healing process that most often takes years?
Shame, you say? They are ashamed of their behaviors and thus continue to make it about them as they self wound through negative internal dialogue of how awful a person they really are.
And so there is a season of shame to be expected, perhaps even tolerated.At the scene of an auto accident the person wallowing in shame would either be pushed aside to be admonished, perhaps arrested by law enforcement, or shaken into sense “Snap out of it—there’s a woman bleeding out here!!”.Or isolated from the wounded to not cause her further harm.
Does it come down to the moral fiber and character of the betraying partner? Would not a caring person tend to the wounded? Makes sense.
But addiction and/or the narcissistic tendencies do not make sense. The mental gymnastics required to commit intimate betrayal make such humane actions unlikely. The betrayer has long worked a program of self deception and distortion to twist reality into a place where their actions were deemed acceptable, if not inevitable to them.They have justified themselves into the oblivion of self centeredness and moral disengagement intimate betrayal portrays.
Snap out of It!!!
Oh that those words would work. Oh that the pleas for kindness, caring, accountability and reliability were met with seriousness and action.When the people we love or with whom we have a deep connection stop caring, stop paying attention, stop investing and fighting for the relationship, it is not only trust that slips away. So too does love.
How long do we wait? How long do we tolerate the intolerable behavior of disengagement? We are worth so much better, so much more. Truth.
No one can answer that question, but the wounded person.This respect for self, autonomy of choice does nothing to lighten the pain of being abandoned every minute, day, week and month, by a partner making his behavior and time spent about him with little to no regard for his partner.
When you find out that your spouse’s idea of sex is one hundred eighty degrees different from yours, it is certainly a shock. Especially when he has been portraying himself as a committed husband.
When you choose a man to marry in full willingness to dedicate your time and body to him and you discover his idea of time spent and sex engaged in do not include exclusivity or commitment, your world shatters like a crystal goblet on concrete.
The universe feels suddenly hollow as if the substance you relied upon was not real. The stuff of your character and beliefs are not his.Your ‘marriage’ is hollow.
To be willing to engage sexually with a woman outside of marriage, your husband has behaved in a way that says ‘sex is undertaken with a willing partner, someone convenient, agreeable, and or duped.’ Given the opportunity, your husband has sex. This is bathed in entitlement, misogyny and, because done in secret, deceit.It is diametrically opposed to the marriage vows he freely undertook with you. Your expectations were to be treated as special and sacred where the bedroom is concerned. Your marriage bed was meant to be between you and him.
And you probably lived a life believing he actually lived up to those vows. You probably thought you were indeed special and sacred to him. That you and your body would be looked upon as exclusive and protected from all assault. That you were the apple of his eye. That he would go to great lengths to protect the sanctity of you and your special exclusive relationship.
So when he decides to obtain erectile help in the form of prescription without talking to you about it, you might well think he is still on the path of opportunity, should it present itself. Or that he may be planning on grooming opportunity with another. Or, given the best benefit of the doubt, he is living in make-believe that your marital relationship is something it no longer is—safe, full of trust and bearing the fruits of emotional intimacy. He is living yet again in the fantasy of believing that because you once upon a time made vows of exclusivity, that they remain intact despite his obvious dereliction of them and you. That you are willing to undertake the most personal of activities a woman can offer a man…full access to her body.
It communicates that you are in the place of being okay with sex without a committed, emotionally vulnerable and trusting relationship. That his sexual menu was then, and seems now, to still be one of convenience and opportunity, not of commitment and emotional intimacy. In other words—sex is a fantasy world to pretend you have a commitment and a meaningful relational intimacy when you don’t, with the goal of sexual release and ‘high’/ false intimacy.
What level of hypocrisy and abuse does this rise to?
“What are you thinking?” is the sentence that comes immediately to mind.
Evidently there is very little thinking involved. There is knee jerk impulsivity to assume you are willing and available to engage in a sacred exclusive act for what?? ‘fun’? Sexual release? a good time? To what level of assumption does this rise? Has your moral compass somehow shifted to be his? What??
I am at a loss of words to convey the depravity of this thinking/this assumption.
In what universe do we live that we are expected to dance to the fantasies of our spouse? Are we objects to control and to which he has access? We certainly are not the stuff of sacred, protected and beloved.
Oh hollow universe that has placed us in the path of such a delusional man.
May we continue to fill our universe to the brim by following our own integrity, our character intact, living in self care– even if our heart has been shattered on the rocks of disappointment.
Five and a half years (and four days shy of what would have been our forty third wedding anniversary–had I actually been in a real marriage) from my unfaithful spouse’s confession of a twenty seven year affair and I still hurt down in the core of me. The anger and devastation still live there, uninvited and despite all the self care and self value deeply felt. It still is beyond my ability to understand how someone who swore undying love and protection could inflict the cruelest actions against everything promised as sacred. How could I have been such a transactional commodity?
That said, I happily report that this does not occupy my days anymore. I am mostly free of the soul withering effects of betrayal. And yet the reality of it is never too far away. The reality of it will always live deep inside me.
cruel
adjective. Willfully or knowingly causing pain or distress to others.
Enjoying the pain or distress of others.
Causing or marked by great pain or distress.
How can a betrayed spouse define their betrayer as abusive or cruel?
abusive
adjective. Using, containing, or characterized by harshly or coarsely insulting language.
Treating badly or injuriously; mistreating, especially physically.
Wrongly used; corrupt.
Let’s unpack why.
“Willfully or knowingly causing pain or distress to others.”
Many have said that betraying one’s spouse is not meant to hurt them. ‘What she doesn’t know won’t hurt her’. This is delusional thinking and a lie of the highest degree. A betrayer knows what they are doing is wrong and harmful or they would not hide it. They know they are harming their marriage by nullifying it. They know their expenditure of time, effort, emotions, money on another subtracts that time, effort, emotion and money from their spouse, family, and home. Their actions and emotional investment are spent on another.
As limited human beings how we invest our time is where our heart will be. It demonstrates commitment to another that directly denies and disinvests in the primary relationship. That investment leaves the faithful spouse to live life alone—physically, emotionally, financially, during all episodes of betrayal including the incessant thinking/planning/daydreaming involved in betrayal. The betrayer is not present for enormous amounts of time, if only emotionally. They are actively building a house of cards making their spouse the villain in contributing to the necessity of its construction.
The distress suffered by the betrayed, even and especially when they are unaware of the secret life their spouse is carrying on, is of the deepest most destructive kind. The lying and gaslighting involved in all affairs has the effect of detaching the betrayed’s gut from reality. The betrayed knows their spouse is not invested in their relationship in a healthy way. Even if the betrayer is showering the spouse with guilt gifts, the lie behind them is felt in the saccharine disingenuousness. The gut feel that the giving has strings attached. In my personal case, it was not guilt gifts, rather it was withdrawal of presence, both physical and emotional. Our relationship grew increasingly surface with day to day interactions all about responsibilities or planning of some future vacation. Bait and switch. Don’t pay attention to the man behind the curtain.
“Distress” is an understatement. I was a taken for granted, overworked, over-giving betrayed spouse who was secretly resented for investing so much time and energy in keeping the home and kids afloat. Catch 22. I was blamed for being tired and not responsive enough sexually. What woman responds to sexual demands and score keeping/shaming? CRUEL.
“Enjoying the pain or distress of others.”
As the ‘other’, I do not believe my spouse was Snidely Whiplash cartoon villain, wringing his hands in delight as I struggled to run the home. Not that kind of sadistic villain. He DID however enjoy the freedom of time my distress afforded him. He escaped home and responsibilities with his mistress both physically and emotionally—-enjoying that escape at my expense. So yes, he was gaining enjoyment from my pain and distress.
… “causing or marked by great pain or distress.”
I was greatly pained and distressed at my inability to measure up to my spouse’s sexual expectations. I thought it must be something wrong with me. So much so that I sought medical advise as well as read about low libido. The greatest cruelty of all is distorting another person’s reality. Not only was I made to feel at fault and shamed for it, I was kept track of on a calendar as to my performance or lack thereof. I was made an object of sexual gratification rather than a living, breathing human with emotions and needs of my own. I was emotionally and physically abandoned for another, yet held to account for not performing adequately often sexually. CRUEL & ABUSIVE
“Using, containing, or characterized by harshly or coarsely insulting language.”
Not to my face, but to his mistress and his brother who was in on the charade—I was to blame for his actions. I was a sexual disappointment not fulfilling his estimation of ‘enough’. I was made a performance value, not a loved wife.
“Treating badly or injuriously; mistreating, especially physically.”
But he never laid a hand on me in anger—no bruises no abuse? Even the most naive of us know this is not true. Emotional abuse is every bit as harmful and often much longer lasting than bruises. Sleeping with another, de facto exposes the unwitting spouse to potential sexually transmitted disease—some fatal. That is playing Russian Roulette with the betrayed’s life and wellbeing. ABUSIVE.
How did he treat me badly? His withdrawal physically and emotionally – secretly blaming me for it.
“Wrongly used; corrupt.”
If gaslighting, manipulating another’s reality and using them to escape responsibilities is not a corruption of marriage vows and basic human dignity, what is?
Am I the abuse victim? Not anymore. I was. It is forever realty I was cruelly abused and betrayed.
What was I really? A naive, over trusting, over giving, accepting far too little, spouse who was, yes, taken advantage of for those qualities.
There are few realities as diametrically opposed as Lust and Love.
Lust seeks self gratification, caring little for anything or anyone else.
Love gives joyfully and without expectation of return.
There is something strangely soothing about these realities. It puts into perspective how shallow the behaviors of lust were in my, and other’s, unfaithful partners. It casts a new light on the self absorbed, devoid of meaning place my unfaithful was as he pursued his drug of choice–lust. The negative impact of the suffocation of love is truly pitiful. Lust rots the very core of human growth and meaning, replacing it with toxic self centeredness. Lust requires the luster look for fault in his legitimate partner in order to enable emotional distance and fuel the justifications necessary to betray.
Lust consumes the mind of the luster, building in focus and desire until quenched. It cares not for anything other than the use of the other’s body as a selfish tool towards physical self gratification. The soul of the lust object is seldom considered, of interest or concern. What an empty pursuit, squelching all growth.
Love revels in the other with a passionate and considerate affection and care that expresses itself in the desire to give to and protect the beloved. Love longs to be with the beloved for the depth and beauty of the other’s soul – a never ending mystery to explore. Love honors, cherishes and protects the beloved with a deep concern mirrored equally only in care for self. Love thy beloved as thyself.
Lust delights in short lived conceited passion that burns hot and consumes the attention of the luster to the exclusion of all positive loving pursuits. Lust kills love. It smothers any spark or ember of thoughtful caring for the individual, leaving the luster focused on one thing—self gratification.
Love grows in the many paths of exploration into the complexities of the beloved. Love thirsts, not for momentary physical release, rather for deep connection.
Lust is centered in the physical, the corporeal.
Love adores the body and the soul.
It is only when I truly felt these deep truths that I could gain a new perspective.
I feel sorrow for the time and wasted energy my unfaithful spent in such a shallow destructive pursuit. Thing is, lust not only destroys love, it destroys the genuine self esteem and growth of the luster.
How sad is that.
I grieve not only for all the years lost that we might have had a genuine love, I grieve for a life wasted in such self consumption. I truly did not know the person I married. He hid himself from me and from himself. He betrayed his own life and growth before and during all the days, weeks, months and years of his acting out betrayals. His self destruction is greater than all the devastation wrought upon me. What a pitiable waste.
And still he fears to feel the weight of this reality. I can’t say I blame him. Who would want to face so much wasted life? And yet it is necessary for him to grieve the loss of his true self—to the black hole of lust. He must recognize and feel the truth of all the losses in order to grieve them and move on. I pray he will be able to accomplish this personally terrifying work so he might salvage the balance of his life to turn away from the meaningless, destructive shallowness of lust—and toward the light of love. The salvation of love. The blessings and growth and joy of genuine caring for others.
For so much of my life I worked myself toward the edge of exhaustion trying to be the best me I could be. A big part of that ‘work’ was taking care of my family. Subsets of that were childcare, home maintenance, bringing in extra income, yard maintenance and advocating for my learning challenged son.
Whew. Just listing those is tiring. When I look back I can clearly see that I was trying to have it all, do it all and thus, feel accomplished/needed. My purpose in life was to be an excellent me. Any sacrifices, I thought to be natural to the season of life in which I found myself. Being a mom meant sacrificing. Surely I would have years after they flew the nest to explore ‘me’.
I am now in that empty nest place and indeed I did for a time, explore the new career of writing. It was a true joy, now morphed into blog writing rather than novel creation. And yes, there are many hours to spend in self care and the search for purpose. Sometimes too many.
It seems life is often like that. Feast or famine. I remember Oprah talking about the lie of ‘you can have it all’. Her conclusion was that each of us can have it all, just not all at once. There is deep wisdom in that. Yes, I could be a great mother, before I took on outside work. There simply are not enough hours in the day nor enough energy for any one person to do it all and have it all at the same time, if that means undertaking motherhood (a 24/7 job) and full time employment. It took my intense investment in becoming a published author post empty nest that highlighted the truth of this.
I did the best I could during those years I mothered and worked. Most women who find themselves in this place, do the same. Truth is, doing either of those full time undertakings is doable and enough to occupy any human. Doing both requires sacrificing somewhere. Usually that means streamline-ing, prioritizing, and/or allowing your selfcare to languish. Balance is doable just so far before the balancing act requires something to give. ‘Good enough’ becomes vital. Imperfection.
Balance. The goal of a life well lived. Even now in my Covid quarantine isolation, I spend my days balancing housework with gardening, with exercise, with painting, with reading, with cooking etc. The blessing of retirement/quarantine is, by its nature, the ability for balance without great sacrifice of any of the undertakings needed or desired.
SO what does this all have to do with betrayal trauma? Oh so much. Most women feel the pressure to be and do it all. Often their marriage is called upon to absorb some reduction of time and attention– a sacrifice in service of the unbalanceable demands of motherhood, home maintenance and employment. If you are fortunate enough to be married to a healthy spouse, they are ‘on the page’ with the sacrifices required during this lengthy season of life. They realize and accept that they will not get the same amount of uninterrupted focus as they did B.C. (before children), not what they can anticipate in empty nest years. They communicate the inevitable difficulties and strains of this season and work with their spouse to mitigate the challenges as best they can. Teamwork. Balance.
An unhealthy spouse who builds resentment, has unrealistic expectations and creates unenforceable rules about what their spouse should or should not be doing —all without discussion–can and does set himself up to betray his values. Add in a measure of entitlement formed from a less-than ideal childhood and you have the perfect storm for infidelity.
“Tale as old as time,” are the lyrics from Beauty of the Beast. In that story the ‘tale’ refers to boy meets girl. In the case of this article, I refer to the no-win set up of a stonewalling, quietly resentful spouse meets the season of high demand inherent in childrearing/working outside the home.
“You ‘never’ had sex with me”. (Notice the black and white thinking). If I’ve heard that excuse for taking on a mistress once, I’ve heard it hundreds of times. Entitlement. Silence. Unrealistic expectations unmitigated through communication, compromise or support. Wham-o.
Tale as old as time. Lives shattered. Hearts broken. Marriage destroyed.
All in pursuit of fun, fast and easy escape. Escape from reality. Raising a family requires compromise, sacrifice and intentional attention paid to the marriage. Anything less and someone, something suffers.
Now I am more than okay with being an imperfectionist. I have found it vital to my sanity, my contentment, my self care and my quality of life. “God grant me the serenity…” I crave, nay, I deserve serenity in this lifetime. Contentment. Purpose without burnout. And the energy to be relational too.
And so do you. Practice, not perfection. That is life. A life well lived.
In this thing called life we are all born innocent and unique. Experiences written on the immaculate slate of our purity. As years of sun leather and freckle our skin, so too does trauma assault our serenity.
We are malleable. We are resilient.
Society gives us all sorts of messages. Many of them are gender specific. Some uplift. Many burden.
I came ‘of age’ in the 1970’s. It was a time of cultural and political upheaval. For all the optimism, there was and is the underlying truth of human frailty and foibles. We live in a world of evil and good. Yet it has been my experience that good eventually prevails.
“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” – Martin Luther King jr.
Greater minds than mine recognize the magnificence of the human experiment. Just as our democratic political system is deeply flawed, so to has it proven to be the salvation of multitudes.
In the 1970’s and 80’s the womens liberation movement was in full swing. As is true of many movements, the pendulum of its truths required such intensity to shift the arc toward change, unforeseen and unwanted consequences ensued. Young women of that generation were told they could and should have it all.
A perfume commercial of the era summed it up:
I found myself into the position of being able to have it all but not the time or energy to accomplish it all.
“What do you do?” A familiar party icebreaker of the day.
“I’m a homemaker/mother.”
During that era the facial expression such a reply engendered was often one of disappointment, pity and negative judgement. “Oh (you are JUST a homemaker)” Such conversations were often cut short. The person asking, swam in the cultural times and either saw a woman who stayed home as a simpleton, unmotivated, unqualified to do anything of real importance OR lazy/entitled.
As the years passed and reality of juggling home and outside employment became apparent, such wise women as Oprah Winfrey stated the truth. “You can have it all…just not all at once.” Even that message has taken decades to sink in. Many still don’t believe it.
So I went back to school. Already having earned a B.A. and teaching credential, I found the profession had changed and now required a C.L.A.D. certificate in addition to the aforementioned university work. (Cross Cultural, Language and Academic Development) in order to be considered employable as a public school teacher. I gained the status of ‘having it all’.
As my kids were young I’d run an in home daycare and then taught preschool. Both these pursuits brought in minimum wage or less. I wanted to make my university degree mean something–to assure my father (who footed much of the expense) AND the cultural expectations to bd good enough. I wanted to earn my way AND be a world class mother homemaker.
“You can have it all…just not all at once.” Even though I heard and appreciated that ground breaking message, society did not support it.
I became a human doing. Relaxation and rest faded into the rear view mirror of the times and the stage in life. The mother of children knows she is depleting her internal resources. I knew it. And yet I fell for the story. A truly good woman can do it all.
I became my roles. I ran a home, raised the kids, earned that CLAD and a full time job as a public school teacher. I did it all— except it cost me. Yes, we now had some expendable income (another legacy of the women’s movement–rising prices forcing many women into the workforce to survive). We finally achieved a lifelong dream of mine–to take my kids to experience their European roots before they left the nest. I knew most probably they would not have the perspective enhancing experience of travel until their kids grew up without a similar cost to their mental, emotional and physical health. I wanted more for my kids–a dream of most all parents.
What did it cost for me to survive the tsunamie of that stage of life? Personal exhaustion. Plummeting libido. Less “Us” time. Notice I said ‘less’, not none. Something has to give when children arrive. Usually both parents realize this reality and accept less couples time for the season of childrearing. They consider themselves on the same team and carve out as much together time as they can both manage. Usually (and especially in my era) that required the man to do more at home. Not a little bit more. A chunk more. Balance the domestic scales. Step in when his wife was exhausted by life’s pressures, as she did when his calendar demanded it.
I was not blessed with a healthy husband. Unrecognized by me, I married an addict. A man with deep childhood abandonment wounds and an alcoholic father. A man who felt entitled for the universe to pay him back for all the losses of childhood. A man who did not share his challenges, ask for or give help. Once he began his twenty-seven year affair, both his real and fantasy lives went behind a mask. He could not afford to be truthful and transparent with anyone–and keep his addiction. Unhealthy coping mechanisms built and solidified over the years until he thought he wanted to leave and escape into fantasy 24/7.
Reality smacked him in the face and he realized all he had to lose. He is still afraid to face his grief and so he maintains a role of hiding behind a mask of pretend and silence. This is a continuation and escalation of his abandonment of feeling his emotions or sharing them–thus abandoning me emotionally and physically. He chose false praise and sexual adoration over working on and nourishing the real love in his marriage. What seemed fun fast and easy was actually just another unhealthy coping mechanism which devastated his real marriage, and me. Thus is the way of addiction. Hurt people hurt people. Pain that is not transformed will be transmitted. Secrets and hiding what he considered unlovable–him.
Oh the webs we weave when first we learn how to deceive. First self-deception and betrayal of all he holds true in favor of believing no one could love him as he is. Play the role of the loving committed husband; the attentive hyper sexual lover to his infidelity accomplice. Both lies. Both masks. Both roles played in misguided belief they were the answer to his emotional pain and loss.
So I played the Enjoli perfume woman of the commercial and he played the good guy, Santa dad. Both of us believing a delusion.
Are all roles unhealthy? Carried to an extreme, yes. Played to self detriment, yes. Leaning on one role to the exclusion of balance, yes.
And so he blamed me for not being sexual enough and I resented him for not being present emotionally or physically enough. Expectation gone awry turned into pain and detachment. So sad. So sadly common.
The truth is none of us is a role. None of us is the combination of the roles we play–even the helpful healthy ones. We are all unique and uniquely precious. Even with the best of intentions, roleplaying can be our undoing. Balanced and flexible roles are our happiness and success. Sharing our roles, our struggles, doubts and fears–success. Share the burdens and the joys. Always a work in progress—never perfection.
Participate in roles. They are not you. They are tools to accomplish goals, not life sentences. You are worthy of love, good enough and lovable apart from your roles.
Isiaisis the hurricane loved to blow wind and rain. He took great pleasure in watching the trees bend, the grass of the fields sway. Staying out over the ocean can become monotonous even if the waves, the sea are his life and family. Even though the sea supports his life, feeding and caring for him so he has the ability, the energy to visit the shore and all the thrills that await there.
“I can’t wait to caress the shore, dive deep inland and witness my power. It’s so much fun”.
Many have witnessed what happens when the hurricane comes ashore. If that hurricane could decide to come ashore, Isiaisis would be full of glee in anticipation. “Nothing bad will happen. The people onshore know how to take care of themselves. I provide them life giving rain for their plants and drinking. They will be fine on their own.”
Even though it is known far and wide by all the people the potential destruction of a hurricane, Isiaisis denied it would harm anyone or anything. And before the people’s ability to forecast such a storm, they were well and truly blindsided. No warning. No ability to prepare.
No matter how vital and strong the people, they can not protect themselves against most of the destructive power of the storm. They are witness to the dark clouds and rain, but before forecasting, had NO idea what was coming. Thye lived in the (approaching) rain, the inconvenience of the downpours.
But Isiaisis was hell bent on the shore and all the fun there. He knew he had the potential of destruction but he told himself nothing would come of it. His rain would indeed help. So he came ashore dashing one town and one state after another–leaving a path of destruction far and wide. Some of the people lost their roofs, some their homes, some their lives. The newspapers would talk about him for many days, weeks, months and even years to come. He would be the topic of much discussion. Human experts on how to prepare for a hurricane, how to limit damage would careful dissect the harm he caused. They would learn how to better recover and protect.
“Isiaisis” was on the tongue of the people. Recovery was not about Isiaisis, even though the storm was what caused the damage. Recovery of the people, their homes and their lives was not about the storm. It was about tender care, attention to all the details of healing. PRepart=ation and protection learned for the future.
Did anyone miss the storm Isiasis?
“Good riddance”
Did the people still desire the benefits of the rain? The soft caress of a warm summer storm?
YES.
They needed to attend to the damage of the rain and wind gone wild first. The storm’s name was used often. It was the topic. The damage had to be the focus.
And what became of Isiaisis? He blew up the cost, weakened, gained humility when he saw the havoc his ‘fun’ had caused upon the people and the land. And he turned around, regained water and power from the sea. He looked carefully at all the damage and learned what his ‘fun’ had cost. He wept over the pain his choices had caused. He returned to the land in warm summer rains, soft caresses and care for the land and the people. He brought healing and rebuilt trust over many many months with the land and the people because they saw through his loving, helping actions that the storm can protect and care and love.
The people will always be wary of the dark clouds and wind. They will need the loving reassurance and actions of the caring Isiasis who has changed his heart to never again lash the shore in ‘fun’. He would never again look upon such actions as ‘fun’. No pleasure would the memories bring. Deep regret and sadness, embarassment and grief now power Isiaisis to tend to all he had destroyed–and for the rest of his days when the people talked about him, he would know it was the fear, the trauma and the damage of which they spoke–not him– the rain and wind when he returned in love and repair.
The land and the people tended far and wide to the destruction his choices caused, but it was not about him, the rain and wind. It was about tending to the pain. The wind and the rain of Isiaisis needed to do their own reflection and change, for the people had zero power over his healing. Isiaisis knew he needed to keep his destructive power, even a whisper or hint of it, far away from the people while they healed. It was not about him and his pain of regret, his difficulty in learning how to rein in his power. It HAD to be about the damage, the loving tending to repair in soft, gentle, understanding reassuring actions of life poured down on all he’d destroyed.
It indeed was not about him. __________________________________
A man and his wife drove along winding roads toward a celebratory dinner for the beautiful new car the wife had bought for him. She’d spent many hours working to pay for the car, but wanted to give it to the husband because it was the model and make of his dreams. She’d lovingly sacrificed to make the car possible.
“Slow down,” the wife request as he sped along the curves. “We want to arrive in one piece.”
But (And) the man thought nothing would happen. He knew this road well. He thought his wife was too careful–a stick in the mud. So he didn’t listen to his wife’s pleas.
Well you know what happened. He drove that car with his wife off the road, down into a deep gorge, rolling over and over.
The man shook his head, took fast inventory of his body, pushed and crawled out the shattered window. A painful gash at his temple stung and his body ached with bruises.
He looked back at the wreckage of his beautiful fun dream.
“Oh shit,” he realized his wife was still inside the wreckage.
He wanted nothing but to run away. How could he ever face her again? He’d ruined what she’d so carefully worked to give him. He’d not listened to the danger he knew his careless driving might cause. He’d willfully and selfishly driven with the wind in his hair, laughing at the power and speed. Should he dare to look at his wife? He didn’t even want to know what his actions had caused. He sat on the side of the hill, aching head in his hands until the ambulance arrived. He watched as the EMT’s extracted the bloodied, broken body of his wife. One of the EMT’s checked him out. He rode in the ambulance with his wife as the EMT’s tended to her, their expression belying the seriousness of her condition. He waited for hours in the waiting room, his head bandaged and aching.
“Oh my poor head. It hurts. I was so stupid to drive so fast. Now I’ll never have that beautiful car. We’ll never enjoy that special celebratory meal at that expensive precious restaurant we’d always dreamed of enjoying together.” Nearly all his thoughts and energy grieved his losses, thought about his pain.
The doctors told him to go home because his wife would be in intensive care for a long time. The man used their suggestion to justify not visiting his wife. In truth he did not want to see her pain, her brokenness, the pain in her eyes he knew his poor choices had caused. He stayed away for month as his wife recovered in a recovery facility. The doctors told him of the process his wife was required to go through, the pain, the long hours of rehabilitation.
“Don’t you want to visit your wife?” a nurse asked.
“I have to go to my traumatic brain injury classes”, he said. “I’ll come see her in the evening while she is sleeping. I don’t want to cause her any more pain in seeing me, who caused this accident.” He made the accident all about him and his pain, his process.
He did visit a few times when his wife was asleep. He could barely look at her. He felt so ashamed and guilty. One time when she woke, she cried.
” I hurt so bad,” she said. “But(AND) I am working hard to recover. I am making progress.”
“That’s good,” he said, filled with self hatred. All he could think about was his shame. He touched his head and winced.. He thought about how he was driving his old clunker again and his beautiful fun new car was in the junkyard. He hated having to go to TBI classes and the headaches he still had. He was so focused on himself he could not really ‘see’ his wife’s pain, let alone tend to her pain.
He made the inevitable consequences of his ‘fun’ driving all about him and his painful consequences. “If she’d just not bugged me about my driving, I wouldn’t have had the accident. I could have kept driving and having speedy fun long after our celebration dinner. I would still be on the winding roads having fun.”
The wife came home. The man brought he meals as she healed more. He continued to go to his TBI classes, did his self care fun and exercises, watched tv–escaped from the reality of his recovering wife. Even when he heard her moan or cry at night, he turned over and went to sleep in his bed. He could no longer sleep next to her–it was too painful for her while her wounds healed.
He held it against her that he had to sleep in the extra room. He blamed her injuries, knew she needed to heal, but still felt deprived of his own bed and his beautiful fun new car.
She wanted to talk about the car, his driving, the accident. She wanted to understand how the accident happened even though she knew it was his carelessness that lent to it. She needed to know what curve, what blind spot, what speed, what mechanical factors if any had led to this horrible lifechanging crash. She felt she may never be comfortable driving with him again. Surely not unless and until he had dug deep to understand everything that led to the crash. Not until he learned and choose to tend to her, care for her and her recovery, be there for her in the years of painful recovery. The physical pain may never allow her to sleep in the same bed with him. The emotional pain and fear may never allow her to feel comfortable with him driving especially with her in the car. She may never be able to earn enough to buy another new car. He might not either. They’d have to do with the old clunker. Or someday get a better used car, but (and) never the shiny special one.
“Poor me. I’ll never have that fun new car. She will never be able to sleep next to me. She will have pain in her eyes and her body for years, maybe forever. It’s too hard to face her and the consequences of the crash. But (and) I don’t want people to judge me as a bad guy so I will do a little to look like I am helping. But (and) I will escape whenever I can from her and our reality.”
And he made it all about him, his pain, consequences and discomfort in seeing and living with his broken wife.
When she wanted to talk about the accident, to understand, to make sure it would never happen again by hearing his understanding of her pain and the reasons the accident happened–he stayed silent.
He made it all about him and his pain.
“How is this not about me?” He asked when his wife kept on and on about the crash. “I caused the crash.” Oh woah is me. You talk about me and my driving all the time. You talk about all the specifics of what led to the crash. It is all about me and my fuck up.”
“The topic is you and the consequences of your choices. The pain and life changes, yes. You and your choices are the topic”, she said. But (and) the reality is I need to heal, you need to heal and if we are ever going to get along, WE need to heal. That will take a long time and lots of dissection of the why’s the how’s the where’s, the what’s. We MUST understand so this will never happen again and so your driving and attitude will be changed through action. So I can see and experience your change of heart and actions for a LONG time.. So YES, you are the topic. HEALING and CHANGE through reparative action is the focus, the action.
You see this is not about you. It is about healing the pain, the consequences– and understanding, a change in behavior and heart. Repair to me, to you and to us. It is about the critically wounded who will take much longer to heal–ME. And the dead relationship that is traumatized. Your name will be the topic, your behavior will be the topic–the healing will be the focus, the recipient of the care and love and patience.”
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
The definition of significant rings familiar. However, in the study of statistics ‘Significant’ has a color of meaning that I find.. well, significant.
significant
adjective
Important; of consequence. Having or expressing a meaning.
Statistics – of or relating to observations that are unlikely to occur by chance and that therefore indicate a systematic cause.
The significance of the choice to have an affair can not be understated. Until and unless the unfaithful recognizes what led them to make those choices, they are at risk of a repeat performance. Humans must dig deep to understand themselves. Self reflection is vital to self management and self control.
When a person’s thinking blossoms into stories they tell themselves that are not cross checked with reality; when a person assumes, he or she crosses into the land of minimization, justification, villianization of others and generally what 12 step programs refer to as “stink’in think’in”. The unfaithful often have placed significance into their own thought processes without benefit of adjusting their lens to reflect 20/20 reality. In short, they fool themselves–self delusion.
“unlikely to occur by chance and that therefore indicate a systematic cause.”
Their choices did not occur ‘by chance’. They have a systematic cause that must be unearthed to recognize it, clarify and adjust it to defend against its repetition.
What can we say about significance when it relates to the thinking and actions of the betrayed? So many of us are blindsided by our partner’s betrayal. Rightly so. Not many people expect the most beloved and presumably trustworthy person in their life to destroy the contract, the agreement to support, honor and cherish.
What I am about to say may tweak you the wrong way, make you mad or, at first blush– just seem w-r-o-n-g.
I found my identity in the wrong things.
WHAT???
I hear you thinking: “Is it wrong to be committed to my spouse, family, home and career?
Whoa. I did not say anything about commitment. I said ‘identity’. My significance.
identity
the sense of self, providing sameness and continuity in personality over time and sometimes disturbed in mental illnesses.
Many of us have such a huge commitment to our spouse, family and home that it becomes our identity. We feel a-fronted should someone criticize how we are parenting or judge our housekeeping or our marital relationship. We take on an inordinate share of our worthiness and place it outside our healthy circle of control. At the end of the day we have zero control over other person’s choices–even our children and spouse. Truth be told, we have little control over anything or anyone other than ourself.
For those of us who find our sense of worth in the success of our marriage, our children, our career, the state of our house—we are bound to be disappointed. We may, in fact, live in a nearly chronic state of low level disappointment.
There is no such thing as perfection. No such thing as reliable control (and therefore responsibility) for other person’s behaviors. It is not realistic to think that we do. “Mental illness?”, though? Perhaps if taken too extreme. We risk slipping into codependence at best.
Out of love we misplace our value, our identity, sometimes our very significance on the perceived health of our spouse, children, home, and/or career. We put the golden eggs of our self esteem and value in other people, places and things. We exert unenforceable rules and demands, whether stated or imagined, onto imperfect, limited person’s and things. We set ourselves up for disappointment.
When we judge our day, our week or our life on how well others outside our circle of control are behaving, and place the value of our happiness upon them, we will eventually, inevitably be disappointed, ney, devastated should they betray us.
I misplaced so very much of my identity, my value, my worth on how well I was doing in my primary relationships; how successful those relationship were in the lens of my upbringing and cultural influences. Did my life measure up to what I deserved because I gave so much and tried so hard to be a great mom, wife and employee? Surely everyone else who professed to love me– owed me the same. They would act in love toward me, support me, value me and feed into my identity of good mom, wife and employee.
Nuts.
It just doesn’t work that way. What any given person invests in is seldom returned in full. Even when there are occasions of happiness, of support and investment of love toward us, it is imperfect and limited–as everyone and all situations are. If my identity is as a valued, respected and loved wife, mother and employee, I WILL be bruised and disappointed when not treated as such.
In the case of infidelity, I will be devastated. My perceived value as that great wife, mother, employee is going down the drain when the plug is pulled. When the rug of my expectations is yanked from beneath me the ‘unfairness’ of my expectation of faithfulness and love–shattered, I am in peril of being shot down. I feel devalued if not worthless. All my love and work and giving did not yield what I told myself I deserved, earned. And why didn’t I see it coming? Is there something wrong with me that this atrocity should have been cast upon me? My perfect world is shattered. My expectation of growing old with the spouse I loved always and forever at my side in loving support—obliterated. “Plan A” into which I invested all my golden eggs has proven to be untrustworthy, flawed and… *gasp* uncontrollable.
I am now in the land of destroyed plan A–hoisted into a plan B I neither planned for, expected or deserved. Where do I go from here? The rubble of plan A is all around me and my outlook on life has taken a severe beating. From where do I find my strength, my value?
For those of faith, a higher power is the one reliable answer. From a secular perspective, another safety net must be constructed or drawn upon. If we have put all our worth and identity in our marriage, we are starting from ground zero. For those of us who have spread our identity out to include a broad spectrum of persons, places, accomplishments, our task will have some support so vital to heal. Grief needs to be witnessed. Many of our unfaithful are too deep in shame or ‘the fog’ to help us. If our very identity, our significance has been placed in them, we are up that cliche creek without a paddle.
What we all desire is to be loved. When someone we love lets us down in the most profound way and we do not have a strong relationship with our personal value apart from persons and things, we are bound to flounder. The first step of the 12 step recovery programs reminds us that we are powerless over _______________. Fill in the blank. Whether it be alcohol, overeating, drugs or other people the truth of it rings loud and clear.
God
Grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change—
The courage to change the things I can (myself, my attitude, my personal circle of control–ME!)
A man who would betray his wife is the ‘bad guy’, right?
“I wear the chain I forged in life,” replied the Ghost. “I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?” Scrooge trembled more and more. “Or would you know,” pursued the Ghost, “the weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself? It was full as heavy and as long as this, seven Christmas Eves ago. You have laboured on it since. It is a ponderous chain!”
A guy who works hard at a lucrative career affording his family the niceties of life and a great vacation each year—goes to church on Sunday and votes in every election. Good guy—right?
You may have just been caught up in the same sort of black and white shallow judgementalism that pervades most addicts thinking. And the thought patterns that lead to destructive choices, such as betrayal.
No one is born ‘bad’, as most of culture defines it. We are molded through our upbringing mostly by people who have likewise been molded–to have strengths and weaknesses, good and bad qualities. And you know what? Most of this modeling has no nefarious intent. It is the result of the unexamined life. The failure of generation after generation to do the difficult work of realization, responsibility and change.
It takes courage and fortitude to break old patterns that are ingrained from childhood. Old, rusty, ponderous chains. Often these patterns were survival mechanisms that allowed us to adapt to scary or difficult situations when we were powerless youngsters. Coping mechanisms that did the job as kids, but when carried on into adulthood reek havoc with selfhood and relationships.
A little boy who is sent to military school run by nuns, ostensibly to gain a foothold on the path to college by parents who struggled to pay for this schooling, but could not see their way to making any other choice when overwhelmed by multiple siblings, one of whom was deaf, and an alcoholic dad. Bad people? Hey, they sent their seven year old to boarding school where his tender heart was terrified by a system meant to mold young boys into men. There he learned to hide and lie and cheat to survive. Fly under the radar. Don’t get caught or reprimanded. Bad kid?
No matter the good intent of the parents. No matter the innocent child turned to manipulative survival skills. No matter. The intent to pass on destructive life coping skills was not there, yet it happened…worked like a charm.
“The best laid plans of mice and men.”
Where was the introspection of the parents when they made those decisions, convincing themselves that discipline and structure would be to their eldest son’s advantage? Where? When Dr Spock was touting ‘spare the rod and spoil the child’– and ‘let them cry it out’? Where was the language of the heart that could have looked into the innocent eyes of the eldest of four and seen a young boy who needed his family so much more than a structured college bound education in isolation? How else could that tender heart have taken it, but to feel rejected and punished. A human doing, not a human being any longer. Straighten up and fly right, boy.
We are not born to lie and cheat, steal and break vows. We are carefully taught –mostly by people who are justifying their choices by convincing themselves they are doing what’s best. Until and unless they figure otherwise, the legacy goes on. From grandfather to father to son the story continues. Until and unless someone can look deeply into self and reality to say ‘no more’.
How do you break the cycle of learned self-deception?
Why? via the opposite. Truth. Vulnerability. Hard conversations. Courage like one has never before had to muster.
Breaking the code of silence.
Breaking the chains of addiction’s mandate. Secrets and silence.
Breaking away from passive, looking the other way existence.
Unabashedly sharing one’s heart and the pain overflowing from all the mistaken choices made and enforced in one’s own childhood. Grieving innocence lost. All those years missed in the loving bosom of an imperfect, but caring family. The message internalized: ‘I am not worth loving.’
And so the same story, different scenery and timeframe, but the same broken story is repeated again and again.
Christine Renewed 