I totally agree with you Rman. I have said the same thing so many times, you don't know how many couples I've known and thought they had the perfect marriage and then find out it's far from including my own.

Birk, sometimes facebook totally unravels me, all my so married-up so-perfect friends. Underneath, though, I think most people are dealing with some pain. Too bad, in our culture, that it cannot be acknowledged.

I think of Japan as so repressed. And yet.

I once caused a fender-bender there, and needed some Japanese change to make a phone call from the pay phone, to my then-husband, on the base. I went into a ... japanese 7-11 of sorts with my paper yen to get some coins, as ruddy and tear-streaked as I get (FUGLY!)

Before the old women could give the incoherent danger-to-society-American-girl some change, she held both my hands in hers, and shook her head down, and I swear, she felt my damn pain.

I heard this REALLY cool editorial piece at Christmastime this year, some monk bashing the new Christmas card culture.

He said Christmas cards used to have the holy family on the front. Jesus did not marry, he hung out with God, and with sinners.

Now, we worship the nuclear family - if you don't have one to put on your Christmas card, well, then just don't send one. If you don't have the newsy ode to the picket fence to include, then please keep your head down and out of the way of perfect-family-worship-season.

WWJD?

I put aside nearly everything that made me who I was, to chase after the "picket fence family dream".

Then my wife leaves me for a man that was like the old me.

Read that a few times.
There is a lesson there.

seconding what AJ said.

To thine own self be true.

Man, this hits home! It happened behind closed doors. Why we don't tell anyone, friends, family, church members? I think alot of that is self preservation. It is very hard to say "my spouse does x, y and z to me." Those aren't easy words to say outloud. Logically it sounds like it would be, but once you are in that situation it is entirely different.

And you have to figure, this person you love is tearing you down until you think you don't deserve any better. And they tell you that no one will believe you anyways. They are right, no one does. They are telling you that YOU are the problem...

Wow, this is something I think about all the time too. From the outside we looked like the picture perfect family. Everyone thought he was this stand up straight laced soldier in uniform....WRONG! People wouldnt believe me if I told them what went on behind closed doors, but he did end up shocking the hell out of a lot of people who dropped him as a friend when they found out the truth. I even have in writing...."spousal abuses" a reprimand... from his Chain of Command. Im sure the judge will like to see that.

Yes, Z is right..the truth will set us free. I had to take along hard look at myself and the part i played...I didnt stand up for myself and didnt walk away when I should have and Im paying dearly for it now.

it always makes me wonder when I see other couples.....so many keep silent, and the ones who speak are rarely taken seriously. Sad.

I loved that movie. I can't watch it now though I get too emotional.

i felt like we did have a perfect marriage, she hid it all from me
maybe i'll achieve a perfect singledom instead..

Our marriage was allways obviously flawed. I wished I could hide it from people, but he was abusive infront of my family and friends. Everyone close to me disliked him pretty fast. I can imagine it must be scary for a parent to see their daughter being threatend by a 6 foot 7 huge guy. I not only put myself through hell, but my family and friends too.
I remember when my parents had just gotten divorced, they hada some friends that were so cute together, allways holding hands. I thought I wanted my marriage to be like theirs, and was happy to have an example that marriage could work... a couple months later they divorced! She was having an affair with her yoga teacher!

I think this is something that is fundamentally wrong with how relationships are run now a days. If you lie to the public then is becomes easier to lie to yourself. Living life in community and with your spouse is heathiest if you can practice authenticity. But we've been brought up to believe image is everything. Who has it helped??? Did it help us to watch out parents model this?? Wouldn't it be more teaching if we knew that marriages struggle from time to time and that gets imbedded into our expectations and then we see our parents work it out and we learn that it's WORK to remain successfully married. In my minded this is a great gift we can bestow on our children....give them a leg up so they could possibly learn from our mistakes. No person or marriage is perfect and it's ok for people to see this....but even more important is for people to learn how it's worked through. We are mostly authentic with our real selves on this board...isn't that part of the real success of this place ....why it's so addictive... Because we arn't playing lies we are being ourselves and getting validated for it.


My thought anyway

I look at couples too- they seem happy. I wonder what their secret is, I wonder why I am not entitled to join the secret club. I knew something was wrong- behind closed doors. I didn't realize that he was behind another door that was closed away from me. I am now starting to understand all the mixed messages he sent. Explains why I was so angry, hurt, confused and scared all the time. Now I am just trying to separate what was my stuff, what was his and move on.

I think most of us lived this "lie"--we put on the front that our marriages were perfect when we probably deep down knew they were in trouble. Those rose-colored glasses wouldn't let us acknowledge what was truly there.

I've often said to people that my ex cheating was in some ways the best thing that could have happened to me. It forced me to take the blinders off and really look at the life I was living, and when I did, I din't like what I saw: a verbally/emotionally abusive man who treated me like crap, who lied, cheated, abused marijuana, and treated his family with disrespect.

So glad I'm out of that now.

Rman, please lean on your family and friends. They will help you through this.

Hugs!

same here Anna... (to response #5)

Rman,
I did a similar thing and an even worse thing. First, i did not tell my parents, because I did not want them to worry or say "I told you so". Second, I told his parents and of course they turned it around on me and took their son's side....blood is thicker than water.
But once I told my parents, the flood gates just opened and to my surprise, my mom, whom I'd have thought would surely be negative, gave me nothing but support!
Nothing can take the pain you feel away, but when someone lends an ear, it helps your heart feel better....even if only temporarily, but sometimes that's what we need. Especially when we're having those "peak" trauma moments. you know, the ones where your heart hurts and you think you just want to quit work, life in general and curl into a ball in a corner somewhere and just wish you would die........and go to heaven.
I don't know you, but I can tell you that I love you as someone who is going through what I am going through.

Rman, my counselor told me that more than 50% of marriages end in divorce (as stated in earlier post).

He went on to say that, of the rest, less than 50% are experiencing peace and contentment.

I was stunned. But then I thought about the couples that I know. I could see signs of the trouble. If I could see it, what else was going on that I could not see?

I would like to be part of the 25% enjoying peace and contentment in married life. (Kimmeee, I have to add this to my bucket list.)

Food for thought.
RR99