My tears of sorrow - to my husband
Some people will read this and wonder why I am apologising to you but my darling husband I am so sorry. You were the person who chose to step outside the boundaries of your marriage and have an affair but I am so sorry for so many things.
I have cried tears of sorrow all week. I have reflected on my behaviour during the last 3 months and I am ashamed of myself. I hate to sound cliched, but just like you, I wish I could turn back time.
I don't wish that I could turn back time so you did not have the affair. I can accept this now and in a strange way I am grateful that your affair has made me realise so many things about myself and given me the opportunity to address my issues and become a better person.
I wish I could turn back the last 3 months. I have been so caught up in my own despair that I have failed to realise that you have been in pain also. You have been suffering, and yet I just selfishly expected you to meet my own needs.
I now understand that what I expected from you was completely unrealistic. You were involved with someone else and I expected you to come back into my life declaring your undying love for me. If you felt love for me you would not have stepped outside the boundaries of your marriage. My expectations of you were so unrealistic and therefore never achievable.
I accept that my behaviour has contributed to you feeling completely unloved and being the person that you are, needing to find your worth elsewhere. I know my behaviour was a reaction to your behaviour, but I have also worked out that I should have handled things so differently.
I smothered you. I backed you into a corner and gave you no room to move. The only direction you could go was to turn and run from me and for that I will never forgive myself.
I cannot believe how I have treated you. In my desperation I have only succeeded in hurting you. Part of me wanted to hurt you in the same way that I have been hurt. I wanted to see you in pain. I wanted to see you in tears. I wanted to see you beg to come back into my life.
I understand that I have hurt you immensely and for this I will be eternally sorry.
I understand that I have been extremely selfish and for this I will probably never forgive myself.
I understand that it may be too late for us, and if this is the case I will be eternally grateful for the many years and many good times that we had together.
Please understand that I want you to be happy and if this means your life does not include me then I will be heartbroken but I will understand.
But above all I just want you to understand that I love you with all of my heart and I always will.
I have cried tears of sorrow all week. I have reflected on my behaviour during the last 3 months and I am ashamed of myself. I hate to sound cliched, but just like you, I wish I could turn back time.
I don't wish that I could turn back time so you did not have the affair. I can accept this now and in a strange way I am grateful that your affair has made me realise so many things about myself and given me the opportunity to address my issues and become a better person.
I wish I could turn back the last 3 months. I have been so caught up in my own despair that I have failed to realise that you have been in pain also. You have been suffering, and yet I just selfishly expected you to meet my own needs.
I now understand that what I expected from you was completely unrealistic. You were involved with someone else and I expected you to come back into my life declaring your undying love for me. If you felt love for me you would not have stepped outside the boundaries of your marriage. My expectations of you were so unrealistic and therefore never achievable.
I accept that my behaviour has contributed to you feeling completely unloved and being the person that you are, needing to find your worth elsewhere. I know my behaviour was a reaction to your behaviour, but I have also worked out that I should have handled things so differently.
I smothered you. I backed you into a corner and gave you no room to move. The only direction you could go was to turn and run from me and for that I will never forgive myself.
I cannot believe how I have treated you. In my desperation I have only succeeded in hurting you. Part of me wanted to hurt you in the same way that I have been hurt. I wanted to see you in pain. I wanted to see you in tears. I wanted to see you beg to come back into my life.
I understand that I have hurt you immensely and for this I will be eternally sorry.
I understand that I have been extremely selfish and for this I will probably never forgive myself.
I understand that it may be too late for us, and if this is the case I will be eternally grateful for the many years and many good times that we had together.
Please understand that I want you to be happy and if this means your life does not include me then I will be heartbroken but I will understand.
But above all I just want you to understand that I love you with all of my heart and I always will.
posted by kissmekate at 4:09 pm
16 Comments:
how things change.Isn't life the funniest thing, first we are betrayed and are so shattered (pardon the pun) that life seems so cold and lonely. We wonder why? We wonder what if? We wonder, what did I do to deserve this? We cry and think of all the great times. We try and makes sense of it all.
Then suddenly, it is all our fault! We see the world as, well, I did this to myself, I have no one else to blame but me, me, me, so why not just tell everyone, the reason my husband is a cheating, lying b******* is because I am not worthy of him. Bull****. What has happened shattered? This is not your fault!!!!! Please, don't give this man your heart again, so he can again crush it like some dried out clay, that crumbles into dust. Don't give him the pleasure of you saying, ok hon, you were right in what you did, you did it because I am a bad person. I haven't been a good enought wife. C***, no man or woman should step out of the boundaries of the marraige vow to play in another feild just because he of she feels they are badly done by. Grandmothers saying, "You made your bed, now lie in it". Do not give him the satisfaction of you saying, sorry honey it is my fault you strayed. Your story makes me sad and I feel your confidence in you has let you down. You are strong, you are beautiful, don't sell yourself short shattered. You didn't hold a gun to this mans head and say go out and get yourself a mistress because I am not worthy of you. He did this, don't you own it, this is not yours, it is his. He needs to deal with it and suffer the conciquences.
Karma, my love, karma.
Keep strong, listen to your heart and your head, your heart already knows it is over, your head only disagrees.
Anonymous it is funny that you post your comment. I actually knew that I would face the music of my readers with this post.
I do not see this affair as my fault. I never have and I never will. All I am saying is that I take responsibility for my behaviour. It does not mean I accept him straying. I am using it as an opportunity to better myself.
It has given me an opportunity for self assessment and to be honest with you, I don't like the person I have become. I am assessing my behaviour and making the necessary adjustments to become a better person. I am not accepting my husband's choices as my fault.
I have from day one accepted how my behaviour has contributed to my husband feeling the way he has, but my behaviour still did not give him the right to have an affair.
I have realised that my marriage may be over. My behaviour has contrinuted to that and I accept that. I want my husband to be happy but I know that if he does not accept responsibility for his actions and behaviour he will never find ultimate happiness.
It is a great pity your husband was unable to communicate his feelings of unloved prior to the affair so you were given the opportunity to assess yourself. Weren't you feeling unloved when you started this blog shattered, with no knowledge of the affair, what stopped you from having an affair also. I respect this post but it pains me to see you apologise when he comments on the price of lunch ;-(
Sometimes I wish that I had the ability to rewind back time. But then I remember that I wouldn't have known better because my husband never expressed his disatisfaction to me. He'd tell me things like, "I love spending weekends with you" and "I love you"
Deep down inside, I wanted the break up to be my fault, because I feel - as you probably do, that if it's our fault, then we are in a position to fix the marriage. But this is not the case - both of our spouses have 100% control in fixing or breaking both of our marriages. (Isn't that fair?)
But since this problem is not really our fault, we feel that we are not in control, and not being in control means that we have no choice but to accept things as they are.
My husband's mistress is able to convince my husband that the break up of our marriage is 100% my fault. (I can imagine her printing pages of my blog and going over them with my husband) That's the way that she eases his conscience (and perhaps her own) for his actions. And, he listens to her and not to me - even though I wanted to work on my marriage and do things differently (after I found out about the affair and he listed every little thing that I supposedly did wrong - things, which he had never complained about in the 10 years of us being together.).
So basically, people will do whatever they really want to do, and they'll hear and twist around whatever is convenient for them - notwithstanding what is the appropriate thing to do.
Therefore, don't blame yourself for any of his actions. Your feelings are completely normal given your circumstances- are you ashamed of being human?
Is it me? Why is it that men can't have feelings too and suffer not as much as we do but suffer nonetheless. I know we are more emotional but they feel as well and sometimes they make desperate decisions, decisions they have to live with.
Shattered - yes, we all have responsibility for the way our lives turn out. And the compromises we make. But I keep remembering that you are the third wife that didn't work out for this man. And for that, I think you end up with far less of the blame/responsibility than you might be looking to take on.
Still, if you are able to learn and grow from this then you will be better off.
lily - You get it!
Guys I am not apologising for my behaviour before the affair. I am apologising for POST affair.
No it is not my fault that he had the affair because HE made that decision KNOWING that it was not the right thing to do. Therefore I am NOT responsible for the affair.
phantom lord agree with you entirely. Yes I was feeling terribly unloved but I did not have an affair. I had every reason to do so but I obviously have different values to my husband.
John - I am wife #3 and until my husband does the smae thing as I have done, look within himself, he will never have a 100% satisfying relationship with anyone. I feel really sorry for him if he chooses this path because I want him to be happy. But at the end of the day only he can make this decision.
I too am a bit stunned by the change of tone. But, you know, I don't think anyone gets out of these situations without some fairly massive swings in mood and perspective....
I guess we can only take responsibility for our own behaviour. I hope that your husband takes responsibility for his.
By the way, I have added you to my blog roll.
To the Phantom,
Perhaps he chooses to deliver apologies in a somewhat more personal forum than here.
I think its safe to say we all feel responsible when our relationships fail, if we didnt question ourselves how else are we to learn, after celebrating my 40th yesterday in single town I am probably the last person to offer advise on how to keep a man LOL, but from the words of a bloke friend who has survived my whiplash tongue, my brutal honesty, "the man who is worthy will survive, the rest will fall" so with that in mind I don't no I wont apologise for who I am, and mate neither should you. If the man of our life can't stand the heat then its time THEY got out of our kitchens. Never ever compromise you, always be true to yourself and treat you like you would your lover.. Nothing wrong with loving yourself. While whale watching some surfie guy flirted with me, life begins at 40? maybe lol. My point is, don't be scared of tomorrow, the sun will still shine and the rain may still pour but happiness and contentment are from within ourself, and by George I think your on your way to recovery Shattered..
Shattered,
I can only assume you are a young beautiful woman... and I bet you will have no problems once you are ready to find someone else that is deserving of you.. take your time... and look to the future... enough is enough!!!
RE Anonymous said...
To the Phantom,
Perhaps he chooses to deliver apologies in a somewhat more personal forum than here.
Maybe he should try it. Unless he has an image to protect, but then again, isnt your soul mate worth an image?
Shattered,
I read all of these comments and I think I agree with all of them and none of them at the same time.
I hope he realizes everything he has and done wrong. And no not just the affair. Where has he been. Why isn't he doing everything he can to show you he loves you. You need his heart, but he hides it.
You may have made mistakes, but no worse than anyone else. You deserve to be happy. This man is on his third wife. If he doesn't know how to make a marriage work by now he never will. He will do it to you again.
Its hard but you need to move on. You sound like a wonderful person. You will find someone to make you happy sooner rather than later.
I hope for the best for you.
Shattered,
I think you are acknowledging that it takes two people to do ANYTHING without granting innocence to your hubby?? I love it that you are able to find ANY good in this situation, that you are able to try to grow and learn. It is very wise to recognize that ANGER is just PAIN MASKED. Being Pissed Off will only drag this on. You will decide when and what works for the two of you.
I have not read your blog from day one so forgive me if my theory is a mute point, but have the two of you ever looked into the POSSIBILITY of him being a sex addict??? As in NOT an excuse, but a bona fide ADDICTION. That does NOT have to mean Intercourse etc...just the NEED to find acceptance, love whatever from other women. Three marriages makes me wonder. I bet he loves you like mad, but is ILL. I would love to discuss this with you if you have any desire. I know this is not a widely accepted concept yet, but it is being proven more and more to be a real disease...only the drug of choice is attention/fantasy so most people think it is not real. Check out this site if you think it could help AT ALL...www.sa.org
Thinkin' about you!!
** From Lost In Waste (damn beta blogger)***
HI guys,
Thanks once again for your thoughts. I have added an email link to my profile. Feel free to email me.
jump in fire I think I have started to travelt he path to recovery. I think I have a long journey ahead, but nonetheless I am on that path!
mt-detroit I think this has happened but I really think he is too late (stay tuned for further posts).
mackenzie very interesting website. I think this may be a real possibility after reading the site.
This is a beautiful post, so raw, so real.
Hang in there!
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