Guest Post: Life After

by Laura S., founder of Infidelity Counseling Network

I did not stay in my marriage. I am still married.

How can that be true?

The answer lies in the term “stay.” A simple word but a deceptive one. After my husband’s affair, we decided to try to mend our relationship. Mending a relationship is a journey of healing (always), pain (unfortunately), honesty (ouch), hard work, vulnerability, more hard work, more honesty, and partnership. Staying in a relationship is something completely different. If you stayed in your marriage but still feel wounded, you know exactly what I mean.

You cannot mend your marriage all by yourself. It takes both partners, fully invested in recovering from the infidelity and the destruction that betrayal pours everywhere, like seeping poison. And if your partner is not remotely interested in mending, then you have a choice: you can end the relationship or you can “stay” in it, knowing that it is injured and cracked.

So what did we do? Oh, there are zillions of books and articles and websites that give the seemingly magic recipe but truly it’s an individual path like any type of personal growth. We went to couples’ therapy. We went to individual therapy. We attended a healing weekend retreat. We learned about communication. He explored the reasons for his betrayal. I explored my own self. He tried to figure out why he hurt me. We read “The Monogamy Myth” by Peggy Vaughan and “Mating in Captivity” by Esther Perel. He saw my pain, he shared my pain, he grieved over my pain. He worked through his issues and I threw things (okay, that didn’t help). I broke things (ditto). We yelled. We cried. We yelled again. We committed to brutal honesty. We lied. We told the truth.

And above all, we agreed that we did not want only to “stay”. We wanted a healed relationship or nothing at all. I wanted his integrity or nothing at all.

I do want to be careful here about seeming holier-than-thou. Some may interpret my story this way. But the infidelity conversation has to allow for good people making hurtful choices, just as it allows for bad people making hurtful choices. And why did we try to mend? Eight years later, I can barely remember. It was a complex reason having to do with love, kids, finances, shame (if we get divorced, what will our families think?), stubbornness, hope, and 23 years of history together (good times and awful times) that were not ready to be stored away.

Three months later, we could be tentative friends again. Seven months later, he moved back in. Two years later, we had recovered our marriage. Eight years later, my friends say, “I bet you guys never fight.” Are they kidding?  Of course we do. We are imperfect. Our marriage has ups and downs, just like everyone’s.

I don’t mean to imply that some paths are better than others. There are many valid reasons to stay, just as there are valid reasons to end it or mend it. I just want to be careful about the language we use. Recovery from betrayal is both powerful and exhausting, whether by yourself or with your partner, and in that shared pain we somehow, eventually, survive.

Infidelity Counseling Network offers peer mentoring (on a sliding scale) for anyone dealing with betrayal. 

Guest Post: Leave When You're Not Valued

by StillStanding1

Unfortunately, in life there are times you will not be valued. Do not stay where you are not valued. Do not waste time in self-pity because someone did not value you. Your value, your worth, comes from your heart, not from someone else. ~Sarah Johnson

One of the things that amazes me about this site, this collection of warrior souls, is how often we all reach a similar place in our rumbles at the same time. Whether we choose to stay or go, we find ourselves pondering, or stuck, or questioning along the same lines. Have I done the right thing (in staying or leaving)? Why doesn’t he get how much he’s hurt me? Is this as good as it gets? Why can’t I forgive, or move on, or let it go? Will I ever feel something for him again? Or conversely, How did I not see he was such a selfish ass? And on and on.

Lately, what has been bubbling up over on the Separating/Divorcing page is this: How did I choose so badly? And I see this same theme coming up in other threads. How could I not see the potential for this disaster coming for me? As if we should have somehow seen this horrific break in trust in our life partners before it happened. As if we should somehow have magically known and avoided it.  

What that sounds like to me is that we are taking on the blame for our spouses’ cheating (not dissimilar to the self-blame we wrestle with early after D-day, in the form of if I had been skinnier, younger, sexier, blah, blah, blah. When we hear of another’s pain, do we think, “wow, she should have seen that coming. Look at his family!”? No. The idea that we should have been able to see the tragic flaw(s) in our partners creates the illusion that we have control over this situation. Because if we are to blame, we can change the past.

Here’s the thing: We chose our partners to the best of the ability we had at the time. We were hopeful, optimistic and trusting. We believed in their basic human goodness and potential. I’m here to say that this is a beautiful thing. Very likely, we weren’t wrong then. They had all the potential we saw. We were never wrong to believe in them. But people change. The choices they make over time, the people they choose to invite into their lives, the forms of entertainment they choose, the experiences they have at the hands of others, all shift them from their centers if they go through life unconsciously. They made choices, over time, that led them to become different people. Not the human of potential we once saw, but instead someone making unhealthy choices to avoid dealing with pain and difficulty. Choices that ultimately led to breaking faith with and hurting the one he promised to love and protect.  But those choices are all his. His responsibility, not yours. His to wrestle with and make amends for.

For those looking at exes and soon to be exes (STBX), trying to understand the crazy, selfish, manipulative asshole that is keeping you on the roller coaster as you navigate divorce: You’re wondering how you could have married that guy? You didn’t. He wasn’t that guy when you married. Certainly, the potential for that guy was always in there, but the potential for the good guy you saw was in there too.  His choices determine which one he became. And now, he’s digging himself deeper because he knows he messed up (even if it is only subconsciously) and by making you look crazy (or demanding or shrill, etc.), he justifies his crappy choices. He doesn’t have to be too uncomfortable or deal with guilt and shame. Although many of us offered second chances, he was incapable of valuing us or the gift we offered.

For those rumbling with do I stay, or do I go?, I think it boils down to the same questions. Is he keeping you off balance to avoid dealing with his own shame and guilt? Is he shifting blame to you (problems in the marriage are not justifications for choosing to cheat)? Is he taking a good hard look at himself and doing the work to figure out how he got here? Has he said he’s sorry as many times as you need to hear it? Has he shown that he values you and this second (or third) chance you are giving him?

And for all of us, are we looking at ourselves, treating ourselves as if we have value? Are we in tacit agreement that we don’t have value by allowing others to treat us in that way?  We are not obligated to stay in a marriage where we are not valued. Regardless of finances, family expectations and (to utter a near blasphemy) even regardless of children, you are not required to immolate yourself on the pyre of his flaming pile of dog poo. You have permission to put yourself ahead of him, your in-laws, and yes, even (or especially) your children. Your children are best served by your modeling healthy self-worth. It’s going to feel selfish if you’ve never practiced choosing yourself or putting your needs ahead of or in line with others’. It's going to get uncomfortable. But I encourage you to start by saying no to things you don’t want to do and yes to the things you do. (I’m not talking about buying that pair of shoes and then not having grocery money. I’m talking about saying no to baking all the cookies for the bake sale. No to picking up his dry cleaning. Yes to a quiet walk outside instead of cleaning the bathrooms for the third time this week.)

A few months after my ex and I separated, I was still trying to fight for my marriage. I in no way wanted a divorce. I had given this man several chances to choose better for himself, but he rejected them all. We were past mediation and just in the waiting phase before the divorce was final. I was focusing on getting out of my shell, making friends, exercising, doing art, getting good sleep. I was doing my best to deal with reality as it was. And honestly, it was such a relief not to be living with his nonsense any more. I felt like I could breathe. My daughter, out of the blue, says to me, “Mom, I didn’t want the divorce at first, but you are so much happier and healthier, that I can see it is the right thing.” Wow. I hadn’t even considered that I was either of those things, but the truth is, I was both happier and healthier without him in my life. And I’ve watched her, in the year since that conversation, showing herself more love and care in her choices and in how she approaches relationships, both friendships and romantic. That’s a big deal.

Part two of this is that I am now much quicker to recognize when I am not being valued as I ought, and now have the experience, strength and self-worth to walk away. I also recognize that the time with my ex has not been a waste. I have my children. I have so much learning. And I still (finally!) have me.

It’s okay to grieve the loss of the idea, the story you thought you had, or the relationship or any other change. But know that you will come out the other side. Trust yourself. Listen to your inner voice. Whether you stay or go, know that you have value and treat yourself that way.

How much is enough?

My 15-year-old son has a girlfriend (I know, I know. He's far too young. A baby!). He's smitten. They recently celebrated their one-month anniversary. A week later he visited the cottage of another friend. A girl. A visit that was planned months ago with this good friend.
Cue the drama: His girlfriend became convinced that "something" would happen between my son and his friend. And so she flirted with some guy over text, something my son only knows because a friend of his girlfriend sent him screen shots of the offending texts. My son plans to ask his girlfriend for the "truth" and if she lies to his face then he'll "have to decide what to do next."
It's not easy for me to back off and let my people in my life figure things out on their own though I try mightily. And so I asked my son some questions: What, to him, constitutes "cheating"? How important is honesty in any relationship? Where does he draw the line in what he will and will not tolerate in a relationship? How much is enough?
It's a question we all need to examine for ourselves. For some of us, putting up with someone's shit is a far easier life to imagine than being left or walking away. Far more tempting to tolerate an unhealthy relationship than none at all.
But we don't usually see it in those stark terms. We don't usually realize the fear beneath these choices that don't really feel like choices. We don't see that, by refusing to take a stand about what we will and won't tolerate, we're betraying ourselves. We think we're avoiding pain. But really, we're absorbing it.
How much is enough? 
"Enough" for me is the refusal of a partner to take responsibility for his choices and a refusal to do the work necessary to help us heal.
"Enough" for you might be his choice to cheat in the first place. "Enough" might be his choice to gamble away the mortgage. It might be his dedication to porn. "Enough" might be the first time he hits you. "Enough" might be the 87th time.
"Enough" is that place we come to where we realize that our own integrity is worth the price of heartbreak. It's where we take responsibility for our own choices and insist that others take responsibility for theirs. Enough is where we realize that standing firm in our own convictions won't be the easy thing but it will always be the right thing. Enough is freedom.

As for my son: I hope that he won't betray himself by moving the line between what he will and won't tolerate in order to avoid heartbreak. In any case, if this goes on much longer, I promise you I will have had more than enough.  ;)