Surviving Infidelity

A journal entry from January 23, 2015   Last night I dreamed that Joe still had secrets. If I believed that it will make me crazy. As devastating as it was to find out he had an affair, it was even more upsetting when I learn ed there were more secrets. I thought I knew this man better than anyone else and it turned out, I didn’t know him at all. It's the secrets that break my heart. That's why honesty is so important. What I don’t know, can make me crazy. The not-knowing fuels my imagination. I review things over and over in my mind trying to envision the things did and talked about with other women. Each time I learn something from Joe’s past I can think of a dozen different ways to adjust my understanding of it.  Someone wrote that sexual betrayal is like a puzzle with pieces missing. We will never know every detail. We weren’t there. In my dream, it was the thought of secrets that startled me awake. He promised -no more secrets. ...

From my Journal dated January 21, 2016 I used to feel loved and valued. Joe was my mirror.  The love I saw in his eyes was a reflection of who I am.  I must be the most amazing person because this man chose me and shows me  every day  how much he loves me.   When my mirror shattered, when I realized there was a whole other side to my husband that I didn’t know about, my self-worth disintegrated like shards of glass.  My sense of self vanished.  With each new disclosure my mirror splintered and my fear grew.  I was lost without that mirror. Without it I didn’t know who I was. Even now, two years later, when Joe mentions a temptation it pulls me back.  It doesn’t matter that he's turned away from the temptation.  I am still afraid. The beliefs I had about my husband and what I meant to him are gone. I just realized those are two separate things. My beliefs about Joe are not the same as my value to him. My value has never change...

A journal entry from  December 24, 2013   It's Christmas Eve and I’m sitting here afraid to begin this writing.   A fraid to open my frozen heart to the rush of emotion I know is sure to break through if I allow myself to really understand what has been going on in my life for … how long?   Joe said a few months.     Joe has been having an emotional affair for a few months. Instead of dealing with this I started googling, “Is it really an affair if there is no sex?”   T he answer is yes and it can be much more damaging than a fling.   I’m sick.   Why did he need this?   I think I'm crazy. I want to sweep it under the rug and curl up in his arms.   I want Joe to make it better.   I want him to say all of those comforting loving things that show how much he loves me.   I’m in denial. I want him to protect me from this awful thing that has happened but he's the one who did it.   He is my abuser.   I under...