Society wants to sweep everything under the rug. I say Hell no to gaslighting! and yes to expressing and talking about you feelings till you blue in the face if that makes you heal your way.

I so agree with you here. DDay was 2 years and 3 months ago ish, divorce was final about a year (wow, I remember dday date but not the date the divorce was final- weird!) And I still need support occasionally. It's not like I'm mired in grief everyday or anything, don't get me wrong. But I still deal with issues here and there, Something like this changes you. It changes how you view the world. It's funny, but even when you know the stats, you never think it will happen to YOU. That someone who you care about so much, is supposed to care about you just as much- would be ABLE to do this.

I'm just glad you didn't buy into the plan to just let it go. You feel what you feel, and no amount of others devaluing your feelings will change that!

My CS told my parents that I suspected he was cheating and I must be unbalanced to think that. When I came to them and told them I was thinking of leaving, instead of supporting me they told me to wait awhile to see if that's what I really wanted. Then when I caught him with Ow in my bed, they moved me out. Not a word has been spoken since.

Allora - thank you so much for posting the link to that article!! That is EXACTLY what I was dealing with last night and didn't know there was even a name for it!

My H and I are working on rebuilding after his A, and last night when he was at work I was texting him about how I was anxious for him to come home so we could "get busy" so to speak. Then, trying to be funny and coy, he started teasing about how he might be too tired or he might just play video games instead... in the end I was frustrated, angry, and crying, because withholding sex for those reasons was something he did during the A and it sort of "triggered" a flood of emotions again. His response was that I was acting crazy and emotional and needed to learn how to take a joke. Ugh!! I would never dream of making a joke related to a sore memory for him, maybe it's something reserved for clueless men to do!

I've even had a friend on here tell me I was paranoid because I stay away from dating sites. She has been doing this sort of thing quite a bit and I suspose I will have to call her on it.

Yes, my ex did that too, one of the reasons he's the ex. Your feelings should be acknowledged not dismissed like you don't have the right to be heard.

OMG this is such crap!!!
You know, there is something positive about being cheated on more than once, because the second time around I can see through bullshit even with eye patches on . When a person is truly remorseful for their affair and fully own up to what they did, they would NEVER say those words to you, because they try really hard to understand what you are feeling, suck it up to you and keep you happy so you don't dump their butt!

My stbx-husband, has done EVERYTHING to make it up to me. unfortunately after years of bad marriage everything was dead. Cheating was just closure to a bad marriage.
Every single day he lived to see that I was feeling better. He wanted to know if i was happy, sad, tired, angry and he would do whatever it took to fix it.

He sent me flowers, he went to counseling, he did all the housework, took the kids out, cooked, brought me coffee and lunch to work, took care of me when i was sick, he was always trying to touch me, he always asked how I was doing, he would say i'm sorry no as many times as i wanted to hear it, he told me he loved me and that i was the best woman he has ever met and his life and he would do anything in this world to see me happy again. He read self-help books to learn how to be a better husband , he even told me he was willing to let me be with whoever i wanted as long as we could still be together at home. There was absolutely no doubt in my mind he would never cheat on me again

This is what a person does when they are truly sorry.

Everything else is fake, self-serving act to make yourself look better.
I am really sorry you got hurt like this.
(((hug))))

i hear it all the time, even now and we are a year from Dday.

I had dealt with the same and was told by my CS and her mother and her dad that I needed to just get over it. The past is the past, you can't move forward by dwelling. I never had the chance to heal because that's all that was being bashed in my head. It's like she was getting over and wanted everything to be swept under and that it was a mistake and not a big deal when it was. I was screaming at everyone why is this about me and me getting over it to benefit her. Even her therapist was like that making it all too easy for her. Nobody really holding her fully accountable for this behavior and finding ways to blame me and telling me what kind of husband I wasn't being. I wasn't perfect no but by no means did I deserve to be cheated on and she was no saint so of course it came off as straight bull to me. We as BSs have our part but we also have a right to feel and be hurt and not told to just get over what wasn't our fault or choice in the first place.

Society is not equipped to deal with unplesant emotions and feelings. I think I felt this the most going through the divorce. I have a group of three girlfriends I see once a week and get coffee with. We catch up on life- it's usually very casual conversation. During my divorce, I talked about how stressed I was, how I was gaining so much weight, and how hurt I was while we were out. My "friends" looked at me like I was crazy, and they had absolutely zero understanding of how I could be so upset about a relationship that was over. Never mind that my ex husband and I were together for a long time, we lost our child and went through that together, etc... Like just leaving is supposed to make things not hurt anymore.

I was honestly pissed off during counseling anyway. My ex husband was the one with the problem, so why did I need to go and sit in counseling with him? I felt like I was working to soften the blow for him at my expense. But the counselor was similar to yours- she told me I needed to drop things when they were upsetting my husband. "He's not going to feel safe being honest with you if you keep getting mad at him. You need to work on your attitude and pick your battles. It doesn't matter when the affair started in the long run- the point is that you two are together and the affair is over." Um...no. The point is if I can't get a f*cking straight answer to my questions out of the lying hole in his face, he might as well still be having an affair because I can't trust a darn word he has to say anyway, and it's not rebuilding. And no...I WILL feel hurt with every lie I discover as the truth comes trickling out slowly. Because what he did was a terrible, cold-hearted, cruel thing and it's painful. End of the f-ing day!

Thank you for posting this. I completely agree.

How many times did I hear that crap?

Like, every day for 20 years of marriage.

Since the divorce, no one is allowed to say that crap to me.

L~

Oh! Add to that list...

'What?! Are you pmsing again????'

Yeah, bite me, Loser.

L~

I had someone write in a post to forget what Trisha said. Totally made light of what I had written because it didn't go along with her way of thinking. I'm still smarting over that one and wondering how to handle it.

I heard it in my marriage. If he didn't want to deal with a problem it was "get rid of it". I think most of the family wondered how long it would be before he "got rid of us". His get rid of it was his way of not wanting to help with problems with the farm, my job or the children. Putting down my words and efforts.

Cognitive dissonance


From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia









The Fox and the Grapes by Aesop. When the fox fails to reach the grapes, he decides he does not want them after all. This is an example of adaptive preference formation, which serves to reduce cognitive dissonance.[1]
Cognitive dissonance is a discomfort caused by holding conflicting ideas simultaneously. The theory of cognitive dissonance proposes that people have a motivational drive to reduce dissonance. They do this by changing their attitudes, beliefs, and actions.[2] Dissonance is also reduced by justifying, blaming, and denying. The phrase was coined by Leon Festinger in his 1956 book When Prophecy Fails, which chronicled the followers of a UFO cult as reality clashed with their fervent beliefs.[3][4] It is one of the most influential and extensively studied theories in social psychology. A closely related term, cognitive disequilibrium, was coined by Jean Piaget to refer to the experience of a discrepancy between something new and something already known or believed.

Experience can clash with expectations, as, for example, with buyer's remorse following the purchase of an expensive item. In a state of dissonance, people may feel surprise,[2] dread, guilt, anger, or embarrassment. People are biased to think of their choices as correct, despite any contrary evidence. This bias gives dissonance theory its predictive power, shedding light on otherwise puzzling irrational and destructive behavior.

A classical example of this idea (and the origin of the expression "sour grapes") is expressed in the fable The Fox and the Grapes by Aesop (ca. 620564 BCE). In the story, a fox sees some high-hanging grapes and wishes to eat them. When the fox is unable to think of a way to reach them, he surmises that the grapes are probably not worth eating, as they must not be ripe or that they are sour. This example follows a pattern: one desires something, finds it unattainable, and reduces one's dissonance by criticizing it. Jon Elster calls this pattern "adaptive preference formation."[1]

Cheaters try and reconcile conflicting choices and emotions. Those phrases you mentioned are what they say when they do not want to think about what they have done, specifically what they have done to us. Genuine remorse can not be faked and betrayed spouses should accept no substitutes. I don't think society is dismissive of emotions, just the people we marry...especially after caught cheating...

MrMalaise - this explains why cheaters are dismissive, but what about friends? Less than a month after finding out about the affair, one of my closest friends told me, "You're going to just have to get over it." What was her excuse?

A CS will undoubtedly lie, dismiss, excuse, etc. but what about friends and family? "Stop being such a drama queen," "Don't you think you're overreacting?" "Shouldn't you be over this by now?" These are all comments that I've personally heard or else close friends have heard after being betrayed by their spouse. We're made to feel "crazy" even by those who (by my reckoning) should be the most supportive.

At least a CS has reason to deflect, dismiss, and excuse. I have a hard time understanding why others would be so dismissive of the pain, anger, frustration, embarrassment, and general emotional destruction that takes place when one has been so thoroughly betrayed.

Well, damn. I guess I missed that memo!

Good to know. I'll just set aside all of my angst and slap on a smile. Perhaps I can get some pills for that. Brave New World, anyone?