by Chinook
I had never known such desperation as I felt after I discovered that my husband had been having an affair. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t think straight. I couldn’t control my emotions even the slightest bit. My body and mind were in a state of such extreme anxiety that a single errant thought (about her, about the two of them together, about what this meant for our children) could provoke a full-blown panic attack.
I had never known such desperation as I felt after I discovered that my husband had been having an affair. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t think straight. I couldn’t control my emotions even the slightest bit. My body and mind were in a state of such extreme anxiety that a single errant thought (about her, about the two of them together, about what this meant for our children) could provoke a full-blown panic attack.
Between fits of racking sobs, I launched into doing the three things that I always do when I feel powerless:
(1) Research
(2) Figure out the story of what was happening
(3) Play out future scenarios in my head
I did these things for every moment of every day.
Every.
Single.
Moment.
It was exhausting, and in the end only one of these coping mechanisms was useful.
I’m surprised to report that even at the frantic pace at which I did it, research helped. My trusted inner community, in whom I confided right from the start, responded with great resources. On the advice of a friend, I was reading Mira Kirshenbaum’s book “I love you but I don’t trust you” within a day of finding out about the affair.
On the advice of another, I started journaling. A third recommended that I exhaust myself with high-intensity exercise. “Sleeping pills,” said a fourth. In spite of my internet searching, it took a long time before I found the Betrayed Wives Club. (I think I eventually made my way here by typing something like “when will the devastating pain of infidelity ever end?” into Google.) But within a few weeks, I had an effective therapist, an informational session lined up with a divorce lawyer, other betrayed women to talk to, and a dozen great books to read.
On the advice of another, I started journaling. A third recommended that I exhaust myself with high-intensity exercise. “Sleeping pills,” said a fourth. In spite of my internet searching, it took a long time before I found the Betrayed Wives Club. (I think I eventually made my way here by typing something like “when will the devastating pain of infidelity ever end?” into Google.) But within a few weeks, I had an effective therapist, an informational session lined up with a divorce lawyer, other betrayed women to talk to, and a dozen great books to read.
The second coping technique — trying to figure out the story of what was happening — drove me and everyone around me crazy. My mind was racing, trying to compute WHY my husband had done this. (Was he a psychopath? Was he a compulsive liar? Was he a closeted misogynist? Did he have an attachment disorder? Had he even wanted kids? Had he even wanted to get married?) Talking is part of my figuring-out process, and I talked about it incessantly. At one point my father finally declared: “I don’t give a HOOT what he wants! What does CHINOOK want?”
This coping technique failed spectacularly. I was trying to control the situation by understanding it. But I had neither the information nor the hindsight necessary to understand it. Even if I could, understanding it wouldn’t make the pain any less excruciating. Also, to my father’s point, I was putting my attention in the wrong place: I was making my husband the center of the story when the real focus needed to be on me.
The least useful of all my coping techniques by far was the last: trying to predict the future.
A very good, very wise friend of mine calls the practice “telescoping”, and if you’re doing it, I urge you to stop.
The danger of using a telescope to try and see the future (which is impossible) is that we miss out on observing what is happening right here, right now. And what’s happening now is key. The only thing any of us can do when devastated by a trauma is to pick the next right step, as Glennon Doyle says. (It’s a variation of the “one day at a time” motto of Alcoholics Anonymous.) And in order to choose that next right step, we need accurate information on exactly where we are right now.
This very wise friend of mine also reminded me that I didn’t need to make any big decisions right now or for some time to come. The only thing I needed to do was gather information. Information on what my husband had actually done. Information from HIM (not from me trying to figure it out for him) about why he had done it. Information on what he was going to do next. Information on my legal options (and, if I hadn’t already had it, our financial situation).
And, most importantly, information about how this all made me feel and what it revealed to me about what I want.
So, if you have just had your entire world upended, if your mind and heart are racing with the shock of it all, if you are trying to telescope your way into a future that feels safer than your present, please stop.
Put down the telescope.
You can’t see the future. None of us can.
All you have is now.
Take the next right step.
Then the next right one after that.
Then the next right one after that.
When you walk a path of next right steps, you can’t go wrong.
