Thursday Thought

On backsliding, emotional labor, resistance and pie. Plus the two questions you need to ask

M'mmmm...pie. That somebody else made.  It's holiday season, the unofficial time when our secret sisters run themselves ragged trying to model perfection while inside the conversation goes something like this: I thought I was further along than this. I've completely slid backward. I am so triggered and so mad at myself because I need to get nine pies baked. (Seriously. Nine pies. That's a LOT of pie.) Am I never going to get over this? What's wrong with me? Why can't I handle this better? Let me tell you something. It's a full-time job just wading through the devastation wrought by infidelity. And yet, I don't know a single person who was able to just focus on working through the pain. Instead, we're also raising children (which, I might add, is also a full-time job), tending to elderly parents, working our paid jobs, volunteering at the goddamn bake sale to fundraise for Cub scouts, grocery shopping to ensure our family doesn't starve... And baking nine freaking pies for Thanksgiving dinner.  What the hell is wrong with us that we think that's not enough? What is so toxic about our culture that no matter how many balls we have in the air, we're beating ourselves up for not being able to juggle more? Where did we learn that if we're not able to keep everything running smoothly while looking great and simultaneously dealing with the most devastating betrayal in our lives that we're failing? Oh wait...I know where we learned it. In a culture that tells us our worth is directly related to our pants size and our ability to hold onto a man. In a culture in which women's emotional labor is invisible. In a culture in which our visible pain is not to be shown in polite circles. The only correct answer to "how are you?" is "Great!" though "So busy!" is also acceptable as long as it's said with a smile.  But here's the thing, my secret sisters. We don't have to buy into this toxic and insidious bullshit.  Nobody can simultaneously heal from the pain of betrayal while keeping her life running smoothly without sacrificing something crucial: Yourself. How does this sacrifice take place? Piece by excruciating piece. Why can't I be more like her? Why aren't I further along in my healing? Why do I get triggered so easily? Why can't I get over this? Why am I so angry at everyone? Why do I keep screwing up? Why am I so tired? I'll tell you why. Cause this is exhausting difficult painful work.  Want to know the real question you should be asking yourself when you notice that you're tired and frustrated and agitated and angry and sad and numb? What do I need right now? And the next question: How can I give that to myself? Cause there's nothing wrong with you that you're tired and frustrated and angry and agitated and sad and numb. Nothing wrong at all. That is the appropriate response to betrayal. It is the appropriate response to the recognition that your emotional labor – not just healing yourself but taking care of everyone else and making it look easy – is a rigged system. Of course, you're angry. Of course, you're agitated. Of course, you're frustrated and sad and numb. The system is rigged against you. But you don't have to play along. What do I need right now? How do I give that to myself? That isn't letting others down, it's showing them that you recognize your own worth. Which also communicates to them something amazing. That they're worthy too and that they get to value themselves. It gives them the space to ask the same questions: What do I need right now? How do I give that to myself? There's nothing wrong with you that you're still being triggered two years out, five years out, seven years out. There's nothing wrong with you that the holidays are really really hard. There's nothing wrong with you that you're freaking exhausted at even the thought of baking NINE pies. Or one pie, for that matter. Pies are a lot of work! There's nothing wrong with you. Full stop. Nothing. What do I need right now? How can I give it to myself? Two questions. And the answers are so often simple.  Harder is silencing the resistance to those answers. I need a nap. (Oh, but resistance says you don't have time to nap. You need to tidy up, set the table, buy presents.) I need to cry. (Oh, but resistance says crying is pathetic. Besides, you should be over this by now.) I need a few days alone. (Oh, but resistance says how selfish of you to take time away when there are kids who need feeding, dishes that need washing. That Christmas tree isn't going to put itself up, you know.) It's so hard to fight back against that resistance. But that's our work. To value ourselves. To value others enough to take care of ourselves so that we can show up for them as our best selves. To understand that we're not doing anyone any favours by dragging resentment along with us. I'll say it again for those in the back. There is nothing wrong with you. Healing will take longer than you think. Even with healing, you will have triggers. There will be times when you think you're backsliding. There will be times when you think you've made the wrong choice, no matter what that choice was. There will be days (weeks!) when you wonder if you've made a horrible mistake.  What do I need right now? How do I give it myself? Life has a way of sorting itself out if we just keep showing up as best we can. With our armour put away because we don't need it. Trusting ourselves to keep ourselves safe. With our hearts open. Not necessarily with nine pies. Or even one.  Unless baking pie is what you need right now. For the rest of us, that's what bakeries are for.

The Certainty of Change

"My heart pounded in my ears. My chest and stomach felt tight. I couldn't breathe all the way in. Maybe I was having a heart attack. It wasn't unheard of, after all. I resisted the urge to look symptoms of heart attack or stroke on the Internet. No good was going to come of that. I imagined the ambulance racing up our drive, lights flashing in the country darkness. How had I gotten here — again? All the...searching, seeking, reading... All the goddamn thinking, and there was still this: the waiting out the night. Face-to-face with my aloneness. With the certainty of change."~Dani Shapiro, "Devotion"

Waiting out the night. Were truer words ever written that describe the experience of betrayal? If I could sum up the years following the discovery of my husband's betrayal, those four words are it. Waiting out the night.
It's excruciating, isn't it? After the initial gut-punch of discovery, after the falling to our knees, we just want the agony to be over. We want the pain to stop. To let us catch our breath. To point us in some direction that makes sense. To promise us...something. That we're safe. That we're making the right choice. That we're going to be okay.
Instead, we wait out the night. What choice do we have, really?
There's the horrible, do-not-do-this choice of swallowing a bottle of pills and denying ourselves a happily ever after. There's the numbing ourselves through booze, or drugs, or shopping, or gambling, or endless TV watching. There's the plain of lethal flatness, a nice place to visit but you don't want to stay there. There's the pain shopping – hours of scrolling through the OW's Facebook feed, or driving past her house, or gossiping about her with uncomfortable looking friends.
Or, there's the (ugh) waiting out the night.
Shapiro goes on to call it "the anguish of the unknown" and that's really what the night is, isn't it. It's the fear that morning won't come. That the darkness won't give way to light. My 3 a.m. worries that hover, huge and unbidden, seem ridiculous in the morning. And yet, in that thick, wooly darkness, my thoughts seem necessary. Important. True.
Part those heavy curtains though and daylight brings a clarity. A lifting of the heart, a revival of new possibilities.
Optimism. Hope.
Until then, we wait out the night.
Not passively. Waiting isn't about resignation so much as realization that this is part of the process. That, beneath the waiting, a plan is taking shape. Our future is taking shape.
It's a future informed by having survived the trauma and accepting the anguish that life sometimes delivers. It's a future shaped by recognizing our worth and our strength.
It's a future that doesn't promise no more pain but does promise what we need to respond to whatever comes next.
Whether your night comes as you move into a new life without him, or whether it comes as you await enough clarity to make your choice of whether to stay or go, or whether it comes as you begin to rebuild your marriage, we all must...wait. Betrayal demands it of us. It delivers the darkness until we can see the blurry, distant light of dawn over the horizon.
Know that the darkness will gave way. As long as we don't wait passively but continue to do the work of loving ourselves, being kind to ourselves, challenging the stories that endlessly loop in our brain and make us crazy. As long as, within the darkness, we sit with the awareness that we deserve love and respect. Knowing that, we can trust the light will come.

Guest post: Awesome advice from a betrayed wife

"Steam" often comments to this site, offering up her experience as a guide to others, and supporting those who aren't as far along the path as she. 
She wrote this awhile back and it's so succinct and compassionate, that I requested her permission to re-post it so that more can read it.
I love that this site has become a hub for so many who feel isolated and confused. I love how respectful we all are of each other's experiences, always recognizing that we each need to walk our own paths.
Thanks, Steam, for helping make this such a great space.
~Elle


I was immediatly diagnoised with PTSD in our 1st MC session. Our counselor made it very clear to my husband that my reaction to his selfish and fucked up action was completely NORMAL, not that that makes you feel instantly better, but it was good to have a name for it. Reliving it over and over again is hard to avoid when you cannot stop thinking about it. I am 10 months out this week and I have done my best to "reclaim" the places and things that gave me joy, that he stole, that I thought he had stolen forever. Since most of his affair was online with only three in-person meetings – when they met (in another country) and two months later when they had sex twice (in another country) –  there is not much to reclaim. All I have asked is that he NOT take me to the place they had their one dinner. He said it was bad anyway and he would never go again, good I dont need to go there, it was never mine to begin with. I am starting to feel safe again, and although I cannot ever trust him again like I did when I was blind, I do trust him a lot more. I no longer hit every e-mail address and social media page of his every day or even every week, I no longer search for her online. But I watch the cell phone bill like a madwoman. Something I never ever checked which had all I ever needed to know.
I feel a lot more like a better me, and our relationship has changed so drastically it's almost a miracle. And the hardest part to admit? It was not just him who had to change. I had to do my part too.  

If you are brand new to this, don't think YOU need to do that immediately. You need to heal and he needs to help. It's only then that you can find a better version of yourself...she is in there, I promise. 

It's not your fault, it was never your fault, you are not the one who cheated. You are not the one who risked everytihng, so just take it minute by minute – don't rush it – go through it, not around or over or under it, and if you have a new relationship with your partner (we could never have found one without counseling, relish it. 
BTW, I had EMDR about 20 years ago and it was quite astonishing. If I was still living in the land of PTSD I would not hesitate, but first I wanted to beat my H up in counseling for a while. 
lol  
Look at that, I just laughed. You will too...you will get through this unless your husband is an absolute a-hole and you are with a bad man, not a good man with issues and mistakes. Hang in there if he is worth staying with – and he will show you if he is – and thrive.  

All I have wanted to do other than save my own relationship was to be able to help others who have been through this. The spark came while I was googling within hours of finding out on that horrible d-day. I was of the school "once a cheater, always a cheater" and "if anyone ever did that to ME, he would be gone SO fast".  

Arent we all?

But when he DID do that to me, I gave him an immediate (and I add, loud and hysterical) choice he had to make – her or me. When I saw the absolute devestation in HIS eyes, seeing what he had done to ME, seeing his tears, hearing his words, feeling his absolute remorse, sadness, and looking into an opening into his soul I had never ever ever seen before. When I locked myself in the bedroom and he sat outside talking to me through the window, I surprised mySELF when I realized that even though I could not touch him or look at him right NOW, I wanted him to stay.
I wanted to know if we could survive this.  
I wanted to know I would be ok (because how could I EVER be ok again??) 
I wanted HOPE. 
and this was the only place I found it.  

I hated the name "club" – lol. I thought it would be just another husband bashing site, but it was not. [Elle's] words, as someone who had been through this, gave me HOPE – her essays and her links and her answers to others – so much wisdom and compassion, smart funny and sarcastic, but not bitter – it gave me what I needed. I wanted to get "there" where [she is], and I am on my way.  

No one could have told me that I would ever get through this, but honestly, somewhere on this blog that very first day – [Elle] actually did.

~Steam

When Remembering Becomes Reliving

I was listening to a radio program recently about PTSD – post-traumatic stress disorder.
I talk a lot about PTSD on this site because it was the paradigm that felt the most right to me after D-Day. After a friend of mine, who counsels those with PTSD from childhood sex abuse, suggested I was experiencing post-trauma, my response to my husband's infidelity began to make sense. Well, as much sense as PTSD ever makes.
It was a tough sell at first. As I've noted on this site before, PTSD seemed so...dramatic. As if I was exaggerating my experience. PTSD was for veterans and rape victims, domestic abuse survivors and people who fled the Twin Towers.
There's increasing research, however, that PTSD is more common than that. That those of us who experience a sudden, shocking event (infidelity anyone?) can come away with PTSD. Not all of us, of course. But some of us. Too many of us.
PTSD is created, explained the doctor on the radio program, when the feeling we experience during trauma (fear, grief, shame, for instance) becomes linked with certain stimuli (a sight, a smell, a sound).
As the doctor on the radio program put it, the neurons that "fire together, wire together."
It explains why a certain song can suddenly transport us back to that moment of finding out and suddenly our heart is racing, our blood pressure is skyrocketing, our hands are tingling. We're not just remembering the trauma, we're re-living it.
Maybe it's the sight of a certain model car. The voicemail message on a husband's cell phone (which I'd listened to roughly 30 times as I tried to reach him, knowing he was with her). A certain time of year. A snowstorm.
At first, it's normal for the entire experience to feel like a nightmare from which you can't awake. For some of us, however, that feeling lingers...and sometimes gets worse.
While we might become more functional in some ways, we have periods of the day when we're immobilized. When we're flashing back. When we're not remembering what we know but reliving it.
The most important thing to know is that this, under the circumstances is normal. Know also, that it's surmountable. Life will not always feel like a war-zone in which you're unsafe and insecure.
But it's important to get treated so that you can begin to heal. To have memories, including bad ones, without trauma.
Infidelity is so much more devastating than most of us could have imagined. Far more devastating than our culture understands. Unless, of course, you've lived through it.

When "Time" Feels Like a Four-Letter Word

Anyone who's experienced grief has no doubt been told that "time heals all wounds", "things will get better with time", "time is a wise counsellor" and blah blah f'ing blah.
After my D-day, time felt far more like an enemy than a friend. The thought of dragging myself through another day, another week, another month of this version of hell seemed like far more than I could manage.
And yet, what most of us are seeking in the aftermath of betrayal, is assurance that time will heal. That memories will fade. That mind movies will stop. That our heart will one day beat without pain.
The good news is that's an assurance I can give. Happily, easily and with confidence.
The bad news is that I can't give you a timeline.
That largely depends on your situation (has your husband cut off all contact? is he remorseful? has he or you left the marriage and created a separation agreement? is the OW out of your life? and so on...) and on how you're handling it.
The more you can find support for yourself through this, I believe, the quickly you'll get through it. The better able you are to manage the inevitable pain (running into the OW, explaining to your children, finding more information...), the more quickly you'll move to a place where the pain lessens.
It will take time...that four-letter word.
But with time, you'll be able to hear a certain song, or look at a particular photograph or talk about the affair(s) with a friend without feeling as if your heart is in a vise.

Surviving Infidelity: The best advice you never heard

Mention cheating and you'll inspire some strong reactions, often along the lines of "castrate him!" and "homewrecking whore". While self-righteous fury is occasionally cathartic, it rarely serves the cheatee very well, who may well still love the potentially castrated man (though she's likely less fond of the homewrecker).

The result is that few of us are offered particularly healthy advice from our friends and family, even -- sometimes especially -- if they've gone through it themselves. My friend Annie, with whom I confided because she'd had a similar situation and, I thought, could support me, responded to my comment that I didn't want to lose my marriage with a dismissive, "well, I wouldn't stay". End of conversation.

Sadly, this leaves so many of us feeling doubly injured. We've suffered this grievous injustice, we think, and yet talking about it leaves us open to poorly thought out opinions, self-serving advice or gossip. I learned very quickly to confide in very few people and only those whom I felt sure would simply support me.

Fortunately, I did come across a wonderful Web site – Surviving Infidelity – that allowed me to discuss my situation anonymously and candidly, without fear or judgement. If I did receive unwarranted advice, I simply dismissed what didn't work for me and took what did. Because it was from strangers, it was so much easier to do.

It also inspired me to create this site -- to create a sense of community around the issue of infidelity and to invite other women to join the conversation. Betrayal changes who you are. Never again will you look at the world through the same eyes. It helps to share this new you with others as you figure out where you go from here.

What are some of the Web sites that have helped you? Please post them here for others to try.