The Vow

[merrmeade]

Last night was our anniversary. It was more bitter than sweet for me, so I ended up staying up most of the night writing him a letter about the vow that had been broken. This is what I wrote:

 

Dear [H],

I had a hard time emotionally last night. It was probably better here than at home, but it still caused an avalanche of thoughts and feelings. I decided to write something to you about how I see the marriage vow and what it means now:

The Vow

The vow is more than a promise or an idea. It was the mainstay of our marriage, the glue that made oneness where we could not. In many ways, we were different, apart even, but as long as we had the vow, dissonance and disparate elements were silenced, contained by a bond which defined and sustained us.

 

Nor do I think of “vow” as a linguistic concept subsumed by the word “marriage” or even “monogamy.” It certainly did not guarantee us harmony. But, nurtured by time and experience, it created an exclusive world that was ours alone – a physical and spiritual intimacy of attitudes, touch and smell; of movement, taste and looks learned and answered; of pleasures, habits and disappointments accepted and absorbed. It was our innermost knowledge of each other and created the outermost protection to our union.

By definition, our vow could not be shared and existed solely between us, the two who created it, alone. As long as our vow was secure, our marriage survived, and our lives together as family was impenetrable. The vow did not need to be proven, and our trust of each other was not in question.

____________________________

 

Now, all of that is in upheaval and our marriage, mortally wounded. You have broken the vow. You took it out of that exclusive world forever. You shared all your thoughts and feelings about everything all the time every day – in emails, in text messages, in phone calls, in person – with someone else. You shared the marriage bed – my bed – with a woman you were not married to. You touched someone else the way you touch me. And now, I cannot be intimate with you without thinking about that, that what you are doing to me, you did to her.

 

Perhaps because we stopped being open with each other, your loyalty for me began to disintegrate and you allowed yourself to break our vow. Perhaps you felt more and more entitled due to your pitiable situation and became emotionally vulnerable to someone else. You justified your involvement with an elaborate moral fantasy about the necessity of helping her and her family (maybe to create purpose in your own life). You and she nurtured your mutual emotional and physical neediness; arrogantly dismissed the need for prudence and social decorum (i.e., never being alone together inside a house); actively sought emotional and psychological intimacy in the name of “friendship”; created and fostered opportunity for intimacy and finally satisfied your sexual and emotional needs together. In short, you made excuses, rationalized and justified to yourselves and everyone else the nature and necessity of your relationship. You did so at my expense and ultimately sacrificed our marriage. You continue to defend her, I feel, and fail to recognize the ways in which she has also used you and abused me. (It is certainly not fair that she is not being held accountable by anyone for any of her actions to the extent that you and I have been dealing with our pain and difficulty, now is it?)

 

The chilling callousness you BOTH displayed with your premeditated trysts, platitudes and lip service to the love and pity you felt for her disabled spouse, lying paralyzed only miles away and completely dependent on her is the one unforgivable element of this whole sordid story.

 

So all that said, I still see reason and promise to try. I suppose. Some days.

__________________________________

[some of this next is lifted from the last post in my first thread] I gave him this letter tonight and then told him that I'd realized the reason I'm still here, the reason I've been flipping through therapists like playing cards looking for the right one and the reason I keep writing these letters and having these conversations that he rarely participates in. The reason is NOT what one therapist called my need for revenge. It is NOT even because of the hope for reconciliation. The reason I am still here processing the crap of what actually happened with my H is because I have a deep-seated, barely articulated craving to make sure that he sees everything that he did. He has to walk through this same fire I've walked through without looking down or away, head straight, eyes open.

 

I also realized that we are doing quite well - or that I am doing quite well in my crazed but unmovable determination to make sure he is made to look squarely at what has happened and what it means, see and understand what it has done.

 

I don't know whether I'll ever be able to forget the fact that he essentially had another wife and family for a while, whether I'll ever be able to be intimate with him without thinking of his being so with her. I said this to him, and he didn't flinch. I also said that I realized, too, that there will be no 'reconciliation,' no getting back together, no forgiveness and no forgetting. But if - IF - we get through this as a couple, it wil be starting over completely in a new relationship as new people. I said that actually we are doing pretty well that we were sitting there talking (well, with me talking and him listening as usual - I said that, too) without freaking out. I said that I've been through hell and so has he but we can now see progress and stages beginning to form. I said that if we survive this, we'll be better as individuals and changed, regardless of what happens. I said that he's seen me devastated but not destroyed and that I will survive. The fact that I'm letting him walk this recovery with me is going to help him and he will have to face his actions. I said that I knew very well that the point will also come that I will feel compassion for him and it will be genuine. I said that when I forgive him, it will be for myself because I need it to heal myself. It does not mean that we will stay together. It means that we will have gone through hell together. The future is unwritten.

Edited August 2, 2012 by merrmeade

[TaraMaiden]

And his response to all this was..... what?

[Summer Breeze]

Some of this next is lifted from the last post in my first thread] I gave him this letter tonight and then told him that I'd realized the reason I'm still here, the reason I've been flipping through therapists like playing cards looking for the right one and the reason I keep writing these letters and having these conversations that he rarely participates in. The reason is NOT what one therapist called my need for revenge. It is NOT even because of the hope for reconciliation. The reason I am still here processing the crap of what actually happened with my H is because I have a deep-seated, barely articulated craving to make sure that he sees everything that he did. He has to walk through this same fire I've walked through without looking down or away, head straight, eyes open.

 

merrmeade I'm really sorry but in this bit you talk about denying something a therapist said regarding your need for revenge and then you talk about having him walk through the same fire. That sounds more like revenge than accountability to me.

 

All through your post are references to his silence and lack of participation in, well, anything. That disturbs me because as verbose as your post is it looks like communication is very important to you. His silence appears disrespectful and counterproductive.

 

You also keep mentioning that you don't know if you'll stay or if you'll last. I have no idea your backstory but if you have a H who really isn't participating and you're not sure if you want it to work then what are you doing still beating the dead horse? I know it sometimes takes time to figure out what you want to do but these seem to be a couple of key factors here.

 

I'm so sorry you're feeling this way and it sounds like you're not getting the support from your H that you need. I hope things get better for you and you move on with whatever you choose to do with your life.

[merrmeade]

And his response to all this was..... what?

 

Hmmm. He was affected by it, read it 3 times, we talked. He answered more questions, was open and forthcoming. He wants to regain my trust and save our marriage.

 

I am actually feeling quite good about things, focused and at peace. I do not need anything from him. I still have hopes for MC to help us individually, but think that what we (I) have been doing at home is therapy. In the end the truth will release us both and identify what and who we have become, what and who we want. Divorce is still an option but not today. That's it.

Edited August 2, 2012 by merrmeade

[merrmeade]

I gave him this letter tonight and then told him that I'd realized the reason I'm still here, the reason I've been flipping through therapists like playing cards looking for the right one and the reason I keep writing these letters and having these conversations that he rarely participates in.

 

That wasn't really fair and sounds like something other than what it is. He is there and participates as best he can. He's bad at it. It's not a question of effort or interest. He just doesn't talk ever. And I don't wait.

 

My brother told me my SIL (yes, the OW who he doesn't know is the OW) does this - finishes his sentences, even answers questions she asked of him. Ironic.

Edited August 2, 2012 by merrmeade