Bullied after DDay

[donnamaybe]

I'd leave too and tell the poor kids their father died.

Oh - my - gawd!

[donnamaybe]

Some here want to make a statement by deriding others.

You mean like your "virago" comment?

[donnamaybe]

WW, you are not happy in your M. That's going to spill over onto the kids. It cannot be helped, and there's no shame in that for you. Now you have to decide how to deal with it. Obviously, having an A isn't a good way to go about it. If I were in this predicament, I would hire a divorce attorney and start the ball rolling and let the chips fall where they may. No matter what you decide, there will be some level of hurt for your kids. However, staying in a loveless M is going to be a long term example that I'm sure you don't want them to learn from.

 

I'm betting your H isn't really going to deny his kids. He is hurting and wants to hurt you back. What do you think? Do you honestly think he would refuse to continue to be a good father to them?

[WorldIsYours]

You are making up your own premise.

 

Think that's you doing that.

 

The premise of this thread-i.e. the "OP" is precisely that-that he had threatened to abandoned his kids(several times)-which is a ploy to manipulate. Tweak it all you want. Make excuses and/or say it was done in angry..or hurt..or the desire to reclaim some semblance of control....but muddle the bottom line why it was done( or said)...

 

The purpose of this thread was to put blame on her innocent husband, who was a victim of her affair and is a victim to her attitude. End of story.

 

Actually, she was ready to leave her H for this man but not children....again, do not make your own truth...it is not YOUR story. Stop making up things up.

 

This is a public board and no one is making up a story but OP.

 

ahh..but he didn't leave because wheelwright stayed-that was the terms he gave her...

 

But she wasn't forced to stay, and she didn't stay because of him. It was because of OM.

 

sure you did....and yet...

 

And yet what?

[WorldIsYours]

uhh...saying "more likely" does not make it "untrue" or "true". It means he does not know for sure...so he could not possibly tell me what I said was untrue because he cannot defend that. Neither could you.

 

Yes it does, and you're harping on something that is totally irrelevant.

[tami-chan]

Yes it does, and you're harping on something that is totally irrelevant.

 

LOL....if it did, then one should make a commitment to what they believe is the truth..making statement like that is cowardly.

Edited March 20, 2011 by a LoveShack.org Moderator

[White Flower]

OP's reason for staying did not have anything to do with the children, because if the MM would have followed through, most likely she would still be in the R.

We can't really know that, but what we do know is she chose to stay FOR the sake of her children. She posted as much. Why would she just post something that didn't mean anything to her? Why would she waste her time like that?

 

Like we all have time to sit around and create stories. Not!!!

[WorldIsYours]

LOL....if it did, then one should make a commitment to what they believe is the truth..making statement like that is cowardly.

 

Beliefs or attempts to justify destructive behavior?

[BB07]

I seriously doubt WW is going to come back to this thread. Can't say I blame her after all there is very little help and support offered up.

The last few pages of this thread even have me wondering if there is someone who has multiple identities posting on the same thread. I suppose stranger stuff has happened on LS.

[WorldIsYours]

I seriously doubt WW is going to come back to this thread. Can't say I blame her after all there is very little help and support offered up.

The last few pages of this thread even have me wondering if there is someone who has multiple identities posting on the same thread. I suppose stranger stuff has happened on LS.

 

She got plenty of help.

[WorldIsYours]

If anyone deserves credit, it's actually OP's H, because by bullying her, he figured out a way to keep the family together, despite OP's wish to destroy it.

 

The man is a saint for even staying in a bad relationship like this. And she decided on her own to stay but the marriage and family is destroyed, because of her reasons of staying, which are not in the benefit of her husband and family.

[whichwayisup]

She'll be back, she seems to not be on LS daily.. Plus, she's one who seems to be open to alot of different point of views, she may not take the advice but she does read it.

[wheelwright]

You mean like your "virago" comment?

 

It was a question which is different to a comment.

[wheelwright]

WheelWright.......I just wanted to say that you should get some professional help in dealing with the issues from your childhood and the resulting effects of the affair. It's clear that you are having a very difficult time moving on and you need to make some decisions for your future.

 

I wish you all the best and hugs...........:)

 

Thank you for this. I accept the truth in it and appreciate the sympathy.

[wheelwright]

Things I said to H on D Day:

 

Leave the house for a couple of hours, and don't come back until I call you or I truly think I will kill you - Did I mean it? probably not. Did he believe me? absolutely.

 

If you want to be with OW, go. I will sort out the finances, sell the house and me and our son will be off travelling for a couple of years - Did I mean it? Probably. Did he believe me? no, he knew me better.

 

Things I said to OW. If you continue to harrass me I will take your life apart piece by piece. Did I mean it? At the time yes. Did she believe me? Absolutely. Would I have done it? No.

 

When my XH (son's father) abandoned our son to go live in the US with his new (and very nice) woman and not speak to him (hasn't for over 22 years) I told him if he didn't maintain contact I would tell our son he had died. It would take time to get over his loss, but far more damaging to think his father didn't love or want him. Did I do it? No. Could I have done it? possibly. Did it make any difference? No.

 

The reason I say this, is that in times of pain and hurt people say all sorts of things. H told me that had I left he would have took off and we would never have seen him again. Yes he would have done this, it reflected how he felt at the time. I really don't think most people can understand the feelings of powerlessness that a BS experiences on discovering an A. However, words are just that, words. I don't think anyone should stay with anyone because there is an implied threat, however, I also don't think that anyone should stay and live a lie.

 

3 years on and the reaction from your H might be different if you were to sit down with him and say that you were unhappy and how you could both best continue to parent your children. If you are only staying because you think he will abandon your children, then yes, that is like a threat hanging over your head. But, marriages split up, parents remain parents. I should sit down and discuss things with him now and try not to obsess about a response when he was hurting.

 

This is a great and sensible post.

 

It triggers things in me when you talk about your x - in terms of my dad who abandoned me and my sister on my mother's request as she had started a new family. And I didn't find out she had requested this until after my dad had died. He got in touch with me when I was 18, but I ignored on the grounds of his previous abandonment.

 

For me, yes parents remain parents after splits. I don't understand my mum or dad's behaviour, but things were different in those days.

 

Or my H's when he 'bullied' me.

 

I think this thread is interesting in some of the issues it has thrown up - for me but maybe others too. Partly it is about how far can a BS go and remain justified?

 

And the other part is how deep must a BSs pain be to create this behaviour in the first place?

 

I see both sides now after the comments, and I am glad I do. That seems a reasonable place to be.

[wheelwright]

Okay, fair enough. It's just that in your pasts threads you never really described your husband as someone who would be deliberately manipulative. I know he was angry and difficult at times (and what bs wouldn't be?) but he never came across in your posts as the jerk you are making him out to be now.

 

I think that you don't love your husband and you don't really want to be with him. I think you are once again leaning towards ending the marriage and to make yourself feel okay about that you have started to build a case against him, both here and in your own mind. That is not unusual.

 

I didn't have to demonize him to justify my feelings.

 

So in part I wonder if you are not doing a little of this yourself because you want out of the marriage so you're putting together your list of reasons to make leaving feel okay.

 

At times I demonize everyone. H, myself, xMOM. Even his W who is relatively innocent, but lied to me and then lied again in a way I found confusing.

 

I may be alone here, but I feel it may be true for other WSs too.

 

I do not know what I want. I don't know if I want out of my M or if I am capable of making that happen. I knew when I was in love with another man I couldn't stay, and that made my decision easy. Not about an exit - I didn't know or make the decision on if he was there for me, but on the ethics of loving another.

 

That was easy. Easier than living with a man I didn't love and feeling that the reason for that might be because I am messed up and not because it was real.

 

In my M H makes me feel safe, loved, discarded, uncomfortable, fearful, and then withdrawn. And then safe again.

 

And I don't know if I need to get out of that because of him, me or us.

 

That's one of the things I am trying to find out.

[wheelwright]

You held the cards. He played his ace.

 

You are the one framing these events as a "game". That is your perspective, based on your way of navigating life.

 

People breakdown under extreme stress. People hurt themselves, run away. It is no game. It is the real life result of being dealt a blow that knocks the wind out of you. It is probably difficult to comprehend that level of pain when you are the person that dealt the blow.

 

WW, I think you are have a lot of motivation to see your H's actions in a bad light. Meanwhile, it seems you see your own actions in the best possible light. Why be so generous with yourself, and not with your H?

 

I can see why you might think this from the OP.

 

In fact the opposite is more motivating. I could have a happy and stable life without disrupting my kids if I could find more good in my R with H.

 

When I see H's pain I am unable to function. I go into autopilot with only guilt and rationalisation to calm it.

 

When I was a kid, I use to cry and point at the screen saying 'poor pussy' when I watched Tom & Jerry.

 

My kids don't do that. They laugh.

 

Maybe my compassion doesn't come over here on LS, but I feel it. It may even be the reason for my problem.

[wheelwright]

She'll be back, she seems to not be on LS daily.. Plus, she's one who seems to be open to alot of different point of views, she may not take the advice but she does read it.

 

Yes I am open, and I read all the comments.

 

I am especially thankful on this thread, as I was feeling very unsure about myself when I posted, and I expected no good to come of it. But I came back the next day to wonderful insights and POV.

 

I owe a debt of thanks to many.

 

I do take advice here seriously, but I find the decisions bigger than 'you cheated and you don't love like you should, so leave'

 

In fact, I think accepting the scale of the issue, as well as the back story my childhood has to play, is part of my growth.

[donnamaybe]

It was a question which is different to a comment.

 

Um, yeah. Okay. So if I were to ask someone, "are you an idiot?" they should have no reason to take offense.

[wheelwright]

That was a cartoon. Your Husband is a real person.

 

All that people can base their view of you on is your actual behavior, not what you claim you feel on the inside. No doubt you are feeling something inside, whether that is "compassion" is an unknown.

 

Your basic problem seems to be an inability to distinguish "right" from "wrong." Unfortunately that's often the case with people who engage in the kind of behaviors you've attributed to yourself.

 

It's "wrong" for you to have cheated on your husband.

 

It's "wrong" for you to continue to pine away for your OM while still in a marriage to your husband.

 

 

That is, if you think your marriage "matters." If you want it to be a "good" marriage. If you don't care about those things, it doesn't matter, but then you should just get a divorce.

 

Nothing you have posted, unfortunately, bears any real indication that you have the fundamental ability to distinguish "right" from "wrong."

 

Look, I haven't said I pine away. You seem to infer that because what happened meant something to me and I am unwilling/unable to rescind.

 

Anything I write here is as much an unknown to you as my compassion.

 

Personally, I find right and wrong essentially difficult. There is cultural right, religious, and the endless philosophical search for what it actually is. I am in pretty distinguished company in finding the issue complex.

 

There is freedom, honesty, beauty, not causing pain, integrity, caring, duty, courage, kindness, faith.

 

But the point at when each or any of these are tested should create tension. Otherwise we do not really evaluate any of them.

 

In my A I valued some of the above more than others. And we all do that all the time.

[wheelwright]

Um, yeah. Okay. So if I were to ask someone, "are you an idiot?" they should have no reason to take offense.

 

I reckon on balance, it's fairer to ask rather than assume.

[whichwayisup]

Personally, I find right and wrong essentially difficult. There is cultural right, religious, and the endless philosophical search for what it actually is. I am in pretty distinguished company in finding the issue complex.

I have to ask, and I ask with respect. Because the lines are not clear for you, the right and wrong thing..How do you teach this to your kids? Kids need clear boundries of what is right and what is wrong. What's acceptable and what isn't.

[White Flower]

Wheelwright,

 

I just have to take the time here and give you a huge warm hug. I'd offer you a cup of coffee, yes, all the way across the pond, and have you sit at my table so I could tell you that you are handling the mean, hateful Hell, fire, and brimstone posters with so much grace, dignity, and intelligence.

 

Sometimes it is so very obvious why some get cheated on, but you are not that kind Wheelwright. You don't appear to me as someone who is vindictive or shallow. You put your story out there, risking the bashers you knew would possibly invade your thread but you exposed yourself anyway. The only reason someone does that is because they seek the truth and need to clarify what is right for themselves and those they love. I have always recognized that in you even though we have differing opinions on many issues.

 

You don't seem to have black and white reasoning but then again you weren't raised with that kind of reasoning growing up. If someone can point your torrid past out to you surely they can't fault you for the example set before you can they? Yet they condemn you anyway. Interesting.

 

And though you had that difficult upbringing you turned out perfectly stunning with your graciousness and intellect. These are the qualities that inspire your H to beg to keep you, yet some posters refuse to see that! All they want to do is punish you and if this were my forum I'd delete their accounts because they are offering no support. They only come to bash, probably because they have no one left to bash at home.

 

I feel sorry for them as do you. And I admire the way you handle them.

 

Let me know when you're ready for another cup.

Edited March 21, 2011 by White Flower

[donnamaybe]

I reckon on balance, it's fairer to ask rather than assume.

Yeah. That's what I thought. One WOULD take offense, and rightfully so.

[xxoo]

I can see why you might think this from the OP.

 

In fact the opposite is more motivating. I could have a happy and stable life without disrupting my kids if I could find more good in my R with H.

 

When I see H's pain I am unable to function. I go into autopilot with only guilt and rationalisation to calm it.

 

When I was a kid, I use to cry and point at the screen saying 'poor pussy' when I watched Tom & Jerry.

 

My kids don't do that. They laugh.

 

Maybe my compassion doesn't come over here on LS, but I feel it. It may even be the reason for my problem.

 

Ok, WW, I'm starting to understand. What sometimes comes across as your lack of compassion is really evidence of the depth of your pain--feeling so much pain that you need to reframe things a different way to alleviate the pain. Your need to reduce the pain is the driving force.

 

Thinking about this thread on the whole---rationalizations borne out of the need to reduce pain is a common theme. You percieving your H's pain as "bullying", your H threatening to run away, and, poetically, White Flower's suggestion to take the kids and tell them H has died because he threatened to leave. All of these are irrational responses to shock, disbelief, pain. Sadly, pain is the common ground.