Rebuilding Marriage After Infidelity Community Group
A community for those who have been through the heartbreak of infidelity and decided to stay with their partner and try to re-build the relationship.
At the end of this month it will be one year since D-Day. He is completely remorseful and bears the guilt of his infidelity. Maybe it's because of the one year mark. Maybe it's because he's learning more about himself in his therapy sessions... But lately he has been beside himself. For example I caught him crying while looking at a picture of our family, bawling crying. He said he hates himself. He hates that he cheated and what he had become during those months of indiscretion. Part of me feels sad, and another part says "hell yes you deserve to feel this way." Our marriage counselor says I need to be more compassionate. But how can i do that when I still feel enraged at the thought of them together. When does forgiveness happen?
Your H was crying? Good. Did you feel the pain of his actions? Of course you did. Shouldn't he?
Your MC can go jump off a cliff. Why should you feel compassion for a guy who consciously made such bad decisions? Makes no sense to me.
I would take such opportunities to drive home your points. When your H is weak, feeling remorseful, that is the time to drive home the pain his actions caused you!
He hates himself. If my H ever said that I would say: I understand. There have been many days I have hated you as well. What you did was horrible.
It impacted so many people, and caused them pain as well. And then I would walk away.
There will be no real change until he owns his own shit. Let him. Your MC wants you to spare him. I do not understand that.
I would speak up and tell your H and the MC that you still hurt. You need your H to apologize to you every day. The OW should apologize to you.
We both know that won't happen, but you can still say it.
Do not let them try to cut you down. That is what is happening now.
Just say you still hurt. Put on your sad face and just stare at them both.
If they say something is wrong with you, you need to get over it - that is a line I keep getting from my H, I just tell him he wounded me to the depths of my very existence. I question every day who he really is. I fight the impulse to cheat on him, just so he can feel a morsel of the pain he caused me. I just mind fuck him right back.
Truth is I am fine now. Yes, I do hurt when I think about him and the OW, so I try not to think about them. I hope he hurts. He should. I can promise you, these cheaters did not give us any thought when they did what they did.
And just think about all the lies, the effort they put into their affairs. All that energy could have been put into us and into our relationships.
Don't think for one minute we don't have scars from the wounds inflicted from these cheaters. Your feelings are valid. Do not let this MC and your H
diminish your feelings or make you feel guilty. You didn't do anything. You were on the receiving end.
He did this ... not me!
The next time you’re told to have “compassion” tell them both that you’ll have just as much compassion as your husband had for you when he was exposing you to STDs and breaking your heart and your trust, which is ZERO compassion. ***drops the mic*****
At the same time if trying to build a new relationship you do need to find a way to help a REFORMING cheater grow.
I would not participate in a pity party but rather encourage them to use their pain as motivation to continue growing so that they can become better people and resist making poor decisions in the future.
You need to be goal orientated but at the same time not compromise your integrity.
Cheaters by nature are poor at handling personal suffering as cheating usually is some type of poor coping mechanism for internal strife. You surely do not want to hand hold them but point them in the right direction instead so they learn how to process emotions properly, just as the therapist should be doing.