I just need a like button. I think about the scars from bike wrecks and surgeries and childbirth. They are all part of my story, part of who I am. I think if my broken heart and when I picture it in my mind, i can see it healing, maybe for the first time in my life. Hanging onto hurt and resentment let's me stay safely a victim. And wrapped up in the victim blanket is the illusion of safety. Hanging on to past hurt includes an implicit bargain. The deal being if I hold on to this, I won't be hurt again. It's an illusion if safety and control. But it's not a bargain with the universe. It's a deal with the devil. And that guy never pays up. So the scar means I'm healing. That I'm letting go of being a victim. That I'm taking responsibility for my life and most importantly I'm choosing living over safety.
Amazing, Hopeful! What you wrote hit home. I've been thinking a lot lately about the things I'm still dealing with. And I have to say that I see and feel myself healing, but there is a part of me that may still be holding onto some things that do more harm than good. I know I'll rumble a little longer with those feelings.. try to get to the bottom of them because, so often, for me there's something underlying and not just the surface emotion/reaction. Thank you for what you wrote. It was what I needed to hear.
Thank you for your words. I am currently struggling with letting go of the pain. I know I need to (and I feel better when I can), but I keep hanging on to it sometimes. I think it's like you say... I'm keeping it as a sense of security. Like somehow if I keep thinking about it and stay hyper vigilant it can't happen again. This is not the truth. I was vigilant enough before. The issue was never my amount of vigilance!
I am still holding on and struggling with things. I feel them so strongly, however it is hard to explain to my husband. And I even think is this rational? But it is a reoccurring feeling. I can see it all intellectually but emotionally I struggle to get past it. I struggle with what I cannot change. I know what is at the root of it all but not sure there will ever be enough answers or any right answer. But I am hung up on it. And it keeps me swinging back to low points. Everything is going so well for me but really I have always done well. This is all just so hard. Ugh.
I find myself in the same place, Hopeful. I know that I can't change the past. I just wish I could move past the memories of it. I still struggle sometimes with feeling like second best, although in my head I know I am not. And now I'm trying hard to talk with my husband about my emotions without bringing up all the awful things he did. He never shuts me down when I talk but often it's a recitation of the hurtful things he did. He acknowledges it all, has so much remorse, and knows it's the source of my pain, but I also recognize that it hurts him to remember it too. It's just painful all around.
This is becoming true for me. My best friend is able to point out how much stronger I seem, how much calmer I am and how much more rational my thought process is becoming as time passes. I don't always see that so it is wonderful to get her feedback.
My physical scars from life are my tattoos to remind myself of the road I've traveled some very happy memories of giving birth, some not so much fun but life lessons. I'm still a work in progress when it comes to the emotional scars of life but I'm working my way through them and I'm the better for it!
My scars are like a war memorial in my heart. They remind me of where I have been and never to be that stupid again to build a false reality that was not true. My war memorial I look at from time to time, not quite as often as I once did. Great Wed hug for sure.
My scars are fresh, healing but fresh and remind me at times of where I am at or where I need to be. So the last few weeks have been hectic.... busy at work and I got sick ect... so what is the first things to go from my life, yoga, journaling, meditation, all my most healing self care. And those scars start to reopen and I feel the pain of the wounds beneath and I get a little off track and try to avoid pain and then have to wake up and feel the pain, tend to the wounds, so again the scars can start to heal again.
This seems to be an iterative process for me. A year ago it was so much harder and more painful and more difficult and less clear what I felt and what was going on. This is where I'm at this weekend- needing to tend some wounds that opened up over the last 10 days.
Unknown The ow in our situation continues an occasional drive through the neighborhood but I can't imagine the pain if I had to encounter this person every day! I'm so sorry you have to live through this pain every day! Almost three years since the affair ended here as well! I'm hoping time will continue to heal the wounds that surely will only leave scars! The ow tried so hard to remind my h that when their affair began, they knew it would hurt someone for a little while....meaning me when he asked for the divorce. Problem was he didn't want a divorce and when she told me he thought finally he would be free of her... I imagine her scars are deep since she destroyed her marriage to be with my ahole! Prayers for us all!
We do not associate with her or her partner but my h wants us to just wave at her when we pass by as if nothing happened and move on. I feel like it is wrong to acknowledge her in any way. AM I wrong?
Unknown, As Steam often reminds us on this site: My heartbreak, my rules. YOU get to decide what feels comfortable and right to you. I agree that waving at the woman who slept with your husband is a bit much to ask of anyone. Honestly, he should be grateful you haven't stuck a knife in her back. A real one. So no, there should be absolutely NO Contact and that goes for any gesture of acknowledgement. As far as you're concerned (and your husband is concerned), treat her like she doesn't exist.
Unknown Seriously! He thinks you can/should just wave and be courteous to the woman he had sex with! I'm sorry but not just no but hell no! Elle's right to say ignore because this is a non person now! That's almost as crazy as the time my h said before thinking that his ow would be someone I could have been friends with if it wasn't for the affair! Yep! I blew a gasket on that bs as well!
I was friendly with the OW. And the only reason she was being nice was to throw me off of what she was really trying to do. She tried to make me trust her so I didn't suspect her. She actually had me make her a cake for her family reunion and hugged me when I agreed to do it. It also just happened to be the exact same cake I made my husband for Father's Day. She had over heard me talking to someone else and I was stupid enough to show her the picture. I still don't understand why she had to have the same cake other then the obsession she had with him. I don't have to see her at all because we moved across the country but, I've still dealt with her and her flying monkey ( her best friend) who she sent to attack me on social media. She was going to set me straight about their affair being a real relationship. It lasted about 10 days and he had total sleep deprivation from ingesting adderall that she had been slipping him in his coffee. The flying monkey told me that I was lied to, not only by my husband but, from the Dr's, Nurses and counselors regarding his sleep deprivation and what caused it. I still hold onto a lot of anger where these women are concerned. Not only for the lies they told to cover up theirs indiscretions but, putting all the blame on my husband.
Thank you Elle & Theresa for your comments. I am hoping that having to deal with seeing her all the time will get easier but it just keeps everthing so alive in my mind. We are now retired and should be living our golden years totally happy
Unknown- these guys can be unbelievable. Wave? WAVE? Don't feel bad or alone in your husbands insanity. Mine went even further than Teresa's husband. Since I had met hisOW #2 at one point, when I asked him (ahem asked is an understatement) him to write her a good bye and no contact text he thought it would be a good idea to include my info to her so we could all get together sometime in the future!!!!!!!!! GOD we could all write the damn book couldnt we?
I just need a like button. I think about the scars from bike wrecks and surgeries and childbirth. They are all part of my story, part of who I am. I think if my broken heart and when I picture it in my mind, i can see it healing, maybe for the first time in my life.
ReplyDeleteHanging onto hurt and resentment let's me stay safely a victim. And wrapped up in the victim blanket is the illusion of safety. Hanging on to past hurt includes an implicit bargain. The deal being if I hold on to this, I won't be hurt again. It's an illusion if safety and control. But it's not a bargain with the universe. It's a deal with the devil. And that guy never pays up.
So the scar means I'm healing. That I'm letting go of being a victim. That I'm taking responsibility for my life and most importantly I'm choosing living over safety.
Amazing, Hopeful! What you wrote hit home. I've been thinking a lot lately about the things I'm still dealing with. And I have to say that I see and feel myself healing, but there is a part of me that may still be holding onto some things that do more harm than good. I know I'll rumble a little longer with those feelings.. try to get to the bottom of them because, so often, for me there's something underlying and not just the surface emotion/reaction.
DeleteThank you for what you wrote. It was what I needed to hear.
Thank you for your words. I am currently struggling with letting go of the pain. I know I need to (and I feel better when I can), but I keep hanging on to it sometimes. I think it's like you say... I'm keeping it as a sense of security. Like somehow if I keep thinking about it and stay hyper vigilant it can't happen again. This is not the truth. I was vigilant enough before. The issue was never my amount of vigilance!
DeleteI am still holding on and struggling with things. I feel them so strongly, however it is hard to explain to my husband. And I even think is this rational? But it is a reoccurring feeling. I can see it all intellectually but emotionally I struggle to get past it. I struggle with what I cannot change. I know what is at the root of it all but not sure there will ever be enough answers or any right answer. But I am hung up on it. And it keeps me swinging back to low points. Everything is going so well for me but really I have always done well. This is all just so hard. Ugh.
DeleteI find myself in the same place, Hopeful. I know that I can't change the past. I just wish I could move past the memories of it. I still struggle sometimes with feeling like second best, although in my head I know I am not. And now I'm trying hard to talk with my husband about my emotions without bringing up all the awful things he did. He never shuts me down when I talk but often it's a recitation of the hurtful things he did. He acknowledges it all, has so much remorse, and knows it's the source of my pain, but I also recognize that it hurts him to remember it too. It's just painful all around.
DeleteThis is becoming true for me. My best friend is able to point out how much stronger I seem, how much calmer I am and how much more rational my thought process is becoming as time passes. I don't always see that so it is wonderful to get her feedback.
ReplyDeleteI love this. What happened to me doesn't define me.
ReplyDeleteCM
My physical scars from life are my tattoos to remind myself of the road I've traveled some very happy memories of giving birth, some not so much fun but life lessons. I'm still a work in progress when it comes to the emotional scars of life but I'm working my way through them and I'm the better for it!
ReplyDeleteMy scars are like a war memorial in my heart. They remind me of where I have been and never to be that stupid again to build a false reality that was not true. My war memorial I look at from time to time, not quite as often as I once did. Great Wed hug for sure.
ReplyDeleteMy scars are fresh, healing but fresh and remind me at times of where I am at or where I need to be. So the last few weeks have been hectic.... busy at work and I got sick ect... so what is the first things to go from my life, yoga, journaling, meditation, all my most healing self care. And those scars start to reopen and I feel the pain of the wounds beneath and I get a little off track and try to avoid pain and then have to wake up and feel the pain, tend to the wounds, so again the scars can start to heal again.
ReplyDeleteThis seems to be an iterative process for me. A year ago it was so much harder and more painful and more difficult and less clear what I felt and what was going on. This is where I'm at this weekend- needing to tend some wounds that opened up over the last 10 days.
Love and support sisters
Becky
I saw this on Instagram H O P E
ReplyDeleteHang on pain ends. I thought it was very fitting for what I feel at times. It's getting easier day by day.
Hell yes, I am.
ReplyDeleteThe other woman lives down the street from us. Seeing her almost daily is very difficult. It is going on 3 years for us
ReplyDeleteUnknown
DeleteThe ow in our situation continues an occasional drive through the neighborhood but I can't imagine the pain if I had to encounter this person every day! I'm so sorry you have to live through this pain every day! Almost three years since the affair ended here as well! I'm hoping time will continue to heal the wounds that surely will only leave scars! The ow tried so hard to remind my h that when their affair began, they knew it would hurt someone for a little while....meaning me when he asked for the divorce. Problem was he didn't want a divorce and when she told me he thought finally he would be free of her... I imagine her scars are deep since she destroyed her marriage to be with my ahole! Prayers for us all!
We do not associate with her or her partner but my h wants us to just wave at her when we pass by as if nothing happened and move on. I feel like it is wrong to acknowledge her in any way. AM I wrong?
DeleteUnknown, As Steam often reminds us on this site: My heartbreak, my rules. YOU get to decide what feels comfortable and right to you. I agree that waving at the woman who slept with your husband is a bit much to ask of anyone. Honestly, he should be grateful you haven't stuck a knife in her back. A real one. So no, there should be absolutely NO Contact and that goes for any gesture of acknowledgement. As far as you're concerned (and your husband is concerned), treat her like she doesn't exist.
DeleteUnknown
DeleteSeriously! He thinks you can/should just wave and be courteous to the woman he had sex with! I'm sorry but not just no but hell no! Elle's right to say ignore because this is a non person now! That's almost as crazy as the time my h said before thinking that his ow would be someone I could have been friends with if it wasn't for the affair! Yep! I blew a gasket on that bs as well!
I was friendly with the OW. And the only reason she was being nice was to throw me off of what she was really trying to do. She tried to make me trust her so I didn't suspect her. She actually had me make her a cake for her family reunion and hugged me when I agreed to do it. It also just happened to be the exact same cake I made my husband for Father's Day. She had over heard me talking to someone else and I was stupid enough to show her the picture. I still don't understand why she had to have the same cake other then the obsession she had with him.
DeleteI don't have to see her at all because we moved across the country but, I've still dealt with her and her flying monkey ( her best friend) who she sent to attack me on social media. She was going to set me straight about their affair being a real relationship. It lasted about 10 days and he had total sleep deprivation from ingesting adderall that she had been slipping him in his coffee. The flying monkey told me that I was lied to, not only by my husband but, from the Dr's, Nurses and counselors regarding his sleep deprivation and what caused it.
I still hold onto a lot of anger where these women are concerned. Not only for the lies they told to cover up theirs indiscretions but, putting all the blame on my husband.
Thank you Elle & Theresa for your comments. I am hoping that having to deal with seeing her all the time will get easier but it just keeps everthing so alive in my mind. We are now retired and should be living our golden years totally happy
DeleteUnknown- these guys can be unbelievable. Wave? WAVE? Don't feel bad or alone in your husbands insanity. Mine went even further than Teresa's husband. Since I had met hisOW #2 at one point, when I asked him (ahem asked is an understatement) him to write her a good bye and no contact text he thought it would be a good idea to include my info to her so we could all get together sometime in the future!!!!!!!!! GOD we could all write the damn book couldnt we?
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
Delete