What to do with the anger?

At first I was angrier with his Affair Partner than with him.  (And I don’t mean to gloss over his Affair Partner from 2008 – the online EA).  I should probably differentiate between the two.  I will call them PA and EA.  PA was physically present.  She was tangible. She was real to him, even though their relationship was pure fantasy.  EA was his ideal. A neglected housewife.  Everything about their relationship was pure fantasy.  There was nothing tangible.  There were long phone calls, time spent on Second Life and skype calls and messaging.  They had amazing sex in their minds.

PA was the most damaging.  She was close, willing, horribly broken and needy.  She accepted the crumbs.  Much like bread crumbs Hansel and Gretal dropped to find their way home, she picked up the crumbs hoping for a “real” relationship at the end.  One I don’t think WH was ever willing or even able to give her.  But she always held out hope.  It didn’t matter how poorly he treated her, she was always willing to accept his pretty words, promises and apologies.

For a long time I was very angry with PA.  She had befriended me, she watched my children, she was in my home so much, I even cleaned her kitchen once at a party at her house because I felt sorry for her.  Little did I know.

I remember her standing in my kitchen waiting for WH to say goodbye to me and the kids before going out with his friends.  She was always going to drop him off or she would hang out with WH and one of his friends.  I remember her standing there waiting for him.  After D-Day I wondered if she had a smug grin on her face because she knew they were going to have sex right after they left.

On D-Day I hated her more than I hated him.  I thought she was a stupid, needy, worthless person.

Below is an excerpt from a letter to her that I will never send.

And do not think for one instant that you know the state of our marriage.  You know what he told you.  You were not in our marriage.  You were not privy to our private conversations.  You know what he told you.  When I met you, you were well into your affair with him.  Our marriage was completely destroyed by the time you met me.  He was devoting all of his time and energy to the good feelings of his affair with you and had almost completely withdrawn from our marriage.  What you witnessed was what I was receiving from my marriage.  Nothing.  He was distant and cold.  And I did not understand why.  I was hurt and I tried to mask that hurt.  I was jealous of the time he spent with you and his friends.  I was angry that I was left at home night after night.  I was furious that I only got to spend time with the drunk that wandered home at night.  Our marriage may have had problems, but he drove our marriage into the wall and your foot was on the accelerator.  So please don’t tell me that I treated him poorly.  Not when he was treating me horribly.  Not when he was withholding affection from me and giving it to you.  Not when he was giving you all of his time and his family none.  If he was unhappy in our marriage, you had a direct hand in his misery.  Because you are a cheap, selfish person.  A better person would have told him that you would not date him until he ended his marriage.   But that didn’t matter to you, because you had no intention of ending your marriage until he left me.  You pushed him to divorce me.  But he wouldn’t.

Writing that letter helped me get every thing out of my head.  Prior to the letter I had a running dialogue of every thing I wanted to say to her IF I ever got the chance again.  It clogged up my mind, put too much focus on PA, (and some focus on WH), when it should have been on me.  I had to let it go.  I had to get it out.  I never wanted to talk to her.  I never wanted to see her again.  But I had things I needed to say.  And in the end it didn’t matter if I said them to her directly or not.  Writing the letter helped me vent the anger and hurt and betrayal, without getting into a pissing match with her.

My last real contact with her was in the wee morning hours of June 16, 2010.  When I had to look at her smug, embarrassed face.  Smug because WH was leaving to go be with her and embarrassed because WH had called her and told her to come talk to me.  All she kept saying was that “we never meant for this to happen”.  I realized pretty quickly that any conversation with her was not going to reach her that it would be a waste of breath.  I told her “I hope he treats you better than he did me.” and I turned and walked back inside.

I know he treated her worse.  I know she accepted his mistreatment and always came back for more.  I know she was willing to abandon her kids to be with a man who had no respect for her, treated her cruelly and fed her sweet little lies to get what he wanted.  Still to this day, I have no idea who the monster was that dated her.  At that time my WH was just one rung above the monster.

In the end, I got better.  I got the man he is capable of being.  I got the man who is capable of being a kind and supportive partner.  A partner who is able to balance his wants and needs and with my wants and needs.  (We don’t always have equilibrium – but I see the effort).

So in the end, I am sorry for the time and effort I wasted on her or trying to out do her.  She really wasn’t worth my time.  These days I don’t think too much about her.  She is more of an abstraction than a reality.

Ironically, I owe the discovery of WH’s earlier online EA to my ability to let go of PA.  I had read that the AP could have been anyone.  When I discovered the online EA and the existence of EA, I realized this was true.  PA may have had a greater emotional hold over WH, but she was not the first and she certainly was not his only or even his one true love for that fact.  The discovery of EA made PA that less special and I was able to finally let her go and the anger I felt.

D-Day 2, 3 and 4

These are hard days. I just wonder why all the deception was necessary.

I get D-Day 2, he never ended the Affair. He was still talking to his Affair Partner. They were still talking on the phone, texting all day long, chatting online and meeting up – for sex or who knows what else. He kept on telling me it was over. That he just wanted to be friends with her that was it.

And then I saw it. He had forgotten to close out everything he was looking at online and left a craig’s list classified page up for apartment rentals in Indianapolis. (Where his AP was supposedly moving with her children). I was furious. I checked the history and not only was he looking for apartments, he was looking for jobs.

I have no idea what his real plan was or if it was just furthering his fantasy about them running off together. I confronted him and he told me that they were going to be together. But before he rode off into the sunset with her he was going to get our family in better financial shape.

I was furious, hurt and betrayed all over again. His Affair Partner still had his heart and his mind (such as it was). I left the house to sit on a park bench and cry in the rain. I called his mother and talked to her. I went to my empty condo and picked up my Mother’s day flowering plant off the back porch (not venturing in) and I returned home.

The next day I had the added joy of discovering that not only was he actively seeing her and not coming home at night, but they were shacking up in our former home.

I got really angry and made plans to leave for a week. I decided then and there I was going to take the kids and leave on Saturday morning.

I think the speed in which I took action, threw WH for a loop. On one hand he was happy that I wasn’t going to be interfering with his time with his Affair Partner and then sad that the kids were going to be gone. I have no idea at the time exactly where I fit into the whole equation. But in the span of two days, he went from telling me he wanted to be with her to telling me that he would do whatever it took to fix our marriage.

D-Day 3 and 4 were not so cataclysmic. D-Day 3 was just a confirmation of what I already suspected. That he had taken the Affair underground and he had brought his Affair Partner into our new home. D-Day 4 was the discovery of an online emotional affair from 2008. Once again after his confession of his physical affair, I began to suspect that his online gaming had included at least an inappropriate relationship. There had been a phone call from a woman a few years before that was unusual, not really accusing him of anything specific and he had been able to convince me it was just some nut from the gaming community. There was also a lot cell phone calls to unusual numbers – lots of minutes talking during the day, which I discovered when I changed the plan and lowered the anytime minutes, which was in line with what we historically used. But once again I trusted him and didn’t think to much of it at the time.

However, since my trust was destroyed, these little episodes from the past suddenly were troubling. I asked several times if there was anything else. If there was any other relationships that he needed to confess in the spirit of open and honest communication. And he said no.

I suspected and questioned him about bringing his Affair Partner in our home. When he inadvertently left his facebook page open and I found a message fragment from months earlier. He and his Affair Partner were making plans to get together while I was out of town. She said in her message that she would come to the apartment. When I confronted WH, he said it was just that one time. They had gone to the condo and she had not set foot in the apartment. I knew that wasn’t the truth. She had been to our apartment and had been seen by other people. WH had an explanation – she had something for him to sign. I remembered that due to a baby brained moment, I had accidently allowed the electricity to be shut off in the condo and I didn’t get it turned back on until after their date. I then I discovered another message about getting together on Tuesdays (when I was at work and he was off). I bluffed my way into a confession – he had sex with her in our new apartment but also in the condo while we were still living there.

So I wonder why all the need for deception? I knew. I had questioned him about these facts. Why continue to lie? Did he think that the truth was never going to come out? Did he think I wasn’t going to notice he was still keeping these huge secrets? I could see the guilt on him a mile away. My trust was shattered. I didn’t believe a word he said, so why continue to lie? Did he think it was going to be able to pull the wool over my eyes? One of the reasons he was able to deceive me for so long was that I trusted him – blindly.

I have no idea why he continued to lie. Was it self preservation? Did he think I was going to leave if one more thing came out? Did he feel so guilty and ashamed by his behavior – that he hoped if the secret never saw the light of day he would not have deal with it?

I know understanding why he did what he did is his burden to bear. I can’t figure it out. I am not going to spend time doing so.

The journey

As I am closing in the on a full year of No Contact with WH’s second Affair Partner, I contemplate recapturing the joy in my life.  I have come to a realization that my happiness is not dependent on someone else, nor can that someone else make me happy.  Happiness comes from within.

I love my children.  I take great pride in my children.  My children make me laugh and they give me moments of joy.  But they do not make me happy.  I experience happiness or joyful moments with them.  But those moments are fleeting.  I cannot be dependent on my children to make me happy.  Although I am happy because I am their mother.

I love my husband.  This year has been a struggle to be happy with him.  I certainly have not been happy because of him.  His actions have really put a damper any real joy.  It has been hard to put the painful memories aside.  I know I need to forgive in order to move on, because I do not want to stay in this one place for too much longer.

I feel love for him.  I give him love and I receive love from him.  He makes me smile or laugh.  I feel comfortable with him, at times.  But some days I feel a great sense of relief when he is not here and I have time to my own thoughts.  I have time to relax.  I am not sitting with him analyzing his mood, the situation wondering if it will be a good time to bring up the affair.

I wonder if I will have those moments of abandon with him.  I know I will never trust him the way I used to.  Blindly.  I am reserved around him.  Some days I am waiting for the other shoe to drop.  I am preparing myself for the day when he comes home and tells me he just does not want to be married to me.  That is not the way to love without abandon.  And even if I were to leave him and move on.  I don’t know that I could ever love anyone with the abandon I felt with him.  Will it always be this reserved?  Will I feel the joy without the worry?  Will I always be looking over my shoulder instead of straight ahead?

I don’t know.  Perhaps only time will tell.

So I focus on how to bring joy back into my life.  I want to be the person who laughs out loud all of the time.  Who can go to bed without thinking the worst.  Who can take sip of wine without needing it to dull the pain, but taste the texture.

How does one get the joy back?  Well last summer and fall, I faked it until I made it.

At that time, my husband was still very much involved with his girlfriend.  Although telling me he wanted our marriage.  On those days when he would leave the house for five or so minutes to get a pack of cigarettes or run over to the condo to do a load of laundry and then be gone for over an hour, I knew he was talking with her.  He would sit at the computer on facebook or playing one of his online games and I would see the message boxes being minimized every time I walked by.  It was crushing my spirit.  So I would go to the kitchen and put on some music.  I would do the dishes or fix lunch or breakfast.  The girls would come in an join me.  I would laugh and sing and dance with them.  I felt no real joy on the inside.  Any joy I experienced was from them.  But those memories are such fun ones.  I hope my kiddos remember the fun they had with me and not that mommy was sad all of the time.  Looking back, I don’t see the dancing as forced. I don’t remember a lot of the bad specific memories and I am happy I have those joyful ones to fill the void the unhappy memories have made.

As I struggle to find meaning in all of this to put the affair and all that happened into some sot of context, I wonder what is so special about me.  That is the real kicker in all of this the shot to my self esteem.  I have never once wondered what was special about me.  I knew.  These days it is harder to understand.  Because if I was so special why did he wander.  Why did he go looking for companionship and sex and attention?  Why didn’t he cleave to me?  I know intellectually what the reason is.  That it never was about me.  It was something broken with him.   To quote Steel Magnolias.  “Its what my head says, I just wish someone would explain it to my heart.”

So some days it is tougher to keep the dark shadows from creeping in.  It is tough to find a reason to smile.  Some days it is simpler to cry in the shower and force a smile or laugh on the way out.

I remember when I was younger, putting on music and dancing around my apartment.  The freedom.  The exhilaration I felt.  The exhaustion from dancing.  The weight being lifted from my heart.  I felt lighter than air.  Of course I was 25 lbs lighter then.  I was performing all of the time.  I was on stage.  I was busy. I was experiencing life and art and joy.  I was experiencing sadness and grief.  I was tasting life.  So dancing around my apartment was just an extension of how I was living.

I wonder what happened to that person.  Youth makes you fearless.  Maybe that it is why it is tough to find joy these days, I am no longer fearless.  I live waiting for the other shoe to drop.  I lived and died for someone else, rather than myself.

Those days are ending.  I am attempting to rid myself of the toxicity that controlled my life.  I realize that I only have control over me.  I do not have control over WH’s decisions or choices.  Those are on him.  I get to decide what is best for me.

For now, it is remaining in my marriage and healing.  We have good days and bad days.  Days when I am sad and days when I don’t think about his cheating.  (Even though it may not be forefront in my mind, it is always there – just below the surface.)

I must remember I did not cause this mess.  It is not my mess to fix.  I cannot control this mess.  I can only focus on myself. I know what I will do if he breaks NC or if he has another Affair.  I do not have to figure out why he did what he did.  I have released myself from that obligation.  I only have to focus on myself and my healing.

D-Day 1

I don’t remember what I said exactly. I remember very clearly wanting to hit him, so instead I smacked the dashboard of the car with all of my might. As I sat there in the passenger seat with my hand still stinging, I watched as my whole world crumbled before my eyes. I couldn’t believe my ears. He was having an affair. He was in love with her. He loved me but was not in love with me. He said “We never meant for this to happen.”

I was eight months pregnant. My husband and I had not had sex in almost six weeks. His affair partner was in my home constantly. During the day when I was at work, in the evening when I was at home. Her children, our children played together. I thought we were becoming friends. I was a little jealous that she got to go out with him. That she seemed to enjoy the same things he did. Little did I know.

They were “old” friends who has recently reconnected. She was miserable in her marriage and he was attempting to be a good friend. I had no idea what was going on. Looking back, the signs were all their that he was cheating, but I ignored them because WH (Wayward Husband) would never lie to me. WH was a lot of things but he had never been able to keep the truth from me.

As I quickly gather my thoughts that were crashing around me, I realized that he had been working up the courage to tell me he was leaving me. I thought the whole car ride that he was angry with me, that I had done something to insult him or hurt him. He was angry with me because he didn’t want to confess his affair. He knew he had to, but he didn’t want to.

I found out later that his best friend was forcing his hand. He never had any intention of telling me. His best friend gave him an ultimatum tell Isadora or I will. So my husband and his affair partner decided to break the news to their respective partners. The four of us had been together Friday night and all day Saturday, until his affair partner left with her husband in the early hours of Sunday morning. His affair partner had told her husband Sunday morning and she came back to our house that evening. I remember that evening she was a little moody and distant. She wouldn’t eat dinner with our family at the dinner table. She chose to eat at the coffee table. My belief is that while she was telling her husband, my husband was supposed to be telling me. But he didn’t.

I knew that morning when he dropped me off at my office that something was horribly wrong but I never expected his confession. He didn’t want to tell me, but I forced it out of him. By forcing that horrible truth out of him, all the joy in my world was sucked out that car window.