Spouses of Sexual Addicts. Community Group
**I am sorry this is an epic read, by i promise a worthy one.....................
"Mending A Shattered Heart"
A guide for partners of sex addicts....By Stephanie Carnes PH.d
Page 37- 45
Partners of sex addicts commonly demonstrate six stages of personal growth and development. These stages were initially developed by Dr Patrick Carnes. His research focused on sex addicts and their partners. He followed 99 partners of sex addicts over five years, as they progressed from finding out about the addiction to integration of this, in their lives.
These six stages will serve as a model to help guide you through a rough and necessary journey toward your healing and recovery. There are aspects of the stages that will best describe you today. But the stages are also meant to give you a practical set of steps involved in recovering from this crisis in your life. Most important, the stages help you see that you are not alone and that things can improve.
The Stages;
* The Developing Stage/ Pre-Discovery
* Crisis/ Decision/ Information
* Shock
* Grief/ Ambivalance
* Repair
* Growth
How you experience the stages of recovery will depend on many factors, including your personality, any medical or psychiatric diagnoses such as depression or addiction and past loses. If you have experienced losses or betrayals, or have suffered abuse or trauma in your background, you may find it more difficult to move through your stages.
You may find one stage more challenging than another, and you may even stay in one stage for a longer period of time. You may confront a new crisis or challenge which may pull you back into an earlier stage, such as triggering event like the anniversary of discovering your partners addiction or an old cell phone bill. These triggers can conjure up old feelings that you believed you had resolved. Similarly, you may see yourself vacillating between two or more stages at once.
1. Developing Stage
Is the period of time prior to knowing there was a problem or before discovery/ disclosure. You may find during this stage that you were either completely in the dark about the addiction, or had some suspicions but were not fully aware of the extent of your partners sexual acting out. During this stage, you might try to keep the peace in the home and hold an idealised view of the relationship.
If you were completely in the dark about the acting out, you may have had a hunch that something wasn't right with the addict. You likely experienced the unmanagability of the addiction in the other areas of your life, such as parenting, finances, work and intimacy. Because life was increasingly unmanageable, you may have found yourself attempting to control the other areas of your life, such as work, the children, the household etc.
Conversely, you may have known about certain aspects of the behaviour, like pornography use, but had no idea about the content of the sex acting out. When you accidently found suspicious info you might have overlooked it or believed the addicts convincing explanantions. Your gut instint may have been telling you one thing but your mind told you another. You sensed that something was wrong, however, you didn't have the info to back it up. Instead you questioned yourself and would give your partner the benefit of the doubt. This may have even resulted in you questioning your own self worth.
During this stage its common to tolerate behaviours that others woulf find intolerable. This may include verbal or physical abuse, lack of availablity, emotional distance, and a lack of functioning in many areas. You may have found yourself caretaking to a fault. Unconsciously, you may have minimised the addicts behaviours, and covered up for them by making excuses or concessions despite your better judgement. You may have found yourself defending the addict, and believeing the addicts words over his actions.
Core Characteristics;
* believing tall tales
* tolerating and normalising unacceptable behaviour from the addict
* self doubt, not trusting gut instincts
* having hunch something is not right
* seeking couples therapy
* unmanagability
* loss of values, morals, or beliefs deemed imporatnt to keep peace with your partner
2. The Crisis/ Decision Stage
During this stage, the facade of the secret life of the addict has been exposed, and reality and disillusionment is beginning to settle in. As in any life-altering crisi, how you respond has a lot to do with your personality and if you suffered from prior crisi in your life. This means that if you are someone who has experienced frequent loses, then you are apt to be more reactionary than someone who has not. The old responses get reactivated and add to your distress. In addition, the duration of the addicts behaviours, the types of behaviours engaged in, and length of time of the relationship will also influence how you respond to the fallout of discovery/disclosure.
If you are someone who withdrawls from crisis, you will find that you want to avoid knowing about the addict or sex addiction in general. You may act as though nothing has changed and try to keep up with your normal respomsibilities. Or if you are someone who is more action-oriented, you will find yourself seeking honesty and accountability from the addict, despite the fact that a part of you cannot trust what she or he says.
Due to broken trust, you may find yourself checking up on your partner or playing detective to determine if he or she is still lying and acting out. In fact, you may find yourself doing these behaviours when typically you are not someone who snoops or even wants to, but you find you are compelled to look for things. You may ruminate or obsess about the addict, his ir her whereabouts and seek to review the details of his or her behaviour repeatedly.
Much of this is in attempt to examine what happened and to come to terms with how you didn't figure out what your partner was up to before the discovery. You may be replaying the past in an attempt to capture how you could have prevented it from happening or confronted it sooner. All of these action steps are in response to being lied to and are a strategy to ward off the painful realities you are beginning to experience as a result of the betrayal.
Core Characteristics;
* a catalytic event occurs: you discover or are disclosed to about your partners duplicate behaviour.
* information gathering
* taking action/ making decisions, such as sending the sex addict to treatment or joining a 12 step group.
3. The Shock Stage
The crisis and shock stage often overlap, and for some may even happen simultaneously. During the crisis you learned about behaviours, gathered info, and perhaps responded by making decisions. Shock is how you responded emotionally and spiritually to the crisis confronting you.
The upheaval during the shock stage can last 6 months and at times years. Variables that predict how long you are in these two stages depend on your presponse to the crisis and how your partner does or doesn't progress in recovery. Feelings of betrayal are overwhelming and mistrust of the addict reaches its peak. You seek honesty and accountability from the addict even though he or she has become untrustworthy to you. Despite this, you want disclosure of all previously concealed info or believe there is more when you have been told that there isn't. You don't know what to believe and you suffer from a multitute of reactions.
You may have periods of numbness, contrasted by times of upheaval and conflict. At times, you may find it easier to avoid the feelings. However, despite this strategy, there are often many feelings lurking underneath the surface that arise during times of conflict such as anger, resentment, pain, shame, hostility, and hopelessness. You may be experiencing crying spells, depression, and even thoughts of suicide. You may begin to question your worth.
Understandably, you will have tremendous self doubt and will need outside support to help you validate your pain and challenge some of your thinking. Living in an addictive system is about secrets and isolation from others. Recovery becomes about letting others into your world and learning new behaviours and choices that were previously unavailable to you.
Core Characteristics;
* emotional numbness or avoidance
* feelings of victimimation
* suspiciousness
* terror about the slips, future relapse
* distrust
* conflict
* feelings of despair
* anger, hostility, self rightousness, blame and criticism
4. Grief and Ambivalence Stage
One of the most important aspects of moving through your pain is recognising and experiencing your grief. Acknowledging your pain and sadness is essential to moving past feelings of anger and betrayal. At the core of betrayal are feelings of pain, sadness and rejection. Anger is often considered a secondary emotion to pain and sadness. So grieving is one of the central processes allowing you to move through your anger and feelings of betrayal. The wounding you have experienced cuts to the very core of your heart and soul, leaving you feeling shattered. Allowing yourself time to grieve the many losses during this time will help propel you into the next stage of repair and growth.
Distinguishing grief from self pity is important too. You may believe that feeling sorry for yourself is a waste of time and an indulgence that should not be tolerated. But grief is essential because it is that most private area of yourself that allows you to own your pain on a deeper level. Acknowledging, "Hey I have been seriously wronged and i hurt" is important. It helps you stop internalising the problem and move into your own core feelings of loss, betrayal and sadness. It allows you freedom from focusing on what the addict is or isn't doing which will assist you in connecting with your authentic self.
Some of the losses you will experience are;
Loss of the dream of your relationship
Loss of self
Loss of relationship as it once was
Loss of emotional safety
Loss of sexual safety
Loss of financial stability
Spiritual vacancy eg; 'where is god?'
You may contemplate separation, divorce, and have fantasies about how life would be without the partner or wish something would happen to him so you wouldn't have to go through this pain anymore. You may also find yourself attracted to someone else. Alternatively the idea of being attracted to someone else may repulse you and conjure up feelings of mistrust and tremendous fear.
One of the significant gifts that comes from this stage is the gift of self awareness and introspection. Instead of focusing on the addicts needs and wants, you begin to focus on your needs and wants. Your self care typically deepens during this stage. This is an essential shift to make in the healing process because without focusing on yourself, you will not move into the next stage of repair.
Core Characteristics;
* grieving losses
* feelings of dpression
* ambivilance about the relationship
* increased introspection and focus on the self
* less focus on the addicts behaviour and more on your own
5. Repair Stage
For many partners, it can take years of shock and grief before healing really starts to solidify and they move into the repair stage, Repair is marked by increased introspection and less focus on the addicts nehvaiour. Although you continue to hold the addict accountable for what he did to you, you have moved toward greater responsibility and honesty for your own happiness. You know you need to be treated respectfully and honesty by the addict, but you see how others treat you stems from your own self worth.
You may alos start to make the connections between your past during this stage. For example; you may consider how your family of origin impacted your choices and influenced your adult actions, especially in your relationship with the addict. This may include focusing on the themes from your past, such as abandonment, abuse and neglect.
Many partners deepen their spirituality at this time. Coping skills and social support systems become stronger. Secrecy and isolation are replaced with solitude and compassionship. Self defeating behaviours often diminish. Overall your deep pain and turmoil subsides and a more relaxed, introspective self emerges with a stronger voice.
These changes reflect in your relationship as well. You will have a better understanding of the addiction and the addicts behaviours, which places you in a stronger position to evaluate the relationship. You have a clearer picture about the addicts sexual acting out and the boundries you need to keep yourself safe. You belive the actions, not the words of the addict, and you don't live in denial of the addiction or the addictive behaviours. You are able to hold the addict accountable and not fear communication. You are able to see red flags and confront them effectively. If you become retraumatised by relapses or divorce, you openly seek additional resorces and handle it. You are more emotionally prepared to make a decision to leave a relationship if indicated. If the addict is in recoevry, and your relationship is progressing in a healthy way, you may explore trust and intimacy that is deeper than before.
Core Characteristics;
* intropsection
* decision making stage about the relationship
* deeper insight into causes of your co-addiction
* family of origin themes examined and intergrated
* prior losses more fully grieved
* increased strength and coping skills
* Boundary setting
* emotional stability
6. Growth Stage
The final stage is growth. This syage involves continued self transformation. One of the hallmarks of this stage for partners is letting go of feelings of victimization and replacing it with resiliency. You may discover a way to make meaning out of your suffering.
Gratitude for the addiction and the opportunities for self actualization that it provided occur here. The addiction was a catalyst for change and you responded to it. The many challenges you faced elevated you to a higher level of well being and you experience of inner peace and greater appreciation for the work that you had to do in confronting this challenge.
You turn outward, not in a caretaking sense, but in a genuine desire to pass on what was given to you. Your compassion for other peoples pain reinforces your committment to healing. You can now realisitically check your motivations and can catch yourself when you fall into old self defeating patterns.
Core Characteristics;
* decreased feelings of being victimised by the addiction
* focus on issues not directly related to the addiction
* communication of your role in the dyfunction of the relationship increases
* acknowledgement of the gifts the addiction has bought to your life
* ability to be present and fully focused on the other areas of life.
Conclusion;
While considering these stages, don't judge yourself harshly or try to force yourself into a future stage. Every partner goes through the stages at her pace. Hopefully, reviewing these stages will provide you some peace of mind that the crisis will not last forever, and growth and insight are the inevitable gifts you will recieve through this experience.
AMEN!!
"Mending A Shattered Heart"
A guide for partners of sex addicts....By Stephanie Carnes PH.d
Page 37- 45
Partners of sex addicts commonly demonstrate six stages of personal growth and development. These stages were initially developed by Dr Patrick Carnes. His research focused on sex addicts and their partners. He followed 99 partners of sex addicts over five years, as they progressed from finding out about the addiction to integration of this, in their lives.
These six stages will serve as a model to help guide you through a rough and necessary journey toward your healing and recovery. There are aspects of the stages that will best describe you today. But the stages are also meant to give you a practical set of steps involved in recovering from this crisis in your life. Most important, the stages help you see that you are not alone and that things can improve.
The Stages;
* The Developing Stage/ Pre-Discovery
* Crisis/ Decision/ Information
* Shock
* Grief/ Ambivalance
* Repair
* Growth
How you experience the stages of recovery will depend on many factors, including your personality, any medical or psychiatric diagnoses such as depression or addiction and past loses. If you have experienced losses or betrayals, or have suffered abuse or trauma in your background, you may find it more difficult to move through your stages.
You may find one stage more challenging than another, and you may even stay in one stage for a longer period of time. You may confront a new crisis or challenge which may pull you back into an earlier stage, such as triggering event like the anniversary of discovering your partners addiction or an old cell phone bill. These triggers can conjure up old feelings that you believed you had resolved. Similarly, you may see yourself vacillating between two or more stages at once.
1. Developing Stage
Is the period of time prior to knowing there was a problem or before discovery/ disclosure. You may find during this stage that you were either completely in the dark about the addiction, or had some suspicions but were not fully aware of the extent of your partners sexual acting out. During this stage, you might try to keep the peace in the home and hold an idealised view of the relationship.
If you were completely in the dark about the acting out, you may have had a hunch that something wasn't right with the addict. You likely experienced the unmanagability of the addiction in the other areas of your life, such as parenting, finances, work and intimacy. Because life was increasingly unmanageable, you may have found yourself attempting to control the other areas of your life, such as work, the children, the household etc.
Conversely, you may have known about certain aspects of the behaviour, like pornography use, but had no idea about the content of the sex acting out. When you accidently found suspicious info you might have overlooked it or believed the addicts convincing explanantions. Your gut instint may have been telling you one thing but your mind told you another. You sensed that something was wrong, however, you didn't have the info to back it up. Instead you questioned yourself and would give your partner the benefit of the doubt. This may have even resulted in you questioning your own self worth.
During this stage its common to tolerate behaviours that others woulf find intolerable. This may include verbal or physical abuse, lack of availablity, emotional distance, and a lack of functioning in many areas. You may have found yourself caretaking to a fault. Unconsciously, you may have minimised the addicts behaviours, and covered up for them by making excuses or concessions despite your better judgement. You may have found yourself defending the addict, and believeing the addicts words over his actions.
Core Characteristics;
* believing tall tales
* tolerating and normalising unacceptable behaviour from the addict
* self doubt, not trusting gut instincts
* having hunch something is not right
* seeking couples therapy
* unmanagability
* loss of values, morals, or beliefs deemed imporatnt to keep peace with your partner
2. The Crisis/ Decision Stage
During this stage, the facade of the secret life of the addict has been exposed, and reality and disillusionment is beginning to settle in. As in any life-altering crisi, how you respond has a lot to do with your personality and if you suffered from prior crisi in your life. This means that if you are someone who has experienced frequent loses, then you are apt to be more reactionary than someone who has not. The old responses get reactivated and add to your distress. In addition, the duration of the addicts behaviours, the types of behaviours engaged in, and length of time of the relationship will also influence how you respond to the fallout of discovery/disclosure.
If you are someone who withdrawls from crisis, you will find that you want to avoid knowing about the addict or sex addiction in general. You may act as though nothing has changed and try to keep up with your normal respomsibilities. Or if you are someone who is more action-oriented, you will find yourself seeking honesty and accountability from the addict, despite the fact that a part of you cannot trust what she or he says.
Due to broken trust, you may find yourself checking up on your partner or playing detective to determine if he or she is still lying and acting out. In fact, you may find yourself doing these behaviours when typically you are not someone who snoops or even wants to, but you find you are compelled to look for things. You may ruminate or obsess about the addict, his ir her whereabouts and seek to review the details of his or her behaviour repeatedly.
Much of this is in attempt to examine what happened and to come to terms with how you didn't figure out what your partner was up to before the discovery. You may be replaying the past in an attempt to capture how you could have prevented it from happening or confronted it sooner. All of these action steps are in response to being lied to and are a strategy to ward off the painful realities you are beginning to experience as a result of the betrayal.
Core Characteristics;
* a catalytic event occurs: you discover or are disclosed to about your partners duplicate behaviour.
* information gathering
* taking action/ making decisions, such as sending the sex addict to treatment or joining a 12 step group.
3. The Shock Stage
The crisis and shock stage often overlap, and for some may even happen simultaneously. During the crisis you learned about behaviours, gathered info, and perhaps responded by making decisions. Shock is how you responded emotionally and spiritually to the crisis confronting you.
The upheaval during the shock stage can last 6 months and at times years. Variables that predict how long you are in these two stages depend on your presponse to the crisis and how your partner does or doesn't progress in recovery. Feelings of betrayal are overwhelming and mistrust of the addict reaches its peak. You seek honesty and accountability from the addict even though he or she has become untrustworthy to you. Despite this, you want disclosure of all previously concealed info or believe there is more when you have been told that there isn't. You don't know what to believe and you suffer from a multitute of reactions.
You may have periods of numbness, contrasted by times of upheaval and conflict. At times, you may find it easier to avoid the feelings. However, despite this strategy, there are often many feelings lurking underneath the surface that arise during times of conflict such as anger, resentment, pain, shame, hostility, and hopelessness. You may be experiencing crying spells, depression, and even thoughts of suicide. You may begin to question your worth.
Understandably, you will have tremendous self doubt and will need outside support to help you validate your pain and challenge some of your thinking. Living in an addictive system is about secrets and isolation from others. Recovery becomes about letting others into your world and learning new behaviours and choices that were previously unavailable to you.
Core Characteristics;
* emotional numbness or avoidance
* feelings of victimimation
* suspiciousness
* terror about the slips, future relapse
* distrust
* conflict
* feelings of despair
* anger, hostility, self rightousness, blame and criticism
4. Grief and Ambivalence Stage
One of the most important aspects of moving through your pain is recognising and experiencing your grief. Acknowledging your pain and sadness is essential to moving past feelings of anger and betrayal. At the core of betrayal are feelings of pain, sadness and rejection. Anger is often considered a secondary emotion to pain and sadness. So grieving is one of the central processes allowing you to move through your anger and feelings of betrayal. The wounding you have experienced cuts to the very core of your heart and soul, leaving you feeling shattered. Allowing yourself time to grieve the many losses during this time will help propel you into the next stage of repair and growth.
Distinguishing grief from self pity is important too. You may believe that feeling sorry for yourself is a waste of time and an indulgence that should not be tolerated. But grief is essential because it is that most private area of yourself that allows you to own your pain on a deeper level. Acknowledging, "Hey I have been seriously wronged and i hurt" is important. It helps you stop internalising the problem and move into your own core feelings of loss, betrayal and sadness. It allows you freedom from focusing on what the addict is or isn't doing which will assist you in connecting with your authentic self.
Some of the losses you will experience are;
Loss of the dream of your relationship
Loss of self
Loss of relationship as it once was
Loss of emotional safety
Loss of sexual safety
Loss of financial stability
Spiritual vacancy eg; 'where is god?'
You may contemplate separation, divorce, and have fantasies about how life would be without the partner or wish something would happen to him so you wouldn't have to go through this pain anymore. You may also find yourself attracted to someone else. Alternatively the idea of being attracted to someone else may repulse you and conjure up feelings of mistrust and tremendous fear.
One of the significant gifts that comes from this stage is the gift of self awareness and introspection. Instead of focusing on the addicts needs and wants, you begin to focus on your needs and wants. Your self care typically deepens during this stage. This is an essential shift to make in the healing process because without focusing on yourself, you will not move into the next stage of repair.
Core Characteristics;
* grieving losses
* feelings of dpression
* ambivilance about the relationship
* increased introspection and focus on the self
* less focus on the addicts behaviour and more on your own
5. Repair Stage
For many partners, it can take years of shock and grief before healing really starts to solidify and they move into the repair stage, Repair is marked by increased introspection and less focus on the addicts nehvaiour. Although you continue to hold the addict accountable for what he did to you, you have moved toward greater responsibility and honesty for your own happiness. You know you need to be treated respectfully and honesty by the addict, but you see how others treat you stems from your own self worth.
You may alos start to make the connections between your past during this stage. For example; you may consider how your family of origin impacted your choices and influenced your adult actions, especially in your relationship with the addict. This may include focusing on the themes from your past, such as abandonment, abuse and neglect.
Many partners deepen their spirituality at this time. Coping skills and social support systems become stronger. Secrecy and isolation are replaced with solitude and compassionship. Self defeating behaviours often diminish. Overall your deep pain and turmoil subsides and a more relaxed, introspective self emerges with a stronger voice.
These changes reflect in your relationship as well. You will have a better understanding of the addiction and the addicts behaviours, which places you in a stronger position to evaluate the relationship. You have a clearer picture about the addicts sexual acting out and the boundries you need to keep yourself safe. You belive the actions, not the words of the addict, and you don't live in denial of the addiction or the addictive behaviours. You are able to hold the addict accountable and not fear communication. You are able to see red flags and confront them effectively. If you become retraumatised by relapses or divorce, you openly seek additional resorces and handle it. You are more emotionally prepared to make a decision to leave a relationship if indicated. If the addict is in recoevry, and your relationship is progressing in a healthy way, you may explore trust and intimacy that is deeper than before.
Core Characteristics;
* intropsection
* decision making stage about the relationship
* deeper insight into causes of your co-addiction
* family of origin themes examined and intergrated
* prior losses more fully grieved
* increased strength and coping skills
* Boundary setting
* emotional stability
6. Growth Stage
The final stage is growth. This syage involves continued self transformation. One of the hallmarks of this stage for partners is letting go of feelings of victimization and replacing it with resiliency. You may discover a way to make meaning out of your suffering.
Gratitude for the addiction and the opportunities for self actualization that it provided occur here. The addiction was a catalyst for change and you responded to it. The many challenges you faced elevated you to a higher level of well being and you experience of inner peace and greater appreciation for the work that you had to do in confronting this challenge.
You turn outward, not in a caretaking sense, but in a genuine desire to pass on what was given to you. Your compassion for other peoples pain reinforces your committment to healing. You can now realisitically check your motivations and can catch yourself when you fall into old self defeating patterns.
Core Characteristics;
* decreased feelings of being victimised by the addiction
* focus on issues not directly related to the addiction
* communication of your role in the dyfunction of the relationship increases
* acknowledgement of the gifts the addiction has bought to your life
* ability to be present and fully focused on the other areas of life.
Conclusion;
While considering these stages, don't judge yourself harshly or try to force yourself into a future stage. Every partner goes through the stages at her pace. Hopefully, reviewing these stages will provide you some peace of mind that the crisis will not last forever, and growth and insight are the inevitable gifts you will recieve through this experience.
AMEN!!
I know where i am, do you?
I know where i am, do you?
And...yes, I think that I know where I am too. Swinging back and forth between all of the above. Move up a few spaces and fall back four. I have gone on with my own life now for many months...at first I couldn't even sleep...or tend my responsibilities...I just froze up and turned inward for months tending the shock and pain. I have failed to recover any substantial connection with my H...even though we have tried. Tooo much shock and anger to feel connected with him on any but trivial levels. I don't hate him any more. At first I did and then went numb. Then for a while it hardly affected me at all. I cried some...and then just told him how I felt and what he had done to the relationship and sent him off to counseling. I went too...to a separate counselor...but was too damaged to benefit in any meaningful way. Just tended as much of the collateral damage that I could at the time...and went into myself for regrouping my thoughts and my life.
But, over time...I refused to bury the anger again. I allowed myself to feel something...anything...for a change. Seems that anger is better than nothing. I never have really allowed myself to display any negative feelings. Sooo, I decided it was time for some real truth for a change. I let him have it with both barrels...no holding back at all. I told him exactly what I felt and why. I'm glad I did. I needed that. And it helped....both of us. He got the point....I think his rock bottom came at that point and he realized that he had destroyed something he valued....not only the relationship with me...but his daughter...and his dad. Quite a wakeup call. I wouldn't want to be there.
I'm not totally without feeling for him. But, I don't trust him sexually any more...meaning that I believe he won't do what he was doing ever again...but it gave me a weird insight into his sexual mind...lust instead of love...degradation of women...and that has remained constant for me which stops any true intimacy. I guess somewhere inside I dont believe that one can cure lust once conceived...but can only refuse to follow it's path to completion. Need to talk to the psych about that concept. SEx...love....lust???? Confusion there.
I am just ambivelent most of the time....just looking at the overall relationship outside the sexual arena where the lions-share of the damage occured. I tend the day-to-day routine...but blanche at the thought of intimacy. Too scary to ponder much. That's why I react to defensively to sexual intimacies. Sorry! Sex scares the H out me now.
I grieve the loss of the relationship and my life goals up to this point. Old age....grandchildren....normal life? And, I reallly feel stupid for being so loving for so long and for trusting him at all. That was very stupid on my part...and I hate stupid moves. Embarrassing to look so very naive. So, in a convuluted way...I hate me...I hate that I maintained my loving attitude and I hate the kindness and consideration that I fostered for all of those years in my stupidity. How very stupid of me to give to one who was a selfish deceptive person.
But, mostly, I seek to do no damage to him...although I want to at times...and the strain is great to not take punitive action. I think that I am moving farther and farther away from my marriage and farther into my own separate life to keep from doing that.
For the record, the Psych says that I'm on full self-protective alert from my H....right where I should be...given the circumstances. He says because the deception was in place so long....17 years of the most recent occurance....and was so absolute....I truly trusted him again even though he had hurt me this way before...and that I have been repetitively traumatized by both this H and my XH...that the trauma is broadspread...PTSD...and other medical complications. So, he says I should be protecting myself from my H...and that it is warranted. Said he'd talk to me more about how to separate myself.
He also says that I may never be able to forgive my H...which is true.. and neither here nor there to me...I never forgave him in the way most consider forgiveness...before either...just accepted the damage it caused...told him what would happen if he continued and moved on in the direction I wanted my life to go. I trusted that he valued our relationship enough to quit messing around. He didn't value it enough. He told me that in that arena he was selfish and didn't care what anyone thought...including me...other than to hide it so that he could enjoy the relationship with me and enjoy that too without conflict. He said that he knew I would react with withdrawal from him...or divorce him. He was right.
And....I don't intend to forgive it now either. He knows that too and accepts that I won't. He says he understands that and that I shouldn't forgive him...he deserves to get whatever I want to dish out. He knew what he was doing....so there is no reason to forgive it whatsoever to my thinking. That also doesnt mean that he can't quit...and we can't live together...it just means that I don't forgive it....I have no intention of doing that...I don't think that I ever did...and I don't think that I ever will...in the traditional sense. There is no need to forgive someone who intentionally did something that they knew would hurt and just didn't care.
The psych also says the I may never again be truly committed to a relationship with him again...not impossible...but doubtful because of the longterm deception. Which means I think that it is just a lastchance trial...maybe from now on...I dont know. Also that I am recovering my own life already...that I have decided not to die...and can feel better about my separate life with a lot of work. Right now it feels in looking back like a shithole. He says that to feel good about life again, I may have to divorce at some point even if my H has stopped his activity for good....he's not sure yet and neither am I at this point. My H knows that too. I am honest with him. He knows that I have made a decision that for now...I will take no action...but self-protection and seeking outside interests to keep me out of the dark hole of the relationship issues.
If one considers forgiveness as refusal to take punitive action, even though it is warranted, then one could conclude that I have forgiven him in that sense. I have not taken punitive action and I hope that I can restrain the desire to do that for all times. Maybe...maybe not...it's always an option....like everything.
So, that's where I am. Slowly moving away from my historical life....knowing that whatever I did...it didn't work....knowing that I need to change...to stop being attentive to his needs and attend mine...to let him carry the burden of his own transgressions and decisions....to know that I need to be more selfish and think for once...of what I want now and what I need now. It's very weird for me to think of just me....never done that before...but I'm learning. I guess that's setting new boundaries...not sure. Just know that I need to feel good about what's left of my life. And, as yet, I'm not sure how to do that.
I am in the Grief and Ambivalence stage. After 14 years, I just want to be free of the pain and I really do not care much about the marriage. I just have to plan my steps carefully because I have 2 small children and I want to keep the impact on them as small as possible.
Where it said that in the Devepoing Stage that you would tolerate behaviours others would not really rang true for me. The early part of our marriage H was going to hookers - in retrospect, what woman with a normal sense of self respect would put up with that? Anyone else would have left him at that point. He stopped after I told him I would not touch him if someone else was touching him. Now he is into computer porn and women's lingerie and shoes(hooker kind of stuff) in his size. I guess he masturbates with that stuff.
The knowledge and support in this group really helps in moving through this stage. Talking about it helps me not to worry so much about what he is doing but to more clearly start thinking about what I need to do. SA is so tough because it is not something you can talk about with any friends or family because of the shame WE feel as a result of his behaviours. It sucks. Sometimes I get so angry that I am the one feeling all pain and he is just being selfish. Basically the SA is happy if we wives stay off their case about it and let them get off in whatever way and however often they want. So we suffer in silence.
THis is interesting indeed, thank you trina for posting it.
Apologies if this sounds at all smug, but after clawing myself around and back through many of these stages, i am now at the Growth Stage.
I no longer hate the addiction, nor fear it in my relationship, and oddly can identify with some of the appreciation of the addiction within my relationship. I'm not going to flat out say I'm glad for some of the things I've had to dealt with, but appreciate the journey and where it has led me and my marriage. I know this may sound incredulous to many who still hate it, and wwho are back in stage 3, but its true i am here.
I now understand why when i recently found out the final piece of the puzzle, that my h did not have the strength to tell me in our full disclosure, why i did not fall apart again, i was not in shock, i was just in a healthier place to deal with it. And strangely i am now greatful for that! I mean gee wizz, who the hell is greatful for a deciet!. But thats where i am, and now i understand why.
My recent trip to the US was apart of my letting go of the disease, and showing my h that i can try to trust him again. We both past with flying colors. I have found inner peace, and want to spend the rest of my days now helping others get through the journey with knowledge and the tools.
I yesterday applied for a (mature age!) Bacholer of Social Science degree at Victorian University, and know that this is what i want to do with my future. Fingers crossed for acceptance.
I know that the addiction is never over, but that i can have the confidence to cope with what life throws at me.
May we all reach peace.
I'm more curious if these are natural stages of development, or do you work through one to get to another? Does this question even make sense?
"The final stage is growth. This stage involves continued self transformation. One of the hallmarks of this stage for partners is letting go of feelings of victimization and replacing it with resiliency."
Now if the spouse is still internalising, or still holds onto a little bit of self doubt, or suffers low self esteem, then she is not letting go of the victimization, and hasn't fully understood to process of addiction. The "Self defeating behaviours often diminish" and "increased strength and coping skills", from stage 5 would definately need to be achieved first, before moving onto stage 6.
Yes, I would believe these are a natural stage of development. This is the first time i have read it, and i can personally identify with every single painful step for the last 7 years. I think i bounced around the first 4 steps for years. It was not until i got therapy and knowledge, that i was able to find the strength to progress finally to the next stage.
Interestingly the next chapter is all about Should I Go or Should I go? By Patrick Carnes. It says "Seldom does everyone get into recovery on the same day" Therein is one of the greatest challenges to a couples life in recovery. No-one 'gets it' at the same time. A preceding chapter outlines specific stages that the SA and the spouse may be.
It outlines the many different stages the SA is at while we are at our stages. Very indepth, with diagrams, and hard for me to share, more than 12 pages.
This is a book all spouses should seek in their recovery! I've been through the wringer in my time, and thought i knew alot, but boy have i learnt much in this book!
I guess I dont get it. I'm missing something integral somehow. Because, my XH was definitely a sexual deviant, if there ever was such a thing. I didn't divorce him for twelve years. I didn't use a probe to check him out either...resilient? But, facts would filter through the grapevine and I would note them for future reference. I finally just silently watched his actions, no emotional outbreaks, no questions...no talking about my suspicions...nada. I figured if you give a fool enough rope, they'll hang themselves. He did...and as soon as I knew that he had been lying for so long, I divorced him. End of subject. As I wnet on with life, I didn't blame all other men for what he did, or what he was, I just figured he was a nut case. Also end of subject. I didn't feel bad when I left and I didn't expect anyone else to be like him. That seems the only thing to do to me. Tell me what you think about that.
Thanks so much for all your typing, Trina. This was great to read!
LinneaL, i hear you on that. I was at the repair stage, way before my h got there. I believe he is there only now. The knowledge and strength you find in yourself now, does benefit them if they are willing to utilise it. Best of luck to you :)
I find you nothing short of amazing. I would do anything in the world to get where you are. I'm seperated and my H is still in denial, lying, "using" while telling me he's not. Is there anyting we can do to help our SA hit rock bottom quicker? Perhaps that's the controlling part of me that just wants forward movement but I have to be honest. I'm so tired of being the one hurt and shattered. I've been in counseling and am shifting my energy to myself rather than his addiction. My obsessing have significantly decreased but I would do anything to have the thoughts of his sex chat/emails completely removed from my head. Despite his continuous betrayal and lies, I still have an enormous amount of love for him. I've tried to hate him and move on but can't. Any advice?
I wish you the best on your acceptance. I have full confidence in you.